April 5, 2025 • 61 mins
The trucking industry just experienced what the Trump administration calls "the greatest and most consequential day of deregulation in US history" with the rollback of EPA 2027 emissions standards. Patrick and the Outer Belt crew unpack this dramatic shift that has sent ripples through the entire transportation sector.
For years, trucking companies have been preparing for a massive buying frenzy in 2026, as the impending 2027 emissions regulations threatened to add $30,000-$40,000 premiums to trucks with unproven technology. The catch? Only Paccar (Kenworth and Peterbilt) had developed an engine clean enough to meet these requirements, with competitors struggling to catch up. This regulatory change provides enormous relief to fleets still recovering from the freight recession and facing high interest rates.
The conversation shifts to practical trucking solutions as the team shares their experiences with modern jump boxes – compact portable batteries that can start a dead commercial truck instantly. These devices have revolutionized roadside assistance, replacing the cumbersome chargers of yesteryear that required hours to get a truck running. The hosts reminisce about earlier days when getting a truck jumped meant waiting for service companies or rigging multiple trucks together with jumper cables.
Another industry-changing development comes from Georgia, where courts will now allow juries to consider seatbelt use when determining accident settlements. This seemingly common-sense change was previously forbidden, potentially contributing to the astronomical rise in trucking lawsuit verdicts – from $2.3 million in 2010 to $22.3 million in 2018. The team debates whether this will help reduce "nuclear verdicts" that have driven up insurance costs across the industry.
Have questions about trucking or want to join the Highfield team? Call us at 833-493-4353 option 1 or email theouterbeltpodcast@gmail.com to learn more about opportunities with our growing fleet.
Email us: theouterbeltpodcast@gmail.com
Website: www.hyfieldtrucking.com
Interested in joining our team? Email us at info.hysg@gmail.com we have open trucks! You must be part of a team. No solo drivers.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Boogity, boogity, boogity, let's go racing boys.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Hey everybody, welcome to the Outer Belt.
I'm Patrick and you know myfriends.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
Shirley Buttermilk.
Speaker 4 (00:18):
Eric.
Speaker 3 (00:18):
Zucchini bread.
I'm so glad you're back.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
And Jerry oh man, it's the whole crew.
We're all here again.
Finally, we got her back fromthe great state of Montana.
And Jerry oh man, it's thewhole crew.
We're all here again.
Finally, we got her back fromthe great state of Montana.
Woman power.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
He got it right.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
I pay attention and I have it written down on a cliff
note, but still.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
As you should, as you should.
As a good Boy Scout, beprepared, you, always be
prepared you wear your badgesall that stuff, I thought about
be prepared.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
You wear your badges.
All that stuff, I thought aboutbeing prepared.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
The one.
I went to Montana badge.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
I went to Montana and I survived, and all I got was a
stinking badge.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
No, I also got some huckleberry pancake mix, oh,
okay.
Speaker 5 (00:52):
All right I didn't get the pancake mix, but I got
caramels and some.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
Did you get the huckleberry syrup?
No, oh, it tastes just likeblueberry from IHOP I thought it
tasted like strawberries.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
myself Does it On a summer evening.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Huh, I don't know how to go from there.
So, speaking of being prepared,I just did the round trip to
Bolt Custom Trucks in Indiana.
Yes, you did, and I thoughtabout our good friends over at
Expeditor Boogie.
Yes and of course we're talkingabout Jerry, of course, and
(01:31):
he's a good guy.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
He's a good guy.
He's a good guy.
We talk bad about him sometimes.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
We talk bad about him .
He truly is a good guy Most ofthe time, but he's a good guy,
yeah, he means well, anyways,anyways.
So I went over to Bolt CustomTrucks.
I was thinking about himbecause I left at 4 pm in the
afternoon, actually closer to 5.
, and I was just going to gothere and come right back, get
back home around midnight and Iwas like that's cool, I can do
(01:55):
this.
So I grabbed my usual bag withmy permit book in there and
water and 5-hour energy and allthat stuff and I head out of
town at about halfway to FortWindy and I was like boy, I hope
this truck starts, because Ididn't bring any clothes.
I didn't bring a spare anything,I'm like if I have to get a
(02:15):
hotel while I'm here, I ammaking a trip to Walmart, so
luckily everything worked fine.
It all panned out good, didn'teven have to use the jump box
and was able to get back safeand sound.
Speaker 3 (02:28):
Good Way back before midnight.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
So my Boy Scout badge would have been ripped off of
my shirt For preparation.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
Yeah, I did see the jump box was still at 80% this
morning so I got it on thecharger, so we're ready for the
next time.
Very cool, yeah, good deal.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Do you have to put it on the floorboards this time of
year or is it holding charges?
Like in the wintertime, youhave to get it toasty.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
It holds its charge, no problem, but it wants to be
warm in order for it to providemax power.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (02:57):
So I also learned that if it has the cold error on
it, it'll still work.
It just won't provide max powerwhen it's cold.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
I see.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
So, you can start a go-kart.
Right exactly, you couldn'tstart the Jeep, but you could
start a go-kart, or maybe like aVolkswagen Bug, if you put the
jump box on there.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
The original, and then you pushed it and popped
the clutch.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Well, you need the extra weight for leverage Going
downhill.
You know it's something aboutphysics.
I have a fun fact Go ahead.
Speaker 5 (03:27):
It doesn't matter how long the jump box is on there.
If the truck is not neutral, itstill won't start.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Oh, what a fun fact, this is true.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
I got another one for you.
Did you just learn of this Sortof?
Speaker 1 (03:40):
It also doesn't matter how long the jump box is
plugged in and how many timesyou run through the cycle.
If your negative post hasaccidentally popped off because
you didn't have a good grip, ittoo will not work.
Speaker 5 (03:51):
That'll cause a problem too, so just some good
troubleshooting, you know ideas?
Huh yeah, Neutral.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
Imagine that I know right.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
I tell you what if I drove a truck anymore, like, how
do do I?
That's the wrong way ofphrasing it on a regular basis
if I was yes, if I drove truckon a regular basis, I would buy
one of those things and have itwith me all the time.
Oh yeah, you know, apus fail,chargers fail, like to be able
to just grab like, oh, battery'sdead.
Let me just grab this thing andwe're off the races.
(04:21):
Nice little that it's such ahandy little tool.
Speaker 3 (04:24):
I would have one.
I think about when Vince and Ifirst started.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
Back in 1847.
Yes.
What the protocol was, whichwas you had to get a branding
iron really hot and then you hitthe back of the horse.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
Well, or sometimes you had to call a tow company
out to jump you.
We still do.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
We still do, yeah, we still do, we still do.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
Not in the yard, you mean when we first started in
the yard, when we first startedin the yard the trucks that were
.
Speaker 3 (04:49):
We did have Rusty's, the trucks that we had in the
yard.
That was your way to get themto fire off.
You had to call.
You had to wait hours He'dfinally arrive and then it would
jump, and Vincent a littleresearch.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
We could jump a truck in the yard with jumper cables
and another truck and anothertruck.
When we had to call Rusty's waswhen the truck was out of fuel
in the yard.
Oh, maybe that's what it wasand we had to get them to fuel
it and then jump it, because theAPU doesn't run with no fuel
either.
So that's when we used to callRusty's.
We haven't called Rusty's outin quite some time.
Speaker 3 (05:25):
I'm sure.
More on top of making sure ourtrucks are fueled, and I think
it's a great investment though,too, even if that's what you
were doing and also I didn't do-the research.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Patrick had already purchased that before he left,
and it arrived when we werethere.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
It's a nice, it was a nice addition.
It's a nice, it was a niceaddition.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
It's paid for itself over and over, oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
I found it and they've gotten cheaper.
They're actually.
You'd think something like thatwould get more expensive.
They've actually gotten a lotcheaper.
I was at our good friend's downat ELW and I was going to get a
truck jumped off.
Battery was dead Again and hecame over in his Dodge like he
(06:12):
normally does.
He's got a big engine so hecould usually just jump a truck
off with his truck's battery,and so I was kind of business as
usual, and he walks out withthis little tiny
lunchbox-looking thing and I'mlike what is that?
And he's like we're going tojump your truck off and I'm like
with that, yeah, not a chance.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
And it does, it looks like a little lunchbox.
Speaker 1 (06:25):
It fires off like it's perfectly fine, yeah, like
it doesn't even.
It's, you know, like a normal,like you're jumping off a car.
It's just vroom, vroom, vroom,vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom,
vroom.
It's like vroom, like thebatteries in the's all lithium,
I think.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
When we used to go over to TK and a truck would sit
there long enough, it wouldhave the same problem the
battery died or something.
They used to wheel out the bigstand-up charger that's four
feet tall and have to runextension cords to the shop and
had to sit there for a couplehours to charge the batteries.
I remember that, and now theyhave one it's actually a lot
(07:05):
smaller that works pretty wellas well.
Yeah, and then the guys over atCarrier did the same thing.
They finally invested in oneand they worked great.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
I remember that one that old fighter used to have
and they'd walk out to your carand it was on a dolly, two big
giant wheels, and they'd plug itup and they'd hit it and it'd
be as it's trying to like, andthen that one.
We would get started that wayand sometimes it wouldn't, and
if it didn't have enough chargeit was like, oh my gosh, gotta
bring it all the way back.
(07:34):
It was always a hassle, uh.
And they eventually moved tothe smaller portable ones.
But my favorite was cap citytrailers theirs they took a golf
cart.
They were like screw this,hauling this crap around a golf
cart on the.
They took a golf cart.
They were like screw this,hauling this crap around A golf
cart.
On the back of the golf cartwhere the back seat would be.
They put in like a bank of likefour or six batteries and then
(07:54):
had the little control moduleand then that's what they used
to jump vehicles off.
Wow, they just drove up to you,but I think now they've moved to
a jump box.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Everybody's moving to those things.
They're all using this, exceptfor TK.
They're all using that same onewe have.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
You know, there was a truck that was broke down or
something.
I don't remember the situationaround it entirely, but Jimmy
had to go out.
It was near where they livedand Jimmy had to go.
I think we had already movedthe team to another truck or
something.
I can't remember all thedetails, but Jimmy had to go
pick the truck up and he droveout.
(08:30):
There wasn't sure if thebattery was dead or not, and so
he went into his localO'Reilly's.
They didn't have a large enoughbox for that size engine, so he
got one that was for like a 7liter and his idea was we'll
charge it, we'll try it.
If it doesn't work, we'llreturn it.
Sure, but it fired the engineoff.
(08:50):
Yeah, and he said it was deaddead when he got to it, hooked
up to it and it fired it rightoff so.
I don't think it can do repeatedones like ours can do.
It can do multiples.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
We can jump a lot of trucks off with ours on our
single charge.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
I don't think that one can, but it had enough power
to get it done once, and that'skind of all you need then
charge it back up.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Yeah, nice, that world has come so far, but again
the one I've got, like I keep apersonal one in my vehicle.
It's a small one.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
It's a couple hundred dollars.
Yeah, like they're notexpensive at all.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
The good ones are not expensive at all.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Seems like a small investment, for if you had to
wait for somebody to come, youknow.
Yes, because you're on vacationand then you've got to wait for
somebody to come jump you offor whatever else.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Ours has paid for itself over and over again.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Not just in having to pay Russies to come out, but in
our time, yes, you know to getthe jumper cables out, get
another truck in position whereyou can reach it and that kind
of stuff.
It's paid for itself just inour time, Absolutely so.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
Yep, no, I think it's great.
I definitely would have jumpercables.
We always did have jumpercables on the truck, but I would
also have that.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Yeah, we did also.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
There's nothing like asking somebody hey, can you
give me a jump?
Oh, do you have have cables too?
Speaker 1 (10:05):
you know it's a lot easier when you hold the cables
up and say can I get a jump andthey're more apt to help you
that way, especially with a bigcommercial truck having the
heavy duty cables?
I mean, my jumper cables were ahundred dollars at walmart they
were the heaviest ones.
They made and they're plentygood, um, but you get.
You know, normal person, theirnormal car has the 15, 20 jumper
cables.
They can't handle that muchcurrent and you talk about risk
(10:25):
of fires and stuff like that.
A couple little things to makelife on the road easier.
Batteries die.
It happens all the time, allthe time.
Just being prepared for itdefinitely takes that situation
from bad to horrible.
Because, imagine, you've got towait on a jump, so we have to
turn this load down.
Yeah, we have to pull off aload because we're wait on a
jump, so we have to turn thisload down.
(10:46):
Yeah, you know we have to pulloff a load because we're waiting
on a jump Again.
Something like that could payfor itself in one jump, sure.
But I did get some really greatnews this weekend that I wanted
to talk to you all about, orthis week.
So, as you all know, one of myroles here at Highfield is to
plan out truck purchases andwork with the dealerships and
figure out when we're going tobuy equipment and we're not
going to buy equipment.
(11:06):
And I've been hyper, uber,crazy, stressed, because 2026 is
supposed to be the year oftruck purchases.
Everybody and their brother isdoing it.
It's an absolute nightmarebecause in 2027, the EPA changes
that are coming out areextremely strict and, as of
(11:29):
right now, paccar has an enginethat is clean enough to meet
those standards, and it's 2025.
Let's keep things in mind thisis a year and a half away.
Paccar has an engine that'sclean enough to meet those
guidelines, and nobody elseReally.
So Kenworth and Peterbilt theyhave an engine that's clean
enough to meet those guidelines.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
And nobody else Really.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
So Kenworth and Peterbilt they have an engine
and no one else does.
So Cummins has an engine thatthey say is almost done it
should make the guidelines andthey've invested some ungodly
amount of money into gettingthis engine to meet all the
(12:07):
clean air requirements andeverything.
And they're talking $30,000,$40,000 premiums on top of
whatever we're paying for trucksnow for this new engine.
I don't believe Detroit has asolution yet.
I think they're still workingon it and I don't think Navistar
, which is international.
I don't think they have one forit yet.
I haven't seen anything comeout from Volvo about it either.
(12:28):
Now maybe they do and they'rejust waiting to release it, but
I haven't seen it out yet.
So it's been a bit of a panicbecause everybody's going like,
well, these engines A, they'regoing to jack the price up way
high.
It's a brand new technology.
None of us know if it's goingto work out.
We, like Eric and I inHighfield, have been victims of
a new EPA control system comingout.
(12:51):
That was a nightmare and almostbankrupted our company Called
the Ardhead yes, the Ardheadfiasco with Caterpillar.
