Suggestions for hauling Computer Garage from Beaverton, OR to Yates

At 09:43 PM 3/4/02 -0700, you wrote: Check with a trucking company and see how much they'd charge just to haul a load after you pack and load it. A friend of mine recently moved him. The moving companies wanted a fortune (~$100,000) to move it and it would have taken at least half a dozen large U-haul trucks. He talked to a local trucking company and made deal with them just to haul the stuff after we packed and loaded it. We had already packed most of the tooling a such into crates and strapped them onto pallets ahead of time but the really big stuff, such as the 16" x 5 foot (bed size!) lathe had to be loaded directly into the turck. The company brought out a ~58 foot trailor and parked it next to his place on Friday. When loading day came (Saturday) my friend rented a three wheel forklift with ballon tires (we were working out of a yard and an open field so there was no pavement). We used the forklift to load all the pallets and then the machines. We got everything loaded in about 6 hours. The truckers came back two days later (Monday) and picked up the trailor and took it straight to NY. It arrived less than 24 hours after it left his place. In NY they had a garage with a paved driveway to put it into and a forklift there and waiting when the truck arrived. They had everything unloaded and the truck was out of there in less than a hour. IIRC my buddy paid the trucking company $1800 to haul the load. As it turned out, it was a bargain! Everything arrived intact and he had zero problems with the move itself. A moving company would have kept the stuff around while they tried to combine loads and such and invariably something what have been lost or stolen. I know a 58' truck doesn't sound that much bigger than a 24' truck but it will haul a LOT more! First, it's designed to carry 60,000 pounds or more and not 6,000 like a U-haul truck. Plus the body is a lot wider, our's was slightly over 8 feet wide instead of the <6' for a U-Haul. Plus the ceiling is MUCH higher. I don't know exacly how tall the big trailor was but it was well over 8'. Finally, the driver is a trained and professional truck driver so you don't have to try and learn how to drive it as you go! And that also leaves you free to drive your own automobile to your destination. My buddy was going to have to ship one auto. I think the charge for that alone was a much as the truck cost. Joe