jerry61

With almost 40,000 members at DTR now, how would a forum
set up for us DTR members that use our trucks to make our living.
I am a long haul RV hauler, average about 10,000 miles a month, and
would love to have a forum for like minded members along with short haul
and local type working drivers.

Of course as long as spamming is still not allowed this could be a win win
thing for all 40,000 members. We learn from all members in every forum and
I think all members can learn a few things from us.

jerry

mj007

Sounds like a plan to me.

iker42

i like the amount of forums we have now, but i think this would be a good idea. people could post routes - stops - meet ups - ect.

ccoop769

I would luv to have a commerical forum. i think that is a great idea cause im always bouncing around to different forums and getting different responses from people who use there big 3500 rams for personel use and they dont use and abuse there trucks as us hotshotters do on a daily basis and i would like more of a accurate response from people who do there stuff on a daily basis. :PLEASE MAKE A COMMERCIAL FORUM FOR US COMMERCIAL PEOPLE. Possibly with even sub catagories inside that, but 1 step at a time!!!!!!!!!!!

jthorpe

We have plans on doing a Chevy forum and Ford forum Separate from this one so it's not so cluttered. I hadn't thought of a commercial truckers forum, but it might be a good idea. I can tell you from experience with this site that it might take a while to get going given the fact that there is probably other places those guys hang out right now. I'll put it on the list to consider. Thanks for the good input.

jerry61

Thanks Jack,

After several months of trying to find where OTR type hot shotters and
other haulers hang out on the web I haven't located them yet.
There's an active Drive Away drivers forum at Yahoo but they or sort of a big truck craft of their own.
Most of the drivers in my type hauling are the 1 ton Dodge Cummins and a few of the earlier Ford Powerstrokes which made me think a small corner of DTR might be set up for "the place" for us.
Along with all working trucks, as mentioned, including agriculture and
ranching, etc there's a bunch of us out there.
Doing the math,,tounge in cheek,,of DTR's 40k members, with a wild guess, my thoughts were that maybe 5-10% of us are the owners of working trucks. That'd cipher to about 2,000-4,000 members probably not quite enough for our own working truck forum.
Maybe we can lean towards, and gather, in the Hauling/Towing Forum If they'll put up with us.. along with PMing for awhile.

thanks again for considering it,

jerry

ccoop769

Even for simplicity, How about just a commercial thread on DTR forum main page like right below the tow/hauling thread/topic??????????

jthorpe

Well, I'm kinda hesitant to put anything on the existing forum because I really don't want it to get too cluttered. I may put a test forum as a sub-forum to towing and hauling, just to see what happens. Some people don't like sub-forums though because they usually don't get as much attention as the forums on the front page. Let me think about this for a while. I'll get back to you and let you know what I decide. Good input.

ccoop769

I think that is a great idea to start it like that
I could post alot of topics to get things started and I bet within a month it would get to a nice size

jthorpe

Not a bad plan. I'm not going to be able to set it up today because I am about to go to work, but I can try and do it sometime this week. I can setup multiple forums with the same user database so moving over to a new one wouldn't be too difficult. People who are already registered here would be able to go over to the new site without having to re-register.

jerry61

I too think that's a good approach and hopefully it'll blast off.
I certainly hope so,,I don't want to get egg all over my ugly mug on this
thing.
I'm optomistic and really do believe it'll be good for the site.
I'm even shopping for a budget type laptop to take on the road with me for online work related stuff,,,,cheapest fuel stops, mapping, highway conditions, weather and certainly to stay tuned into DTR.
In fact "What's Best Budget Laptop To Buy For OTR" would be my first thread in the new forum.

thanks

Wulfdiesel

I got the Itronix VR-2
I would never go back..it is a beautiful laptop. the display is AMAZING. The GPS system acts as a built in mapquest and there are tons of upgrades and it is a great support site
I traded in my toughbook 30 for it
hopefully this helps and hpefully we get a commercial truckers forum!

Texas_Trucker

I'd like to participate in such a forum. I'm a local fuel hauler.

ccoop769

I got my laptop form circuit city. I paid 450 bucks and includes a dual core amd turion @ 1.8ghtz, 1gb mem, 80 gig hd, wireless built in. At amazon you can get a verizon plug in usb/card for free with 2 year contract with verizon at 59 bucks a month. Verizon modem retails for 300 bucks. Battery time sucks but i got a 450 watt invertor from a autoparts store for 20 bucks. As for GPS, i got a garmin c550 for 350 bucks shipped through some internet source. That unit retails for around 500.

jerry61

> got my laptop form circuit city. I paid 450 bucks and includes a dual core
> d turion @ 1.8ghtz, 1gb mem, 80 gig hd, wireless built in.

Today I saw a Gateway at Best Buy that is priced well within my budget.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1179877238826

I'm not sure how good it is but with a upgrade on the RAM to 1 gig I think
it may be worth it. I hope it's loaded with everything I need if I buy that model. Laptop shopping and wireless is all new to me so have to do my homework like starting out here asking all these questions.

I am with Cingular/ATT now so I'll probably stay with them.
Most of my work with the laptop will be on the road so a 12v
cigarette lighter plug or inverter will be my juice. I won't be too
concerned about battery life.
Or even a larger screen, brightness and good
in sunlight should be more important to me.
Being lightweight is not important beings it'll be mounted in the truck 99% of the time.
I am concerned about the ruggedness of the cheaper ones and the heat
of the truck cab on a hot summer day is my greatest concern about that.

Someone told me about the Microsoft Navigation setup so I might look into
that. I like the thought of having the maps on a larger monitor (laptop)
than the smaller monitors of the other type systems like Garmin and the others.

I looked into the Itronix that Wulfdiesel suggested but as much as I'd love to go that route it just isn't in my budget at this time.

thanks