So what everybody's doing is in2026, they're planning on buying
tons of trucks, thousands andthousands and thousands of
trucks.
Truck manufacturers have beenkind of waiting on this to
(13:12):
happen, talking with theirsuppliers, making sure they're
going to have enough equipmentto build all these things,
talking about when they want toadd on the additional staff, be
able to do the multiple shifts.
It's been a big deal.
That's been coming now for awhile and everybody's kind of
been sitting getting ready forit and it's truly terrifying of
like when they release thosespots.
(13:33):
If you don't immediately get onit, you're not going to get a
truck, and then your next optionis going to be one of these
2027 models, which is going tobe unproven technology.
It's going to cost way moremoney, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker 3 (13:45):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
So it's been a big, big, big stress point.
Everybody's been freaking outabout it and, as of a week or so
ago, the EPA, with the Trumpadministration, has officially
rolled back that requirement.
How'd they put it?
They've overturned rules.
(14:06):
They call it the greatest andmost consequential day of
deregulation in US history.
I think that's a bit much.
I think that's just theadministration doing what they
always do.
But it is, I think, a huge win,you could say, for the trucking
(14:29):
community, Because it's clearthat we need to keep pushing
these greenhouse gases down.
And I think you know unlessyou're a rolling coal kind of
person, like there is someclimate change that we can
affect on it, but the technologyis not there and the scramble
has not been good.
Those EPA measurements theybasically said, like we're not
(14:49):
going to do it right now, let'sput it back in the EPA's hand,
come out with some new timeframeto implement these things, give
these manufacturers a littlemore time to make it happen.
But what that has effectivelydone is they have destroyed that
not destroyed, but they havegotten rid of that whole buying
frenzy that's about to happen.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
So will they have too much product.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
No, because they haven't started building yet.
Speaker 5 (15:16):
Is that a good thing, then, or a bad thing?
Speaker 1 (15:18):
So it depends on where you sit on this.
It does so.
If you're a truckingmanufacturer, the truck sales
are already pretty good.
They're not great, they couldbe better.
Truck sales have definitelyslowed down, but they're pretty
good.
People are starting to buyagain.
If you are a dealership andyou've not been selling trucks,
(15:41):
it probably kind of stinks, butfrom a fleet perspective, from
the end user perspective, it'sgreat news.
You know, coming out of thiskind of bad economy situation or
this recession freightrecession we've been in, a lot
of trucking companies are kindof weighing the whole.
We need to buy these truckswhen we can, but we also don't
(16:04):
have the money to do it.
Interest rates are pretty high,so that affects companies,
because companies borrow moneyto buy trucks.
So it's like compounding issues.
It's the trucks are expensive,the interest so the money is
expensive and oh yeah, there'sbeen a freight recession so they
already don't have a lot ofmoney to work with.
(16:24):
So there's been a lot of fleetsthat have been kind of like what
do we do in this type ofsituation?
Because there's people that youknow if you've got a two or
three-year-old truck, you mayhave wanted to run that thing
out to five years.
But they're now saying you know,I'm going to go ahead up with a
2027.
Because if you get a 2829, wellthen it's been out there for a
(16:45):
couple of years, so it's not asscary, and so it's been a huge
stress point on fleets notknowing how they're going to be
able to afford these things andhow they're going to be able to
buy them.
And even again, if you even canget them, because it's going to
be the ones that don't alreadyhave them that are going to be
taking the brunt of it.
So we've been looking at it andgoing like all right, how do we
(17:06):
, how do we play this?
Do we want to, um, order abunch of trucks in 26?
Can we order a bunch of trucksin 26?
Do we need to get those?
And when I say 2026, you haveto order them in 2025 to give
them a 2026.
So they're, they're fresh onour plate of conversation and
this just just drasticallyreduced changed that.
(17:27):
Personally, as an end user, assomeone who runs these trucks,
it makes me happy.
Speaker 3 (17:32):
How long is the delay for?
Speaker 1 (17:35):
They haven't said yet .
So they basically got rid ofthe rule and said EPA.
You need to work on this andfigure it out.
Speaker 3 (17:40):
So could it come back and still be 2027?
Speaker 1 (17:43):
Doubtful, doubtful.
Yeah, I don't think that'sgoing to happen.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
Yeah, it's the administration, the EPA of the
current administration.
It's just like the Californialaw we talked about, where
California withdrew theirrequest for CARB stuff because
of the current EPA.
So it's very doubtful.
So it may come back in the nextcycle with a new administration
, but there'll still be thattime limit.
(18:06):
You have a few years on this,and you'll have time after that
too, because they still have togo through all the processes.
The regulatory processesactually make the rule, and then
you have to have time forpeople to actually be able to
buy the equipment.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
It's still a few years away, but yeah it
certainly could come back.
It's also possible that itcomes back with this
administration.
Right, it is possible that youknow, towards the end of the
Trump administration, that theydo release these rules.
I mean, you know the EPA stillis trying to reduce greenhouse
gases no matter who's in officegases, no matter who's in office
(18:46):
.
Now it may be they're not asstrict or they change some rules
, but they in general they'renot loosening things up so much
that it's like wild wild west.
I mean, trump was in in 2016 16to 2020.
Yeah yeah, and in those years hedidn't remove uh any of the uh
trucking uh greenhouse gasregulations and, as a matter of
fact, in so there's 2012, or2010 was the first one.
(19:09):
I think there was a 2017 or2018 greenhouse gas increase or
not increase, but a stricterrule that played on through.
So I mean, he's neverrestricted them before.
This is the first time they arerestricting it and it is
literally because the industryis going we're not ready yet.
Speaker 3 (19:27):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
This is about to cause a disaster.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
Especially, like you said, there doesn't sound like
very many manufacturers areready for it.
You said Paccar, and that wasit.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
Paccar and Cummins is about to be there.
Speaker 3 (19:41):
About.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Yes, so, like, even when you look at on the so we
run heavy-duty trucks, right?
So we run Class 8 heavy-dutytrucks.
We have Class 8 engines.
These are million-mile trucks,like when you hear people talk
about a million-mile truck,these are the ones.
Our engines, transmissions,everything is designed to last
that long.
The engines are wet-sleeve,which means, if you know what I
(20:08):
imagine, a piston going up anddown the cylinder, the wall that
surrounds the piston, um, on anormal like your car, is all a
part of that that big giantblock of iron.
On a commercial truck, that isa class eight.
It's a wet sleeve, which means,um, you can actually there's a
thin layer of metal around thatpiston that you can actually
remove and put a brand new onein.
So it takes all the abuse ofthat piston going up and the
(20:29):
fire and the combustion andeverything, and then when it's
petered out, when it's no longergood and it doesn't have a good
seal, they can literally justremove that and put a brand new
one in there.
Speaker 3 (20:38):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (20:39):
And the block and everything stays the same.
So these are really well-built,long-lasting machines.
A Class 7 truck or class sixmedium duty is what they call
that.
Those do not have wet sleeves,so they are like your car.
When the engine's junked youcan rebuild some elements of it,
but the majority of them you'rejust taking the engine out,
(20:59):
putting a new one in.
Usually at that point yourtruck's done.
You're not going to do all that, but on those right now you can
buy those from Cummins, you canbuy them from Paccar, you can
buy them from who's the otherguy?
Cummins, paccar, detroit andDetroit and PACCAR have already
(21:21):
said we're out.
So with these new greenhousegas emissions, cummins is the
only one that's selling thosemedium-duty engines.
So it doesn't matter.
In a couple of years when youbuy a medium-duty truck, you
will only have Cummins as anoption.
It doesn't matter what brand youchoose, but it's because the
(21:42):
cost of developing these newemission systems are so
incredibly high.
I mean, you think of like thesecompanies are billion-dollar
companies but they don't have abillion dollars in free cash
sitting there to pour into R&D.
So a lot of them are takingwhat caterpillar did in 2009 or
10 when they said we're out,we're not doing this anymore.
(22:03):
It's cheaper just to focus onsomething else than it is to
design these engines for thesubmission system, so um heather
has a question yes, ma'am justwant to make sure I'm
understanding.
Speaker 5 (22:15):
So the reason of the frenzy is because if you buy the
trucks before 2027, you're kindof grandfathered into not
having to meet the EPA standards.
Okay.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
Yes.
So that's why, yeah, emissionstandards are for that calendar
year.
Speaker 5 (22:32):
So they start anything that year are new or
made Correct, okay.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
Yes, and there are things like EPA credits.
They can do so.
For a long time, detroit Dieselwas actually selling clean air
credits to International becausetheir MaxForce engine was not
clean enough.
It didn't meet the standards.
It was close but not quite, andso for every pound of
(22:57):
greenhouse gas that theydetermined that this thing
wasn't as good as they had tobuy credits from other companies
that exceeded the greenhousegas rules.
So detroit was running cleanerthan what was required so that
they had leftover tax or epacredits.
They were actually able to buythem from detroit and and do
that, and that they wereprobably buying some from
(23:20):
Detroit, some from Volvo, somefrom Cummins, like just to meet
demand.
And that's one of the bigreasons why Volkswagen Group had
to step in and buy them,because they blew all their
money on tax credits and theynever could get that engine the
way they wanted it.
It's also what gave them such abad name.
I mean, those Max Force engineswere just garbage, absolute
garbage, and it was all becauseof the emissions stuff they put
(23:43):
on it.
Again, I don't think this isgoing to kind of what you're
saying.
I don't think it's going tokill the emissions mandate, it's
just delaying it.
I do think it's going to comeright back in a few years Just
giving them a little longer.
Absolutely Well, and then?
Speaker 3 (24:01):
maybe somebody doesn't monopolize, you know,
give those other companies timeto catch up and get their engine
where it needs to be, and soit's a little more equal
opportunity for selling, buying,purchasing power, that kind of
thing Absolutely I get it.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Well, and you look at like at the EPA 2010,.
Then there was the 2014, 15, 16, whatever it was.
Everybody was able to do a fewminor changes to meet those new
standards, and so there wasn't alot of pushback.
This new line of standards isjust going so far that it's like
(24:34):
, oh, we have to rethinkeverything.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Well, it doesn't sound like an even playing field
for selling of product.
You know, maybe that's whereit's coming from.
You know, if the only one thathas it is Paccar and you've got
three others who are your majormanufacturers and they're not
even close, how's that equal?
Yes, you know kind of threeagainst one's take it to.
(24:59):
I mean, I don't know how it allshook out, but to me that's
kind of you know well, and andcummins will sell to anyone they
don't care, but pat car won't?
Speaker 1 (25:07):
packers only gonna put their engines in peterbilt's
or kenworth's period.
So it's not even like you couldbuy a freightliner with a pack
car engine in it, sure.
So it's very interesting.
I know I'm trying to convey howstrong of an issue this is.
So Ford and Chevrolet slash GMCtrucks slash International, and
(25:36):
I put all them together becausethey actually Chevy, gmc and
International all build theirtrucks in the same exact factory
.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
And then Ford builds theirs separately.
But they are all supposed to bedoing better when this comes
around because they havegasoline options, not because
they have a better diesel,because if gasoline, gasoline
isn't impacted by these it hasan impact about these.
Cummins just released theirvery first gasoline-powered
engine ever Wow Because of thisregulation.
(26:10):
So it's a big, big, big deal inthe industry.
There's been lots of R&D goingbehind the scenes, lots of.
Speaker 3 (26:17):
So they're trying to get away from diesel.
So they're trying to get awayfrom diesel.
Speaker 1 (26:20):
No, they're trying to get away from diesel.
Diesel is actually better thangasoline.
It's just that those gasengines don't have that same
standard.
Speaker 3 (26:27):
I see.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
Because there's so few of them.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
If you're going to buy a big truck, you're probably
not going to put a gasolineengine in it.
So there's so few regulationsthat Cummins came out with this
engine to give peoplealternative.
You don't want to buy thatuntried, untrue uh diesel.
So interesting, it's definitelya.
It's a weird world.
We're living in the economicsof it, with that big pre-buy not
(26:52):
going to happen anymore and, um, I mean again, for years we've
been talking about this.
It's literally been something.
We've been talking about this.
It's literally been somethingwe've been talking about since
like 2020 leading up to 2026gonna be the time to buy.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
Yes it's.
Speaker 1 (27:03):
it's literally been a point of conversation for that
long and, uh, the fact that itis now kind of with the stroke
of a pen scrapped and everybodyjust took a gigantic sigh of
relief, it's just wild.
Speaker 5 (27:21):
Do you think there's going to be an overflow of
trucks?
Because they were anticipatingthis as well.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
No, they haven't built them.
I think, yeah, I think we'refar enough out that they don't
that, they wouldn't have gottenthat far in the process, yep,
yep.
And who knows what CARB will do.
Carb could always come back andsay well, if you want to sell a
truck in our state, then youhave to meet these greenhouse
gas emissions, or something.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
Well, that's what the California pulled, though, back
in February, where they werepetitioning for a waiver to set
their own rules.
Yeah, and they pulled thatpetition because they figured
the EPA wasn't going to go forit.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Well, you know what's crazy is?
They pulled that, but they leftin their carb testing.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
Well, I think they left in the things they already
had a waiver for.
Speaker 1 (28:03):
If there's a waiver already there.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
They didn't bother it because it's already approved.
They're just enforcing it moreWell.
The enforcement started onJanuary 1st of 24, but, yes, now
they're enforcing it a littlebit stronger.
Speaker 1 (28:16):
Well, that's just some crazy changes in our
industry, some things that havebrought me great relief, and I
thought I would share that withyou all because it's huge
impacts on our industry.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
And one thing I'm curious too, talking about how
it could change, is the Bidenadministration said all the
Class 8 trucks got together.
So Volvo, Daimler Internationaland Navistar and PACCAR all got
together and petitioned the EPAand the president to allow them
(28:53):
to factor in aerodynamics of thetruck into lowering those
greenhouse gases, to factor inaerodynamics of the truck into
lowering those greenhouse gases.
So in other words, if they'resaying like you need to get that
down to 10 miles per gallonwhich I know it's way more than
that, but let's say that's whatit is Then they wanted to say
well, if we built an engine thatwas pretty efficient but we
could also do some thingsaerodynamically to make it even
(29:15):
more efficient and the wholepackage meets your requirements,
can we do that?
And the EPA and the Bidenadministration said no, this
really just focuses on yourengine and you have to stick
with that.
So I'd be interested to see ifthat becomes a part of the new
ruling once they do roll it outeventually.
Sure, because that's a waywhere they can.
