FIVE FOR THE ROAD

Customized heavy haulers shine at shows and work in the dirt

By Lanier Norville

No matter how or where they’re used, owner-operators take pride in their rides. It’s easy to spot them on the open raod as they criss-cross the country delivering the goods.

But those who use their rigs for heavy hauls in the oil fields and construction world are less often seen or appreciated for the work that goes into such customized big rigs by the  general public. These rigs daily work environment is one where you’d least expect to see an owner-operator devote a lot of time and money to fix up and personalize their trucks. But they do, and they do it well.

Take a look at these five tricked-out heavy haulers–customized for both looks and performance. All five of these off-road workhorses haul heavy loads over rough terrain, and all five have earned bragging rights at big league truck shows.

Jake Lindamood of Lindamood Demolition knows a thing or two about maintaining a custom severe service rig. His trucks tackle tough terrain and debris-filled construction sites daily as they deliver demolition equipment to condemned buildings and haul away the resulting rubble.

“Being in the demo business you’ve gotta go where the jobs are,” Lindamood says. And those jobs often take him and his team to landfills, rock quarries and mines. But when his tricked-out Petes are polished on the show floor, people stare incredulously, unable to believe that they are working trucks, Lindamood says. “When people like that drive by and see the truck in a landfill, it’s kinda nice,” he says.

Among his fleet of 18 Peterbilts, two stand proudest: King Ranch, a 2007 dark brown and tan Peterbilt 379 extended hood, and Juiced Up, a bright orange 2007 Peterbilt 379 four axle heavy hauler. Both show trucks have double frames, 46,000-pound Air Trac suspension and heavy-duty front ends with oversized tires. Both have flip-up front bumpers.

“A lot of people have the flip bumper just cause it looks good, but we actually use it when we go off road,” he says. Each one has other custom parts that make it one-of-a-kind, such as King Ranch’s rugged hardwood floors or Juiced-Up’s electric headache rack doors.

“We’ve got pride in our trucks cause we did it,” Lindamood says of his team, who does all the paint and body work in house. “The week before a show is like a madhouse,” he says of his shop. “We’ll tear the trucks down to nothing trying to get them clean and polished. We’ll touch up anything that got messed up” the week before at job sites.

Once, the fenders on King Ranch got scratched less than a week before a show, Lindamood says. But, “When something happens, I don’t let it go. I fix it as soon as I get time,” even if there isn’t a show coming up, he says.“It’s a challenge to keep a truck looking like that,” Lindamood says, “but that’s our hobby; that’s what we like doing.”

JUICED UP

Year/Make/Model: 2007 Peterbilt 379 4 axle heavy hauler

Engine: 625-hp Caterpillar with a Pittsburgh power chip that allows up to 750-hp

Transmission: 18-speed

Owner: Jake Lindamood

Hauls for: Lindamood Demolition; Dallas, Texas

Freight: demolition equipment

Terrain: on and off-road: construction sites, landfills, rock quarries and mines

Interior modifications: Silver and orange paint on the cab’s interior; orange upholstery

Exterior modifications: Custom built back fenders, rear bumper and attic rack; painted and chromed motor; flip-up front bumper and new visor panels; electric headache rack doors; pearlescent orange paint

Awards: Best Peterbilt, Billy Bob’s Truck Show, 2008; third-best Peterbilt, GATS, 2008

KING RANCH

Year/Make/Model: 2007 Peterbilt 379 extended hood

Engine: 565-hp Caterpillar

Transmission: 18-speed

Owner: Jake Lindamood

Hauls for: Lindamood Demolition; Dallas, Texas

Freight: demolition debris

Terrain: on and off-road: construction sites, landfills, rock quarries, mines

Interior modifications: hand scraped hardwood floors; painted dash panels; Phillips aluminum steering wheel; custom lighting in cab floor

Exterior modifications: flip-up front bumper; painted and chromed motor; custom deck plate; custom rear bumper; chrome brake drum covers; painted brake drums; chrome suspension parts; dark brown and mocha pearl custom striped paint job

Awards: First place, NAST Truck-Lite trophy competition, MATS, 2008; Best of Show, Billy Bob’s Truck Show, Fort Worth, Texas, 2009

John Steed of Grand Junction, Colo., named his 2004 Kenworth W900L the Rocky Mountain Equalizer because “It goes up and down these rocky mountains like they’re not there,” he says.

That’s probably thanks to the 1500-hp Caterpillar engine that Steed modified with turbos, timing electronic computers, modified exhaust manifolds and oversized air-to-air coolers. And it might have something to do with the 18-speed transmission with 2150 lb/ft torque and 3500 lb/ft clutch.“We had to put that in to hold the horsepower,” he says.

His business, the 18-truck fleet Henderson Heavy Haul, takes him and his drivers all over the country to pick up and deliver windmill blades that can be as long as 165 feet. Because windmills are often situated in high places, delivery means trekking long distances off-road, often up steep mountain inclines.

“Most of them go off road to very inhospitable regions,” he says of the trucks in his fleet. “Some places they have to hook onto us with bulldozers just to get up there.”

