Tow Trucks, Wreckers and Car Hauler Discussion

[HotRodPC]

Seems we have enough Tow Maters on GMSB to justify this thread. Especially since a couple of us tend to end up derailing other threads when the topic steers a bit close to the tow truck business.

Feel free to post up pics of your Tow Trucks, Wreckers and Car Haulers, Share your business, along with your tow, recovery and repo stories. Just remember, no blood, guts and brains pics allowed.


I thought I'd prefer a roll back truck. But after working in a Self Loader Conventional yesterday, I changed my mind. They asked me how I felt about a Self Loader. I said, before yesterday, I wouldn't have wanted one, but now I want one. They said OK, and got busy working on this truck. Replaced all the injectors and injector computer. At 5pm tonight, they told me to take it for a drive. It ran like ****. The mechanic worked on it for about 5 minutes and said take it now. It hauls ass now. He forgot to tighten up some hoses to the intake, and the turbo tubes. It hauls ass now. Then they said go test it out and pick this car up. I got back with the car and asked how I liked it. I said, yeah works for me. This one even has a rear camera with a screen on the dash to watch what you're doing. Then said, OK its your truck. Take it home and wait for the phone to ring !!!

****** pic and the truck is filthy, but that's it. Its an F450 Xcab instead of the Standard Cab F350 I thought I was getting. It'll take a few days to get it cleaned up. I guess its been sitting a few months. When it broke down, they parked it and ordered parts but never got to it until they needed to get me a truck.

 

[HotRodPC]

Snapped this pic while in Ft. Smith, AR today. Obviously a Wanna be big rig Squarebody.

 

[towjoe]

I'm in process of considering building a 4X4 crew cab wrecker. I have a 86 6.2 diesel 4x4 wrecker that the rear frame is shot in. I have a real clean 86 C30 crew cab I have been driving daily. I do have a 81 K35 6.2 crew cab dually over in the parts row to.

Has anyone tried the 4wd swap yet and have any advice on my best route to go? I have been thinking about the crew cab wrecker Idea for awhile now since it seems more and more people are getting stranded with more than 2 people in a car. figured the 6.2 would be econamical unlike a 454 also

 

[HotRodPC]

Yea I seen on here somewhere a guy converted a suburban by splicing frame. I'm just not sure about scratch building another wrecker tho, I ended up over $8500 in last one. I think the idea would be a cool one tho. I guess tho I have 2 crew cab 4x4 frames in fence row so that might be best route. Just thought if it was easy to do I'd save the other frames for other projects

I'd like to have a crew cab wrecker. Although the need isn't there much. I have picked up a couple before, both them sumbishes were so damn fat that I couldn't even get 4th and 6th gear, so it was a long ass 26 mile drive at 50mph in 5th gear. And once with a 35 mile ride with a rather large women, husband wasn't so little either, but not a fat ****, and their 3 kids ages 4-9 years old. Now that was just plain ass stupid and I all but refused to do it. Very unsafe !!! But bossman insisted since they didn't have funds for a cab and were new residents of OK so they had no friends or family. Now if the boss was in that situation, he'd have go on the damn radio and had his wife bring the Burb to the scene and follow the wrecker. But, I'm just a ****** loser employee so I'm the one that gets kill a family of 5 and myself.

 

[towjoe]

I have a extended cab rollback that is real handy. Think a crew can wrecker would be a sweet thing.

 

[HotRodPC]

I have a extended cab rollback that is real handy. Think a crew can wrecker would be a sweet thing.

The thing about a CC wrecker here, is we get many people traveling from OKC to Dallas, or Dallas to Wichita, Dallas to Tulsa or Stillwater etc. Especially during the college football games. And when they do, they have a car load. You can make some good money taking a car broke down in the OKC metro area to Dallas or Tulsa, or picking it up down there and bringing it up here if you can carry 4 people cause you get the mileage but they don't have to pay for a bus ride, or have someone else come get them, cab ride or whatever. Bossman has done it before. Shhhhhh, didn't have a TX permit either. But where he killed it at, was he also got intouch with Copart, took the vehicle to Dallas with 2 people, then on the way back, picked up 2 Copart cars, 1 in Murrietta, OK and one in Ardmore, so he covered the fuel for the trip and them some in the 2 Coparts he picked up making that tow bill 100% pocket money. But, a CC would be a bitch in some places where it's tight to drop off. That long wheel base can be a bitch backing up and in tight places. So, just having it available for when needed, and maybe driving it a couple cake walk tows a week to keep it ready to roll and not let it sit, then it would be a good thing to have. I'd honestly like to have 2 squarebody wreckers, one being a CC. If I did, I'd start up a tow service here in Moore. Pretty much just the city work. Get my 1 or 2 impounds a day and a PPI here and there I'd be good to go. I might even consider doing Cross Country, but I'ld only do them for my zip code and my zip code only since they don't pay ****. But it would make the phone ring you know.

