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Anybody want anything from Ontario?

Time for nuther story;

in a previous post Chicken alluded to the toughness of oilfield haulers and my last story attested to that as well, now Chicken has brought up the gearing/transmission topic, I think a lot of machinist will have an interest in all things mechanical so I'll cover some of the equipment we used.
This stuff was built to the roughest treatment we could dream up when it was manufactured...if it wasn't tough enough we'd build it tougher next time. This equipment was built to be stuck to the floorboards/flat deck in muskeg mud, hook onto it with 2 D8's and pull. Every winch tractor & bed truck had a big 4-6 inch heavy wall pipe bumper and was "skid plated" underneath from rad to drive shaft. The trailers we pulled would be very foreign to Chicken & his fellow deck hands, his will be a 3 axle, 12 wheel "2 center rail frame" trailer built to be light...ours were 2 axle 16 wheelers, 4 rail (2 center,2 "outside") with a heavy steel back bumper with a "live roll" to winch loads up over. A 400" bed truck and a float ( or Wheeler as we refereed to the trailers) was almost loaded weight for what Chicken would weigh with a full legal highway load.
Winch Tractors: The workhorse of the highways. these trucks could be powered from 300-450 hp (mechanically fueled, no computerized hi horsepower engines back then), We geared them to handle big loads with the limited hp of the time. All of the older trucks used still had the old 5x4 transmissions but current models of the time came from the factories with 13 or 15 sp main transmissions, then went into the shop to have a 4 sp A-box added behind the main...now we had upwards of 60 forward speeds & 6 reverse...and we sometimes used them all. Chickens rear end gearing is probably in the 3:90 up to 3:42 for fuel millage, ours were in the 4:11 to 4:30, much slower at a given RPM. These trucks had 30-50 ton winches mounted tight behind the cabs with "doghouse door" single bunk sleepers...none of these 60 or 80" double bunk "walk-ins for us.
Bed Trucks; The work horse of the lease sites. These trucks were used to "place" all parts of a rig to be pinned together by the rig crew. A small bed was 300" wheelbase, big was 400 -500". they were all equipped with a "Texas Rigging"steel flat deck-gin pole set up and 50-80 ton winch. These trucks carried 120,000 lb rig components around the lease's on their decks, no trailers, so they were geared slower than the winch tractors ...top highway speed was usually 45 mph.

This leads into todays story...finally eh...
After a rig was all set up we were turned loose to head back to our base...the peeler bars if before "last call" or base yard if not. The bed truck drivers didn't want to arrive hours later than us and be left out of all the fun so we had methods to look after them. If it was to be a "highway in daylight" trip back, one of us winch tractors would load the bed truck on our trailer and another would piggy-back his trailer....however if it was an "after dark short 2 or 3 hundred mile trip" we had other "quicker" options, once we hit a suitable road one of the 65 mph capable winch tractors would nudge his oilfield bumper up to the rear apron of the bed truck trailer and push him home...the bed truck driver takes his truck out of gear, sets the throttle at about 1200 rpm to keep some heat & oil pressure up in engine & power steering and away we went.
One night, 3 winch tractors , again Billy S and Billy R and myself, along with one bed truck being pushed by Bill R. The bed was being driven by a fellow we called "Fuzzy", he was of Ukrainian decent and spoke with a very heavy accent. It's about 3 or 4 in the a.m. and we were coming into a little town called Calmar that the highway goes right through the middle of town. Its 3 in the morning and bars all closed so Billy cant see any reason at all to slow down and Fuzzy is at his mercy. About 1/2 way thru town Fuzzy starts hollering on the CB in his Uk accent , the first transmishion that Bill S and I hear is "Billy, Slow down for F$%k sakes Billy, there's a cop over there" But Billy R doesn't hear the transmission meant for him, as anybody used to using CB's knows if your too close together, they don't work, and Bill was only the length of a trailer behind Fuzzy...he didn't hear a thing. The last transmission Bill S and I hear from Fuzzy is "awwww f#$k Billy its too late" ...but that cop must have been dead to the world sleeping or he was still "occupied" with one of the local bar beauties as we four straight piped rig trucks thundered through town at 65 mph and he paid us no mind at all
 
Dispatch asked me if I want to go to Texas. Heck yeah I do!! It’s another load of pipe. That’s fine sign me up.

Then dispatch sends me a message asking if I have tow hooks on my truck....

Pipe, Texas, tow hooks..... what god forsaken part of the patch am I getting sent to?

