Show what your customers have come to pick up lumber with.

[customsawyer]

Normally I have some customers show up that have way to little truck or trailer for what they are getting. This one was a little overkill. It is about 1000 SF of flooring and they drove 2.5 hours one way to get it.

[Magicman]

And then there was this guy that delivered these Hickory logs to you to be sawn:


 
Thankfully they were secured with a strong rope.  :D

[customsawyer]

Perfect size for propellers.

[longtime lurker]

 

 

About 2200lb of timber on a rack with a 1000lb load rating...  he made it 1/2 mile down the road before it collapsed. Another 1/2 mile and he'd have been there ( and had it not been so close I'd have refused to load it FWIW)

I've got some stories, but not a lot of photographic evidence

[Southside]

I don't have a photo but there was the guy who showed up for turf driving a Tesla....at least it had a hatch back thingy. 

[Magicman]

During my first year of sawing when I was selling lumber, I had a guy haul lumber away in a pickup with the tailgate up, the sliding rear window open, and the 2X4's resting on the dash inches from the windshield.  

Another straddled the lumber, tied it to the front and rear bumpers, and then crawled underneath and tied it to something.  Don't know if he made it home but at least he paid me and left.  ;D

[kantuckid]

No pics, but I was once tearing down an old barn to salvage lumber and tried to make it a "one last trip" load using our twin sons high school shared PU a small Nissan truck. it was a 3 hour RT so I overloaded and paid for my load with folding the tailgate. 

Another overload I allowed to happen was when this local guy loaded my old log truck too far back on the bed and as I attempted to climb our private road homeward, the truck tipped backwards and I had to offload by hand off one side to be upright again.
 
Murphy's Law in full effect? :D

I'm sure many of us have seen those folks at a HD or Lowe's loading materials into a nice, shiny SUV on the roof or in the backend. 

[Old Greenhorn]

I didn't have the heart to take a photo, but last March I had a guy come to pick up 130 Mushroom logs (plus a couple extras) and also bought 2 large contractor bags full of compacted planer ships. I figured the whole load t around 4700# and it didn't quite fit in the truck and was mounded over about a foot above the bed rails. I suggested two trips, but 'Nope, we'll get it, we have straps." OK, they pull out those 1" box store straps that are too short, find pieces of small rope to lengthen them and hook them to the body panels through the rot holes. :D It looked like a cluster fart. The tires were squatted and the springs dang near bottomed on the 3/4 ton pickup. When they pulled out of the driveway they drove like they were balancing a teacup on their lap. The truck waddled and swayed and I never saw them make 30 MPH before they got out of sight. I wonder if they ever made it? They had a 35 mile drive and had to cross a bridge across the Hudson and use several state roads. I figured if the truck held out some Trooper would probably stop them for a chat.
 But I got paid. :D
 That was one of my customers that started our relationship by telling me clearly he knew exactly what he wanted and didn't care to hear my suggestions. He changed his order 4 times before he took delivery, then delayed his arrival several times on the day of. Haven't heard from him since. Gee, I hope he's OK. ;D

[kantuckid]

There's a video post on the FB WM group this a.m. of log trucks loaded, in mostly foreign countries, with huge tropical rainforest looking logs while dumping them along their route, as they travel dirt haul roads. 

[WV Sawmiller]

 

Actually this was just sawing the customers logs into timbers and he stacked them on a trailer hooked to his ATV. He had a block under the trailer and when we pulled it out to move forward this was the result. The helper and I were able to stand on the front and added enough weight the wheels touched long enough to pull the load out of the way.

 I had a customer 90 miles away order a bunch of 16' 6" X 3/4" boards to put under a metal roof. I asked him what he was driving and he said a pick up. I reminded him and he decided to rent a U-haul trailer to come get it.

When we first moved here I had a bridge that needed resurfacing so I sent my wife to the local sawmill and she bought 27-2"X8"X12' White oak boards. They loaded them on her half ton Ford truck. When she got in to leave she said "This truck steers funny." The looked and laughed and said "They do that when the front wheels are off the ground." They unloaded half and she made 2 slow trips home with them.

Kantuckid,

I saw many loads of logs as you describe in Cameroon in west Africa while working there. I once saw 2 loaded log trucks meet on a dirt road in The Central African Republic and the logs scrubbed the whole length from where they overlapped the sides on both trucks. Fortunately the chains and binders held. Many of our company drivers used to drive log trucks and they told me the load check was to keep loading till the tires started to flatten out significantly.

[Magicman]

Does firewood count?


 
Everything was OK until I tried to move forward.  :D

[WV Sawmiller]

   That's what you get for trying to tow a 10 year supply of firewood in Mississippi. :D How many people had to sit on the front before you could drive off with it. ;D

[customsawyer]

This is more like what I normally get.

