Small fleet owner Kevin Hunter, based in the Pittsburgh suburb of Bentleyville, Pennsylvania, started his Hunter Contracting LLC business in 2013 after several years working with family in a separate trucking business.
It started with an International 8100 he hooked to a gooseneck trailer and “ran around locally doing that,” he said. But not long after that, he bought a day cab tractor from his family’s business to start growing his own fleet.
Kevin Hunter
“We bring brand-new equipment into dealerships, we take them to ports, we go anywhere if someone needs these machines moved,” he added.
As was noted by several owners consulted for Overdrive’s Niche Hauls report this summer about heavy and oversize hauling, Hunter's lived through the decline in the business since he’s been in it. “A few years ago it was good, and then it seems like everybody wants to get into heavy-haul,” he said. “Everyone wants to be the guy moving the big stuff. And there’s people getting in the heavy-haul that don’t have a … clue what they should be charging” to haul.
Yet he's been able to sustain growth and keep his drivers in quality equipment.
“All my work trucks are like really done up,” Hunter said. “You would think they’re owner-operators when you see them. They’re really nice-looking trucks.”
[Related: High-dollar frieght means high cost consideration: Heavy/oversize hauling]
He's kept his drivers in virtually in brand-new equipment through the years, but up until late 2023, he stayed in that first day cab he bought from the family business. That all changed when he heard Kenworth was planning to discontinue the W900 model. He ordered one for himself.
Hunter fully rebuilt the unit after getting it new from the factory in 2023. Lights are one of many additions that make the truck stand out.
“When they threatened to discontinue the glider kits, I didn’t jump on it,” he said. “I didn’t believe it. When I heard they were gonna discontinue this, I jumped on one and got one for myself.”
[Related: No. 1000 walkaround: First of the last of the W900s, Kenworth's 2025 Legacy Edition]
At the 2025 Shell Rotella SuperRigs truck show at EchoPark Speedway in Hampton, Georgia, Hunter showed off the pristine 2024 Kenworth W900L, paired with a 55-ton Talbert low boy painted to match the rig.
The trailer features black paint on the deck with red outriggers to match.
Hunter ordered the W900L with the same purple/maroon paint as his day cab, yet wasn’t happy with the quality of the paint work from the factory. He and his painter took on a full recoat, complementing his fleet trucks -- all red with black stripes. “The guys, my wife, everyone was like, ‘why don’t you do the opposite of the guys’ colors?’,” he said. He went with black as the primary color, red striping, and he didn't stop there. The rest of the truck was rebuilt, including an engine swap.
He put in a Caterpillar C15, but with a big bore kit. “We call it a C17,” Hunter said, because it’s now closer to a 17-liter than a 15-liter.
The engine doesn’t lack in power. When he put it on a dynamometer, “it dyno’d 1,150 [horsepower] to the ground.”
At the time of SuperRigs in May 2025, the unit only had about 15,000 miles on it -- Hunter only runs it locally when he jumps on a load -- but it had already gone through one transmission. “We read the torque thing, and it was putting like 3,450 to the ground,” he said. “So at the flywheel, it’s gotta be up over 4,000 or around 4. So, it’s pretty much putting twice the torque that the transmission’s supposed to handle.
“I guess I’ll change transmissions with oil changes,” he joked. Realistically, though, he said the truck is fun to drive as-is, and will probably leave everything in place for now before turning it down in the future.
He added a new visor, cab lights, mirror brackets, steps, deck plate, light bars, cab skirts and more. The project took about six months from when he started it in September 2023 until it rolled to Louisville, Kentucky, for the 2024 Mid-America Trucking Show.
Paint work on the three rear fenders continue the theme of the cab.
Randy Martin at Spare Time Fab did the interior work, including button-tuck upholstery throughout. The floor is painted the opposite colors as the cab’s exterior, with red as the main color with black stripes.
The dash is also painted red with black around the instrument panels to give it a striped look like the rest of the truck.
[Related: Small fleet owner's '88 Pete 379 Pretty Bitchin' with B-model Cat]
For custom-equipment features and videos delivered to your email inbox, subscribe to Overdrive's weekly Custom Rigs newsletter via this link and access all videos in Overdrive's Custom Rigs Youtube playlist below.