(29:36):
You know, maybe the enginedoesn't have to be as difficult
to produce if we canaerodynamically make it a little
more slippery through the airso it's using less fuel.
Speaker 3 (29:48):
Sure Gonna have a bunch of like Disney bullet
trains driving down the road,that's right.
Speaker 5 (29:56):
Tesla looking at.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
I don't know I just was thinking something
aerodynamic.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
You've got the Shell Super Truck which is right here.
That's slippery.
Yes, look at that thing, gotthat little cone nose on it and
everything.
Not cone nose but raked nose.
That's a slippery sucker, thatthing.
You know it's crazy.
They've been able to get prettygood fuel economy out of it.
But if you go back to theoriginal, which is this old
(30:25):
Peterbilt cab over, I was goingto say a cab over probably gets
no aerodynamics.
They don't.
But if you look at thisPeterbilt cab over right here so
you see the similarity, right,it looks like the Shell Starship
, I think is what they call it,they do.
Is way more aerodynamic thanthe 372.
So you see, the 372 is acamover.
(30:48):
It's very basic, and all theydid was put the ever so
slightest curve on the front ofit and the windshield, and then
they added all the fairings andstuff which were not common.
So this truck came out in 1988.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
The cab over the cab over did?
Speaker 1 (31:09):
yes, the Peterbilt 372.
It's funny because a lot ofpeople say it's the Darth Vader
looking one.
Yeah, but it kind of reminds meof the old Honda Pil pilots
that they called the white oneswere Stormtroopers.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
No, that's a Honda Ridgeline.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
Yeah, Ridgeline.
Yes, yes, had one of those, sothis one being the Darth Vader.
But even like, look at themirrors, they're pretty standard
mirrors from back in the day.
They're not super aerodynamic.
This truck Well, let me go back.
So the, the super new modernstarship, gets got 10.8 miles
(31:45):
per gallon.
That's what they were able to do, which, if you think, about 80
000 pounds at 10.8 miles pergallon, that's pretty impressive
that's super impressive um, nowthey weren't going very fast
and aerodynamics played a lot toit, and they had all these
experimental gear ratios andyada, yada, yada, that was 2018.
In 1988, 30 years prior, thePeterbilt 372 got consistently
(32:08):
over 11 miles per gallon.
Speaker 3 (32:10):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Consistently Isn't that insane Very much.
Speaker 4 (32:15):
Could it haul the same weight?
Speaker 1 (32:16):
Yes, they were both doing 80,000 pounds.
It's just unbelievable.
But now, as far as which iscleaner, even though the
Peterbilt got better fueleconomy, it was definitely doing
a lot more to pollute the world.
They had no what's an emissionin 1988?
The only emissions they wereworried about back then were
cars and getting let out, but no, these things.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
I wonder if a part of that is how they closed the gap
between the trailer and the cab.
Speaker 4 (32:44):
I wondered about that On the Peterbilt.
Definitely be, better airstream.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
Versus that space there.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
I'm sure that's absolutely you know it's part of
it.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
The idea is you get that gap as small as possible
right yeah, but then you limityour turning radius and that
type of thing.
It is what I love about thePeterbilt 372.
Is this ad right here, becausethey didn't do aerodynamics back
then, but they straight up callit out.
You know, comparing the roundedkind of it's so not rounded, I
(33:16):
mean, it is just barely.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
Barely yeah, but.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
And how they're comparing it to the front end of
a bullet and showing how theairflow goes around.
Again, this was reallyunprecedented stuff.
The only truck really beforethis came out was in like 86 or
something, was the T600 fromKenworth, which, again
Peterbilt-Kenworth being thesame company or owned by the
same company, it's notsurprising.
(33:40):
One does an aerodynamic andthen the other one does another
aerodynamic.
Sure, they weren't reallytalking about this back then.
It wasn't really a concern, youknow.
Speaker 2 (33:47):
No, because fuel was cheap, mm-hmm.
Speaker 1 (33:49):
Yes, yep, and you know back if you go back even
further in the 70s, when fuelwas not cheap, trucking was
regulated so it wasn't really afair market for trucking or for
freight.
So if fuel was expensive,people just had to pay it.
(34:10):
You know like customers had topay it.
It is what it is.
When they deregulated, thatreally pushed the pricing down,
but that got a lot of people inthe environment and so, yeah,
it's just I don't know.
I love this, the stuff whereit's like all these old trucks
and uh, and then seeing whatthey could do back in the 80s,
which 88, I guess, feels like,does it feel like yesterday?
Speaker 5 (34:35):
sometimes for of us, maybe more than others Exactly.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
I'd like to not revisit 88.
That's when I graduated highschool.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
This truck was just coming out it was.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
I was too young to drive it.
Still I was 13.
Speaker 3 (34:55):
Fresh teenager I was.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
I'm not going to talk about how old I was, graduated
high school, yeah, junior high.
Speaker 3 (35:11):
I was junior high, eighth grade Junior high, maybe
ninth, eighth, ninth.
Speaker 2 (35:17):
It snowed in Baton Rouge in 89 yeah, back in 88 we
were doing the WAP the WAP noneof you will get that, but
there's someone out therethat'll understand that I made a
little bit of money, I think.
Speaker 5 (35:29):
I did.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
It was a dance, it was a dance yeah huh, there's a
few people out there that'll getthat, but not many back in the
80s.
Speaker 3 (35:39):
Well, if you know that.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
Please let us know and comment.
Speaker 5 (35:43):
I think you just feel so old.
Speaker 3 (35:46):
I still feel old, hashtag Vins or something.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
Hashtag Chili Wap.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
That's right.
Did you want to demonstrate itfor us?
So people know I will not.
Speaker 5 (35:52):
I won't even provide Jerry with the video.
Did you want to demonstrate itfor?
Speaker 2 (35:56):
us.
So people know no, oh, I willnot.
Okay, I won't even provideJerry with the video of it.
Speaker 1 (36:04):
But Melissa did and here it is.
It's here Just kidding.
So, as you can see from thesepictures, aerodynamics make a
huge part of the efficiency ofthe trucks, and the more
efficient they are, the lessfuel they consume.
(36:24):
Sure.
Which just by that the lessfuel, the less greenhouse gases
they put out.
Yeah.
So, that's why they want toincorporate it.
And you know, unfortunately, sofar the answer has been no, but
I think it will change.
I really I don't know.
Speaker 3 (36:38):
I have a question for Jerry Out of the bullet train,
or bullet-looking truck, and the88 truck, which one would you?
Speaker 4 (36:45):
pick the newer one.
Speaker 3 (36:47):
You'd see yourself driving a newer one, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (36:50):
That's your style?
Yeah, but that's not fair,because he likes little creature
comforts like power steering,air conditioning.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
Absolutely they conditioning.
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (37:01):
They had cruise control.
I heard about it.
Speaker 3 (37:04):
They take this little stick and they would shove it
between the dash and the I don'teven want to know what they did
back then.
Huh.
Speaker 2 (37:13):
Think about it too A lot of excited driving yeah.
Speaker 3 (37:17):
I know my dad was a truck driver.
He had a cab over.
Speaker 1 (37:22):
A lot of those were limited to 55 miles an hour.
Can you imagine seeing thecountry at 55?
Speaker 2 (37:28):
Yeah, because they weren't aerodynamic, they
couldn't go any faster.
Speaker 5 (37:32):
Weren't there rules.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
It's like driving a wall of bricks.
Speaker 1 (37:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:35):
Yeah, and when the speed limit across the country
was 55.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Was it Johnson that required the speed limit across
the country was 55 back then.
Was it Johnson that requiredthe speed limit, or something?
Speaker 2 (37:41):
like that.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
I forget who it was Well, it was because of the fuel
thing right, Because the fuelcost was high.
Speaker 5 (37:45):
Yes, they're like hey , if you only drive 55, you'll
get your best fuel economy Right.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
But the law, the legal limit then was 55.
And if you didn't move yourlimit down to 55, you didn't get
federal funding for highwaysCorrect.
So they kind of forced thestates to do that.
Speaker 1 (38:02):
They still kind of do .
They've inched it up, but Ithink 80 is the max right now.
You can't go 85.
Speaker 2 (38:08):
80 is the max yeah, Speaking of 80 being the max
speed limit and 55 was safer,Zoom, zoom.
There are rules in effect atevery state where you have to
wear a seatbelt when you'redriving a vehicle.
Yes, and in Georgia they arelooking at allowing jurors in
(38:32):
lawsuits involving motor vehicleaccidents to be told if the
plaintiff the person that'sdoing the suing, the person that
was injured, if the plaintiffwas wearing a seatbelt or not,
and to be able to use that factin determining the amount of a
(38:53):
settlement or a verdict ordamages being paid to the
plaintiff.
So here's what I'm saying Ifyou and I are in a car accident,
you're at fault.
I'm injured because you're theone that was at fault in the
accident.
This is all speculation.
Patrick is a very, very, very,very safe driver most of the
(39:14):
time.
Speaker 1 (39:15):
I will say I've only totaled one vehicle and it was
in Georgia.
But go on, there you go.
It was in.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
Georgia, so I get injured in said accident.
I'm sorry.
Okay, and I accept your apology.
When we go to court.
Speaker 1 (39:28):
Can I get you to sign that?
Speaker 2 (39:29):
No, Can I get you to sign the apology that you just?
Speaker 1 (39:33):
made to me.
No, I cannot.
Speaker 2 (39:35):
I have it on recorded .
Speaker 1 (39:36):
I'm always recording.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
Jerry's recording.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
Jerry's recording when he's in court.
I was on the phone with Jerrywhen I got that totaled up car.
That's true, anyways.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
So I sue you for damages.
I'm hurt.
I got a broken tooth orsomething.
I'm hurt, so I sue you fordamages.
We go to court and, during theprocess of going back and forth,
my attorney can tell the juryI'm sorry.
Your attorney can tell the jury.
Well, he wasn't wearing aseatbelt.
Had he been wearing a seatbelt,maybe he wouldn't have broke
(40:08):
his tooth on the dashboardbecause he wouldn't have went so
far forward.
Vice versa, my attorney cantell the jury the facts have to
prove this right.
Speaker 1 (40:18):
Well, that's assumed.
I mean like we should alreadybe able to tell that right.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
That I was wearing a seatbelt or not.
Yeah, maybe, maybe not.
Speaker 1 (40:27):
No, I'm saying I should already be in court being
able to say, like well, hewasn't wearing a seatbelt.
Your Honor, no, but you can't.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
You currently can't Really Cannot.
Yes, that does not play afactor in the jury determining a
verdict.
They do not have to or cannotbe told whether I was wearing a
seatbelt or not.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
That's insane.
Yes, sorry.
Speaker 2 (40:47):
Yes, so the whole purpose of this new law in
Georgia is to try and reducesome of these astronomical
settlements.
Speaker 1 (40:55):
Nuclear.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
Nuclear settlements that are coming out or verdicts
that are coming out that arecosting insurance companies a
ton of money, when someone mayhave prevented this accident or
the severity of their injurieshad they been wearing a seatbelt
.
That's what they're looking atdoing with this new law.
So this article is dated isactually from FreightWaves.
(41:18):
It's dated on the 25th ofFebruary, so it's about a month
old and I don't know where it'sat currently, but it looks like
it's going through the GeorgiaHouse and Senate and the
Republican governor of Georgiahas signaled he's going to
support the rule.
Speaker 5 (41:37):
In March 24,.
It says they signed into law abill that lets juries hear
evidence.
Speaker 2 (41:42):
There you go.
So it is now law in Georgia, inthe state of Georgia 24.
Speaker 3 (41:47):
That was last year.
Speaker 1 (41:49):
No, that's Indiana Indiana.
Speaker 3 (41:51):
Oh, indiana did it.
Sorry, I apologize.
I need to verify that Statesmatter, so Indiana did it last
year.
Correct, I should have verifiedthat States matter, so Indiana
did it last year Correct.
I think that's importantinformation to know.
Speaker 2 (42:03):
I think it is too, in making a decision, I agree.
Speaker 3 (42:05):
Now I'd also like to know, though, medically speaking
I'd like to hear from a medicalexpert witness would it have
mattered if you had yourseatbelt on versus not having
your seatbelt on for the chippedtooth?
And to me as a juror, I wouldhope to take in some of that as
(42:28):
well.
Speaker 1 (42:28):
Well, he chipped it on the curb when he flew out of
the car.
Speaker 2 (42:34):
Would I have flown out of the car?
Sure.
Speaker 3 (42:35):
Sure, I get what you're saying.
Had I had my seatbelt on, I getwhat you're saying.
Had I had my seatbelt on, I getwhat you're saying they have a
lot of.
Speaker 5 (42:40):
I guess they've done so much research with seatbelts.
I would think they would beable to say this wasn't caused
by or was caused by.
If the person had been wearingtheir seatbelt, this is more
likely what their injuries wouldbe to this level.
Speaker 1 (42:58):
And if you've been in a bad car wreck which
unfortunately I have in Georgiathe seatbelt left a mark, sure
Like it was a clear braceagainst me from where that
happened and Eric had thematching mark on the other side.
Speaker 2 (43:09):
I wonder if no, go ahead, Continue.
Please Don't insist.
Well, I was going to change thesubject a little bit from where
you were.
Speaker 1 (43:17):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
So I'd allow you to continue.
Oh, so so I wonder if you takeinto account also.
Speaker 1 (43:25):
So I'm sure they can figure out if they had it.
Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (43:28):
You know how egregious were the defendant's
actions that caused thisaccident.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
Well, I would assume the seatbelt would have to play
a role in what happened, like ifan 18-wheeler rolls over a
truck and kills the entirefamily and everybody's still
inside the truck and no one'swearing a seatbelt.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
It won't make a difference.
Speaker 3 (43:50):
Because a Camaro you can just drive right over it.
Speaker 1 (43:54):
But if occupants are thrown out of the vehicle?
If they're thrown out of thevehicle, of course.
If they're thrown out of thevehicle but the vehicle's also
crushed and burns into flames,it may not matter.
Speaker 5 (44:04):
That's a 90% chance that not wearing a seatbelt
might have helped you Exactly,but in general, when you look at
crashes, seatbelts save, likeit's an astronomical number.
It's like 88% or something Wayhigher than not wearing a
seatbelt.
Speaker 3 (44:19):
I think that knowledge, though, should play a
role in the deciding factor ofwhatever they're going for,
whatever class action orwhatever.
I think it just again.
If it matters, why has it beenwithheld all along?
I?
Speaker 1 (44:39):
guess, why are we being?
