- May 02, 2012
Wes Malmgren used bits and pieces of trucks he’d seen through the years to design and build his personal 2004 Peterbilt and its eye-catching paint job
by James Jaillet
It’s not so much the graphics that capture the attention as it is the color combo of Wes Malmgren’s Peterbilt 379. The black and lime green flattop, an in-house build done at the Malmgren family’s company headquarters in Aurora, Utah, is the rebel amongst a fleet of more refined workhorses.
Though Malmgren’s trucking roots ...
- May 01, 2012
When California flatbed hauler Ernesto Rubio turns into the Old Castle Precast prefabrication facility in the heart of Fontana’s industrial area, the security guards at the main gate wave him through as if he were a celebrity.
- April 30, 2012
Jersey isn’t the first place one would think of being a hotbed for customizing trucks. Gangsters ripping them off and hijacking their loads? Sure. But truck dealerships ripping a new rig apart and transforming what was once ordinary into an extraordinary work of rolling artisanship and craftsmanship? Fuhgetaboutit. That is unless you're thinking pure Mayhem...
- April 22, 2012
SRS National fleet owner and part-operator Jerry Beaudoin drives his company's calling card
By Todd Dills
Many big-rig customizers back their way into building a dream truck. After years of on-road hauling, all the while slowly acquiring the technical know-how to take a working tractor and turn it into a project truck, they hot-rod an old family workhorse or turning a junkyard find into a machine that gleams like new.
Jerry Beaudoin, owner of the Southington, Conn.-based SRS National fleet of 10 company-owned ...
- April 21, 2012
California all-star customizer Jeff Botelho’s show truck and working rig, 5150, inspired by grief of father’s passing
by Todd Dills
“Up until recently,” says Jeff Botelho, customizing trucks was more a highly advanced hobby than anything else for himself and crew at the Botelho’s Custom Trucks shop in Los Banos, Calif.
He runs his family’s Botelho Bros. Trucking business and custom shop out of the same facility, from which the shop’s unofficial name, Tin Can Customs, comes.
“My shop’s kind of like a tin ...
- April 19, 2012
1989 Peterbilt 379 is the first build for big rig newcomer Juan Carlos Ibarra
- April 18, 2012
By Bruce W. Smith
As quarry owner Lloyd Tausch rolled his big Cat 988F wheel loader toward the waiting dump trailer he subconsciously made an effort to be a little gentler depositing the ten tons of granite filling the bucket. He eased up to within a few feet of the waiting truck, rolled the bucket forward, and dropped the load perfectly.
“It’s pretty much what happens whether I’m at a quarry or unloading at the jobsite,” says owner Henry “Hank” Hall, sitting ...
- April 03, 2012
Driver Brent Pecarski began making modifications from the time he picked up the log-hauling truck he drives for Blaskie Trucking in Ontario
By Max Kvidera
Logging trucks are usually sturdy work trucks that go about their job in anonymity. Not Blaskie Trucking’s 2009 Peterbilt 388, driven by Brent Pecarski. It sports Peterbilt’s Violet Effect paint tone, which turns heads and draws camera-toting gawkers in Blaskie’s Ontario, Canada, territory.
“I can haul to a pulp mill in a big city and it’s nothing out ...
- March 16, 2012
Texan Michael Briseno never backs down from a heavy haul
By Bruce W. Smith
When the need for a heavy haul comes in from customers, several rigs in the Lindamood Demolition trucking fleet can answer the call. More times than not it’ll be veteran driver Michael Briseno rolling in behind the wheel of Over the Top – a bright-blue tri-axle ’06 Pete powered by a 625 Cat.
The jobs are as varied as the clients, with loads being anything from big excavators and ...
- March 10, 2012
After four years of painstaking work, Scott Diller’s 1981 KW has a new lease on life
by Max Kvidera
To say Scott Diller will go to extremes to get the look he wants in his show truck is an understatement.
From the time he rescued a 1981 Kenworth W900A that was destined for the junkyard until he rolled it into a Louisville, Ky., competition in 2011, nearly four years passed. Much of that time was spent bending and shaping the 30-year-old rig. The ...