Kevin Hunter: We do heavy haul. We move heavy equipment for local dealerships, construction companies. We bring brand new equipment into dealerships. We take 'em to ports. We go anywhere if someone needs these machines moved.
I'm running 20-21 tractor-trailers. I'm running two dump trucks, and I have another four-axle rollback being built, so I'll be running two four-axle rollbacks here about another month.
I built this truck for myself, I guess a year ago, a year and a half ago. This is a 2024. Like I said, I own 20-21 tractors. When I was building the business, I stayed in my original day cab, and I'd buy all my guys brand new trucks, brand new trucks. Well, when they threatened to discontinue the glider kits, I didn't jump on it. I was like, I didn't believe it. When I heard they were going to discontinue this, I jumped on one and got one for myself.
So I guess I started off, I bought it. It was the original color of my original day cab, which was, it's like a dark purple. It was like a purple maroonish and when it showed up, and I'll be honest, it was like the worst paint job I've ever seen Kenworth do. And I was pretty upset about it. And then my paint guy actually, Mikey, he told me, he goes, "why don't we just repaint that truck?" I was like, what color are we going to paint it? The guys, my wife, everyone was like, well, why don't you do the opposite of the guy's colors? All my trucks are this color red with a black stripe. So I went all black with a red stripe. Then we just started going from there, building it.
We did everything under the engine. We did the visor, we did the cab lights, we did mirror brackets, steps, Hemminger Metals up in Somerset, they built all the bracketry and mounted everything, and did my wet line, did the deck plates, the light bars, cab skirts. The guys in the shop did all the cab lights, air cleaners, and we just kind of ran with it. Got a little carried away with it to be honest.
It's got a Caterpillar. We called it a C17. It's a C15 big bore'd out. I think it's like 16.8 liter, but we're calling it a 17. I dyno'd it out at Jerry Martin's. It dyno'd 1,150 to the ground. We was wondering why it chewed through a transmission at, I want to say 10 or 12,000 miles. It chewed through its first transmission. Well, we read the torque thing on it, it was putting like 3,450 to the ground. So at the flywheel it got to be up over 4,000 or around four. So it's pretty much putting twice the torque that the transmission's supposed to handle. I guess I'll change transmissions with oil changes. It's fun to drive, so I don't know. I'll leave it like this for a little bit and I'll probably turn it down some, but it's definitely fun to drive. It's got a 2250 Eaton 18 speed in it, 3.91 gear ratios in it.
All my work trucks are really done up. You would think they're owner-operators when you see 'em. They're really nice looking trucks, so I had to go above them, so I just kind of got carried away with this one to separate me from them. And we just started doing one thing after another after another. And the way I look at it is, I mean, don't get me wrong, my guys, they take pride in everything they do, but they're not me. I mean, I knew whatever I did to this, I was going to take care of it, and I'm the only one that drives it. So if anything happens to it, it's my fault.
Randy, at Spare Time, he did all the button-tuck and everything. He button-tucked the whole inside of that bunk apartment. He did it up above the visor. He did the door panels. It was big holed. It has a painted floor in it. The floor is actually opposite colors of the truck. It's all red with a black stripe like my guys. The dash is painted. It's black, and it sort of runs like a stripe across the dash to tie in, and it has a sound system. I mean, the interior is not drastically crazy or nothing. It's pretty subtle.
The back of the visor has a little theme on it, a little saying, I say all the time, but it's shortened down, but it's "forget the horse, load the wagon." And then it has a little horse and a donkey that has a hundred dollar bill out in front of it. And the horse is chasing the a hundred dollar bill because that's basically the story of all of our lives. And the wagon's full of hundred dollar bills because we're all just out here trying to chase a buck.
We run majority Talbert trailers. We have Fontaines too. We like our Talbert's. They're dependable. It's a Talbert. It's a 55-60 18-inch Talbert. I call it their heavy-duty, 55-ton trailer that's capable of 60 ton, and I want to say 10 or 12 feet or something like that. The outriggers and all that were painted. I'd like to paint the inlay of the trailer flame red and flip flop the outriggers back to black. We touched up the rails on the trailer for this show. We repainted them. I had moved some 450 and D9s and stuff on this trailer, so I try putting rubber mats down when I haul, and I tried my best to protect it, but it's a low-boy; no matter what you do, it gets hammered.