Wagons west we going back to Regina. Hope @YYCHobbyMachinist is enjoying mapping this
 
1C667521-2E91-476D-BFE2-D8E1ECB03E7B.jpeg

So, I delivered to a fab shop this morning. While I was there I had them whip me up some pipe stakes. This Regina load needed four of them.
I’ve never used pipe stakes, not once. I have no idea if there’s a proper way to make them or what.
They’re also asking for two 50’ straps. Why, I have no idea yet. Luckily there was a place in Regina that stocked them. A normal strap is 30’. I have a couple 40’ straps for goofy stuff.

It’s been a weird day. Not a bad day just weird
 
Wow Dave,

You will be so ready to pick up that lathe base for your South Bend! LOL Great adventures ! You may need a smaller truck for the base though, unless we get carried away ....hahaha
 
Let me see if I have this right. The place you delivered to in Winkler fab'ed the pipe stakes?

Who is demanding pipe stakes, 50' straps, and truck hooks? The shipper or the receiver?

Craig
 
YYCHobbyMachinist said:
Let me see if I have this right. The place you delivered to in Winkler fab'ed the pipe stakes?

Who is demanding pipe stakes, 50' straps, and truck hooks? The shipper or the receiver?

Craig
Click to expand...
Yep! The place in Winkler where I delivered fabbed them up for me. Great people

To be honest, I don’t know who’s asking for all of this extra stuff. I got an email stating a whole bunch of specifics, I think it’s kind of like a general contractor who’s running the trucking part of their project. They could possibly be the receiver down there
 
If the guy looks like some Harrison Ford type or the dude from Jurassic Park.....re-think the load........
 
Did they send a specific design spec for the pipe stakes. The need for these "stakes & the 50 ft straps makes me think this is some sort of manufactured contraption from pipes but has long lost its basic "pipe form. usually these type of loads need pre-fabed support racks that are specifically designed for some really weird shape.

I've hauled some pipe and never used anything more than a little dunage under it and a few "belly wrap" chains (unless it was yellow jacketed pipe, then we spread a bit of concrete powder between pipes)...and check the boomers/strap ratchets often. Budy of mine did have a load of yellow jacket come thru the cab on him one time, loaded in the winter, pipe had some ice stuck to it and then drove through a warm Chinook wind...ice melted,straps loosened and when he had to stop a a set of lights it all slid. 6 joints came right through the cab and were setting on the Kenworth front hood when I got there. He lost the skin on one knuck when one pipe skimmed the steering wheel...he was already leaning out the door or his guts would also be on the hood.
 
I’ll never understand trucking

Supposed to show up at 6:30 am for orientation. No orientation
Supposedly needs to be tarped. No tarping
Fancy pipe stakes and straps? Not needed

This turned into a permit load. Supposedly going through Montana, Wyoming and Colorado. I really hope there’s no snow I don’t have tire chains with me. I won’t lie I’m not happy about going to Wyoming, I’ve never been there but I hear horror stories all the time. That and Colorado I’ve heard is no joke

Nothing special at all for loading, wood dunnage on the deck, craned 4 sticks on then craned 3 more on top. Tossed straps, hung flags n banners and rolled

It’s ironic I was joking with the fab shop people that I was skeptical I needed all this junk. I’ve had it before where the shipper says “driver MUST have 12 4x4s or will not get loaded”. Then they use four of them

Some days I think it’s just one big game for these people
 
How about posting a pic of the load.

What's the destination and planned route?

What's being a permit load mean?

Craig
 
YYCHobbyMachinist said:
How about posting a pic of the load.

What's the destination and planned route?

What's being a permit load mean?

Craig
Click to expand...
I can snag a pic later for you.

It’s going down around Odessa TX. So far I only have permits for Montana. Kinda zigzagging over towards Sheridan WY

There are set legal weights and measurements for trucks. Once you go outside of that you’re considered oversized and have to buy permits in order to move. I’m too long to be legal
 
Go'in to Texas is hell of a lot better than Go'in to Winnipeg...I'm envious. Texas was one of the best trips I was ever a part of, mind you as I said before there was 8 of us and we had a sh!t load of fun & memories on that one.
We probably went the same basic route you are headed east side of Montana (Hardin Mont. Custers last stand 30 mi east of there), Wy, Col, into panhandle of Texas. their weather should be closer to our spring time now and I cant remember any big pulls that whole trip.
Does your over-length permit specify daytime travel only. We were permitted on the way back from Texas and limited to 8:30 am to 4:30 pm weather permitting. If the weather turned the roads even a bit snowy we were instructed to sideline until roads were absolutely clear or they would pull our permits and never have them returned to us...different crew would have had to take over. We did get snowed off the road at Stratford Tex. for more than a day, conditions would have barely been considered winter driving conditions up here but down there considered 'treacherous". Of course Stratford was a biblebelt "dry" county, still from the old prohibition era...and the bank wouldn't exchange any of our Canadian currency..."don't want any of that colored monopoly sh!t down here in my bank" were his exact words LOL.