[Tom King]

I see overloaded trailers, of all sizes, on the side of the road way too often.

People don't realize the axle weight rating means anything.  The axle bends, the hubs flex towards the rear as the wheels fight the flexing, making the wheels crab out, which wears out the bearings Rapidly, causing something to break.

Few things are a sure thing of giving trouble as an overloaded trailer.  The smaller the trailer, the closer the trouble is.

[Resonator]

Normally I have some customers show up that have way to little truck or trailer for what they are getting. This one was a little overkill. It is about 1000 SF of flooring and they drove 2.5 hours one way to get it.

Used to see those when I drove truck, usually a new machinery load got delivered and the dispatch INSISTS you gotta get a haul back load. Regardless of whether the trailer has winches, or the deck is even set up to haul pallets and lumber stacks. :D

I've seen a few fun ones with my lumber. People putting 10'+ long full 2" thick boards on the roof of their SUV and running straps through the open windows, or buying 8' slabs folding the seats down and putting them up to the dash and windshield. 
When I first started selling firewood I'd get people that didn't realize how big a face cord is, and have to make 2 or 3 trips to haul it all in an SUV.  :

[goose63]

If it could fly



 

2 miles of back road to his place

[sawguy21]

I see we don't have a monopoly on it. :D I once got rid of a derelict car, he showed up with a one ton beaver tail and a winch. He loaded the car and left with only the winch line securing it then off down the road with the front wheels barely touching. I found something else to do, didn't want any part of that.

[Lostinmn]

My uncle managed a local lumberyard I worked at summers in high school and college.  I sure wish we had camera phones back then as it would be a treasure trove for this topic  :D

I can't tell the times I had to help some yahoo load plywood sheets and or sheet rock right onto the roof of a car (against our warnings) till it caved in, sometimes they didn't event tie down but would drive with holding on with a arm out the window!  Or tying to explain to someone you can't tie down 1/2 or 1 inch foam by itself to a car roof and not have issues  

Or pick up trucks with sheets of plywood scattered across the street up the block at the first street corner from lack of or poorly secured loads.  Twine isn't stopping anything once things start sliding.  

One guy hauled a 30+ foot lvl beam by strapping it to the side of his truck using the strap as a loops in the front and back. He at least flagged it but wow!  

I'm sure I'm responsible for untold number of rear springs breaking and maybe a axle or two, people had no issue putting 2,000  pounds of shingle and much more in old 1/2 ton trucks even when we warned them and pointed at the sagging tires and axles sitting on bump stops once the pallet was forked on.  

After a while you just got numb to it, you gave them fair warning and then help them load as they saw fit and shrugged as they pulled away.

[mike_belben]

Im not loaded til im overloaded   ;D

[Dave Shepard]

95% of the time it's a small equipment trailer that I can't load with the forks. :

[chet]

Best one I saw was a Yugo leaving a home depot with a couple sheets of plywood tied to da roof. Not more than a mile down da road  Yugo had lift off,  :D  right into da ditch.  

[longtime lurker]

Had a guy once show up to load 3 of 12x12x28' on the top of his LandCruiser... one at a time would have been ridiculous and we didn't load them obviously but the fact he thought it might have been an option was good for a chuckle. Or guys leaving with half tonne of firewood in the back of a hatchback.
 And yanno what goes in a truck with tarps or curtains covering it has always been limited by when the driver says enough. They've really cracked down on the chain of responsibility stuff here where if I load it I am responsible for it, including the fines, so I've got pretty conservative about the whole thing over the last couple of years.

Logs coming in though, that's a whole 'nother story. Finding back roads around weighbridges in log trucks is in my skillset  :D

[moodnacreek]

I am too busy to take pictures but I will say I dislike big short bed pick up trucks.

[YellowHammer]

Last week. A Monster Truck.



 

[Old Greenhorn]

Last week. A Monster Truck.

That one made me chuckle a lot. My buddy Bill bought a small electric car like that for his wife when the baby came along. I don't know what model it is, but it's a Ford- something. She uses it for household errands taking the kid to paly dates etc, and they use it when they go out for dinner and such like that. He took a LOT of ribbing from all the heavy equipment guys and logger types around here. He quickly had some lettering done up for it on the lift gate. One the left side it says:
"The Money
I save
On gas"
and on the right side it says:
"I spend 
On Guns
and Ammo"
 I thought that was pretty funny. It does look funny when I pull in the yard and see that little thing parked between the 450 and the 750. :D
 The gal down the road we did the power pole job for a week or two ago has one that looks just like that. She has a good sense of humor and knew she would take some ribbing from us redneck types. I call it her 'golf cart' and she has taken to referring to it as her 'roller skate'.
 I do like the 'monster truck' moniker thought. Maybe I will try that out next time we are having drinks. :D