 

[towjoe]

I have 2 square body wreckers already both being 4wheel drive. I have a 3rd one I'm not sure what I'm doing with it yet. A little free advice about motor club work, the rates they give you are not what you have to work for. I work for 3 motor clubs now, and adding 2 more as soon as I finish paperwork. I make better money on motor clubs at my set rates than regular retail customers. The big money in motor clubs is provide the best service you can for there customers and they will use you no matter what the cost.

 

[HotRodPC]

Yes, I'm aware there is some negotiating to be done. And another reason why I'd want to do my zip code only. I can be anywhere in my zip code in 10 minutes if the truck is warmed up and I'm dressed. If it's in the dead of the night, I can still be there in less than 20. That is exceptionally FAST response times, and even better yet if you can offer a ride with the vehicle for more than 1 or 2 people and or offer child safety seats too. Why I'd want a CC. I'd rather make the better money per call and do much less, than run my fuggin nuts off for $29 which is AAA and I won't touch that, or $39 for Cross Country. Get me $49 a call within my zip code to my zip code, I'd be happy with that, and an additional $15 if it requires dollies where the standard rate here to throw dollies is $25. Asurion isn't all that bad if they'd get thier **** together on giving a location. I get more fuggin GOA's from Asurion than anyone. But, they pay us a $25 GOA fee.

 

[Jims86]

The International 4700 wrecker I will be driving is a CC.

 

[towjoe]

Yea looks like we got out own thread. I hope I didn't get us in trouble.

My rates on motor club we negotiated to a point that there all I want to do. Some pay half again more that retail here. I run a 20 mile radius and never give under a 45 min eta. There is a lot of the time I can be there in 15-20 min since I have me on one end of area and a driver on other side.

 

[Jims86]

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[HotRodPC]

Yea looks like we got out own thread. I hope I didn't get us in trouble.

My rates on motor club we negotiated to a point that there all I want to do. Some pay half again more that retail here. I run a 20 mile radius and never give under a 45 min eta. There is a lot of the time I can be there in 15-20 min since I have me on one end of area and a driver on other side.

We're not in trouble. I can fix anything, but we were taking over that thread and nowhere near on topic of 2wheel to 4wheel drive conversion, so I had to split it up and clean up over there.

We do that same, NEVER give under a 45min eta. You could be on your way and get a PD call, and if that happens, you turn around and re dispatch another truck to the service call.

 

[towjoe]

Yea or have trouble getting ahold of the driver that's in the area and having to send another driver across town. Or local tow giant was giving cross country 3 hr etas the other day and they have around 20 trucks. I quoted cross country a high price since they never finished signing me up and a 30 min eta. Cross country was impressed because they moved me over to a supervisor and finished signing me up at my rates.

I heard asurion was going out of business the 15th of this month, and Allstate was taking them over. You hear anything like that?

 

[HotRodPC]

Other than this truck being a 6.0 junker motor and breaking down all the damn time, I loved this fuggin truck. F450 with 19.5 wheels. Century Self Loader wheel lift, also had winch and slings for the good ole standard conventional tow too, although I never had to use it. Collins dollies and a pair of Go Jacks. There was not a damn thing I couldn't get with this truck up to a 1 ton pick up, no matter where it was. The light was flip back type which was great for sneaking into parking garages for service calls and even a repo or 2.

 

[HotRodPC]

Yea or have trouble getting ahold of the driver that's in the area and having to send another driver across town. Or local tow giant was giving cross country 3 hr etas the other day and they have around 20 trucks. I quoted cross country a high price since they never finished signing me up and a 30 min eta. Cross country was impressed because they moved me over to a supervisor and finished signing me up at my rates.

I heard asurion was going out of business the 15th of this month, and Allstate was taking them over. You hear anything like that?

As a matter of fact, seems I heard something like that a couple months ago that an insurance co was taking over Asurion but they didn't say who. But that now makes sense after seeing some Allstate commercials about towing. If I understood right, they said you can even have an AllState Road side assistance membership and not even have AllState Insurance. Unlike AAA, they require you to have their fuggin membership to have their insurance. But then again, Allstate might do the same things. You have to have their membership to have their insurance. Back in the day when I was a normal person with a family, wife, kids and a decent job and buying new vehicles every year, I didn't feel the need for roadside assistance. I call 1-800- GMGIVESASHIT and got all that for free cuz I was still under the 36,000 mile warranty.