Do what this guy did and take your own truck to USA 
Carryfast:
RB84:
Carryfast:
It’s just silly that we could run UK reg trucks throughout Russia and Asia but no chance in North America.I would hazard a guess that the big ole expanse of water between the UK AND USA/Canada is the main spanner in the works of making it worth while taking a vehicle over
The big expanse of water is less than the big expanse of land between here and Saudi or across Russia etc.With the difference that the truck isn’t using any of that cheap US/Canadian fuel or wearing anything out while it’s sitting on a boat for around a week and the driver can use that as time off while it’s in transit,if not accompany it.
It wasn’t that which stopped me.It was the two problems that the shipping lines won’t match ro ro rates for a truck with container rates and you can’t get a DOT compliant truck through a UK MOT and a Brit resident can’t register a truck in Canada or US.The former being the real deal breaker.
With maybe the chance of making a US truck both UK MOT and DOT compliant so it can be registered here and haul freight there.
Why would they match prices though? Carrying an artic involves more work, more space and more man power than a container. And let face it no one is mad enough to think the idea of sending accompanied freight across the Atlantic makes any sense! Why waste money and space on a tractor unit that will spend 90% of its time on a boat?
A British friend lives in Connecticut in the US (obviously not a truck driver!) and he would give anything for a British style supermarket with British style produce and prices. US supermarkets look great superficially but as soon as you have to rely on them to live their faults become apparent. The fact is we are spoilt in the UK, our supermarkets are amongst the cheapest best stocked in the world
Pat Hasler:
nedflanders:
Thanks pat for you answers to my questions it cleared up a lot of my thoughts , I have done the holiday drive thing in the usa numerous times and thoroughly enjoyed it and hopefully get to do lots more of it in the future , although been a tourist it don’t come cheap there on my last visit earlier this year was amazed on how expensive everything had gotExpensive yes !.. A lot of tourists come over here and see things on sale such as Levis for a fraction of the price back there, my friends tell me how lucky I am to live in a country with such low petrol prices LOL. Living here is dam expensive as you say, the amount we pay in taxes here is outrageous for a start, a mate of mine who lives in Rugby complains about over a thousand quid a year in council tax, we pay over a thousand dollars every two months for no services to speak of, we even have to pay $59.00 a month to get our dustbin emptied. Just look at the sales tax for instance. A guy I know and work with has no idea how things work over there was telling me how expensive things are in the UK, he quoted prices ad then mentioned VAT, I couldn’t convince him that VAT is already included in the price. When we come to England on our visits we go straight to Tesco for 2 weeks grocery and it rarely touches 100 quid for 4 of us and the countless visitors we entertain, just a weeks groceries here for our family comes to almost $300.00
You are better off living there.
And that’s not to mention medical insurance. Does your company pay for that or is it down to you? Brits take the fact that if there is something wrong with you in UK it’ll get sorted no questions asked for granted where as in US people need to steel themselves for dealing with an insurance company that will try and screw costs down every way they can and not really give a ■■■■ about your life and wellbeing if it means they save a dollar.
