Uploaded February 2017 | Updated September 2026, 1 hour ago
The first paragraph is about how we found this thing. If you want to just read about just the truck, scroll to the paragraph at the bottom.
This truck was first seen on Trashman242's Flickr a while back. It was assumed by everyone at the time that it was either scrapped or sold. Fast forward to November of 2016. Andy coming to Davis and visit family for Christmas. We were making plans for filming over the phone, as I was casually scrolling through Google Street View in Davis. I happened to stumble upon the STS on route as recently as 2015! I told Andy about it and he contacted DWR to ask about the truck and where/when it ran. They explained to him that it only runs two weeks out of the whole year to do post Christmas cardboard, because the State of California only allows them to run it for 1000 miles a year due to carbon emissions laws. It was just our luck that Andy would be in Davis for the one of the weeks that it ran. The folks at DWR could not have been nicer or more accommodating, and I thank them for all their help in finding this truck and letting us in the yard to film unloading and whatnot.
Now to the truck itself. This is a 1999 K8000 STS Automater riding on a 1999 Freightliner FL80. One of the best parts about this truck's design is how easily it unloads because of the tapered body, similar Bridgeport's ASLs. The biggest drawback to using this truck is by far the painfully slow speed at which the packer operates at idle. You'll see the driver smash the cardboard in with his hands in some clips, this is because the crusher panel is so slow (and ineffectual with a material like cardboard) that it's not worth using.
Be sure to check out Andy's video of this thing! He got a ton of way different shots and angles, I promise it's a lot different than this one. youtu.be/nFJNEoBkk40
Thanks for watching and if have any questions please write them in the comments!
Also for those who LOVE packer shots I got a video just for you.
The first paragraph is about how we found this thing. If you want to just read about just the truck, scroll to the paragraph at the bottom.
This truck was first seen on Trashman242's Flickr a while back. It was assumed by everyone at the time that it was either scrapped or sold. Fast forward to November of 2016. Andy coming to Davis and visit family for Christmas. We were making plans for filming over the phone, as I was casually scrolling through Google Street View in Davis. I happened to stumble upon the STS on route as recently as 2015! I told Andy about it and he contacted DWR to ask about the truck and where/when it ran. They explained to him that it only runs two weeks out of the whole year to do post Christmas cardboard, because the State of California only allows them to run it for 1000 miles a year due to carbon emissions laws. It was just our luck that Andy would be in Davis for the one of the weeks that it ran. The folks at DWR could not have been nicer or more accommodating, and I thank them for all their help in finding this truck and letting us in the yard to film unloading and whatnot.
Now to the truck itself. This is a 1999 K8000 STS Automater riding on a 1999 Freightliner FL80. One of the best parts about this truck's design is how easily it unloads because of the tapered body, similar Bridgeport's ASLs. The biggest drawback to using this truck is by far the painfully slow speed at which the packer operates at idle. You'll see the driver smash the cardboard in with his hands in some clips, this is because the crusher panel is so slow (and ineffectual with a material like cardboard) that it's not worth using.
Be sure to check out Andy's video of this thing! He got a ton of way different shots and angles, I promise it's a lot different than this one. youtu.be/nFJNEoBkk40
Thanks for watching and if have any questions please write them in the comments!
Also for those who LOVE packer shots I got a video just for you.
