I attended this year’s Walcott Trucker’s Jamboree for three days: Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. I found it quite interesting that there were no conversations about how nothing that’s new works properly. In fact, much of the conversations were centered around how maintenance-free, efficient, and reliable the new trucks are. In one conversation I had with two truck owners, it was stated that one of the men had several old trucks, and a few new trucks. He shared with me that indeed, it’s nice that he can work on his older equipment. He quickly added to that statement, “The thing is, it’s not just having the time and being able to work on the old trucks; it’s quite necessary to work on the old trucks”. He further shared with us that the only maintenance being done on the new Freightliner Cascadia trucks is changing the oil every 50,000 miles and greasing the few components that still require it every 25,000 miles. I explained to him that based on the fuel mileage that he’s attaining with his new trucks; he now can go 75,000 miles between his oil change intervals.
I got to spend some time with an old acquaintance who also attended the Jamboree. In the evenings, he and I walked around the truck stop looking at antique trucks and sharing stories of driving these old trucks when they were new. We shared a lot of memories of operating many of these old units, but we were positive that if we were to drive them again, we would only want it to be for the length of a parade or nostalgia purposes. The antique trucks and driving them back then is fun to remember, but trucks sure have come a long way from when many of us started our careers.
Now, let’s talk about the smell… When the show ended, the lot quickly cleared out. The visitors who had been walking around and enjoying the displays and the camaraderie with other truck drivers had gone back into their trucks, or back to their hotels, or back on the road. Our 2022 Freightliner Cascadia, Celeste, was parked near the Antique Truck display area during the Walcott Trucker’s Jamboree. Standing next to our Freightliner as the wind current was blowing my way, I got the distinct smell of unburned hydrocarbons. I was taken back to when I was a young child. In this 1960s memory, I was going with my parents to visit my grandparents in Philadelphia. We were traveling down the Schuylkill Expressway (I-76) sitting in a traffic jam in a car with no air conditioning. Of course, the windows were rolled down so that we could get some fresh air, but the smoke from the trucks and cars would make my eyes burn and water. That smell was much like that whiff I got from the parking lot on this day.
As I said earlier, I have fond memories of the old trucks; however, the new trucks have sure come a long way.
