Bryant Mann of White Pine Paving in Hampstead, Maryland, believes in towing in style.
The pristine, customized 2000 Kenworth W900L featured in the above video by Equipment World's sister publication Overdrive is the company’s lowboy tractor, nicknamed "Change Order." It typically pulls equipment weighing anywhere between 100,000 and 120,000 pounds – and it’s got the power to do it with a 600-horsepower Cat C15 coupled with an 18-speed and 4.11 rears.
Mann is co-owner of the paving company with his parents, who started the business 35 years ago.
Bryant MannVideo and photos by Lawson Rudisill
White Pine specializes in paving and other work around the company’s Maryland home base, moving up into southern Pennsylvania for residential, commercial and state projects with asphalt milling and heavy equipment hauling, too.
As with any other trucking business, challenges abound with customers who don’t always want to pay for the service, among others, but “you just grin and bear it and just keep pushing forward,” he added, working through difficulties.
"Change Order"
In keeping with the name of the rig, “Change Order,” there’s a stack of paperwork airbushed onto the back of the day cab to represent both the rig’s name and the jobsite shuffling that White Pine Paving often deals with.
And if you’re wondering what the engine compartment looks like under the hood, just take a glimpse at the airbrush work on the side of the hood.
The artist, Justin Perry, “literally took a picture of the motor as it was sitting in our shop and sketched it out on a piece of paper, projected it onto the truck, and started drawing,” Mann said. When you open the hood, “it mirrors what’s underneath.”
The grille, breathers and other accents feature laser cutouts of construction equipment, aligning with the small fleet's primary business.
Even with all of those features, though, Mann noted, “the most impressive thing to me on the truck is the lighting package.”
Impressive, no doubt. The truck features lights under the steps, inside the breathers, behind the grille and just about anywhere else you can think to add lights.
Inside the cab, custom seats feature the rig’s name embroidered in the headrest. A custom shifter gets you looking up, too, put in at the request of one of Mann’s drivers.
The driver wanted a tall shifter. Mann and company “started adding increments to the shifter," he said, "and it got to be a two-foot extension. It almost puts your hand on the ceiling.”
Want to see more customized haul trucks, check out our sister publication Overdrive's "Custom Rigs" section by clicking here.
Bryant Mann: The truck is called "Change Order." And, for one, we had a lot of changes as we were building the truck. That's why it was called change order. We kept changing our minds, but the back of it actually has a stack of our change orders from job sites that look like it's getting written out.
I'm Bryant Mann. We own a asphalt paving company in Maryland called White Pine Paving. This is our lowboy tractor. It hauls various equipment throughout the state of Maryland. Like, when we get home from the show, it literally is going on night work for the entire week, and it'll work day and night. Like I said, that's my workhorse.
This is a 2000 W900L. It's got a C15 in it with a 18 speed behind it with 4.11 rears. It has been rebuilt twice since we've had it, it's got a little extra power to it. I think it's got 600 to the wheels. The paint work, my father, he's the one who does all the paint work in-house.
And the airbrush work was done by a boy, his name is Justin Perry, long shot airbrushing work. And he literally took a picture of the motor as it was sitting in our shop and sketched it out on a piece of paper, projected it onto the truck, and started drawing. That's what it ended up with. It was really cool. When you open the hood, it mirrors what's underneath the hood. It's really, really neat.
The grille on the truck, it actually has the little cutouts of pavers, dump trucks, backhoes, excavators. The breathers have it, the little equipment around it, and they actually have milling machines put in them too. We do a lot of asphalt milling. And then the skirts underneath the doors of the cab.
And then the the most impressive thing to me on the truck is the lighting package, because we got lights underneath, under all the steps and you usually don't see that a lot. And there's just unique lighting. The light bar's all custom. I mean, we built that. We actually took the factory mounts and fabricated a custom light bar. We actually used it incorporate the stack brackets on it so the stacks hold on top of that which then come down. And most Kenworths you don't see with under mount, like, Peterbilt-style exhaust. But we custom fabricated all the exhaust that come underneath the truck and down alongside it to give it that nice clean look that comes up the side.
And then, the back T-bar that holds all the rear fenders up and everything, that's all solid steel. It was built in-house by myself and one of my other guys. We did all the fabrication for the truck, and, it's all solid steel.
The interior, the seats are all custom. They actually have, the name of the truck is embroidered in the headrest. One unique thing of the inside is I had a driver that we built the truck for. He's like, "I want a tall shifter." Like, okay. So I started adding increments to the shifter and it got to be a two foot extension. It almost put your hand on the ceiling. And, it actually is made out of solid stainless and it says Kenworth and, definitely a conversation piece. You see the people walk by and they just look up at it and they're like, "oh my."
I mean, this truck is built to run. I mean, it wasn't, "hey, we're going to be a prima donna out here and the only thing I'm going to do show it." No, every day, all day.