Speaker 3 (44:40):
nefarious.
Why does it matter that?
Speaker 1 (44:43):
Sure, but we can incorporate, we can tell people
your blood alcohol level or wecan do things like that.
So why has this been withheld?
That is an odd thing, but Iwill say, at the end of the day
you think about it, it's likethe insurance companies are the
ones that are benefiting fromthis.
Speaker 2 (44:56):
They are there's actually a quote from a senator
that is against this law, sayingthat nothing in the bill
requires a single penny ofpremium reduction.
What this bill does is handmore power to the insurance
industry.
So one of the reasons for doingthis is to prevent these
nuclear verdicts and reduceinsurance premiums.
(45:20):
Yes, well, I haven't seenanything in the article, at
least, that says that there'sproof in Indiana that insurance
premiums have gone down.
Speaker 4 (45:30):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (45:31):
And we all know that price on nothing never goes down
, it just goes up.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
Well, that's not true .
There are situations whereinsurance premium never goes
down, it just goes up.
Well, that's not true.
There are situations whereinsurance premiums go down and
you do look across the countryand in different states where
they are.
Like Las Vegas is one of thehighest insurance rates for a
car you can have because theamount of accidents they have,
they're insane.
Even moving from Louisiana toOhio our car insurance dropped
(45:58):
because Louisiana has so manymore thefts than Ohio has.
Like State Farm straight upsaid here's what's up.
Speaker 2 (46:08):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (46:09):
So they certainly do take that into account.
Speaker 2 (46:12):
I understand that they'll take things like
demographics and location intoaccount, but in Georgia, with
this law now, are people goingto see their insurance rates
just reduced, because this lawis hopefully helping prevent
some of these nuclear verdicts.
Speaker 1 (46:31):
I don't know.
But I also know it's not justGeorgia premium holders, it's
also commercial trucks that gothrough there.
Speaker 2 (46:39):
Sure, I get that and commercial trucks have insurance
.
Speaker 1 (46:44):
Yes, but it even comes down to drivers and stuff.
So if you, as a driver, get ina wreck and you cause over,
whatever it is X number ofdollars in damage, most carriers
will disqualify you and you'reout, sure.
And then it's really hard to geta job again.
But a lawsuit gets factoredinto that.
So if you're in a lawsuit andthey award that person $150,000,
(47:08):
that may push you over thatthreshold, right, whereas if
they look at it and go, no, thatperson should have had their
seatbelt on.
We're not going to give youthat much money.
It could save that person's joband, as someone who owns a
trucking company and manages it,I know whatever we can do to
get our insurance rates lower.
(47:29):
We try to do so.
We started putting safetysystems on the trucks.
We've batted around the idea ofcameras.
Cameras seem like like greatidea until you get the nuts and
bolts of it and then they.
They come with a side ofliability.
Um, there's the, there's the.
Uh.
What happens if your driver didcause the wreck, which you know
fine that it's a good thing, uh.
(47:50):
But what happens, uh, if yourdriver, um, if something, gets
caught on there?
That's not trucking related,sure, but it invades the privacy
of your driver, right?
So there's a lot of like, a lotof stuff that goes along with
that.
These are even more detailedstuff that I don't want to get
into um, so cameras become achallenge, uh, but it's all to
(48:13):
drive those insurance rates down.
Insurance is a huge expense intrucking and so I can certainly
understand, from a truckingperspective, insurance companies
wanting it going down, and Ibelieve so they were talking
about in Indiana that they werecritics, were saying that the
legislation distracts from thebigger question if it actually
caused an accident, so whetheror not you had the seatbelt on
(48:34):
doesn't matter, kind of likepeople that get ticketed for or
get blamed for being drunkdriving when they didn't really
cause the accident.
So they say that that is adistraction from it.
But Chris Spear, who is thepresident and CEO of the
American Trucking Associations,said that the law provides
(48:55):
jurors more incompleteinformation to render a verdict.
So it seems like, from atrucking perspective, most
everybody's in favor for it.
It's only your localpoliticians that don't like it,
because their constituents don'tlike it.
Speaker 3 (49:13):
Sure, which is their role right, that's their role,
that's their job is to be thevoice of their constituents.
So I think it Sure.
Speaker 1 (49:16):
Which is their role?
Right, Right, that's their role, that's their job.
That's their job is to be thevoice of their constituents.
So I think it's good.
Speaker 2 (49:22):
I think it's good too .
Speaker 1 (49:23):
For me it's a blind spot.
I didn't know this wasn'tallowed in the first place.
Yeah, I didn't either I had noidea until I saw the headline, I
would have thought for sure.
Speaker 5 (49:33):
Everything I can see it says it's cleared that it's
gone through in Georgia.
Speaker 3 (49:39):
I'm assuming, way back when.
This is like somebody objectedand then there was maybe a law
that said the seatbelt thingcouldn't be brought in.
I mean, like, is that part oflegality, though?
Like you can talk about it?
I mean, I just feel like therewas a law that maybe went
against it to begin with, andnow we're trying to do something
.
Speaker 1 (49:57):
Yeah, I would think there has to be something.
Speaker 3 (49:58):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (49:59):
Maybe not even a law, but a precedent.
Speaker 3 (50:01):
That you couldn't talk about it.
Speaker 1 (50:02):
Yeah, I would think, maybe a precedent or something
that said, you know a judge thatsaid, yeah, we don't want to
hear that.
Or someone that did somethingyou know, hey, this cloud's
cause, cause.
So we don't want to cloud cause.
But I agree, if you give themthe complete picture of it then
you can factor in both cause andhey, this person was doing this
(50:24):
illegal thing.
That also contributed, right,because there are contributing
factors.
And so you know we see thatwith a lot of accidents it's not
always 100% one person's fault.
Sometimes there's a littleblame to go around everybody, or
not necessarily everybody, buta few people.
Speaker 2 (50:41):
So if I can touch on that a little bit, I went back
and looked at the article aboutthe Indiana law back in 2024.
The CEO of the AmericanTrucking Association back then,
chris Spear so same person stillback then, chris Spear, so same
person still After the bill waspassed in February allowing it.
(51:04):
He said that the existing lawforbid seatbelt uses evidence
for jurors.
So in Indiana at least therewas a law forbidding them from
knowing.
It took four years and fourattempts.
So every year for four yearsthey tried to pass this law in
Indiana allowing the seaportevidence to be put to be
presented to jurors, and itfinally passed on the fourth
(51:25):
year.
That's, that's interesting, wow.
Speaker 1 (51:27):
That is Well.
I think there's one thing Imean like.
Even back in Louisiana we saw alot of reform coming with these
crazy verdicts and theseoutrageous sums of money.
Sure, and Louisiana trying towrestle that down and make it
like, no, because that cost.
It seems like, oh well, youknow who cares if corporate
(51:48):
America loses money, but thatjust gets charged back to us, it
does, we pay it, we pay it wesure do, we sure do.
It may not be vocally said, butit comes in the form of a rate
increase the next year.
We've got anything to help keepthose costs down.
And also, the good thing aboutit is it still for the people
that are genuinely wronged?
It still allows for them to becompensated for.
(52:10):
It's not saying, hey, you can'tdo X, y or Z.
It's just saying did thiscontribute?
If it did, then you pay a partin it.
So you don't necessarily get asmuch as someone who is
completely innocent.
Speaker 3 (52:22):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (52:22):
It's your article.
If I can share one more pieceof information from the Indiana
article, also on freight wavesmillion in truck crash lawsuits
(52:44):
rose, on average, from 2.3million dollars in 2010 to 22.3
million dollars in 2018.
Wow, I mean that, that's,that's not just inflation, that
that's crazy money, you know,that's.
Speaker 1 (52:49):
That's a big difference, um it just makes me
think it's attorneys havelearned how to work a jury.
Speaker 2 (52:57):
They have?
Speaker 4 (52:58):
Oh sure they have, Because it don't help when you
see every other TV ad no.
Speaker 3 (53:06):
Or a.
Speaker 1 (53:06):
Biotrach.
It's hard to have it in partialjury when that's what everybody
in America is seeing, rightVery interesting.
Speaker 3 (53:15):
Thank you for bringing that to us.
And who knew it was notpermitted before?
Speaker 1 (53:18):
Yeah, no idea.
Speaker 3 (53:20):
I guess I would just assume it's all part of the case
, all part of the evidence.
Why are we hiding that?
Speaker 5 (53:26):
I think I don't know.
I feel like this sums it up theprimary focus is the
defendant's negligence, not theplaintiff's failure to buckle up
.
So they're like it shouldn'tmatter that person was wrong.
It doesn't matter what the notwrong person was doing.
Speaker 1 (53:46):
But I think to me it still matters.
If a person gets hit by a carand they're jaywalking is
different than a person gets hitin a car in a crosswalk with a
green crosswalk.
Speaker 5 (53:57):
Sure, I get that, agree, not saying.
I agree with that statement butI think that's what the base is
.
Speaker 3 (54:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (54:04):
Yeah Well, it's a well-formed thought sentence.
I just disagree with it.
Speaker 2 (54:09):
I think an important takeaway from this entire
conversation wear your seatbelt.
Wear your seatbelts.
Just, it's safe.
Wear your seatbelt.
Wear your seatbelts.
It's safe.
Wear your seatbelt please.
Speaker 1 (54:18):
Yeah, it does blow me away when I see the number of
accidents and people that don'twear their seatbelts.
Speaker 2 (54:24):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (54:25):
Yeah, Every now and then it happens once or twice a
year we'll get a driverdisqualified for not wearing a
seatbelt and it's like yeah ornot wearing a seatbelt, and it's
like yeah, Like or not wearinga seatbelt properly.
That one gets a little gray tome because in a big vehicle like
that the upper part doesn't doas much as it does in a car, I
(54:48):
understand.
So I still wear my seatbeltproperly every time because it's
the law.
But I have a little empathy forthose situations With the
people that don't wear one atall.
Yeah, it just blows my mindbecause a truck is relatively
safe.
You're a huge item, so when youhit something, the entire truck
(55:10):
absorbs the impact, sure, andit actually doesn't impact, like
it doesn't impact the drivernearly as much as it does
whatever you hit.
It's kind of the school busthing, right, like school buses
don't generally have seatbelts.
A lot of them do, but when I wasgrowing up they didn't.
They didn't when I was either.
And even now that they havethem, they're mostly lap belts
(55:31):
and the reality is like they'renot very effective because
there's so little energy.
Like you think, like oh my gosh, a school bus just hit a brick
wall and came to a stop rightand everybody flew forward if
they were wearing a seat belt.
Well, there's so much energy inthat truck, in that bus that
that it are so much mass thatabsorbs so much energy that a
(55:54):
kid it's kind of a weird thought.
But flying forward into thatpadded cushion of a back seat
doesn't really sustain much harm, like it's pretty safe
situation.
You think, like that's crazy,you can't imagine, but but it
kind of is, whereas a seat beltyou could actually uh, kind of
fold yourself in half, talkyourself, cause back injuries
(56:16):
and things like that.
So it's not like a super whenyou're driving.
They are relatively safe.
But it is very easy to get in acar wreck or a truck wreck and
get thrown out of your truck.
Sure, that is still somethingthat's pretty, especially on the
Cascadias and VolvosInternationals with the big,
huge windshields those are easyto fly out of and drivers still
(56:41):
drive with no seatbelt.
Speaker 3 (56:42):
I just don't get it.
Roll it over, a wind gusts andblows you over Any of that.
Where are you going to go ifyou're not attached to your seat
?
Speaker 1 (56:51):
And you're in a huge cab, so there's lots of room for
you to move around Seatbelt,wear your seatbelt.
And if you see your drivingpartner not wearing a seatbelt,
tell them put your seatbelt on.
Speaker 5 (57:05):
I would like to keep my partner so we can keep our
job.
Speaker 1 (57:08):
If you don't like that thing rubbing against your
shoulder, because I know a lotof people don't they've got
these big fluffy padded thingsyou can buy and put them on,
yeah, and they take all thatpaint away.
They're actually kind of nice,so definitely like.
There's options out there.
If you don't like it, there'sways to get around it and
(57:31):
tolerate it.
It's not worth losing your jobover.
It's not worth losing your lifeover.
All right.
So we have an option I'm goingto poll the audience and we're
going to do it live that way.
You all see it.
We've gone long.
Shocking.
We have to discuss an elementof high-filled trucks, per the
request.
Jerry and I identified italready and we missed it last
(57:54):
week.
We can talk about it now, butit's going to be another
discussion week.
And we can talk about it now,but it's going to be another
discussion, or we can table itfor next week.
Your choice.
It's riveting.
Speaker 3 (58:08):
I hear crickets in my head Chirp, chirp.
Speaker 1 (58:12):
I think that if I talk about it now, I won't be
able to do it justice.
Speaker 3 (58:18):
So let's table it.
Speaker 1 (58:19):
So we'll table it.
Speaker 3 (58:20):
Is it a specific viewer?
Speaker 1 (58:23):
No, it's just continuing the Highfield story.
Speaker 3 (58:26):
Oh, I think you should table it and start next
week with it All right.
We'll do that or next episode.
Speaker 1 (58:30):
So next episode, we will start up in front and we
are going to talk about are youready, drum roll?
I front, and we are going totalk about are you ready, drum
roll?
I don't have a drum roll, Ican't.
There you go.
I don't know if that's actuallypicking up.
Anyways, we're going to talkabout lift gates.
Ooh, lift gates, yes, and boydo I have some thoughts.
Speaker 3 (58:51):
I like to put the Traeger on it, but until next
time, hit that like button ifyou like us.
Speaker 1 (59:00):
Our thumbs up button if you like us.
If you don't like us, hit thatdown thumbs arrow twice.
Really, let people know youdon't like us.
Drop us a comment below.
We see some of y'all arecommenting.
We appreciate that.
Anything you can do to helpsupport our channel definitely
helps us out.
Anything you can do to helpsupport our channel definitely
(59:21):
helps us out.
Speaker 4 (59:22):
If you want to reach out to us, you can email us.
You can email us attheouterbellpodcast at gmailcom,
or visit us athighfieldtruckingcom if you're
interested in learning moreabout Highfield or joining the
Highfield fleet.
Speaker 3 (59:35):
You can call 833-field, which is 833-493-4353
, option one, and you can speakto either delena or myself.
We'd give you lots ofinformation over the phone,
monday through friday, 8 am to 6pm eastern time.
You can also do live chat onour website.
I'd be happy to respond to youthere.
(59:56):
You can do Facebook Messenger.