Don’t get me wrong I love the US, I think it’s a remarkable country and I’ve spent a lot of time there and will do so in future but in grand scheme of things I do think we are better off in the UK
switchlogic:
Pat Hasler:
nedflanders:
Thanks pat for you answers to my questions it cleared up a lot of my thoughts , I have done the holiday drive thing in the usa numerous times and thoroughly enjoyed it and hopefully get to do lots more of it in the future , although been a tourist it don’t come cheap there on my last visit earlier this year was amazed on how expensive everything had gotExpensive yes !.. A lot of tourists come over here and see things on sale such as Levis for a fraction of the price back there, my friends tell me how lucky I am to live in a country with such low petrol prices LOL. Living here is dam expensive as you say, the amount we pay in taxes here is outrageous for a start, a mate of mine who lives in Rugby complains about over a thousand quid a year in council tax, we pay over a thousand dollars every two months for no services to speak of, we even have to pay $59.00 a month to get our dustbin emptied. Just look at the sales tax for instance. A guy I know and work with has no idea how things work over there was telling me how expensive things are in the UK, he quoted prices ad then mentioned VAT, I couldn’t convince him that VAT is already included in the price. When we come to England on our visits we go straight to Tesco for 2 weeks grocery and it rarely touches 100 quid for 4 of us and the countless visitors we entertain, just a weeks groceries here for our family comes to almost $300.00
You are better off living there.And that’s not to mention medical insurance. Does your company pay for that or is it down to you? Brits take the fact that if there is something wrong with you in UK it’ll get sorted no questions asked for granted where as in US people need to steel themselves for dealing with an insurance company that will try and screw costs down every way they can and not really give a [zb] about your life and wellbeing if it means they save a dollar.
Don’t get me wrong I love the US, I think it’s a remarkable country and I’ve spent a lot of time there and will do so in future but in grand scheme of things I do think we are better off in the UK
I`m sure Pat can reply for himself Luke, but he has already said a bit on this thread:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=143764
switchlogic:
Pat Hasler:
nedflanders:
Thanks pat for you answers to my questions it cleared up a lot of my thoughts , I have done the holiday drive thing in the usa numerous times and thoroughly enjoyed it and hopefully get to do lots more of it in the future , although been a tourist it don’t come cheap there on my last visit earlier this year was amazed on how expensive everything had gotExpensive yes !.. A lot of tourists come over here and see things on sale such as Levis for a fraction of the price back there, my friends tell me how lucky I am to live in a country with such low petrol prices LOL. Living here is dam expensive as you say, the amount we pay in taxes here is outrageous for a start, a mate of mine who lives in Rugby complains about over a thousand quid a year in council tax, we pay over a thousand dollars every two months for no services to speak of, we even have to pay $59.00 a month to get our dustbin emptied. Just look at the sales tax for instance. A guy I know and work with has no idea how things work over there was telling me how expensive things are in the UK, he quoted prices ad then mentioned VAT, I couldn’t convince him that VAT is already included in the price. When we come to England on our visits we go straight to Tesco for 2 weeks grocery and it rarely touches 100 quid for 4 of us and the countless visitors we entertain, just a weeks groceries here for our family comes to almost $300.00
You are better off living there.And that’s not to mention medical insurance. Does your company pay for that
Without a doubt. He has his company’s CEO on speed dial after all.
You got that right Luke, the US is full of poverty, industries that led to mass internal migration have moved to China or Mexico and left complete cities in a state of poverty and crime goes hand in hand with that. Outside of the big cities which are mainly on the east coast and the touristy places, the rest of the US is made up of cheap housing, lots of them have wheels under the main floor rather than a foundation or a basement!
Groceries are more expensive, except meat and that is mostly mass produced tasteless crap and has nowhere near the flavour that you get in Britain. The rest of it, what little there is isn’t cheap at all. My local supermarket still confuses me every visit, I get to the end and think I’ve missed a few aisles, the choice is very limited. Unless you want fizzy drinks, chips (crisps) hotdogs or plastic cheese. The last time I visited England I got excited by the choice of good available in a Tesco petrol station and was very happy at the cost, even working the exchange rate by doubling the prices, it cost less than in Canada or the US.
Now saying all that, I have made the most of driving a lorry around over here, helped by a very helpful dispatch and company owners. I stopped in Las Vegas and New York City that many times that I got bored of it and drove past without stopping. I visited the Kennedy space center and watched a rocket launch, went to the Rock n Roll hall of fame, cruised around Hollywood and Beverley Hills in my unit while taking a 36hr break, went to the site of Custer’s last stand, a few civil war battlesites and had a tour of Orange County Choppers. I’ve also been downtown in most of the big cities in the USA and I got to go to the truck shows in Dallas and Louisville too.
