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What is bad luck?
Big Sky Redneck
Member Posts: 19,752 ✭✭✭
Now first off, this is not a pity thread, not asking for that. I'm simply sharing some things from the last year for me.
June/July or thereabouts last year. Head hasket on the Pete let go, took the truck to my former employer, Motorcoach Maintenance to have it replaced. While I can do rhe work I don't have the right setup to do major work. I also agreed to a power mod, the twin turbo Acert engine has its faults and I had a turbo goin bad as well, factory turbo setup is quite expensive, goin with the single turbo eliminates the twin turbo issues, raises power and fuel economy and the initial swap is only a couple thousand over the twin replacement.
Motorcoach hosed me on the price, almost $8K for a head gasket job when it should cost no more than $4K, work is complete, have to pay the bill, I'm pissed but nothing I can do. Borrow the $$, pay the bill and off I go. Truck runs great and fuel milage has gone up 2mpg.
August, engine is building god awfull pressure in the cooling system, blowing out coolant anf it takes a few gallons of water every couple hours. Call Motorcoach, they need to fix this, limp truck back to them. They yank the head, liner busted. Well, that aint my problem, fix it!! My truck is torn down, options are almost none. Let them repair this engine and wait for it to let go again, or just replace it. Much thought given to this, femembering the hosing I got on the headgasket, what to do. Well, surely they can't eff up a compete floor build. Refi truck, $41K later it has a brand new reman Cat in it, my trubo and ECM swapped to it and it runs great. While it makes tons of power there is no need to run it hard, it does things under 1500 RPM that most trucks would have to have the snot run out of them to do, less than half pedal and it moves mountains. Believe it or not, I baby it, never rev over 1500-1600, never floor it except for a short spike to spo the turbo the back out of it and let it work. Runs like a dream.
After that engine replacement work slows down, Behlen is starving me out, not sure what I did to piss them off but but I spent a lot of time sitting and when sitting one begins to think and consider options. Local guy here has a good deal going, running produce out of Washington, Idaho and Oregon, I look at the numbers and realize that I'm making minimum wage with Behlens milage contract. Deal is made to move my truck, I sell my paid off Harley that I fought so hard to pay off and not have repo'ed, sell my flatbedding equipment and buy a reefer trailer. I'm officialy back in the grocery biz.
2 or 3 weeks in to this deal the engine begins spewing coolant again, this time worse. I'm in Salt Lake City, close to home, call Motorcoach, engine is under warrenty, they agree to fix it, limp it back.
I get the truck back to Belgrade, they yank the head and it is cracked in 3 places! Now I'm not going to type out all the conversations but first they accused me of overheating it, I called BS and told Scott to plug into the truck and show me in Cat ET where it overheated, he hemhaws around and I remind him that I used to work for him and I SHOWED HIM HOW TO USE CAT ET!! Show me where it overheated because not once has that thing gotten hot!!
He starts in about the rainbow rings around the injector ports, signs of heat. Once again, I remind him that I worked for him and I'm not some fool off the street he can play this game with. I them asked him if he really knew where those rings came from, he just stared at me. I asked him how they got 700HP out of this, he kept staring, Inasked him how much effing advance the injectors had because that is what caused rhe rainbow rings and that is what cracked the head, all that injector timing cranked up the upper cylinder combustion temps!! Then I told him to fix the truck and SET IT BACK TO CAT SPECS!!
By god that was the wrong conversation to have. They refused warenty, they spiked the ECM to hide the J-Ball software they used to get 700hp then they called the guy I was pulling for telling him he had to pay the bill to repair the truck, that was a dirty lowdown attempt to get paid as Randy was under no obligation to pay that bill.
I saw a long battle coming, so I bought the Volvo to keep running, bills are piling up. Volvos are supposed to be dependable trucks, it should just make money, swallow my pride and get to work.
Motorcoach now calls my co-signer on the Pete, yes I had a co-signer and that was Behlen. The truck was not a lease but a simple co-signed truck loan and I had a written agreement to move the truck and keep making payments. Motorcoach called them and told them that I had modified the ECM and voided the warrenty, they claimed that in doing so I had also ruined the ECM and it shorted out causing the engine failure.