I do a lot of those as well, soreach out, ask your questions.
Speaker 2 (01:00:08):
Comments.
Speaker 3 (01:00:09):
What?
Speaker 1 (01:00:10):
That's all I got Anybody else anything?
No Going once twice.
Well, thank you all so much forhanging out with us.
We look forward to seeing younext time.
In the meantime, wear yourseatbelt, stay safe.
Make good decisions.
Speaker 4 (01:00:27):
Wear your seatbelt and don't leave money on the
table.
Wear your seatbelt and don'ttext and drive and keep visual
atonement.
Speaker 5 (01:00:34):
Good night, good night, bye, bye, bye, goodnight
bye, thank you.
Boogity, boogity, boogity, let's go racing boys.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Hey everybody, welcome to the Outer Belt.
I'm Patrick and you know myfriends.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
Shirley Buttermilk.
Speaker 4 (00:18):
Eric.
Speaker 3 (00:18):
Zucchini bread.
I'm so glad you're back.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
And Jerry oh man, it's the whole crew.
We're all here again.
Finally, we got her back fromthe great state of Montana.
And Jerry oh man, it's thewhole crew.
We're all here again.
Finally, we got her back fromthe great state of Montana.
Woman power.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
He got it right.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
I pay attention and I have it written down on a cliff
note, but still.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
As you should, as you should.
As a good Boy Scout, beprepared, you, always be
prepared you wear your badgesall that stuff, I thought about
be prepared.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
You wear your badges.
All that stuff, I thought aboutbeing prepared.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
The one.
I went to Montana badge.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
I went to Montana and I survived, and all I got was a
stinking badge.
Speaker 1 (00:49):
No, I also got some huckleberry pancake mix, oh,
okay.
Speaker 5 (00:52):
All right I didn't get the pancake mix, but I got
caramels and some.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
Did you get the huckleberry syrup?
No, oh, it tastes just likeblueberry from IHOP I thought it
tasted like strawberries.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
myself Does it On a summer evening.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Huh, I don't know how to go from there.
So, speaking of being prepared,I just did the round trip to
Bolt Custom Trucks in Indiana.
Yes, you did, and I thoughtabout our good friends over at
Expeditor Boogie.
Yes and of course we're talkingabout Jerry, of course, and
(01:31):
he's a good guy.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
He's a good guy.
He's a good guy.
We talk bad about him sometimes.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
We talk bad about him .
He truly is a good guy Most ofthe time, but he's a good guy,
yeah, he means well, anyways,anyways.
So I went over to Bolt CustomTrucks.
I was thinking about himbecause I left at 4 pm in the
afternoon, actually closer to 5.
, and I was just going to gothere and come right back, get
back home around midnight and Iwas like that's cool, I can do
(01:55):
this.
So I grabbed my usual bag withmy permit book in there and
water and 5-hour energy and allthat stuff and I head out of
town at about halfway to FortWindy and I was like boy, I hope
this truck starts, because Ididn't bring any clothes.
I didn't bring a spare anything,I'm like if I have to get a
(02:15):
hotel while I'm here, I ammaking a trip to Walmart, so
luckily everything worked fine.
It all panned out good, didn'teven have to use the jump box
and was able to get back safeand sound.
Speaker 3 (02:28):
Good Way back before midnight.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
So my Boy Scout badge would have been ripped off of
my shirt For preparation.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
Yeah, I did see the jump box was still at 80% this
morning so I got it on thecharger, so we're ready for the
next time.
Very cool, yeah, good deal.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Do you have to put it on the floorboards this time of
year or is it holding charges?
Like in the wintertime, youhave to get it toasty.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
It holds its charge, no problem, but it wants to be
warm in order for it to providemax power.
Speaker 1 (02:56):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (02:57):
So I also learned that if it has the cold error on
it, it'll still work.
It just won't provide max powerwhen it's cold.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
I see.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
So, you can start a go-kart.
Right exactly, you couldn'tstart the Jeep, but you could
start a go-kart, or maybe like aVolkswagen Bug, if you put the
jump box on there.
Speaker 2 (03:16):
The original, and then you pushed it and popped
the clutch.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Well, you need the extra weight for leverage Going
downhill.
You know it's something aboutphysics.
I have a fun fact Go ahead.
Speaker 5 (03:27):
It doesn't matter how long the jump box is on there.
If the truck is not neutral, itstill won't start.
Speaker 1 (03:33):
Oh, what a fun fact, this is true.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
I got another one for you.
Did you just learn of this Sortof?
Speaker 1 (03:40):
It also doesn't matter how long the jump box is
plugged in and how many timesyou run through the cycle.
If your negative post hasaccidentally popped off because
you didn't have a good grip, ittoo will not work.
Speaker 5 (03:51):
That'll cause a problem too, so just some good
troubleshooting, you know ideas?
Huh yeah, Neutral.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
Imagine that I know right.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
I tell you what if I drove a truck anymore, like, how
do do I?
That's the wrong way ofphrasing it on a regular basis
if I was yes, if I drove truckon a regular basis, I would buy
one of those things and have itwith me all the time.
Oh yeah, you know, apus fail,chargers fail, like to be able
to just grab like, oh, battery'sdead.
Let me just grab this thing andwe're off the races.
(04:21):
Nice little that it's such ahandy little tool.
Speaker 3 (04:24):
I would have one.
I think about when Vince and Ifirst started.
Speaker 1 (04:26):
Back in 1847.
Yes.
What the protocol was, whichwas you had to get a branding
iron really hot and then you hitthe back of the horse.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
Well, or sometimes you had to call a tow company
out to jump you.
We still do.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
We still do, yeah, we still do, we still do.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
Not in the yard, you mean when we first started in
the yard, when we first startedin the yard the trucks that were
.
Speaker 3 (04:49):
We did have Rusty's, the trucks that we had in the
yard.
That was your way to get themto fire off.
You had to call.
You had to wait hours He'dfinally arrive and then it would
jump, and Vincent a littleresearch.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
We could jump a truck in the yard with jumper cables
and another truck and anothertruck.
When we had to call Rusty's waswhen the truck was out of fuel
in the yard.
Oh, maybe that's what it wasand we had to get them to fuel
it and then jump it, because theAPU doesn't run with no fuel
either.
So that's when we used to callRusty's.
We haven't called Rusty's outin quite some time.
Speaker 3 (05:25):
I'm sure.
More on top of making sure ourtrucks are fueled, and I think
it's a great investment though,too, even if that's what you
were doing and also I didn't do-the research.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
Patrick had already purchased that before he left,
and it arrived when we werethere.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
It's a nice, it was a nice addition.
It's a nice, it was a niceaddition.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
It's paid for itself over and over, oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
I found it and they've gotten cheaper.
They're actually.
You'd think something like thatwould get more expensive.
They've actually gotten a lotcheaper.
I was at our good friend's downat ELW and I was going to get a
truck jumped off.
Battery was dead Again and hecame over in his Dodge like he
(06:12):
normally does.
He's got a big engine so hecould usually just jump a truck
off with his truck's battery,and so I was kind of business as
usual, and he walks out withthis little tiny
lunchbox-looking thing and I'mlike what is that?
And he's like we're going tojump your truck off and I'm like
with that, yeah, not a chance.
Speaker 3 (06:21):
And it does, it looks like a little lunchbox.
Speaker 1 (06:25):
It fires off like it's perfectly fine, yeah, like
it doesn't even.
It's, you know, like a normal,like you're jumping off a car.
It's just vroom, vroom, vroom,vroom, vroom, vroom, vroom,
vroom.
It's like vroom, like thebatteries in the's all lithium,
I think.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
When we used to go over to TK and a truck would sit
there long enough, it wouldhave the same problem the
battery died or something.
They used to wheel out the bigstand-up charger that's four
feet tall and have to runextension cords to the shop and
had to sit there for a couplehours to charge the batteries.
I remember that, and now theyhave one it's actually a lot
(07:05):
smaller that works pretty wellas well.
Yeah, and then the guys over atCarrier did the same thing.
They finally invested in oneand they worked great.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
I remember that one that old fighter used to have
and they'd walk out to your carand it was on a dolly, two big
giant wheels, and they'd plug itup and they'd hit it and it'd
be as it's trying to like, andthen that one.
We would get started that wayand sometimes it wouldn't, and
if it didn't have enough chargeit was like, oh my gosh, gotta
bring it all the way back.
(07:34):
It was always a hassle, uh.
And they eventually moved tothe smaller portable ones.
But my favorite was cap citytrailers theirs they took a golf
cart.
They were like screw this,hauling this crap around a golf
cart on the.
They took a golf cart.
They were like screw this,hauling this crap around A golf
cart.
On the back of the golf cartwhere the back seat would be.
They put in like a bank of likefour or six batteries and then
(07:54):
had the little control moduleand then that's what they used
to jump vehicles off.
Wow, they just drove up to you,but I think now they've moved to
a jump box.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Everybody's moving to those things.
They're all using this, exceptfor TK.
They're all using that same onewe have.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
You know, there was a truck that was broke down or
something.
I don't remember the situationaround it entirely, but Jimmy
had to go out.
It was near where they livedand Jimmy had to go.
I think we had already movedthe team to another truck or
something.
I can't remember all thedetails, but Jimmy had to go
pick the truck up and he droveout.
(08:30):
There wasn't sure if thebattery was dead or not, and so
he went into his localO'Reilly's.
They didn't have a large enoughbox for that size engine, so he
got one that was for like a 7liter and his idea was we'll
charge it, we'll try it.
If it doesn't work, we'llreturn it.
Sure, but it fired the engineoff.
(08:50):
Yeah, and he said it was deaddead when he got to it, hooked
up to it and it fired it rightoff so.
I don't think it can do repeatedones like ours can do.
It can do multiples.
Speaker 3 (08:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
We can jump a lot of trucks off with ours on our
single charge.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
I don't think that one can, but it had enough power
to get it done once, and that'skind of all you need then
charge it back up.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
Yeah, nice, that world has come so far, but again
the one I've got, like I keep apersonal one in my vehicle.
It's a small one.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
It's a couple hundred dollars.
Yeah, like they're notexpensive at all.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
The good ones are not expensive at all.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Seems like a small investment, for if you had to
wait for somebody to come, youknow.
Yes, because you're on vacationand then you've got to wait for
somebody to come jump you offor whatever else.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
Ours has paid for itself over and over again.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Not just in having to pay Russies to come out, but in
our time, yes, you know to getthe jumper cables out, get
another truck in position whereyou can reach it and that kind
of stuff.
It's paid for itself just inour time, Absolutely so.
Speaker 1 (09:48):
Yep, no, I think it's great.
I definitely would have jumpercables.
We always did have jumpercables on the truck, but I would
also have that.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Yeah, we did also.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
There's nothing like asking somebody hey, can you
give me a jump?
Oh, do you have have cables too?
Speaker 1 (10:05):
you know it's a lot easier when you hold the cables
up and say can I get a jump andthey're more apt to help you
that way, especially with a bigcommercial truck having the
heavy duty cables?
I mean, my jumper cables were ahundred dollars at walmart they
were the heaviest ones.
They made and they're plentygood, um, but you get.
You know, normal person, theirnormal car has the 15, 20 jumper
cables.
They can't handle that muchcurrent and you talk about risk
(10:25):
of fires and stuff like that.
A couple little things to makelife on the road easier.
Batteries die.
It happens all the time, allthe time.
Just being prepared for itdefinitely takes that situation
from bad to horrible.
Because, imagine, you've got towait on a jump, so we have to
turn this load down.
Yeah, we have to pull off aload because we're wait on a
jump, so we have to turn thisload down.
(10:46):
Yeah, you know we have to pulloff a load because we're waiting
on a jump Again.
Something like that could payfor itself in one jump, sure.
But I did get some really greatnews this weekend that I wanted
to talk to you all about, orthis week.
So, as you all know, one of myroles here at Highfield is to
plan out truck purchases andwork with the dealerships and
figure out when we're going tobuy equipment and we're not
going to buy equipment.
(11:06):
And I've been hyper, uber,crazy, stressed, because 2026 is
supposed to be the year oftruck purchases.
Everybody and their brother isdoing it.
It's an absolute nightmarebecause in 2027, the EPA changes
that are coming out areextremely strict and, as of
(11:29):
right now, paccar has an enginethat is clean enough to meet
those standards, and it's 2025.
Let's keep things in mind thisis a year and a half away.
Paccar has an engine that'sclean enough to meet those
guidelines, and nobody elseReally.
So Kenworth and Peterbilt theyhave an engine that's clean
enough to meet those guidelines.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
And nobody else Really.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
So Kenworth and Peterbilt they have an engine
and no one else does.
So Cummins has an engine thatthey say is almost done it
should make the guidelines andthey've invested some ungodly
amount of money into gettingthis engine to meet all the
(12:07):
clean air requirements andeverything.
And they're talking $30,000,$40,000 premiums on top of
whatever we're paying for trucksnow for this new engine.
I don't believe Detroit has asolution yet.
I think they're still workingon it and I don't think Navistar
, which is international.
I don't think they have one forit yet.
I haven't seen anything comeout from Volvo about it either.
(12:28):
Now maybe they do and they'rejust waiting to release it, but
I haven't seen it out yet.
So it's been a bit of a panicbecause everybody's going like,
well, these engines A, they'regoing to jack the price up way
high.
It's a brand new technology.
None of us know if it's goingto work out.
We, like Eric and I inHighfield, have been victims of
a new EPA control system comingout.
(12:51):
That was a nightmare and almostbankrupted our company Called
the Ardhead yes, the Ardheadfiasco with Caterpillar.
So what everybody's doing is in2026, they're planning on buying
tons of trucks, thousands andthousands and thousands of
trucks.
Truck manufacturers have beenkind of waiting on this to
(13:12):
happen, talking with theirsuppliers, making sure they're
going to have enough equipmentto build all these things,
talking about when they want toadd on the additional staff, be
able to do the multiple shifts.
It's been a big deal.
That's been coming now for awhile and everybody's kind of
been sitting getting ready forit and it's truly terrifying of
like when they release thosespots.
(13:33):
If you don't immediately get onit, you're not going to get a
truck, and then your next optionis going to be one of these
2027 models, which is going tobe unproven technology.
It's going to cost way moremoney, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker 3 (13:45):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (13:46):
So it's been a big, big, big stress point.
Everybody's been freaking outabout it and, as of a week or so
ago, the EPA, with the Trumpadministration, has officially
rolled back that requirement.
How'd they put it?
They've overturned rules.
