After being delayed for more than two YEARS, I can now showcase what will be the final nail in the coffin for the last company in the city to hold onto their diesel fleets from the original 2007 contract.
The city's four residential contracts renewed in 2021 for an additional 15 year extension, which finally mandated California Waste Solutions to replace their worn out fleet for brand new CNG powered trucks. GreenTeam, Garden City Sanitation, and GreenWaste Recovery all began receiving new trucks in mid-2021. Problems with negotiating regarding labor disputes and budgeting between the company, the city and the local union delayed CWS from purchasing a new fleet until October of 2022, which was when the first ZR arrived in the yard.
However the truck just sat in the yard, and it was only taken out of the yard in March of 2023 for a Touch-a-Truck Event. Most of the trucks sat at Coast Counties Peterbilt, which were then sent to the CWS Yard where they sat for months. That was until August of 2023, when my driver (who's coincidentally #1 on the seniority list) had his truck suffer a catastrophic hydraulic leak & spill. It finally forced the yard to hastily prepare and send out his reserved truck the following day. All of the other drivers are still waiting on replacement units, which I hear will be rolling out in increments of five.
I was very fortunate to be there first hand when his old truck broke down, which gave me the knowledge to know where he would be the following day in his new truck. So the first portion of the video is SJC-01 on it's very first day on route. Considering the mechanics sent it out without greasing or inspecting the truck, it ran very well, with only a few hiccups relating to the packing speed and the truck stalling out from the RPM cutoff. The operations manager also hopped in for the first couple hours to observe the truck's performance.
The second portion of the video is the truck's first time on my route. Over the weekend the mechanics put chrome lug nut covers on the steer axle wheels, which was a nice touch. His main gripe is that the blade doesn't cycle constantly. It only packs for a couple of cycles, and then it'll stop. Over the next few weeks, he said he had to constantly press the pack button so the hopper wouldn't be overwhelmed. One week that he was training another driver, he said he basically spent the entire route stretched over the console pressing the pack button. I've heard similar issues from other drivers at other companies, and what they do is actually fashion something to wedge into the pack button so it's constantly depressed. He's also somehow got revving down to a science with a brand new McNeilus side loader, which is interesting to say the least, considering these trucks nowadays have pretty low RPM cutoffs. Overall it's a very nice truck, with a few hiccups that will hopefully be ironed out as more new trucks come in.
FYI, this truck and one of its' sister units are actually featured prominently in both McNeilus advertisement and the calendar for 2024, so keep an eye out for that.
Special thank you to the following;
- George (my driver)
- Matt (Operations Manager)
- Jesus (Mechanic)
for always allowing me to film, and to give me a heads up on this truck!
Enjoy the video!
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