Behlen bought thier story, paid them to fix the truck and promptly took my truck and everything I had in it. I lost that truck, Motorcoach and thier greed destroyed me and my truck, they used lies to get out of a warrenty job and cost me over $100K in lost equipment amd investments. I considered prison.
The Volvo, several breakdowns. 3 blowouts, water pump, thermostat, air dryer, major airleaks, busted hoses, busted tanks, electrical issues, I have been pouring miney into this thing non stop.
My trailer, ate two tires in a week. The reefer unit blew the shaft seal in the compressor and kept shutting off. Paid $1200 to fix it, the very first trip it began shutting down again, almost cost me a dairy load. Took it back to the shop and they charged me $275 to tell me they have no clue whats wrong, they can just start changing parts and guessing while I fork over money. Know what people? Eff you. I'll fix it myself, somehow I'll fix it and I'm not experianced with the cooling side of a reefer unit but I'll figure it out with the help of Google!!
I call the dealer I bought the Volvo from, tell my sales lady that the Volvo needs to go, we discuss several trucks, I find they have an old KW with a rebuilt E model Cat engine, truck needs painted but mechanicaly it is a great truck. We go back and forth for a week, finally a deal is made, I call my finance company and explain the situation, they agree to let me do the deal, an appointment is made for Friday. I drive the Volvo with no trailer to Pasco Washington where the KW is, the tire shake has gotten bad on the Volvo, slow ride out trying to not shake the truck apart. I get to Pasco Friday morning, look the KW over and let me tell you this, I fall in love with this truck! We take it out for a test drive, my black cloud comes back.
The warning beepers and lights come on, low coolant, high temps, low oil pressure, high oil temps. Salesman says limp it back, we get to the dealership and coolant is speeing out of the blowby tube and coolant is visible alongside the head, blown head gasket at the very least. Phone calls are made, my saleslady is out with a death in the family, I advised before hand that they are out of money on the Kw and anything wrong is on me, the salesman tells me they can't sell it broken like this and they will fix it, but whos paying for it!!
Looking at having to drive the Volvo back I go to a ture shop down the street to find a cheap fix for the shake, hopefully balancing a few tires and rotating will settle the shake. More bad news, I never saw it but it ate a steer tire on the way to Washington and it has a bad kinpin. Now I need to put kinpins and a steer ture on it! NO NO NO I AM DONE WITH THIS PILE OF CRAP!!
I go back to te dealership and ask the salesman for a ride to the airport, I rent a car and leave the Volvo in Pasco.
I'm home now, trailer in my front yard and truck 500 miles away.
Ok, I was supposed to stert a new lease today in Chatanooga, TN. This lease is different in they provide operating authority (DOT #), cargo insurance and factoring. It is 100% self dispatch, I would do all my own booking of loads and rate negotiations, I'm on my own. We were going to go 100% independant but insurance for me just stsrting out is $13,000 per year, running under F2F Transports lease I save a little over $5K a year in insurance plus they handle the fed safety side saving me a ton of quarterly paperwork. Great way to be independant without the headaches and high insurance cost. I was supposed to be there today.
Not sure how the KW deal is going to go, I think I got my trailer fixed, not sure what is going to happen. Bills are piling up, I have no money to fix the Volvo.
Like I said, not asking or looking for pity or anything else. Just venting. All this pain has been building up, the failures are eating at me. Just need to tell my story somif I due of a stroke or heart attack you kmow why.
June/July or thereabouts last year. Head hasket on the Pete let go, took the truck to my former employer, Motorcoach Maintenance to have it replaced. While I can do rhe work I don't have the right setup to do major work. I also agreed to a power mod, the twin turbo Acert engine has its faults and I had a turbo goin bad as well, factory turbo setup is quite expensive, goin with the single turbo eliminates the twin turbo issues, raises power and fuel economy and the initial swap is only a couple thousand over the twin replacement.
Motorcoach hosed me on the price, almost $8K for a head gasket job when it should cost no more than $4K, work is complete, have to pay the bill, I'm pissed but nothing I can do. Borrow the $$, pay the bill and off I go. Truck runs great and fuel milage has gone up 2mpg.