It can be a huge adventure if you’re lucky enough to work for a good company, but those opportunities are almost impossible to find, I know I was very lucky indeed. It was good to tell another Brit that asked where I was staying that I was just taking a day off work as we sat drinking a beer in New York or Vegas [emoji41][emoji41]
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I`ve been trying hard… honest…
But this picture of the US cant be true can it? I mean were being told that leaving the EU will give us better and cheaper food. Will give us more choice. Our new future will be more like that in free trading nations like the Us, one of our new potential trading partners.
Nah, all of the contributors to this thread who point out any faults in the US can`t be as trustworthy as our politicians, can they?
Sorry. No I`ve got no will power.
A friend of mine moved out there last year and is living the dream. Married with one child he is living in Washington State and done two trips back to back to Miami. He speaks Spanish and English and working for family friends. Otherwise I don’t think he would have attempted it.
That’s the best part of 12,000miles and a fantastic journey, but a lot of time away from home, doing that week in, week out will made you old in a hurry.
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switchlogic:
Carryfast:
RB84:
I would hazard a guess that the big ole expanse of water between the UK AND USA/Canada is the main spanner in the works of making it worth while taking a vehicle overIt wasn’t that which stopped me.It was the two problems that the shipping lines won’t match ro ro rates for a truck with container rates :
Why would they match prices though? Carrying an artic involves more work, more space and more man power than a container. And let face it no one is mad enough to think the idea of sending accompanied freight across the Atlantic makes any sense! Why waste money and space on a tractor unit that will spend 90% of its time on a boat?
How does driving a truck onto/off a ro ro deck involve more work or manpower than moving and unloading a container from a truck or train then loading it onto a ship then unloading it at the other end and dropping it onto a truck/train when all those operations have to be paid for ?.Also doesn’t require dockside space for storage while switching between modes.While in this case the deck crews involved on the ro ro decks are already there being paid for so might as well make use of them.While around just a week at sea each way isn’t anywhere close to 90% of a decent Euro-North American return run more like 30%.While in most cases it’s not a case of driver accompanied.Just driver ( me ) collected on landing.Which seems to be confirmed by the answer which I was given which wasn’t that it couldn’t be done.It’s that it ‘could’ foreseeably work too well,from the customers’ point of view and thereby had the potential to create an ‘inbalance’ in the North Atlantic container v ro ro market.Especially in the case of the combined ro ro/container shipping operations which offered the most ideal shortest crossing route ( Halifax ).IE they were worried about shifting too much demand from their container capacity onto their ro ro decks capacity.While my pleas that it’s only one bleedin owner driver operation and will stay that way,not a new division of Ferrymasters,didn’t make any difference to that mistaken perception. 
Franglais:
I`ve been trying hard… honest…But this picture of the US can
t be true can it? I mean were being told that leaving the EU will give us better and cheaper food. Will give us more choice. Our new future will be more like that in free trading nations like the Us, one of our new potential trading partners.
Nah, all of the contributors to this thread who point out any faults in the US can`t be as trustworthy as our politicians, can they?
No we’re being told by just one specific globalist faction of the Leave side that jumping out of bed with ze Germans and into bed with the Chinese instead will be so much better.
As for the real world we just carry on buying the same British produced meat and veg that we buy now with the win win that we don’t hit our NZ colonial compatriots with unfair tarrifs and quotas when we import their lamb for example.Bearing in mind that their lambing season is the opposite to Europe’s.While the EU’s obvious plan is to make us dependent on European or even Brit mutton all year round.
As for staying with the German led EU stitch up exactly which part of EU economic policy doesn’t make us part of the same Globalist free markets agenda that’s wrecking America.With the lose lose that we are also being bled dry by the EU in the form of paying a fortune for the privilege of providing Brit jobs for EU workers.
newmercman:
You got that right Luke, the US is full of poverty, industries that led to mass internal migration have moved to China or Mexico and left complete cities in a state of poverty and crime goes hand in hand with that. Outside of the big cities which are mainly on the east coast and the touristy places, the rest of the US is made up of cheap housing, lots of them have wheels under the main floor rather than a foundation or a basement!Groceries are more expensive, except meat and that is mostly mass produced tasteless crap and has nowhere near the flavour that you get in Britain.