Two truck stops on your route very memorable, Lamar Col. because it was so big. Brand new at the time (1978) there must have been 80 acres or more of truck parking, It had it's own radio station transmitted from inside the building and had an elevated "cupola" that a guy sat in with a CB and transmitted on a specific CB chanel where there was an empty parking spot so we didn't have to drive endlessly around looking for one, he would say "Black Peterbuilt coming in west entrance with deck load of lumber to section b, row 12, spot 10 ...It worked well.
The second was at Amarillo Tex. Just because....it was a Friday evening when we arrived and couldn't unload until Monday morn so spent an entire weekend there...and Amarillo isn't a "dry county" .

More on the "good things about Amarillo" tomorrow , Safe drive my man!!

Oh yah would really like a photo of your tractor as well, weve had lots of road & a couple of the trailer, need one of the power end pls.
 
historicalarms said:
Go'in to Texas is hell of a lot better than Go'in to Winnipeg...I'm envious. Texas was one of the best trips I was ever a part of, mind you as I said before there was 8 of us and we had a sh!t load of fun & memories on that one.
Click to expand...

8 rigs rolling together..... YEE HAW.... Looks like we got us a CONVOY:p
 
historicalarms said:
Go'in to Texas is hell of a lot better than Go'in to Winnipeg...I'm envious. Texas was one of the best trips I was ever a part of, mind you as I said before there was 8 of us and we had a sh!t load of fun & memories on that one.
We probably went the same basic route you are headed east side of Montana (Hardin Mont. Custers last stand 30 mi east of there), Wy, Col, into panhandle of Texas. their weather should be closer to our spring time now and I cant remember any big pulls that whole trip.
Does your over-length permit specify daytime travel only. We were permitted on the way back from Texas and limited to 8:30 am to 4:30 pm weather permitting. If the weather turned the roads even a bit snowy we were instructed to sideline until roads were absolutely clear or they would pull our permits and never have them returned to us...different crew would have had to take over. We did get snowed off the road at Stratford Tex. for more than a day, conditions would have barely been considered winter driving conditions up here but down there considered 'treacherous". Of course Stratford was a biblebelt "dry" county, still from the old prohibition era...and the bank wouldn't exchange any of our Canadian currency..."don't want any of that colored monopoly sh!t down here in my bank" were his exact words LOL.

Two truck stops on your route very memorable, Lamar Col. because it was so big. Brand new at the time (1978) there must have been 80 acres or more of truck parking, It had it's own radio station transmitted from inside the building and had an elevated "cupola" that a guy sat in with a CB and transmitted on a specific CB chanel where there was an empty parking spot so we didn't have to drive endlessly around looking for one, he would say "Black Peterbuilt coming in west entrance with deck load of lumber to section b, row 12, spot 10 ...It worked well.
The second was at Amarillo Tex. Just because....it was a Friday evening when we arrived and couldn't unload until Monday morn so spent an entire weekend there...and Amarillo isn't a "dry county" .

More on the "good things about Amarillo" tomorrow , Safe drive my man!!

Oh yah would really like a photo of your tractor as well, weve had lots of road & a couple of the trailer, need one of the power end pls.
Click to expand...
I can only imagine the shenanigans you guys got into!!

Yes and no-
Sask- don’t need the paper permit, so can’t answer that since I didn’t read it
Montana- yes, daylight only, specific routing to follow, banners/flags/lights on, must carry paper copy of the permit
Wyoming- I’m not oversize to them, strip the banners and front flags, it’s a ticketable offence to run banners, lights on, drive where and when I want
Colorado- Not oversize, but recommended to run banners and all flags, drive where and when I want
Oklahoma- back to permits, lights/flags/banners, specific route to follow, daylight hours
Texas- permits, lights/flags/banners, specific route, daylight hours

I carry a printer on the truck so I can get permits printed easily. I do actually have to go through Lamar to get to OK. I’ll stop and check out that truckstop. My last Texas run I delivered on a Friday but didn’t reload until Monday so went over to San Antonio. Had a blast there

I think those fancy pipe stakes get used at delivery, they’re “stringing pipe” as I get unloaded. Basically they lift off one stick, place it in the ditch, I move forward and we grab another stick.

The tow hook is for “when” I get stuck

I’ll grab you a truck pic when she’s all dressed again
 
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