Our December 2008/Janurary 2009 Rig of the Month driver is Ron Ruddick from Mission, B.C. Ron’s truck is featured on the front cover of the 2009 Wowtrucks Calendar and he also won three 1st place trophies at this years BC Big Rig Weekend for Gravel Truck, Best Lights and the coveted Peoples Choice Trophy. Many people are amazed that this truck works full time all year round.
As I have said many times before, our Rig of the Month should have been named Driver of the Month because we are more concerned with featuring a professional driver that represents the industry in a positive manner than their ride. Ron just happens to be a well respected professional driver who has a beautiful rig. This is his story:
I was born in Maple Ridge, B.C. and lived there most of my life except for a few years we spent in Pemberton where my aunt & uncle, Betty & Lorne Talbot lived and logged. My dad, Ron, worked for them running their equipment. They logged with a tower and it was a small operation so he did a little of everything from logging to loading and hauling. Then we moved back to Webster’s Corners in Maple Ridge where I lived until I was married. My wife, Jill, and I now live in Mission, B.C.
After we moved back to the Valley, my Dad always had logging trucks and log loaders of his own. He worked in the Fraser Valley from Horseshoe Bay to Hope loading and hauling logs. My Dad and mom, Mary, owned R.D. & M. Trucking where I started working on trucks when I was big enough to hold a wrench. We did all our own repairs and boy was there a lot of maintenance on those old logging trucks. Dad taught me a lot about repairing trucks both before I drove them and for a long time after. (Many years of patience…)
Once I was big enough to sit in the seat and turn the steering wheel, a family friend who worked with Dad, Dave Webster, would stand on the side of the truck and push the pedals while I maneuvered the truck around the yard. From that point on, as far as I was concerned, I was a truck driver. Dad had a lot of good guys work for him over the years and I was lucky enough to learn a lot from each and every one of them.
As I got older, during school holidays and weekends, I worked in the bush running log loaders and moving the trucks around. Dad owned a variety of trucks though the years - mainly Kenworths and Macks.
When I was 17, I got my class 3 with air. I could only legaly drive a straight truck so dad went out and bought a gravel truck. It was an old International gum boot with a 318 screaming Jimmy and a 5 & 4 transmission. I drove that until I turned 19 and got my class 1. Then, lucky for me, we turned it into a logging truck. I hauled logs with that for a couple of more years until we just couldn’t stand it any longer (it was one of those trucks). In ‘78 we traded it in on a new Mack which was my first new truck. Even back then I always liked keeping my trucks clean and painted up, but there was no chrome, it was still all about work.
When I first got out of school we hauled logs out of the University of B.C. Research Forest in Maple Ridge for Henry Carlson and his crew at C&L Logging. Some of the logs were used for research while others were sold to help fund the forest research project. That was where I met my future wife, Jill, who, in the summer, worked for her father at the site doing trail maintenance.
One of the more unique loads that I have hauled, next to long poles and pilings, was a Christmas tree that was over 60 feet in length. It was donated by UBC and we had to deliver it into downtown Vancouver where they stood it up in front of the Bentall Towers. It was quite a project because we had to suspend it on the truck so that it would not break any branches during the trip. It worked out perfect and when they stood it up it looked like it had always been there.
In 1980, Jill and I got married and she is the perfect truckers wife. When we were going together, I worked all the time so if we wanted to see each other she had to be there with me. She has always helped me wash my truck and she even helps with some of the maintenance.
About a year before we got married we bought 2 acres of land and started to build a little house so that we would have a place to move into when the time came. We completed as much of the house as we needed and finished the rest of it as our family grew. It worked out great as we paid for the house and property as we went along so we didn’t have to go very far into debt when the big day came.
We have 2 beautiful girls, Christianne who was born in July of 1981 and Jenny who was born in October of 1982.
In ‘82 we bought a new Mack super liner. This one had a little chrome and aluminium and that opened up a whole new world for me – I got my first real taste of polishing.
One of the jobs I had was hauling logs for Vern Bingham who owned North Fraser Logging. He logged in the Coquitlam and Capillano Watersheds. One area in the Coquitlam Watershed had a huge old growth stand of timber that they actually had to build the road around. Some of these trees were 17 feet across the butt. It was a pretty awesome sight. I got to see nature at it’s finest and the wildlife in the area was amazing.
We worked for a lot of people around the Valley, including some of my relatives like my uncle Bruce and my cousin Craig at K&B Timber.
