Paul, put the tire builders on the run when he showed up at a meeting with his now-famous burlap tire. Radials hadn't come along yet.Īndrew Ambli, the colorful and very outspoken director of maintenance for Briggs Transportation of St. More of each meant a so-called premium tire commanding a premium price. Tires were 'rated' by the number of plies and the amount of air pressure. There were no DOT tire standards in those days. The classic story involves a session on tires specifically, what the fleets wanted and needed for interstate trucking. Suppliers were looked upon as the enemy for at least the first 10 years. Words and blood pressure were explosive at many meetings. The maintenance committee rightfully accused the suppliers of stonewalling.

Maintenance committee members met with reps from AMA and TTMA, explained their urgent problems, and asked the suppliers to go back to their respective companies and work to solve those problems. In the early years, truck maintenance people got little attention from the supplier industry – much less recognition. The truck manufacturers were represented by the Truck Division of the Automobile Manufacturers Association (today's MVMA) and trailers by the Truck Trailer Manufacturers Association.

In the beginning, the maintenance committee was just fleet maintenance men, many of whom started out as mechanics, then advanced in their companies to head their maintenance operations. TMC was formed as a Council of ATA in 1979, and its first meeting was held in Louisville, Ky., that September.

The RCCC MC represents the first 23 years of TMC's history. The RCCC maintenance committee really laid the ground work, and over the next 23 years got fleets and suppliers working together 'to improve equipment and its maintenance,' which are the words in its charter. It was under the direction of the Board of Governors of the Regular Common Carrier Conference that a maintenance committee – with a paid staff engineer to guide it – was authorized and funded. Road breakdowns and blown tires were common. The transition to diesel came rapidly in the late '50s and early '60s, and with it came new operating and maintenance problems. Most rigs were still gas-engined, and certainly not durable enough to run 50 to 60 mph hour after hour. With few exceptions, trucks – and especially tires – were not designed for sustained high-speed operation, nor did they have horsepower to get up the grades faster than a crawl.

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