Fleet Change

guyute65045

Morning all,
I am thinking about changing my fleet around, currently have a F350 that is mostly used by my business partner and a F550 flatbed dump that I haul with.
As I get into bigger jobs I don't foresee the need to haul material with the 1 ton, I am thinking about selling it and buying a tandem and a 1/2 ton for my daily driver.
How many of you use your 1 tons? Do you find it useful to have the extra, albeit small hauling capacity? How about Tandem vs Tri, who has a tandem and wishes it were a tri or vice versa?
My 1 ton only has 78K on it so it is still valuable for now. Thanks for any and all input.

JDavis21835

I think this depends on your future plans for the business. I currently work for a company that is doing 10-12 million in business every year. We have 3 F450s, two with tool bodies, one with a flat bed. The tool body trucks run out on our environmental jobs. So they carry everything a normal pipe crew would carry, plus they have to carry environmental specific equipment, and the tools to do site restoration. Most of these jobs are 1 week projects, so its not worth the trouble to move a trailer in with the crew. The Flat bed F450 is our utility truck. We move small dozers, skid steers, mini exs, and even backhoes in a pinch. This truck also delivers materials to the site. Yes, we can, and usually do haul those items with a tandem axle dump. But we have it so we can pull trailers that require a gvw plated truck with the 450, so it fills in nicely, even though its under utilized.

We also have 3 3/4 ton pickup trucks. 1 of which works on the environmental side. The jobs that truck goes to our environmental piping jobs. So that truck only needs what is on site. This usually being a 16ft covered trailer. Most of their piping is hdpe so the trailer carries all the fusing equipment. 3/4 ton truck #2 is for our civil division. This truck is one long term jobs that usually have an office trailer, and sea container. This fits well since all the items needed are in the jobsite storage. 3/4 ton truck #3 is the truck I have. I cover our smaller environmental jobs, and civil jobs. Most of the civil jobs are not too bad, since I usually have a storage container on site for those. I run into trouble on the environmental jobs. Since I do not have a good storage system on the truck, I have trouble carrying everything needed, not to mention, the truck would be way over loaded.

There has been talk that the office is looking into more 450 tool body trucks. The 3/4 tons will not be retired though, they will be brought back to the yard, and used as utility vehicles. If we need to send a guy out with a skid steer, or mini to do a 1 day job, the 3/4 tons would be used. They would also find a roll in personal transportation on out of town jobs, as well as transportation for office personal that head out to bid lettings. Our office like to send those people out in vehicles with a company name on them.

The way I look at it, I would keep the vehicles you have, and add to your fleet. When you get a tandem/tri axle dump, keep the 550, and find a new use for it. Such as starting a material supply division. This truck would be well suited to most driveway deliveries. But you would also have the big dump for bigger deliveries. Or maybe you get a dumpster trailer for that 550. You can market 5-10 yard cans to home owners. If you own the equipment, and is in good shape, I see no reason to get rid of it. Just find a way to utilize it.