(14:06):
They call it the greatest andmost consequential day of
deregulation in US history.
I think that's a bit much.
I think that's just theadministration doing what they
always do.
But it is, I think, a huge win,you could say, for the trucking
(14:29):
community, Because it's clearthat we need to keep pushing
these greenhouse gases down.
And I think you know unlessyou're a rolling coal kind of
person, like there is someclimate change that we can
affect on it, but the technologyis not there and the scramble
has not been good.
Those EPA measurements theybasically said, like we're not
(14:49):
going to do it right now, let'sput it back in the EPA's hand,
come out with some new timeframeto implement these things, give
these manufacturers a littlemore time to make it happen.
But what that has effectivelydone is they have destroyed that
not destroyed, but they havegotten rid of that whole buying
frenzy that's about to happen.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
So will they have too much product.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
No, because they haven't started building yet.
Speaker 5 (15:16):
Is that a good thing, then, or a bad thing?
Speaker 1 (15:18):
So it depends on where you sit on this.
It does so.
If you're a truckingmanufacturer, the truck sales
are already pretty good.
They're not great, they couldbe better.
Truck sales have definitelyslowed down, but they're pretty
good.
People are starting to buyagain.
If you are a dealership andyou've not been selling trucks,
(15:41):
it probably kind of stinks, butfrom a fleet perspective, from
the end user perspective, it'sgreat news.
You know, coming out of thiskind of bad economy situation or
this recession freightrecession we've been in, a lot
of trucking companies are kindof weighing the whole.
We need to buy these truckswhen we can, but we also don't
(16:04):
have the money to do it.
Interest rates are pretty high,so that affects companies,
because companies borrow moneyto buy trucks.
So it's like compounding issues.
It's the trucks are expensive,the interest so the money is
expensive and oh yeah, there'sbeen a freight recession so they
already don't have a lot ofmoney to work with.
(16:24):
So there's been a lot of fleetsthat have been kind of like what
do we do in this type ofsituation?
Because there's people that youknow if you've got a two or
three-year-old truck, you mayhave wanted to run that thing
out to five years.
But they're now saying you know,I'm going to go ahead up with a
2027.
Because if you get a 2829, wellthen it's been out there for a
(16:45):
couple of years, so it's not asscary, and so it's been a huge
stress point on fleets notknowing how they're going to be
able to afford these things andhow they're going to be able to
buy them.
And even again, if you even canget them, because it's going to
be the ones that don't alreadyhave them that are going to be
taking the brunt of it.
So we've been looking at it andgoing like all right, how do we
(17:06):
, how do we play this?
Do we want to, um, order abunch of trucks in 26?
Can we order a bunch of trucksin 26?
Do we need to get those?
And when I say 2026, you haveto order them in 2025 to give
them a 2026.
So they're, they're fresh onour plate of conversation and
this just just drasticallyreduced changed that.
(17:27):
Personally, as an end user, assomeone who runs these trucks,
it makes me happy.
Speaker 3 (17:32):
How long is the delay for?
Speaker 1 (17:35):
They haven't said yet .
So they basically got rid ofthe rule and said EPA.
You need to work on this andfigure it out.
Speaker 3 (17:40):
So could it come back and still be 2027?
Speaker 1 (17:43):
Doubtful, doubtful.
Yeah, I don't think that'sgoing to happen.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
Yeah, it's the administration, the EPA of the
current administration.
It's just like the Californialaw we talked about, where
California withdrew theirrequest for CARB stuff because
of the current EPA.
So it's very doubtful.
So it may come back in the nextcycle with a new administration
, but there'll still be thattime limit.
(18:06):
You have a few years on this,and you'll have time after that
too, because they still have togo through all the processes.
The regulatory processesactually make the rule, and then
you have to have time forpeople to actually be able to
buy the equipment.
Speaker 1 (18:20):
It's still a few years away, but yeah it
certainly could come back.
It's also possible that itcomes back with this
administration.
Right, it is possible that youknow, towards the end of the
Trump administration, that theydo release these rules.
I mean, you know the EPA stillis trying to reduce greenhouse
gases no matter who's in officegases, no matter who's in office
(18:46):
.
Now it may be they're not asstrict or they change some rules
, but they in general they'renot loosening things up so much
that it's like wild wild west.
I mean, trump was in in 2016 16to 2020.
Yeah yeah, and in those years hedidn't remove uh any of the uh
trucking uh greenhouse gasregulations and, as a matter of
fact, in so there's 2012, or2010 was the first one.
(19:09):
I think there was a 2017 or2018 greenhouse gas increase or
not increase, but a stricterrule that played on through.
So I mean, he's neverrestricted them before.
This is the first time they arerestricting it and it is
literally because the industryis going we're not ready yet.
Speaker 3 (19:27):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
This is about to cause a disaster.
Speaker 3 (19:31):
Especially, like you said, there doesn't sound like
very many manufacturers areready for it.
You said Paccar, and that wasit.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
Paccar and Cummins is about to be there.
Speaker 3 (19:41):
About.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Yes, so, like, even when you look at on the so we
run heavy-duty trucks, right?
So we run Class 8 heavy-dutytrucks.
We have Class 8 engines.
These are million-mile trucks,like when you hear people talk
about a million-mile truck,these are the ones.
Our engines, transmissions,everything is designed to last
that long.
The engines are wet-sleeve,which means, if you know what I
(20:08):
imagine, a piston going up anddown the cylinder, the wall that
surrounds the piston, um, on anormal like your car, is all a
part of that that big giantblock of iron.
On a commercial truck, that isa class eight.
It's a wet sleeve, which means,um, you can actually there's a
thin layer of metal around thatpiston that you can actually
remove and put a brand new onein.
So it takes all the abuse ofthat piston going up and the
(20:29):
fire and the combustion andeverything, and then when it's
petered out, when it's no longergood and it doesn't have a good
seal, they can literally justremove that and put a brand new
one in there.
Speaker 3 (20:38):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (20:39):
And the block and everything stays the same.
So these are really well-built,long-lasting machines.
A Class 7 truck or class sixmedium duty is what they call
that.
Those do not have wet sleeves,so they are like your car.
When the engine's junked youcan rebuild some elements of it,
but the majority of them you'rejust taking the engine out,
(20:59):
putting a new one in.
Usually at that point yourtruck's done.
You're not going to do all that, but on those right now you can
buy those from Cummins, you canbuy them from Paccar, you can
buy them from who's the otherguy?
Cummins, paccar, detroit andDetroit and PACCAR have already
(21:21):
said we're out.
So with these new greenhousegas emissions, cummins is the
only one that's selling thosemedium-duty engines.
So it doesn't matter.
In a couple of years when youbuy a medium-duty truck, you
will only have Cummins as anoption.
It doesn't matter what brand youchoose, but it's because the
(21:42):
cost of developing these newemission systems are so
incredibly high.
I mean, you think of like thesecompanies are billion-dollar
companies but they don't have abillion dollars in free cash
sitting there to pour into R&D.
So a lot of them are takingwhat caterpillar did in 2009 or
10 when they said we're out,we're not doing this anymore.
(22:03):
It's cheaper just to focus onsomething else than it is to
design these engines for thesubmission system, so um heather
has a question yes, ma'am justwant to make sure I'm
understanding.
Speaker 5 (22:15):
So the reason of the frenzy is because if you buy the
trucks before 2027, you're kindof grandfathered into not
having to meet the EPA standards.
Okay.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
Yes.
So that's why, yeah, emissionstandards are for that calendar
year.
Speaker 5 (22:32):
So they start anything that year are new or
made Correct, okay.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
Yes, and there are things like EPA credits.
They can do so.
For a long time, detroit Dieselwas actually selling clean air
credits to International becausetheir MaxForce engine was not
clean enough.
It didn't meet the standards.
It was close but not quite, andso for every pound of
(22:57):
greenhouse gas that theydetermined that this thing
wasn't as good as they had tobuy credits from other companies
that exceeded the greenhousegas rules.
So detroit was running cleanerthan what was required so that
they had leftover tax or epacredits.
They were actually able to buythem from detroit and and do
that, and that they wereprobably buying some from
(23:20):
Detroit, some from Volvo, somefrom Cummins, like just to meet
demand.
And that's one of the bigreasons why Volkswagen Group had
to step in and buy them,because they blew all their
money on tax credits and theynever could get that engine the
way they wanted it.
It's also what gave them such abad name.
I mean, those Max Force engineswere just garbage, absolute
garbage, and it was all becauseof the emissions stuff they put
(23:43):
on it.
Again, I don't think this isgoing to kind of what you're
saying.
I don't think it's going tokill the emissions mandate, it's
just delaying it.
I do think it's going to comeright back in a few years Just
giving them a little longer.
Absolutely Well, and then?
Speaker 3 (24:01):
maybe somebody doesn't monopolize, you know,
give those other companies timeto catch up and get their engine
where it needs to be, and soit's a little more equal
opportunity for selling, buying,purchasing power, that kind of
thing Absolutely I get it.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
Well, and you look at like at the EPA 2010,.
Then there was the 2014, 15, 16, whatever it was.
Everybody was able to do a fewminor changes to meet those new
standards, and so there wasn't alot of pushback.
This new line of standards isjust going so far that it's like
(24:34):
, oh, we have to rethinkeverything.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Well, it doesn't sound like an even playing field
for selling of product.
You know, maybe that's whereit's coming from.
You know, if the only one thathas it is Paccar and you've got
three others who are your majormanufacturers and they're not
even close, how's that equal?
Yes, you know kind of threeagainst one's take it to.
(24:59):
I mean, I don't know how it allshook out, but to me that's
kind of you know well, and andcummins will sell to anyone they
don't care, but pat car won't?
Speaker 1 (25:07):
packers only gonna put their engines in peterbilt's
or kenworth's period.
So it's not even like you couldbuy a freightliner with a pack
car engine in it, sure.
So it's very interesting.
I know I'm trying to convey howstrong of an issue this is.
So Ford and Chevrolet slash GMCtrucks slash International, and
(25:36):
I put all them together becausethey actually Chevy, gmc and
International all build theirtrucks in the same exact factory
.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (25:45):
And then Ford builds theirs separately.
But they are all supposed to bedoing better when this comes
around because they havegasoline options, not because
they have a better diesel,because if gasoline, gasoline
isn't impacted by these it hasan impact about these.
Cummins just released theirvery first gasoline-powered
engine ever Wow Because of thisregulation.
(26:10):
So it's a big, big, big deal inthe industry.
There's been lots of R&D goingbehind the scenes, lots of.
Speaker 3 (26:17):
So they're trying to get away from diesel.
So they're trying to get awayfrom diesel.
Speaker 1 (26:20):
No, they're trying to get away from diesel.
Diesel is actually better thangasoline.
It's just that those gasengines don't have that same
standard.
Speaker 3 (26:27):
I see.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
Because there's so few of them.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
If you're going to buy a big truck, you're probably
not going to put a gasolineengine in it.
So there's so few regulationsthat Cummins came out with this
engine to give peoplealternative.
You don't want to buy thatuntried, untrue uh diesel.
So interesting, it's definitelya.
It's a weird world.
We're living in the economicsof it, with that big pre-buy not
(26:52):
going to happen anymore and, um, I mean again, for years we've
been talking about this.
It's literally been something.
We've been talking about this.
It's literally been somethingwe've been talking about since
like 2020 leading up to 2026gonna be the time to buy.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
Yes it's.
Speaker 1 (27:03):
it's literally been a point of conversation for that
long and, uh, the fact that itis now kind of with the stroke
of a pen scrapped and everybodyjust took a gigantic sigh of
relief, it's just wild.
Speaker 5 (27:21):
Do you think there's going to be an overflow of
trucks?
Because they were anticipatingthis as well.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
No, they haven't built them.
I think, yeah, I think we'refar enough out that they don't
that, they wouldn't have gottenthat far in the process, yep,
yep.
And who knows what CARB will do.
Carb could always come back andsay well, if you want to sell a
truck in our state, then youhave to meet these greenhouse
gas emissions, or something.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
Well, that's what the California pulled, though, back
in February, where they werepetitioning for a waiver to set
their own rules.
Yeah, and they pulled thatpetition because they figured
the EPA wasn't going to go forit.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Well, you know what's crazy is?
They pulled that, but they leftin their carb testing.
Speaker 2 (28:00):
Well, I think they left in the things they already
had a waiver for.
Speaker 1 (28:03):
If there's a waiver already there.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
They didn't bother it because it's already approved.
They're just enforcing it moreWell.
The enforcement started onJanuary 1st of 24, but, yes, now
they're enforcing it a littlebit stronger.
Speaker 1 (28:16):
Well, that's just some crazy changes in our
industry, some things that havebrought me great relief, and I
thought I would share that withyou all because it's huge
impacts on our industry.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
And one thing I'm curious too, talking about how
it could change, is the Bidenadministration said all the
Class 8 trucks got together.
So Volvo, Daimler Internationaland Navistar and PACCAR all got
together and petitioned the EPAand the president to allow them
(28:53):
to factor in aerodynamics of thetruck into lowering those
greenhouse gases, to factor inaerodynamics of the truck into
lowering those greenhouse gases.
So in other words, if they'resaying like you need to get that
down to 10 miles per gallonwhich I know it's way more than
that, but let's say that's whatit is Then they wanted to say
well, if we built an engine thatwas pretty efficient but we
could also do some thingsaerodynamically to make it even
(29:15):
more efficient and the wholepackage meets your requirements,
can we do that?
And the EPA and the Bidenadministration said no, this
really just focuses on yourengine and you have to stick
with that.
So I'd be interested to see ifthat becomes a part of the new
ruling once they do roll it outeventually.
Sure, because that's a waywhere they can.
(29:36):
You know, maybe the enginedoesn't have to be as difficult
to produce if we canaerodynamically make it a little
more slippery through the airso it's using less fuel.
Speaker 3 (29:48):
Sure Gonna have a bunch of like Disney bullet
trains driving down the road,that's right.
Speaker 5 (29:56):
Tesla looking at.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
I don't know I just was thinking something
aerodynamic.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
You've got the Shell Super Truck which is right here.
That's slippery.
Yes, look at that thing, gotthat little cone nose on it and
everything.
Not cone nose but raked nose.
That's a slippery sucker, thatthing.
You know it's crazy.
They've been able to get prettygood fuel economy out of it.
But if you go back to theoriginal, which is this old
(30:25):
Peterbilt cab over, I was goingto say a cab over probably gets
no aerodynamics.
They don't.
