Received on Tuesday afternoon a dispatch to load 3 humvees and take to Phoenix from LA area on wednesday and deliver thursday.
I followed the directions on the QC and found that they forgot to list the right turn onto the street that led to the main gate. After not finding the shipper I called them and I got the right directions and was in the gate 5 minutes later. I arrived, found 4 other Arrow trucks were loaded with 3 Humvees each and 3 were already chained down. I backed to the ramp and was loaded. I threw 4 chains onto each humvee and looked over to see 3 trucks start pulling out.
The driver that was chaining down when I arrived came over and said hi. We had met in Coachella several weeks ago and had talked outside our trucks for over an hour or two with another Arrow driver.
This driver started to give me a hand and right off the bat I was telling him thanks for helping me. He said that 2 of the drivers had helped eachother but 1 driver had sat in the truck and didn't want to talk or help them. So we spent 10 minutes knocking out the rest of the chains and we were then off and running out of LA together.
During the drive something happen to my CB. It developed a high pitch squeal everytime I keyed up so I stopped at Exit 19 in Quartzite to speak with "Hardrive". After finding out that he's closed down and possibly on vacation. Ughh...
I drove on to the Phoenix yard and shut down at the yard. I spoke with the driver who had ran out of LA with me and we planned to get to the customer at 7am an hour and half before the customer opened.
We arrived at the customer and found that we had beat the 3 other trucks and would be empty first. :thumbsup:
We were empty and received dispatches to load at the same location and run a local run to Casa Grande Home Depot which we did. Before we were empty in Casa Grande I received another load to take to CA. The drop was about 15 miles from home so I came home thursday night.
I got back to the truck friday morning to make my 7am drop. I started the truck and hit the lights and began my pretrip. When I got back to the trailer the motor shut off.
I walked back up the tractor and started it.... looked at the dash and I see check engine and engine protect lights flashing.:eek2:
I lift the hood and see the coolant dripping out of a hose. I popped open the resevoir and find its empty. I pulled out a gallon of coolant I had for my leak from the top of the radiator which was pretty light. I poured it in and didn't make a dent in the level. I started the motor and the hose was pressurized. Coolant poured out of the hose :hellno::hellno:
issedoff:
issedoff::tears::tear s:
great now im done for..... atleast i'm at home....
After going back home, filling coolant jugs with water and making calls to let everyone know I was put into contact with a shop about 5 miles away. Breakdown told me that I could disconnect the coolant sensor and I could drive without the motor shutting off:thumbsup:
So I started to roll out and was about 100yds from where I started. I was on a 4 lane street just about to a light, yep the motor shut off and I coasted to a stop in front of a fire station
issedoff: I was in the right lane blocking it. I hit my 4ways.... I was pissed I called the Beakdown Dept and was waiting on hold. I tried the motor and it started I moved away from the fire dept and rolled to the next light. I shut the motor off and was connected with the Breakdown guy. I described what was going on and he stayed online with me. I spent the next 20 minutes shutting off the motor as I coasted to the next light or stop sign. When I got to the shop the owner met me in the driveway and had me drive right in. When I got stopped he popped the hood and said he would have to go get the line. 15 minutes later he was back with a line and said he would have his guy install it quickly.
The owner was about 30yrs old and eager to help. His guy was at my truck within 20minutes and had the hose changed and added coolant quickly....:thumbsup:
I called Arrow:tears::tears::tears: knowing that the 311.28 bill might take a little while to be paid. Arrow said to fax the invoice and they would have it paid shortly.:tears::tears::tears: Arrow called back in 20 minutes and had the bill paid!!!! I backed out of the shop and was at the customer by noon!!!! I was offloaded and put in my empty status. I waited the next 4 hours for a dispatch. At 4pm I was told to call back on Monday morning. I was running back to the house where I shut down at 4:05pm
I am off this weekend which happens to be my 44th b-day. I got to enjoy watching my son play a double header today and relax tonight.
:roll:
