A small glimpse of FedEx multidrop in Edmonton

[bigjon]

I got bored at work today, so decided to bore you guys (and gals) with a diary of (most of) my shift today.
For security reasons I am not allowed to post pictures of the inside of our buildings, So cannot show the processes we go through to get the freight out to the customers.

My Shift starts at 8:30 am, I have the key to my truck on my personal keyring, so I just park my car next to my truck in the parking lot, transfer all the stuff I need for the day (lunch and something to drink) into my cab, and start my pretrip. this gets me to 8:55 yes we do have 25 minutes to pretrip our trucks.

So I drive the truck around to the loading dock and park up on the dock, ready for me to load with all my freight I am about to go and sort out inside. I end up with 67 pieces of freight going to Finning in Leduc , I dont leave the building until after 11 am, as each piece of freight has to be scanned and processed and then stacked up to all fit nice and neatly into my truck. Its only a 5 minute drive to my first drop of the day, And today I was in luck, no 1 hour wait for a bay to back onto So its a quick 10 minute tip, then back to sort out the rest of my stops for the day, which were still being unloaded from the plane when i left before.

Picture of my truck on the left, next to the 53 footer I drive every now and again, with the tail of the plane just showing to the right of the picture

Me loaded for the last time today, Now I’m ready to head into the city, after I do a drop at the International Airport.

First drop is here, Its some freight coming up from the states, which needs to be forwarded to one of the remote areas we dont serve up in northern canada.

Next its into Finning again, this time its their main depot in the city. I manage to get 5 pallets off here, which empties my truck up quite nicely.

Me on the dock at Finning

Next drop is into Tyco , The dock is a right pig to get into, as you can see from the wall other people have had trouble here.
This drop is an awkwad one, as the crate doesnt have enough clearance underneath to fit my pallet jack under So its a quick run outside to pop my rollers up then I can puch the crate out the back of my truck by hand

Next to come off is some parts for the local mitsubishi truck dealer, this dock was so steep I had to be really careful moving stuff around in my truck as gravity makes the jack want to roll out the truck.

How I wish I had one of these trucks instead of the piece of junk freightliner I drive

Into here goes some power generating equipment, Site security meant I couldnt take pictures on site.

For some reason my Camera decided to not keep the picstures of my last 2 drops, but nothing exciting really.

one was a handball some photograhic film onto a cart for the Geographic air survey.

The other was a delivery to a high school, and nobody was there to receive it.

This puts me at 16:30 on the wrong side of the city from where I need to be for 17:00. All the major roads have construction at the moment, trying to get everything done before the big freeze comes. I end up at the City station at 17:11, 9 minutes before I have to be loaded and on my way to make the conection with the plane.

The bottom picture is re-used from a previous post, and shows one of the other trucks loaded with the Air Cargo containers (ULD’s). Fitted to all of our trucks is a roller system, which allows us to move the ULD’s into and out of the trucks easily. They are Air operated, and have an interlock system which lowers the rollers as soon as you release the parking brake.

I am loaded and out of there for 17:20 , and on my way to the airport, a 30 minute drive away. At the airport I am onto the dock and unloaded straight away, as these are the last cans they are waiting for before the plane can leave for Memphis, TN.

The Ramp guys have the plane loaded and away for 18:30, this includes fuelling etc. I park my truck up and do my post trip, and complete my paperwork for the day then head off home.

I hope you have enjoyed seeing what I do over here in Canada, as most diaries are from Long Haul drivers, which is a whole different kettle of fish someday I hope to be doing the long haul stuff, but Im too happy on my cushy little number I have at the moment. If people enjoy this I may consider posting another diary at some point in the future

[ollienotts]

Nice thread
How come you’re not on long haul though? I thought us Brits had to do long haul jobs to get a work permit there?

[bigjon]

Im special I have dual citizenship.
I am a canadian citizen from birth, which meant I could just move here and start work as anythng I chose to work as.

[gridley51]

BigJon,what does your truck gross at and what horsepower do you have?What model is it?
Im curious because Im a member of an American engineering group and they keep talking about carrying x amount of tons in a one ton pickup and pulling gooseneck trailers at 10 ton or so.
Just trying to get a grasp of how they rate commercials over there.
Mark.

[bigjon]

The truck is a Freightliner M2, with a ■■■■■■■ 220hp motor, hooked up to an Allinson auto transmission.
We refer to it as a 5 ton truck, which basically refers to its carrying capacity after you take the tare weight off the gross weight of the vehicle. I actually think i can carry 7 ton, as my gross is something like 15 ton, and the tare weight is only about 7 1/2 ton.
I would be able to carry more weight than that, but the rollers and liftgate use up a lot of weight.

The scenario you mention about the one ton pickup, towing a gooseneck, is using a 5th wheel I should imagine, therby transfering most of the weight to the trailer axles.

[carryfast]

But they still don’t seem to have worked out that a demount wagon and drag outfit is more efficient on some jobs (not airfreight though) like their competition over here has. Was surprised to read that all the trailers are airfreight rollerbeds ? instead of seperating airfreight and ground based transport operations ?.

[rob_k]

Good read and nice pics Jon. Looking forward to next weeks installment.

[dieseldave]

What Rob said ^^

I think it’s interesting to see a side of the job that’s not often seen, so thanks for taking the time and trouble to post it all.

[8wheels]

Nice post although I was pleasantly surprised to see it wasn’t Edmonton, N.London. Although Finning and Tyco both have operations within a few miles of me here.

[av1d]

Nice read . I take it that freighliner isn’t very good to drive then?

Kellogg’s have air rollers in there trailers. Along with a chain pulley. (Well im not sure if they have removed that feature from all the trailers) But when i worked for a company called Cartwrights (in which build trailers, And in which are rented out to Kellogg’s) We refurbished an old trailer in which needed the rollers to be ripped out along with the chain and replaced with wooden flooring. (they were one pain to get out.)

However it was a really cool peace of kit tbh, even though I never seen it in action within Kellogg’s warehouses. I only saw the rollers power up via the air, when we had to remove them.

[merc0447]

Great read buddy, i love getting an insight into different jobs and locations

[44_tonne_ton]

I enjoyed that read/pics BigJon, thanks for taking the trouble!

[dunchues]

Another great read as usual from Jon, but I have actually seen him at work and he wasnt working as hard as these photos show. In fact he was parked at Calgary in an 18 wheeler falling asleep, only woke up long enough to teach me the intricacies of McDonalds coffee then stumbled off into the night.

Only airfreight I have ever done was 2 weeks ago, 11 pallets of coffee with a total weight of 2 tons(!) from Miami to Toronto. Left Miami Friday afternoon, spent Sunday pm at Niagara Falls, and delivered monday at 7am, not much traffic, stunning scenery and getting paid for it. That multi drop stuff will wear you out mate, you need to be driving over the road, I get the ache if I have more than 4 loads/ reloads a week, then again I am older and obviously lazier than you!

[carryfast]

dunchues:
Another great read as usual from Jon, but I have actually seen him at work and he wasnt working as hard as these photos show. In fact he was parked at Calgary in an 18 wheeler falling asleep, only woke up long enough to teach me the intricacies of McDonalds coffee then stumbled off into the night.

Only airfreight I have ever done was 2 weeks ago, 11 pallets of coffee with a total weight of 2 tons(!) from Miami to Toronto. Left Miami Friday afternoon, spent Sunday pm at Niagara Falls, and delivered monday at 7am, not much traffic, stunning scenery and getting paid for it. That multi drop stuff will wear you out mate, you need to be driving over the road, I get the ache if I have more than 4 loads/ reloads a week, then again I am older and obviously lazier than you!

That’s what I call airfreight work. Which part of the job did the plane get .

[dunchues]

That was all my bit Carryfast, the plane bought it in from Columbia on Friday morning! Apparently a well known coffee company from Seattle was short on an order ( sent by sea ) so to keep the customer happy the supplier flew these 2tons over by plane, and the nearest it could get to Toronto on the quick was Miami, and thats where I came in. It was a fantastic drive too; I had gone down to Florida fully loaded with 44000lbs of peat, and its a bit of work over the hills with a manual box. But coming back with next to nothing was great, like driving an auto, fantastic weather, and they even pay me to do it!

[bigjon]

Carryfast:
But they still don’t seem to have worked out that a demount wagon and drag outfit is more efficient on some jobs (not airfreight though) like their competition over here has. Was surprised to read that all the trailers are airfreight rollerbeds ? instead of seperating airfreight and ground based transport operations ?.

I should probably point out that over here we have 6 divisions within FedEx.

FedEx Express - this is all air freight, everything we deliver came into the city on a plane
FedEx Ground - this is the land parcel service covering the whole of North America
FedEx Freight - this is the land Pallet service covering all of North America
Fedex Custom Critical - This is our white glove service, where we will send a dedicated truck to the customer, load their freight and drive direct to the end destination. Customers pay a small fortune for this service.
Fedex Kinko’s - Office Printing etc, its a Print shop basically.
Fedex Trade Networks - These handle the distribution for big multi-national companies, a bit like DHL do with Argos etc.

I work for Express, so everything I do each day comes in on one of our many planes we have land in Edmonton. Today we had a strange sight, we had for the first time ever, 2 international planes land bringing freight in from Memphis, which is our global distribution hub.

The rollers enable me to do my land deliveries in the day, and use the same truck to shift the cargo cans around of an evening.

I take it that freighliner isn’t very good to drive then?

Freightliner have the nickname ‘Freightshaker’ over here. They are built cheaply, and we have had no end of problems with our trucks. Mine has only do 60000 km, and its had to have

Shocks twice
Ride Height valve
Heater Blower
Multifunction Stalk
Wiring Loom Faults

dunchues:
Another great read as usual from Jon, but I have actually seen him at work and he wasnt working as hard as these photos show. In fact he was parked at Calgary in an 18 wheeler falling asleep, only woke up long enough to teach me the intricacies of McDonalds coffee then stumbled off into the night.

You cheeky old git Hows it going ? not spoke to you in a while, keep seeing your number on my phone and thinking I should give you a call and see how things are going. Just too busy now I am back on days, No more of this sleeping after a 3 hour drive to Calgary for me although I will be doing that run for 1 night on Monday, while the regular driver is off for the night.

[grasshopper]

Nice diary mate. Roller floors are brilliant, so easy to use. You just have to make sure you remember to drop the floor after loading!

[carryfast]

BigJon:

Carryfast:
But they still don’t seem to have worked out that a demount wagon and drag outfit is more efficient on some jobs (not airfreight though) like their competition over here has. Was surprised to read that all the trailers are airfreight rollerbeds ? instead of seperating airfreight and ground based transport operations ?.

I should probably point out that over here we have 6 divisions within FedEx.

FedEx Express - this is all air freight, everything we deliver came into the city on a plane
FedEx Ground - this is the land parcel service covering the whole of North America
FedEx Freight - this is the land Pallet service covering all of North America
Fedex Custom Critical - This is our white glove service, where we will send a dedicated truck to the customer, load their freight and drive direct to the end destination. Customers pay a small fortune for this service.
Fedex Kinko’s - Office Printing etc, its a Print shop basically.
Fedex Trade Networks - These handle the distribution for big multi-national companies, a bit like DHL do with Argos etc.

Are there any jobs for Brits going for long distance line haul on Freight.

[bestbooties]

Hi BigJon,
In the UK we have two divisions of FedEx.
FedEx Express and Fedex UK.
FedEx UK used to be ANC until about 3 years ago,but changed hands.
FedEx Express does all the air freight over here mainly out of Stanstead airport.
FedEx UK does all the domestic work that ANC used to do,but we share quite a bit of the airfreight work with FedEx Express.
I work as a part time night trunk driver for FedEx UK,two nights a week.
I run from our main hub in Stoke on Trent which is about as near the middle of the UK as you can get.From here we run as far as the south coast,Cornwall,Kent,south Wales,east Anglia,(Norfolk and Suffolk),and Scotland.
We used to do a lot of Scottish destinations as far north as Aberdeen,but since we opened our hub in Gretna,a lot of Scottish work is done as a change over at Gretna.
I have done the air freight run quite a few times,delivering into the Bishops Stortford depot where they load the air freight containers,with goods for Europe and all points east as far as Australia,or west to Canada and the States.
On that run,we load back incoming air freight to our hub for sorting and onward distribution,whereas FedEx Express does more inter airport trunking.

[bigrig]

Nice one more pics please