To be fair their are loads of silly building anomalies around the world in which they put lightly built mobile homes in Tornado areas and heavy concrete multi stories in earth quake zones.
While we’ve also got plenty of cheap crap food around and it takes a lot of cash and effort to find the decent stuff especially decent pork products.While ironically we’ve got a specialist grocery shop here that provides American beef for example,possibly because we’ve got a large US ex pat community here and it’s just as variable in quality as our own sold with it.IE can be great one week and hopeless the next.While in general I won’t usually buy meat from anywhere except Waitrose or sometimes M and S now and even those are also variable in quality that’s if they’ve not run out of stock of the decent stuff like best Rib Eye or Sirloin or Breckland White Pork joints.
While Euroland,especially us,has also been hit by Globalisation in the form of race to the bottom economics.
The same men run the show, doesn’t matter which part of the world you live in. Food is all controlled by a dozen companies globally, firms like Cargill even control the food our food eats. In the context of this thread, America is the biggest villain of all.
Take truckstops, when I first started over here ten years ago, you had a choice of menu items freshly cooked and a buffet, it wasn’t fine dining, but you got a decent feed. Now it’s hard to find a sit down meal, the restaurants have gone and been replaced by fast food joints. Worst of the lot being Subway, who the ■■■■ wants to work a 14hr day on a poxy sandwich! Another downside apart from nutrition is that drivers now often leave their truck on the fuel pumps while they grab a sandwich or burger and cause line ups as drivers have to wait to get fuel.
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dodged600:
Do what this guy did and take your own truck to USA
It’s not for hire or reward so he can do it, I have seen many European commercial vehicles on my travels, many years ago the Williams F1 team sent their transporter hooked to a Magnum, it was shipped to NYC and driven to Daytona, I knew the driver and he told me he was subject to lot’s of DOT inspections due to curiosity.
newmercman:
Take truckstops, when I first started over here ten years ago, you had a choice of menu items freshly cooked and a buffet, it wasn’t fine dining, but you got a decent feed. Now it’s hard to find a sit down meal, the restaurants have gone and been replaced by fast food joints. Worst of the lot being Subway, who the [zb] wants to work a 14hr day on a poxy sandwich! Another downside apart from nutrition is that drivers now often leave their truck on the fuel pumps while they grab a sandwich or burger and cause line ups as drivers have to wait to get fuel.Sent from my SM-G950W using Tapatalk
Gotta agree with that, Pilot for instance seem to buy out old smaller truckstops and strip out the sit down diner to replace them with fast food places.
Here’s an example of how different my current company are in how they treat me compared to others.
My Mother in law died suddenly 3 weeks ago, the company sent me straight home. My wife was then taken into hospital 2 days after the funeral and I have now been off work for the whole 3 weeks, my truck has been parked on my drive the whole time and my weekly pay has not gone away or dropped. I have now agreed to start back this coming week as my missus is feeling better and even has her beloved Jeep back out.
So tomorrow night I will head empty to Philadelphia for a Monday Ben & Jerry’s load.
Any other company and I would be broke.
So do you think that things are picking up as well as not enough new drivers entering the industry? Trump planned to bring jobs back to America, so more stuff needs to be hauled to supply the jobs themselves and as more people are in work, they have money to spend on stuff that also needs hauling.