August, engine is building god awfull pressure in the cooling system, blowing out coolant anf it takes a few gallons of water every couple hours. Call Motorcoach, they need to fix this, limp truck back to them. They yank the head, liner busted. Well, that aint my problem, fix it!! My truck is torn down, options are almost none. Let them repair this engine and wait for it to let go again, or just replace it. Much thought given to this, femembering the hosing I got on the headgasket, what to do. Well, surely they can't eff up a compete floor build. Refi truck, $41K later it has a brand new reman Cat in it, my trubo and ECM swapped to it and it runs great. While it makes tons of power there is no need to run it hard, it does things under 1500 RPM that most trucks would have to have the snot run out of them to do, less than half pedal and it moves mountains. Believe it or not, I baby it, never rev over 1500-1600, never floor it except for a short spike to spo the turbo the back out of it and let it work. Runs like a dream.
After that engine replacement work slows down, Behlen is starving me out, not sure what I did to piss them off but but I spent a lot of time sitting and when sitting one begins to think and consider options. Local guy here has a good deal going, running produce out of Washington, Idaho and Oregon, I look at the numbers and realize that I'm making minimum wage with Behlens milage contract. Deal is made to move my truck, I sell my paid off Harley that I fought so hard to pay off and not have repo'ed, sell my flatbedding equipment and buy a reefer trailer. I'm officialy back in the grocery biz.
2 or 3 weeks in to this deal the engine begins spewing coolant again, this time worse. I'm in Salt Lake City, close to home, call Motorcoach, engine is under warrenty, they agree to fix it, limp it back.
I get the truck back to Belgrade, they yank the head and it is cracked in 3 places! Now I'm not going to type out all the conversations but first they accused me of overheating it, I called BS and told Scott to plug into the truck and show me in Cat ET where it overheated, he hemhaws around and I remind him that I used to work for him and I SHOWED HIM HOW TO USE CAT ET!! Show me where it overheated because not once has that thing gotten hot!!
He starts in about the rainbow rings around the injector ports, signs of heat. Once again, I remind him that I worked for him and I'm not some fool off the street he can play this game with. I them asked him if he really knew where those rings came from, he just stared at me. I asked him how they got 700HP out of this, he kept staring, Inasked him how much effing advance the injectors had because that is what caused rhe rainbow rings and that is what cracked the head, all that injector timing cranked up the upper cylinder combustion temps!! Then I told him to fix the truck and SET IT BACK TO CAT SPECS!!
By god that was the wrong conversation to have. They refused warenty, they spiked the ECM to hide the J-Ball software they used to get 700hp then they called the guy I was pulling for telling him he had to pay the bill to repair the truck, that was a dirty lowdown attempt to get paid as Randy was under no obligation to pay that bill.
I saw a long battle coming, so I bought the Volvo to keep running, bills are piling up. Volvos are supposed to be dependable trucks, it should just make money, swallow my pride and get to work.
Motorcoach now calls my co-signer on the Pete, yes I had a co-signer and that was Behlen. The truck was not a lease but a simple co-signed truck loan and I had a written agreement to move the truck and keep making payments. Motorcoach called them and told them that I had modified the ECM and voided the warrenty, they claimed that in doing so I had also ruined the ECM and it shorted out causing the engine failure.
Behlen bought thier story, paid them to fix the truck and promptly took my truck and everything I had in it. I lost that truck, Motorcoach and thier greed destroyed me and my truck, they used lies to get out of a warrenty job and cost me over $100K in lost equipment amd investments. I considered prison.
The Volvo, several breakdowns. 3 blowouts, water pump, thermostat, air dryer, major airleaks, busted hoses, busted tanks, electrical issues, I have been pouring miney into this thing non stop.
My trailer, ate two tires in a week. The reefer unit blew the shaft seal in the compressor and kept shutting off. Paid $1200 to fix it, the very first trip it began shutting down again, almost cost me a dairy load. Took it back to the shop and they charged me $275 to tell me they have no clue whats wrong, they can just start changing parts and guessing while I fork over money. Know what people? Eff you. I'll fix it myself, somehow I'll fix it and I'm not experianced with the cooling side of a reefer unit but I'll figure it out with the help of Google!!
