Warthog:
I understand your concern- I have lived with the dangerous traffic of southern California all my 42 years and recently seen a LARGE number of stoopid things on the I-10. But you have taken my lack of experience with a certain model of truck and translated it into an inability to safely drive a truck which only weighs 6 1/2 tons.
I earned a Class A license (semi trucks rated to 80,000 pounds) when I was 20 years old. While I don't drive one often, I have done it many times. I have also operated heavy equipment since I was a teenager and have a current mobile crane operator's certificate (state-recognized).
I understand reading manuals is a great place to start and it would be nice to even make it mandatory, but the Operator's Manual is just under 400 pages. With two kids, a job, and all the family things which suck up time, I will not be able to review the manual before it's time to get the truck. And that's not even counting the Organizational Repair manual, let alone the Depot repair manual. So I AM doing the research; asking questions here is about the same as going to someone's house and asking them there, except that I don't have to find the time to do it on their schedule and I get the advantage of several opinions and experiences instead of one. Also, graveyard shift generally precludes me from interacting with other people on a normal schedule.
The link to the "...Deuce Recovery List..." was excellent! Thanks very much for that. It didn't show up when I did a Search or when I posted this thread. I have printed it out and will start buying parts and fluids.
Thanks very much for your answers and it's good to point out to newbies that these things are not like pickup trucks, not even the bobbed ones.
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I like Chevron DELO. Does anyone have any reason to NOT use this brand and type of oil?
