“I need all you bull haulers and truck drivers to go ahead and come to the front of the class and explain to me exactly what this driver was thinking when he customized his truck and trailer.” That is the opening line of a TikTok from @crushinflorida, delivered straight to the camera by a man in a camo cap and glasses with a yellow school bus parked behind him. “I’ve never seen one like it,” he adds. The text on screen gives the rig a name: “Wanna-Be Bull Hauler.”
He starts with the truck, a red Freightliner with a sleeper that is sitting in tall grass. He calls it an “old freight shaker” and admits it does not look like much of a find at first. Amber marker lights run along the cab skirt and the steps, and there is chrome on the bumper and the mirrors. He voices the objection for his viewers: “This truck don’t look too bad. I’ve seen way more lights than that at the truck stop.” He points out the mud flaps behind the drive wheels, then says the words that set up the rest of the video: “Let’s look at the trailer.”
@crushinflorida
The trailer is a long silver box with the number 53 on its side, and it is covered. Red lights run in rows along every horizontal rail from front to back. A line of amber ones runs along the bottom edge. The rear doors are striped with more red rows from top to bottom.
“I don’t want to even begin to count how many lights are on this truck,” he says. “They’re everywhere. We’re talking driver side, passenger side. There’s got to be 2,000 lights on this thing.”
The previous owner did not stop at the body of the trailer. “He stuck them on the landing gear,” he says, crouching to show a cluster of amber lights on the legs that hold the trailer up when it is unhooked. “He stuck them on the landing gear supports.” Then he pictures the effect on the road: “Imagine riding behind this guy at night, and he hits the brakes and absolutely fries your corneas.”
At the back he finds something he likes. Mounted on the rear bumper are round red lights, three to a side. “These little lights back here on the back bumper, kind of sick, though,” he says, reaching down to touch one. “There’s six of them in total. They’re all pretty good shape.” He jokes that the owner would hardly notice if they went missing: “I don’t think he’s gonna miss six when there’s 14 on the back doors.”
There is one more accessory under the driver’s side, a round black horn with the maker’s name on the cap. “We got a Wolo brand train horn,” he says, and admits he “wouldn’t mind yanking that thing off.”
Then he climbs into the cab. The interior is cluttered and looks long abandoned, though he finds something to praise in what was left behind: “This man has impeccable taste in movies.” The real surprise is on the dash. “This whole thing looks like it’s been sitting forever,” he says, “but it’s got a key.” He reaches for it, and a moment later he says, “This thing might run.”
He leaves the decision to his audience. “I have a really dumb question to ask you guys,” he says, back outside with the red cab over his shoulder. “Do you want to see if this thing will start? I think it’s got a Detroit in it. Could be cool, could be not.” The caption asks a simpler question: “Have you ever seen a more lit trailer?”
For drivers tempted to build something similar, the trailer is a reminder of what a light show involves beyond buying the lights. Every lamp needs power and a ground, and hundreds of them on one circuit will overload wiring that was sized for a handful. Builders who do this properly add dedicated fused circuits and relays for the extra lighting. LED lamps draw a fraction of the current of old incandescent bulbs, which is the reason displays on this scale are practical at all.
Color and position matter too. Federal rules for commercial trucks and trailers call for amber lamps toward the front and along the sides and red at the rear, and the required markers and reflectors have to stay visible. Extra lights in the right colors are common on show trucks, but states set their own limits on brightness, flashing and auxiliary lighting, so it is worth checking local rules before wiring anything in. His point about the brake lights is a fair one. Glare for the driver behind is a safety problem as well as a courtesy issue.
His interest in the bumper lights and the horn points to the other lesson here, which is that a yard like this can be a good source of parts that are expensive new. The rule is the same everywhere: ask first, pay for what you take, and let the yard tell you whether you can pull it yourself.
And if the comments say yes to starting it, a truck that has sat that long deserves a few checks before anyone turns the key. Oil and coolant levels come first. The batteries will almost certainly need charging or replacing, and diesel that has sat in the tanks can grow sludge that clogs filters. A few minutes with a dipstick and a flashlight can tell you whether the engine is ready to be cranked.