Steed talks about a big rig going mountain climbing as if it were an everyday thing—and for him it is. “Things do happen,” he says, “but you just fix them. You have to drive carefully, and the problems are minimal.”

Like Lindamood, Steed fixes any damage his fleet suffers right away. That way, there’s not too much bodywork to do before it hits the show floor. Steed’s son Justin was the mastermind behind the truck’s big win at MATS this year, he says. “It’s a little unusual,” he says of seeing his work truck primped and polished for a show, but “people [who own small fleets] take a lot of pride in their equipment. I don’t think big companies have the time or the inclination to do that.”

But looks aren’t everything to Steed. “The big thing about our business is the service we provide. The looks are just kind of the cherry on top.”

ROCKY MOUNTAIN EQUALIZER

Year/Make/Model: 2004 Kenworth W900L

Engine: 1500-hp Caterpillar; modified with turbos, timing computers, manifolds, and air-to-air coolers

Transmission: 18-speed transmission with 3500 lb/ft torque clutch

Owner: John Steed

Hauls for: Henderson Heavy Haul, Grand Junction, Colo.

Freight: windmill blades

Terrain: off-road: mountainous, steep grade

Interior modifications: Black painted dash; chrome gauges; custom steering wheel; custom chrome gearshift; black ceramic tile floor; mirrored ceiling in place of sunroof; chrome button covers on upholstery

Exterior modifications: Bullet lights and LED lights installed on the roof; black powder coated grill covers, bumper and fuel tanks; black powder coated and chromed steps; extendable trailer up to 154 feet; custom headache rack; custom painted red brake drums; polished aluminum wheels

Awards: First place, working class combination, 2009, MATS

Not all severe service rigs that get a custom makeover go back to work. When Jerry Diemoz, owner of J&R trucking of Rock Springs, Wyo., saw what S&J custom shop in Ft. Wayne, Ind., had done to his old 1981 Pete, his jaw dropped. He had originally sent it in for a modest facelift, but when the shop was invited to enter a truck in the Big-Rig Build-Off, they chose Big Red.

Diemoz, who delivers equipment and rigging to Wyoming’s oil fields, specs all his trucks for better performance off-road, he told Custom Rigs editor Bruce Smith for a previous article.

Big Red after J&R customizing.

BIG RED

Year/Make/Model: 1981 Peterbilt

Engine: Big Red’s engine received a block-out rebuild that gave it bigger injectors, oversized the bore and upsized the turbo for a 1,000-hp Caterpillar

Transmission:

Owner: Jerry Diemoz

Hauls for: J&R Trucking, Rock Springs, Wyo.

Freight: rigging and drilling equipment

Terrain: off road in Wyoming’s oil fields

Interior modifications: sound deadening insulation; custom speaker boxes; Pioneer sound system; rear camera; DVD player; police scanner; leather upholstery; Comfort Ride seats

Exterior modifications: custom-built double-frame rails; new sheet metal in the hood, cab and sleeper; front axle converted to hub pilot-style; custom stainless boxes; locking drivers extended from 46 to 60 inches; new fenders; new Bridgestone drivers; custom stainless deck plate and frame covers; 185-gallon saddle tanks; chrome the front bumper and trim; custom firewall and engine air intake; custom paint job

Awards: 2009 Big-Rig Build-Off Industry Award

“It’s not really that cool,” Jerry Beaudoin says of customizing his severe service fleet. “Expensive is what it is. I do it because I have a passion for trucks, and I like building them.”

When Beaudoin bought his first truck in 2001, a unique orange Peterbilt 379 dump, he turned heads. “I named it Triple Six—a bad name for a bad truck,” he says. As his business grew, Beaudoin bought more trucks and began customizing them himself. He began to establish a reputation in the area, he says, and now he has to keep it up.

Today he owns a fleet of 12 severe service trucks under the name SRS National that remove contaminated waste from various sites and deliver it to landfills. Each one goes off-road for every job, and each one is customized.

Beaudoin and his staff clean each truck weekly as if it were headed to a show. “I won’t even let a truck out of the shop unless it’s clean. That’s just the rule,” Beaudoin says.

Jerry Beaudoin's Triple One at work.

111 (TRIPLE ONE)

Year/Make/Model: 2007 Peterbilt 379

Engine: 565-hp Cummins ISX

Transmission: 18-speed Eaton Fuller

Owner: Jerry Beaudoin

Hauls for: SRS National, Southington, Conn.

Freight: contaminated dirt from factories, schools, oil tanks, gas stations and other sites associated with environmental cleanup

Terrain: gravel pits, mulch yards and landfills

Interior modifications: low-base leather seats; twin stick shift; custom-built aluminum flat panels; interior stripes painted to match the exterior; painted dash; stainless steel headliner and floor; solid chrome steering wheel

Exterior modifications: air-ride suspension; suicide doors; removed door handles, cab lights, horns and emblems; automatic hood opener; painted and chromed motor; blacked out grill; remote control-operated revolving headlights

Awards: Best of Show, Combination Class, MATS 2007; Second place, Outlaw Monster Truck Show, Wildwood, NJ, 2009; Best of Show, New England Dragway, Epping, NH, 2009

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