I call the dealer I bought the Volvo from, tell my sales lady that the Volvo needs to go, we discuss several trucks, I find they have an old KW with a rebuilt E model Cat engine, truck needs painted but mechanicaly it is a great truck. We go back and forth for a week, finally a deal is made, I call my finance company and explain the situation, they agree to let me do the deal, an appointment is made for Friday. I drive the Volvo with no trailer to Pasco Washington where the KW is, the tire shake has gotten bad on the Volvo, slow ride out trying to not shake the truck apart. I get to Pasco Friday morning, look the KW over and let me tell you this, I fall in love with this truck! We take it out for a test drive, my black cloud comes back.
The warning beepers and lights come on, low coolant, high temps, low oil pressure, high oil temps. Salesman says limp it back, we get to the dealership and coolant is speeing out of the blowby tube and coolant is visible alongside the head, blown head gasket at the very least. Phone calls are made, my saleslady is out with a death in the family, I advised before hand that they are out of money on the Kw and anything wrong is on me, the salesman tells me they can't sell it broken like this and they will fix it, but whos paying for it!!
Looking at having to drive the Volvo back I go to a ture shop down the street to find a cheap fix for the shake, hopefully balancing a few tires and rotating will settle the shake. More bad news, I never saw it but it ate a steer tire on the way to Washington and it has a bad kinpin. Now I need to put kinpins and a steer ture on it! NO NO NO I AM DONE WITH THIS PILE OF CRAP!!
I go back to te dealership and ask the salesman for a ride to the airport, I rent a car and leave the Volvo in Pasco.
I'm home now, trailer in my front yard and truck 500 miles away.
Ok, I was supposed to stert a new lease today in Chatanooga, TN. This lease is different in they provide operating authority (DOT #), cargo insurance and factoring. It is 100% self dispatch, I would do all my own booking of loads and rate negotiations, I'm on my own. We were going to go 100% independant but insurance for me just stsrting out is $13,000 per year, running under F2F Transports lease I save a little over $5K a year in insurance plus they handle the fed safety side saving me a ton of quarterly paperwork. Great way to be independant without the headaches and high insurance cost. I was supposed to be there today.
Not sure how the KW deal is going to go, I think I got my trailer fixed, not sure what is going to happen. Bills are piling up, I have no money to fix the Volvo.
Like I said, not asking or looking for pity or anything else. Just venting. All this pain has been building up, the failures are eating at me. Just need to tell my story somif I due of a stroke or heart attack you kmow why.
Comments
Good luck to you and your family.
How is the dodge treating you? You still have the old Ford?
Remember bad luck comes in 3's so I think you are out of the woods.
The old Ford is still going strong as well, getting ready to hop in it and go to Bozeman. It's loud with dual short glasspacks, shifting gears with the 4 speed and 4:11 rears is fun as hell and in Bozeman the college kids act as if I'm the boogeyman with the rifle in the back window of that old loud truck, I love it!! [:D]
And this run of bad luck, God please how much more do I have to deal with!?!?!
I love those old loud trucks. I know the deal I drove my 75 Power wagon into town the other day. She is smoking a bit and the compression is low but I thought she needed to get out on the road and up to speed to blow the cobwebs out.
I had some of these North Raleigh libtards in their Prius's giving me the stink eye. I picked up some lumber at Home Depot and there was a kid who was helping people load stuff, he came to help me and all he could talk about was my old truck.
Do you ever get back east. I believe you were from up around Mt. Union. I'm south of there. You ever get back this way, give me a holler and we'll have a coffee or something.
Lonnie, you've been through it, no doubt.
As much as your story makes me so angry I want to come to MT and kick some *, I have to say you've paid your dues. You have.
I may not be the first to say, but I will say loudly...you deserve a break!! You've busted your butt, never given up...and I for one would say I'm proud of your efforts!!
I wish you the best going forward. Seems like you have a lot of what I would call "variables" moving in your world. Best advice I could give would be to eliminate as many variables as possible.
Despite all your tribulations, you HAVE worked at it...you HAVE tried. And, you have NOT given up.
I will proudly stand and say...I applaud BSR.
Just hang in there, my friend. Good things will come soon enough; you have the right attitude.
Best.
I applaud you as well, but I would never have put up with all the bullshiete that you did. I couldn't keep track of all the different trucks and all that broke and who got stuck paying for what. I would have gotten out of that line of work after your third sentence.