New to Flatbed: What commodities "really" need tarping

It depends on where you run and what time of year it is. Even though stuff is stored outside many places don’t want road grime or liquid de-icer on the product. Same with lumber. If it’s going to be re-sawn or laminated together it has to be kept free of road grime even if they stack it outside.

Short answer is if you’re told it’s a tarp load then you should tarp so it doesn’t get rejected at your destination.

 

Just tell them , "you dont tarp"

 

Shingles, they don't want the packaging to be torn apart from wind damage. I've hauled some steel beams that where stored outside, they wanted trapped because of barcodes on the end of the beam .
Same thing ,didn't want them damaged from the wind. I have gotten away with just tarping the end where the barcodes are. Any type of machines like lathe, press, testing equipment is a real pain and a tarp killer.

 

I tarped a load of gravel once, which upon delivery was removed from the super sacks and placed on the ground . You know like where rocks are supposed to be?

 

First load I ever tarped was crates of magnesium plate, stored outside, in humid So. Texas, but they had to be tarped to keep from getting wet for the trip . 4x4 crate, 16 of them, only tarp we had the trailer was this old giant rubber thing that had never been used and I had never tarped. I sweated off 5 lbs of water and chugged a gallon of gatorade before I left.

I love the loads we get now of an acid used for cleaning sugar processing vats, they come in 25lb polysacks wrapped in plastic on pallets. Now, common sense would say, don't get an acid wet, but apparently, unless there's another chemical added, this acid powder won't activate, I'll take their word for it. Our BOL says safe to transport untarped.

Wait till you pick up the load of plastic or poly pipe and they refuse to let you leave until it's tarped, even though once you deliver it, they will assemble it and bury it underground. Why, because it's for drinking water supply, and the tarp is actually to prevent exhaust smoke from contaminating the pipe.

 

What really needs tarped is whatever the customer says needs to be tarped. I've had lumber that had to be tarped, and other times it didn't. I've had to tarp shingles, pipe, slinkies; ordinarily those don't need tarping, but sometimes customers require it. I've seen drivers that didn't tarp pipe, and got rejected once they got to the consignee. Sometimes they got that coating on there, and if bad weather hits them, those customers will come unglued.

 

If it was landscaping gravel then they might not want road salt on it, as salts can do bad things to plants.

 

You mean like this?

 

Yes but it was gravel that went to road construction .. They put it down underneath the bridge for landscaping... in montana... it didnt bother me to tarp it. Easy load, and they paid 200 bucks for tarp ... ill take it

 

We had a driver that tarped a load of marine plywood. In good weather. The customer liked it so much that he specified every load after that would be tarped.

 

Tarp what you're told, usually the shipper will tell you or it will be on your bills. I had to tarp ROCKS one time. They were giant square rocks I picked up somewhere in Indiana. I guess they were decorative or something. The square loads don't bother me so much but when you get a load that's high-low the whole length of the trailer it can be fairly aggravating. Feels good to be pulling a tanker again lol