Richard has been turning wrenches for 19 years. For almost two of them, he has covered the state of Indiana for Truckup, running mostly between Fort Wayne and Indianapolis. He doesn't turn his phone off. Some mornings start at 2:00, some at 7:00, and by his count he stays busy at least 60 to 70 hours a week between his two biggest fleet accounts.
He also keeps count of something else. Of his last 600 completed jobs, two ended with the truck on a hook.
The work he likes best is the work other mechanics hand back.
"I like the jobs nobody else can figure out," Richard said. "I like big electrical issues. I like transmission work. Anything typically that someone else would turn down, I love the challenge."
LEARNING THE TRADE ON A DRAINAGE CREW
Richard grew up in a small town in rural Indiana, where his father did field drainage work. When equipment broke, there was no shop to send it to.
"We didn't have a lot of resources as far as, something broke down, you take it to the shop, it gets fixed," he said. "At a very young age, I was out there with my father learning how to fix heavy equipment and keep things running, preventative maintenance. It just kinda stuck."
He spent the first 11 years of his career in shops, mainly at a semi dealership, before moving to roadside work. He wanted more of a challenge than the shop was giving him. Later, he started his own roadside diesel repair company and picked up Truckup work to supplement his income while he built a customer base.
WHY ROADSIDE REPAIR IS A DIFFERENT JOB THAN SHOP REPAIR
After a decade on both sides, Richard describes the difference plainly. A shop has more resources, and a customer who tows a truck in has already accepted they won't be repaired and out immediately. The roadside removes that cushion.
"Anytime you go to the roadside, you have to be set up and prepared to do whatever you have to do to fix them and get them on the road, to prevent tow bills, to prevent shop fees, everything like that," he said. "If they wanted to pay that much money, they would've just got towed to the shop to begin with."
That mindset is where the 600-to-2 ratio comes from.
"Being resourceful, and how Truckup allows us to apply ourselves and they don't hold us back, really helps," he said.
A MIDNIGHT COOLANT LINE ON I-70
Richard's first Truckup job came in around midnight on I-70, close to downtown Indianapolis. The driver was hauling livestock, a live load that couldn't sit.
"I didn't know exactly how everything worked, but I called David," Richard said, referring to Truckup's dispatch. "David explained to me whatever I needed to do to get him going. I had the green light: do it, get him going."
The problem turned out to be a blown coolant line running back to the APU, which had drained the system. Richard sourced the part that night, replaced the line, and got the driver moving. The customer posted about the repair on social media for weeks afterward. The two still talk when he comes through town.
The Day He Saved a Mariachi Tour Bus
The hardest job Richard has run through Truckup started with a call about an early-1980s Prevost tour bus carrying a mariachi band from Georgia. The band had traveled to Indianapolis for a concert and broken down. The bus had an old, obsolete engine, and every other repair option had told the owner the same thing: scrap the vehicle and move on.
The job site was an hour and 40 minutes from Richard's home. The front case seal had blown, taking out gears and ruining the fuel pump. Sourcing parts for an engine that old took a lot of phone calls, and the repair took about two weeks of collective time. Richard rebuilt the front of the engine and got the bus back on the road.
The owner still calls him for advice whenever something breaks.
"Most of the customers that we've gained and that I've worked with maintain constant communication," Richard said. "When they're in town, we're their first call."
AN 18-HOUR REPAIR AND A GRADUATION
One job that stuck with Richard came from an owner-operator he'd never worked with before and hasn't worked with since. Richard stayed on the truck for almost 18 hours straight to get it running.
About a day later, the driver sent him a message. Because the truck got finished, he made it to his daughter's graduation. Then the driver told him something Richard hasn't forgotten: the one thing missing from repair anymore is a mechanic who cares about a driver.
WHAT HE TELLS OTHER MECHANICS
Richard's advice for anyone considering the trade is short. "If you want to apply yourself and work every day, as long as you never quit learning, you're gonna be a good mechanic."
For techs weighing mobile work, he points to his own path. "Give it a shot. Think outside of the box for once. Start it as a side gig. Try it a little bit, see what you think about it. I was pretty positive that it would be nothing more than a side gig for me, and it's grown into something that's changed my life."
Asked what he wants people to know about the work, he answered with the mindset he brings to every dispatch.
"A lot of the mechanics that I have met, if it's not something that they can knock out in two hours, they wanna have it towed to a shop and walk away from it," he said. "Every job that I go on, I take pretty personal. I go there in the mindset that I'm going to fix the truck. No matter what it takes, what I have to do, I am going to fix this truck."
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