But if you look at thisPeterbilt cab over right here so
you see the similarity, right,it looks like the Shell Starship
, I think is what they call it,they do.
Is way more aerodynamic thanthe 372.
So you see, the 372 is acamover.
(30:48):
It's very basic, and all theydid was put the ever so
slightest curve on the front ofit and the windshield, and then
they added all the fairings andstuff which were not common.
So this truck came out in 1988.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
The cab over the cab over did?
Speaker 1 (31:09):
yes, the Peterbilt 372.
It's funny because a lot ofpeople say it's the Darth Vader
looking one.
Yeah, but it kind of reminds meof the old Honda Pil pilots
that they called the white oneswere Stormtroopers.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
No, that's a Honda Ridgeline.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
Yeah, Ridgeline.
Yes, yes, had one of those, sothis one being the Darth Vader.
But even like, look at themirrors, they're pretty standard
mirrors from back in the day.
They're not super aerodynamic.
This truck Well, let me go back.
So the, the super new modernstarship, gets got 10.8 miles
(31:45):
per gallon.
That's what they were able to do, which, if you think, about 80
000 pounds at 10.8 miles pergallon, that's pretty impressive
that's super impressive um, nowthey weren't going very fast
and aerodynamics played a lot toit, and they had all these
experimental gear ratios andyada, yada, yada, that was 2018.
In 1988, 30 years prior, thePeterbilt 372 got consistently
(32:08):
over 11 miles per gallon.
Speaker 3 (32:10):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Consistently Isn't that insane Very much.
Speaker 4 (32:15):
Could it haul the same weight?
Speaker 1 (32:16):
Yes, they were both doing 80,000 pounds.
It's just unbelievable.
But now, as far as which iscleaner, even though the
Peterbilt got better fueleconomy, it was definitely doing
a lot more to pollute the world.
They had no what's an emissionin 1988?
The only emissions they wereworried about back then were
cars and getting let out, but no, these things.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
I wonder if a part of that is how they closed the gap
between the trailer and the cab.
Speaker 4 (32:44):
I wondered about that On the Peterbilt.
Definitely be, better airstream.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
Versus that space there.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
I'm sure that's absolutely you know it's part of
it.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
The idea is you get that gap as small as possible
right yeah, but then you limityour turning radius and that
type of thing.
It is what I love about thePeterbilt 372.
Is this ad right here, becausethey didn't do aerodynamics back
then, but they straight up callit out.
You know, comparing the roundedkind of it's so not rounded, I
(33:16):
mean, it is just barely.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
Barely yeah, but.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
And how they're comparing it to the front end of
a bullet and showing how theairflow goes around.
Again, this was reallyunprecedented stuff.
The only truck really beforethis came out was in like 86 or
something, was the T600 fromKenworth, which, again
Peterbilt-Kenworth being thesame company or owned by the
same company, it's notsurprising.
(33:40):
One does an aerodynamic andthen the other one does another
aerodynamic.
Sure, they weren't reallytalking about this back then.
It wasn't really a concern, youknow.
Speaker 2 (33:47):
No, because fuel was cheap, mm-hmm.
Speaker 1 (33:49):
Yes, yep, and you know back if you go back even
further in the 70s, when fuelwas not cheap, trucking was
regulated so it wasn't really afair market for trucking or for
freight.
So if fuel was expensive,people just had to pay it.
(34:10):
You know like customers had topay it.
It is what it is.
When they deregulated, thatreally pushed the pricing down,
but that got a lot of people inthe environment and so, yeah,
it's just I don't know.
I love this, the stuff whereit's like all these old trucks
and uh, and then seeing whatthey could do back in the 80s,
which 88, I guess, feels like,does it feel like yesterday?
Speaker 5 (34:35):
sometimes for of us, maybe more than others Exactly.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
I'd like to not revisit 88.
That's when I graduated highschool.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
This truck was just coming out it was.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
I was too young to drive it.
Still I was 13.
Speaker 3 (34:55):
Fresh teenager I was.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
I'm not going to talk about how old I was, graduated
high school, yeah, junior high.
Speaker 3 (35:11):
I was junior high, eighth grade Junior high, maybe
ninth, eighth, ninth.
Speaker 2 (35:17):
It snowed in Baton Rouge in 89 yeah, back in 88 we
were doing the WAP the WAP noneof you will get that, but
there's someone out therethat'll understand that I made a
little bit of money, I think.
Speaker 5 (35:29):
I did.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
It was a dance, it was a dance yeah huh, there's a
few people out there that'll getthat, but not many back in the
80s.
Speaker 3 (35:39):
Well, if you know that.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
Please let us know and comment.
Speaker 5 (35:43):
I think you just feel so old.
Speaker 3 (35:46):
I still feel old, hashtag Vins or something.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
Hashtag Chili Wap.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
That's right.
Did you want to demonstrate itfor us?
So people know I will not.
Speaker 5 (35:52):
I won't even provide Jerry with the video.
Did you want to demonstrate itfor?
Speaker 2 (35:56):
us.
So people know no, oh, I willnot.
Okay, I won't even provideJerry with the video of it.
Speaker 1 (36:04):
But Melissa did and here it is.
It's here Just kidding.
So, as you can see from thesepictures, aerodynamics make a
huge part of the efficiency ofthe trucks, and the more
efficient they are, the lessfuel they consume.
(36:24):
Sure.
Which just by that the lessfuel, the less greenhouse gases
they put out.
Yeah.
So, that's why they want toincorporate it.
And you know, unfortunately, sofar the answer has been no, but
I think it will change.
I really I don't know.
Speaker 3 (36:38):
I have a question for Jerry Out of the bullet train,
or bullet-looking truck, and the88 truck, which one would you?
Speaker 4 (36:45):
pick the newer one.
Speaker 3 (36:47):
You'd see yourself driving a newer one, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (36:50):
That's your style?
Yeah, but that's not fair,because he likes little creature
comforts like power steering,air conditioning.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
Absolutely they conditioning.
Absolutely.
Speaker 1 (37:01):
They had cruise control.
I heard about it.
Speaker 3 (37:04):
They take this little stick and they would shove it
between the dash and the I don'teven want to know what they did
back then.
Huh.
Speaker 2 (37:13):
Think about it too A lot of excited driving yeah.
Speaker 3 (37:17):
I know my dad was a truck driver.
He had a cab over.
Speaker 1 (37:22):
A lot of those were limited to 55 miles an hour.
Can you imagine seeing thecountry at 55?
Speaker 2 (37:28):
Yeah, because they weren't aerodynamic, they
couldn't go any faster.
Speaker 5 (37:32):
Weren't there rules.
Speaker 2 (37:33):
It's like driving a wall of bricks.
Speaker 1 (37:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:35):
Yeah, and when the speed limit across the country
was 55.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Was it Johnson that required the speed limit across
the country was 55 back then.
Was it Johnson that requiredthe speed limit, or something?
Speaker 2 (37:41):
like that.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
I forget who it was Well, it was because of the fuel
thing right, Because the fuelcost was high.
Speaker 5 (37:45):
Yes, they're like hey , if you only drive 55, you'll
get your best fuel economy Right.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
But the law, the legal limit then was 55.
And if you didn't move yourlimit down to 55, you didn't get
federal funding for highwaysCorrect.
So they kind of forced thestates to do that.
Speaker 1 (38:02):
They still kind of do .
They've inched it up, but Ithink 80 is the max right now.
You can't go 85.
Speaker 2 (38:08):
80 is the max yeah, Speaking of 80 being the max
speed limit and 55 was safer,Zoom, zoom.
There are rules in effect atevery state where you have to
wear a seatbelt when you'redriving a vehicle.
Yes, and in Georgia they arelooking at allowing jurors in
(38:32):
lawsuits involving motor vehicleaccidents to be told if the
plaintiff the person that'sdoing the suing, the person that
was injured, if the plaintiffwas wearing a seatbelt or not,
and to be able to use that factin determining the amount of a
(38:53):
settlement or a verdict ordamages being paid to the
plaintiff.
So here's what I'm saying Ifyou and I are in a car accident,
you're at fault.
I'm injured because you're theone that was at fault in the
accident.
This is all speculation.
Patrick is a very, very, very,very safe driver most of the
(39:14):
time.
Speaker 1 (39:15):
I will say I've only totaled one vehicle and it was
in Georgia.
But go on, there you go.
It was in.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
Georgia, so I get injured in said accident.
I'm sorry.
Okay, and I accept your apology.
When we go to court.
Speaker 1 (39:28):
Can I get you to sign that?
Speaker 2 (39:29):
No, Can I get you to sign the apology that you just?
Speaker 1 (39:33):
made to me.
No, I cannot.
Speaker 2 (39:35):
I have it on recorded .
Speaker 1 (39:36):
I'm always recording.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
Jerry's recording.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
Jerry's recording when he's in court.
I was on the phone with Jerrywhen I got that totaled up car.
That's true, anyways.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
So I sue you for damages.
I'm hurt.
I got a broken tooth orsomething.
I'm hurt, so I sue you fordamages.
We go to court and, during theprocess of going back and forth,
my attorney can tell the juryI'm sorry.
Your attorney can tell the jury.
Well, he wasn't wearing aseatbelt.
Had he been wearing a seatbelt,maybe he wouldn't have broke
(40:08):
his tooth on the dashboardbecause he wouldn't have went so
far forward.
Vice versa, my attorney cantell the jury the facts have to
prove this right.
Speaker 1 (40:18):
Well, that's assumed.
I mean like we should alreadybe able to tell that right.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
That I was wearing a seatbelt or not.
Yeah, maybe, maybe not.
Speaker 1 (40:27):
No, I'm saying I should already be in court being
able to say, like well, hewasn't wearing a seatbelt.
Your Honor, no, but you can't.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
You currently can't Really Cannot.
Yes, that does not play afactor in the jury determining a
verdict.
They do not have to or cannotbe told whether I was wearing a
seatbelt or not.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
That's insane.
Yes, sorry.
Speaker 2 (40:47):
Yes, so the whole purpose of this new law in
Georgia is to try and reducesome of these astronomical
settlements.
Speaker 1 (40:55):
Nuclear.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
Nuclear settlements that are coming out or verdicts
that are coming out that arecosting insurance companies a
ton of money, when someone mayhave prevented this accident or
the severity of their injurieshad they been wearing a seatbelt
.
That's what they're looking atdoing with this new law.
So this article is dated isactually from FreightWaves.
(41:18):
It's dated on the 25th ofFebruary, so it's about a month
old and I don't know where it'sat currently, but it looks like
it's going through the GeorgiaHouse and Senate and the
Republican governor of Georgiahas signaled he's going to
support the rule.
Speaker 5 (41:37):
In March 24,.
It says they signed into law abill that lets juries hear
evidence.
Speaker 2 (41:42):
There you go.
So it is now law in Georgia, inthe state of Georgia 24.
Speaker 3 (41:47):
That was last year.
Speaker 1 (41:49):
No, that's Indiana Indiana.
Speaker 3 (41:51):
Oh, indiana did it.
Sorry, I apologize.
I need to verify that Statesmatter, so Indiana did it last
year.
Correct, I should have verifiedthat States matter, so Indiana
did it last year Correct.
I think that's importantinformation to know.
Speaker 2 (42:03):
I think it is too, in making a decision, I agree.
Speaker 3 (42:05):
Now I'd also like to know, though, medically speaking
I'd like to hear from a medicalexpert witness would it have
mattered if you had yourseatbelt on versus not having
your seatbelt on for the chippedtooth?
And to me as a juror, I wouldhope to take in some of that as
(42:28):
well.
Speaker 1 (42:28):
Well, he chipped it on the curb when he flew out of
the car.
Speaker 2 (42:34):
Would I have flown out of the car?
Sure.
Speaker 3 (42:35):
Sure, I get what you're saying.
Had I had my seatbelt on, I getwhat you're saying.
Had I had my seatbelt on, I getwhat you're saying they have a
lot of.
Speaker 5 (42:40):
I guess they've done so much research with seatbelts.
I would think they would beable to say this wasn't caused
by or was caused by.
If the person had been wearingtheir seatbelt, this is more
likely what their injuries wouldbe to this level.
Speaker 1 (42:58):
And if you've been in a bad car wreck which
unfortunately I have in Georgiathe seatbelt left a mark, sure
Like it was a clear braceagainst me from where that
happened and Eric had thematching mark on the other side.
Speaker 2 (43:09):
I wonder if no, go ahead, Continue.
Please Don't insist.
Well, I was going to change thesubject a little bit from where
you were.
Speaker 1 (43:17):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
So I'd allow you to continue.
Oh, so so I wonder if you takeinto account also.
Speaker 1 (43:25):
So I'm sure they can figure out if they had it.
Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2 (43:28):
You know how egregious were the defendant's
actions that caused thisaccident.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
Well, I would assume the seatbelt would have to play
a role in what happened, like ifan 18-wheeler rolls over a
truck and kills the entirefamily and everybody's still
inside the truck and no one'swearing a seatbelt.
Speaker 2 (43:49):
It won't make a difference.
Speaker 3 (43:50):
Because a Camaro you can just drive right over it.
Speaker 1 (43:54):
But if occupants are thrown out of the vehicle?
If they're thrown out of thevehicle, of course.
If they're thrown out of thevehicle but the vehicle's also
crushed and burns into flames,it may not matter.
Speaker 5 (44:04):
That's a 90% chance that not wearing a seatbelt
might have helped you Exactly,but in general, when you look at
crashes, seatbelts save, likeit's an astronomical number.
It's like 88% or something Wayhigher than not wearing a
seatbelt.
Speaker 3 (44:19):
I think that knowledge, though, should play a
role in the deciding factor ofwhatever they're going for,
whatever class action orwhatever.
I think it just again.
If it matters, why has it beenwithheld all along?
I?
Speaker 1 (44:39):
guess, why are we being?
Speaker 3 (44:40):
nefarious.
Why does it matter that?
Speaker 1 (44:43):
Sure, but we can incorporate, we can tell people
your blood alcohol level or wecan do things like that.
So why has this been withheld?
That is an odd thing, but Iwill say, at the end of the day
you think about it, it's likethe insurance companies are the
ones that are benefiting fromthis.
Speaker 2 (44:56):
They are there's actually a quote from a senator
that is against this law, sayingthat nothing in the bill
requires a single penny ofpremium reduction.
What this bill does is handmore power to the insurance
industry.
So one of the reasons for doingthis is to prevent these
nuclear verdicts and reduceinsurance premiums.