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newmercman:
You got that right Luke, the US is full of poverty, industries that led to mass internal migration have moved to China or Mexico and left complete cities in a state of poverty and crime goes hand in hand with that. Outside of the big cities which are mainly on the east coast and the touristy places, the rest of the US is made up of cheap housing, lots of them have wheels under the main floor rather than a foundation or a basement!Groceries are more expensive, except meat and that is mostly mass produced tasteless crap and has nowhere near the flavour that you get in Britain. The rest of it, what little there is isn’t cheap at all. My local supermarket still confuses me every visit, I get to the end and think I’ve missed a few aisles, the choice is very limited. Unless you want fizzy drinks, chips (crisps) hotdogs or plastic cheese. The last time I visited England I got excited by the choice of good available in a Tesco petrol station and was very happy at the cost, even working the exchange rate by doubling the prices, it cost less than in Canada or the US.
Now saying all that, I have made the most of driving a lorry around over here, helped by a very helpful dispatch and company owners. I stopped in Las Vegas and New York City that many times that I got bored of it and drove past without stopping. I visited the Kennedy space center and watched a rocket launch, went to the Rock n Roll hall of fame, cruised around Hollywood and Beverley Hills in my unit while taking a 36hr break, went to the site of Custer’s last stand, a few civil war battlesites and had a tour of Orange County Choppers. I’ve also been downtown in most of the big cities in the USA and I got to go to the truck shows in Dallas and Louisville too.
It can be a huge adventure if you’re lucky enough to work for a good company, but those opportunities are almost impossible to find, I know I was very lucky indeed. It was good to tell another Brit that asked where I was staying that I was just taking a day off work as we sat drinking a beer in New York or Vegas [emoji41][emoji41]
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I think you’re suffering from a severe case of rose-tinted spectacles, Mark. Chomping on supermarket meat over here in Blighty is akin to chewing on a piece of cardboard or leather. Very little taste, horrible texture and if you are gullible enough to fall for the fake supermarket “farms” marketing guff then the quality is even worse than that! I’ll openly admit (and I certainly won’t be alone) that I fell for the idyllic sounding Woodside Farms marketing, thinking I was buying some locally reared select piggy cuts but it was a mistake that I’ll never make again now that my taste buds have recovered from the shock! As the linked article points out, the farms don’t even exist and it is in fact all the dog-ends imported from the other side of the world that would probably get minced into tins of dog food if Tesco hadn’t beaten them to it. I struggle to accept that the USA and Canada meat selection can possibly be worse than that crap!
But let’s face facts here : the only reason the supermarkets have become what they are both here and in North America is because that is what the majority of the consumers are content with. In years gone by every parade of shops would have a butcher shop and bakery, simply because there was a demand for them, but nowadays the convenience, price and time-saving factors of the supermarkets means that nearly everyone shops there now and the local independents go under. The same will have happened over there too, so complain about the quality all you/we want - we’ve only got ourselves to blame.
Also with the abundance of price comparison websites and apps it just exacerbates the problem. Virtually everyone shops on price over quality and so the independents never stood a chance. You reap what you sow…
What I would suggest to you is to try the meat from your local Costco over there. If they’re anything like the UK branches they have an in-house butchery and do their own Kirkland brand which is superb. You may have something similar over there.
Pat Hasler:
dodged600:
Do what this guy did and take your own truck to USAIt’s not for hire or reward so he can do it, I have seen many European commercial vehicles on my travels, many years ago the Williams F1 team sent their transporter hooked to a Magnum, it was shipped to NYC and driven to Daytona, I knew the driver and he told me he was subject to lot’s of DOT inspections due to curiosity.
^ This.Adams also did similar own account transport to Bonneville in the case of the Blue Bird project.
samuelhawley.com/bluebird1.jpg
But it has to be a DOT compliant ( effectively US spec ) truck to be allowed to haul a commercial paying load even if it’s temporary entry and an international freight movement.Which the DOT make very clear to anyone planning on doing it.Which seems to go against all the norms of international transport in which compliance with the vehicle standards and spec of the country of registration is all that’s usually required.To the point where it’s no problem to use a US spec truck to haul a commercial paying load to/from Euroland etc.