Opinions on gliders

[Hammerhead]

Fuel mileage is always a concern, but yeah in HH work it's not the absolute priority it is for freight trucks.
My two main priorities are;
1)Reliability
This doesn't just mean liner issues. CEL's and derates when you're 14'w X 110'+ long and grossing around 180k are just unacceptable.
Most of the time permit routes take you off on two lane roads in random routes, so it's not just as simple as pull off the interstate at the next city and yard it into a stealership to have it checked out. Never mind that most of the time when these things derate, at those kind of weights you may not have the power to pull it up the off ramp to even get off the road. Now we're talking about becoming a very real hazard to the motoring public. Add to that, most wreckers double or even triple their rates when you are Superload category. And the cops or DOT don't really care, because that thing must be removed from the road before dark period. Because of this, IMHO HH trucks should have Emergency Vehicle status and should not derate power due to aftertreatment issues.
Now back to the liner issue...if the truck needs an inframe enroute, ugh. If the customer can't wait for the load, this is where the $h!t gets ugly.
Option 1-you rent a truck. Great. Except most rental fleets don't have trucks equipped very well to do the job. If the load is going to an easy delivery, not such a big deal. BUT, if the load is going to say Brule mine, here's the mine access procedure. Arrive at the gate, drop your jeep, flip the neck short, chain-up, pull the mine road to the shop so they can assemble the machine you're hauling. Doesn't sound too bad huh? Now I'll tell you what this means...your drives are packin 40k, and so are your jeep. But you've now dropped the jeep. Yup that's 80k on the drives! But we're not done yet. When you fold the neck back to short, you've removed 5' off the front of the trailer...in other words you've slid the drives back 5' closer to the load. On my trailer moving the load one foot moves 2000lbs. So now you actually have upwards of 90k on the drives. Why would you do this? Because the mine road has an 18% grade, with an overall average of 11% for 8km. If you spin out, you won't stop sliding backwards until you're a pretzel at the bottom. You sure you want to do this with a rental truck with 40k rearends?
Option 2-you repower the load. If this option is available it's probably the best. But now you have to trust someone else with your multimillion dollar load, on your several hundred thousand dollar trailer, NOT to f##k up.
Option 3-rent cranes to transfer the load to someone else's unit completely...this will cost more than than the load pays big time. This isn't really an option.

2)Heat retention/dissipation.
When you have the aerodynamics of a bulldozer with a top fueler's parachute brakes deployed, cause that's what your hauling, and you require 15-20lbs of boost to maintain 55mph on flat ground you are creating heat. I've said it before, as much as Rawze stresses aero for fuel mileage for freight trucks, I stress heat dissipation for HH trucks. IMHO they are of equal importance to each application. Heat retention in these motors is probably the biggest factor behind the soot. IMHO the turbo is too small and restrictive on the 2250/2350 for my type of work. I believe it will lead to issues, and if I got one of those motors I would probably go the route of swapping it for an 871 turbo and annoy Unilevers into helping me get it dialed in.

I agree Rig Wrench that buying a truck just to tear it down and fix counterbore, fuel pump, mandate, and such issues out of the gate definately makes a guy think twice. I do know that when I have looked at the used truck/ISX market, I actually am less interested in one that has had the proverbial inframe done...I'm not sure I trust too many shops quality anymore and I'd just as soon buy one for less money that needs to be done, and do it myself so I know what I've got. I have no faith in the new X15 at this point, so that's why I'm going to stick with what I've got, and keep an eye out and be ready for the right opportunity when it comes...but don't ask me what that is