(45:20):
Yes, well, I haven't seenanything in the article, at
least, that says that there'sproof in Indiana that insurance
premiums have gone down.
Speaker 4 (45:30):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (45:31):
And we all know that price on nothing never goes down
, it just goes up.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
Well, that's not true .
There are situations whereinsurance premium never goes
down, it just goes up.
Well, that's not true.
There are situations whereinsurance premiums go down and
you do look across the countryand in different states where
they are.
Like Las Vegas is one of thehighest insurance rates for a
car you can have because theamount of accidents they have,
they're insane.
Even moving from Louisiana toOhio our car insurance dropped
(45:58):
because Louisiana has so manymore thefts than Ohio has.
Like State Farm straight upsaid here's what's up.
Speaker 2 (46:08):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (46:09):
So they certainly do take that into account.
Speaker 2 (46:12):
I understand that they'll take things like
demographics and location intoaccount, but in Georgia, with
this law now, are people goingto see their insurance rates
just reduced, because this lawis hopefully helping prevent
some of these nuclear verdicts.
Speaker 1 (46:31):
I don't know.
But I also know it's not justGeorgia premium holders, it's
also commercial trucks that gothrough there.
Speaker 2 (46:39):
Sure, I get that and commercial trucks have insurance
.
Speaker 1 (46:44):
Yes, but it even comes down to drivers and stuff.
So if you, as a driver, get ina wreck and you cause over,
whatever it is X number ofdollars in damage, most carriers
will disqualify you and you'reout, sure.
And then it's really hard to geta job again.
But a lawsuit gets factoredinto that.
So if you're in a lawsuit andthey award that person $150,000,
(47:08):
that may push you over thatthreshold, right, whereas if
they look at it and go, no, thatperson should have had their
seatbelt on.
We're not going to give youthat much money.
It could save that person's joband, as someone who owns a
trucking company and manages it,I know whatever we can do to
get our insurance rates lower.
(47:29):
We try to do so.
We started putting safetysystems on the trucks.
We've batted around the idea ofcameras.
Cameras seem like like greatidea until you get the nuts and
bolts of it and then they.
They come with a side ofliability.
Um, there's the, there's the.
Uh.
What happens if your driver didcause the wreck, which you know
fine that it's a good thing, uh.
(47:50):
But what happens, uh, if yourdriver, um, if something, gets
caught on there?
That's not trucking related,sure, but it invades the privacy
of your driver, right?
So there's a lot of like, a lotof stuff that goes along with
that.
These are even more detailedstuff that I don't want to get
into um, so cameras become achallenge, uh, but it's all to
(48:13):
drive those insurance rates down.
Insurance is a huge expense intrucking and so I can certainly
understand, from a truckingperspective, insurance companies
wanting it going down, and Ibelieve so they were talking
about in Indiana that they werecritics, were saying that the
legislation distracts from thebigger question if it actually
caused an accident, so whetheror not you had the seatbelt on
(48:34):
doesn't matter, kind of likepeople that get ticketed for or
get blamed for being drunkdriving when they didn't really
cause the accident.
So they say that that is adistraction from it.
But Chris Spear, who is thepresident and CEO of the
American Trucking Associations,said that the law provides
(48:55):
jurors more incompleteinformation to render a verdict.
So it seems like, from atrucking perspective, most
everybody's in favor for it.
It's only your localpoliticians that don't like it,
because their constituents don'tlike it.
Speaker 3 (49:13):
Sure, which is their role right, that's their role,
that's their job is to be thevoice of their constituents.
So I think it Sure.
Speaker 1 (49:16):
Which is their role?
Right, Right, that's their role, that's their job.
That's their job is to be thevoice of their constituents.
So I think it's good.
Speaker 2 (49:22):
I think it's good too .
Speaker 1 (49:23):
For me it's a blind spot.
I didn't know this wasn'tallowed in the first place.
Yeah, I didn't either I had noidea until I saw the headline, I
would have thought for sure.
Speaker 5 (49:33):
Everything I can see it says it's cleared that it's
gone through in Georgia.
Speaker 3 (49:39):
I'm assuming, way back when.
This is like somebody objectedand then there was maybe a law
that said the seatbelt thingcouldn't be brought in.
I mean, like, is that part oflegality, though?
Like you can talk about it?
I mean, I just feel like therewas a law that maybe went
against it to begin with, andnow we're trying to do something
.
Speaker 1 (49:57):
Yeah, I would think there has to be something.
Speaker 3 (49:58):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (49:59):
Maybe not even a law, but a precedent.
Speaker 3 (50:01):
That you couldn't talk about it.
Speaker 1 (50:02):
Yeah, I would think, maybe a precedent or something
that said, you know a judge thatsaid, yeah, we don't want to
hear that.
Or someone that did somethingyou know, hey, this cloud's
cause, cause.
So we don't want to cloud cause.
But I agree, if you give themthe complete picture of it then
you can factor in both cause andhey, this person was doing this
(50:24):
illegal thing.
That also contributed, right,because there are contributing
factors.
And so you know we see thatwith a lot of accidents it's not
always 100% one person's fault.
Sometimes there's a littleblame to go around everybody, or
not necessarily everybody, buta few people.
Speaker 2 (50:41):
So if I can touch on that a little bit, I went back
and looked at the article aboutthe Indiana law back in 2024.
The CEO of the AmericanTrucking Association back then,
chris Spear so same person stillback then, chris Spear, so same
person still After the bill waspassed in February allowing it.
(51:04):
He said that the existing lawforbid seatbelt uses evidence
for jurors.
So in Indiana at least therewas a law forbidding them from
knowing.
It took four years and fourattempts.
So every year for four yearsthey tried to pass this law in
Indiana allowing the seaportevidence to be put to be
presented to jurors, and itfinally passed on the fourth
(51:25):
year.
That's, that's interesting, wow.
Speaker 1 (51:27):
That is Well.
I think there's one thing Imean like.
Even back in Louisiana we saw alot of reform coming with these
crazy verdicts and theseoutrageous sums of money.
Sure, and Louisiana trying towrestle that down and make it
like, no, because that cost.
It seems like, oh well, youknow who cares if corporate
(51:48):
America loses money, but thatjust gets charged back to us, it
does, we pay it, we pay it wesure do, we sure do.
It may not be vocally said, butit comes in the form of a rate
increase the next year.
We've got anything to help keepthose costs down.
And also, the good thing aboutit is it still for the people
that are genuinely wronged?
It still allows for them to becompensated for.
(52:10):
It's not saying, hey, you can'tdo X, y or Z.
It's just saying did thiscontribute?
If it did, then you pay a partin it.
So you don't necessarily get asmuch as someone who is
completely innocent.
Speaker 3 (52:22):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (52:22):
It's your article.
If I can share one more pieceof information from the Indiana
article, also on freight wavesmillion in truck crash lawsuits
(52:44):
rose, on average, from 2.3million dollars in 2010 to 22.3
million dollars in 2018.
Wow, I mean that, that's,that's not just inflation, that
that's crazy money, you know,that's.
Speaker 1 (52:49):
That's a big difference, um it just makes me
think it's attorneys havelearned how to work a jury.
Speaker 2 (52:57):
They have?
Speaker 4 (52:58):
Oh sure they have, Because it don't help when you
see every other TV ad no.
Speaker 3 (53:06):
Or a.
Speaker 1 (53:06):
Biotrach.
It's hard to have it in partialjury when that's what everybody
in America is seeing, rightVery interesting.
Speaker 3 (53:15):
Thank you for bringing that to us.
And who knew it was notpermitted before?
Speaker 1 (53:18):
Yeah, no idea.
Speaker 3 (53:20):
I guess I would just assume it's all part of the case
, all part of the evidence.
Why are we hiding that?
Speaker 5 (53:26):
I think I don't know.
I feel like this sums it up theprimary focus is the
defendant's negligence, not theplaintiff's failure to buckle up
.
So they're like it shouldn'tmatter that person was wrong.
It doesn't matter what the notwrong person was doing.
Speaker 1 (53:46):
But I think to me it still matters.
If a person gets hit by a carand they're jaywalking is
different than a person gets hitin a car in a crosswalk with a
green crosswalk.
Speaker 5 (53:57):
Sure, I get that, agree, not saying.
I agree with that statement butI think that's what the base is
.
Speaker 3 (54:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (54:04):
Yeah Well, it's a well-formed thought sentence.
I just disagree with it.
Speaker 2 (54:09):
I think an important takeaway from this entire
conversation wear your seatbelt.
Wear your seatbelts.
Just, it's safe.
Wear your seatbelt.
Wear your seatbelts.
It's safe.
Wear your seatbelt please.
Speaker 1 (54:18):
Yeah, it does blow me away when I see the number of
accidents and people that don'twear their seatbelts.
Speaker 2 (54:24):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (54:25):
Yeah, Every now and then it happens once or twice a
year we'll get a driverdisqualified for not wearing a
seatbelt and it's like yeah ornot wearing a seatbelt, and it's
like yeah, Like or not wearinga seatbelt properly.
That one gets a little gray tome because in a big vehicle like
that the upper part doesn't doas much as it does in a car, I
(54:48):
understand.
So I still wear my seatbeltproperly every time because it's
the law.
But I have a little empathy forthose situations With the
people that don't wear one atall.
Yeah, it just blows my mindbecause a truck is relatively
safe.
You're a huge item, so when youhit something, the entire truck
(55:10):
absorbs the impact, sure, andit actually doesn't impact, like
it doesn't impact the drivernearly as much as it does
whatever you hit.
It's kind of the school busthing, right, like school buses
don't generally have seatbelts.
A lot of them do, but when I wasgrowing up they didn't.
They didn't when I was either.
And even now that they havethem, they're mostly lap belts
(55:31):
and the reality is like they'renot very effective because
there's so little energy.
Like you think, like oh my gosh, a school bus just hit a brick
wall and came to a stop rightand everybody flew forward if
they were wearing a seat belt.
Well, there's so much energy inthat truck, in that bus that
that it are so much mass thatabsorbs so much energy that a
(55:54):
kid it's kind of a weird thought.
But flying forward into thatpadded cushion of a back seat
doesn't really sustain much harm, like it's pretty safe
situation.
You think, like that's crazy,you can't imagine, but but it
kind of is, whereas a seat beltyou could actually uh, kind of
fold yourself in half, talkyourself, cause back injuries
(56:16):
and things like that.
So it's not like a super whenyou're driving.
They are relatively safe.
But it is very easy to get in acar wreck or a truck wreck and
get thrown out of your truck.
Sure, that is still somethingthat's pretty, especially on the
Cascadias and VolvosInternationals with the big,
huge windshields those are easyto fly out of and drivers still
(56:41):
drive with no seatbelt.
Speaker 3 (56:42):
I just don't get it.
Roll it over, a wind gusts andblows you over Any of that.
Where are you going to go ifyou're not attached to your seat
?
Speaker 1 (56:51):
And you're in a huge cab, so there's lots of room for
you to move around Seatbelt,wear your seatbelt.
And if you see your drivingpartner not wearing a seatbelt,
tell them put your seatbelt on.
Speaker 5 (57:05):
I would like to keep my partner so we can keep our
job.
Speaker 1 (57:08):
If you don't like that thing rubbing against your
shoulder, because I know a lotof people don't they've got
these big fluffy padded thingsyou can buy and put them on,
yeah, and they take all thatpaint away.
They're actually kind of nice,so definitely like.
There's options out there.
If you don't like it, there'sways to get around it and
(57:31):
tolerate it.
It's not worth losing your jobover.
It's not worth losing your lifeover.
All right.
So we have an option I'm goingto poll the audience and we're
going to do it live that way.
You all see it.
We've gone long.
Shocking.
We have to discuss an elementof high-filled trucks, per the
request.
Jerry and I identified italready and we missed it last
(57:54):
week.
We can talk about it now, butit's going to be another
discussion week.
And we can talk about it now,but it's going to be another
discussion, or we can table itfor next week.
Your choice.
It's riveting.
Speaker 3 (58:08):
I hear crickets in my head Chirp, chirp.
Speaker 1 (58:12):
I think that if I talk about it now, I won't be
able to do it justice.
Speaker 3 (58:18):
So let's table it.
Speaker 1 (58:19):
So we'll table it.
Speaker 3 (58:20):
Is it a specific viewer?
Speaker 1 (58:23):
No, it's just continuing the Highfield story.
Speaker 3 (58:26):
Oh, I think you should table it and start next
week with it All right.
We'll do that or next episode.
Speaker 1 (58:30):
So next episode, we will start up in front and we
are going to talk about are youready, drum roll?
I front, and we are going totalk about are you ready, drum
roll?
I don't have a drum roll, Ican't.
There you go.
I don't know if that's actuallypicking up.
Anyways, we're going to talkabout lift gates.
Ooh, lift gates, yes, and boydo I have some thoughts.
Speaker 3 (58:51):
I like to put the Traeger on it, but until next
time, hit that like button ifyou like us.
Speaker 1 (59:00):
Our thumbs up button if you like us.
If you don't like us, hit thatdown thumbs arrow twice.
Really, let people know youdon't like us.
Drop us a comment below.
We see some of y'all arecommenting.
We appreciate that.
Anything you can do to helpsupport our channel definitely
helps us out.
Anything you can do to helpsupport our channel definitely
(59:21):
helps us out.
Speaker 4 (59:22):
If you want to reach out to us, you can email us.
You can email us attheouterbellpodcast at gmailcom,
or visit us athighfieldtruckingcom if you're
interested in learning moreabout Highfield or joining the
Highfield fleet.
Speaker 3 (59:35):
You can call 833-field, which is 833-493-4353
, option one, and you can speakto either delena or myself.
We'd give you lots ofinformation over the phone,
monday through friday, 8 am to 6pm eastern time.
You can also do live chat onour website.
I'd be happy to respond to youthere.
(59:56):
You can do Facebook Messenger.
I do a lot of those as well, soreach out, ask your questions.
Speaker 2 (01:00:08):
Comments.
Speaker 3 (01:00:09):
What?
Speaker 1 (01:00:10):
That's all I got Anybody else anything?
No Going once twice.
Well, thank you all so much forhanging out with us.
We look forward to seeing younext time.
In the meantime, wear yourseatbelt, stay safe.
Make good decisions.
Speaker 4 (01:00:27):
Wear your seatbelt and don't leave money on the
table.
Wear your seatbelt and don'ttext and drive and keep visual
atonement.
Speaker 5 (01:00:34):
Good night, good night, bye, bye, bye, goodnight
bye, thank you.
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