We also opened a retail truck parts store which my mom and dad ran at the yard. Later we purchased a commercial building at Webster’s Corners called R.D.& M. Truck parts and Industrial Supplies, a division of R.D.& M. Trucking. We sold everything from truck parts to logging supplies. After a few more years of hauling logs in the city traffic I decided to take a break. So I went to work in the store for a few years. But sitting still wasn’t for me and I had to get back in the seat.
Meanwhile at home, Jill wanted to teach the girls about farming. We were not farmers but I agreed. In 1990, we sold our place in Maple Ridge and bought 20 acres of bare land in Mission, B.C. We moved a house onto the property and that was the beginning of Ruddick’s Family Farm. We built a barn and fenced the property and we now have cows, chickens, goats and pigs and a big vegetable garden.
We’ve cleared about 10 acres and built paths through the rest, leaving as many trees as possible. The animals do a real good job of keeping the undergrowth down.
When I went back to trucking I bought the Mack super liner off my parents and went to work for Vern Bingham again, who was logging at Hunter Creek in Hope B.C.. If you know Hope you can just imagine the country I was in. It was the steepest road I had ever hauled on. They had to tow me up the hill, around switch backs and up onto the landing. Once I was loaded up they’d turn me loose and down the hill I’d go, slipping and sliding with my heart just a pounding.
We soon realized that this wasn’t working too well, so one time we decided to hook the skidder to the back of the trailer to try and hold me back while going down the hill. Bad idea. The skidder slid down and ran into the back of the trailer which really helped to accelerate the experience.
In the end, they hauled the logs to the bottom of the hill with an off highway truck and then loaded them on my truck. From there I hauled them to a log sort in Mission.
After a few years logging started to slow down, so we decided to try the gravel business. We bought an old 1970 Ford gravel truck from the Spence family in Anmore. We knew them well as we had hauled logs for them over the years. It had a 3208 Cat motor with a 5&4 and was a good old truck. This was a good move as it now gave us work all year long. In the summer we hauled logs with the Mack and in the off season we hauled gravel with the Ford.
In 1995 we traded the Mack in and bought a new Ford 8000 gravel truck. It had a 275 Cummins with an 8 LL transmission. I was working for Lloyd & Carol Davies and family of Davies Sand & Gravel, where I hauled local deliveries and excavation in Mission. The Davies family have treated me exceptionally well and helped me out a lot over the years.
In 1997 I had the opportunity to buy a truck from Tom Dickinson who supplied sand for Tristar Brick & Block. I hauled to Tristar with my truck and had a great driver, Rick Beaugie, on the other truck. But eventually gravel slowed down and we ended up selling the second truck.
In 2000 we traded in the Ford on a model 330 Peterbilt. Unfortunately, it had a Monday morning motor that was nothing but trouble. We fought with that motor until the truck was paid for and then I called Dennis Friesen, my salesman at Peterbilt, and told him that it was time to get rid of the truck. This was all new to me as it was the first time that I factory ordered a truck. Dennis was a great help when we got together and spec’d out the Pete I’m driving today.
It is a 2004, 357 with a C10 Cat, 8 LL trans with 40,000 lbs rears, Pete air track and a custom tub style Langfab box. It has a polished aluminium bulk head, walk rail, side boards, fenders and tail gate and colour matched paint. We took delivery October 1, 2003 and it’s been doing an excellent job ever since. I guess you could say that the polishing is a little more severe now.
When I brought the truck home the amber and red lights didn’t look good against the green box so I went to see Andrew in the parts department at Peterbilt and got about twenty chrome skull light covers. I kept adding more and more lights with skull covers as I thought of different places to put them and we now have over 150 skulls on the truck. The latest is a set of skull headlights.
I have to admit that it gets a lot of attention. One time in particular I was pulled over by the DOT and I’m pretty sure that the inspector, more than anything, just wanted a closer look at the skulls.
That was fine by me. I get along good with the DOT and I find that it’s a pretty easy thing to do. All you have to do is, do your job, keep your equipment in good condition, and let them do their job. Everybody’s happy.
I’m still happily working for Tristar Brick & Block and all the great guys at the plant. Owner Sev Samulski has been excellent to work for over the years.
It’s been a great year. We took home some hardware from BC Big Rig Weekend, which gave us the opportunity to have our truck featured in the 2009 Wow Trucks Calendar. On top of that we were also picked to be in the “2009 Canadian Truck Show Book”.
Our girls are grown now, with babies of their own. Christianne, our eldest, and her hubby Shawn have a young son, Dejal. Jenny, our youngest, and her hubby Aaron have two boys, Wyatt & Mason.
It’s great having grandkids. Not only did our girls grow up on the farm but now our grandkids are also enjoying it. Together we have a great family, we have the family farm and we love trucking. It’s a good life…