Laaibrug

Freight that leaves when we said it would

Line-haul and abnormal loads out of our yard on the N3 at Harrismith — the harbours, the Highveld, the Cape and both borders.

Book a load

What we move

Line-haul freight

Tautliners and flat decks on the N3, N1 and N2. Thirty-four tons a load, collected and delivered on the days we quoted.

Abnormal loads

Transformers, silos, graders and mill sections on low-beds and step-decks. We carry the permits and run our own escorts.

Cross-border

Beitbridge into Zimbabwe and Zambia, and the Trans-Kalahari to Walvis Bay, with a clearing agent standing at both posts.

Containers

Harbour to depot and back at Durban and Coega. Sliding skeletals for tri-axle work and gensets under the reefers.

The fleet

Nineteen horses, mostly Volvo FH and UD Quon, and thirty-one trailers between tautliner, flat deck, step-deck and low-bed. Nothing on the road is older than seven years and every unit is tracked to the second.

The workshop

Six bays and four qualified diesel mechanics in the Harrismith yard, so our services do not sit in somebody else’s queue. A unit that comes off the road at ten at night is usually back on it by morning.

The crew

Twenty-six drivers, all with a valid PrDP and a dangerous-goods card, and none of them alone on a load until they have run a month with a senior. They are paid a salary and not a rate per kilometre, so nobody is pushed to drive tired.

The load

Every consignment is photographed on the deck before the straps go on and again the moment it comes off. Both sets come back with the POD, which turns a damage argument into a two-minute conversation instead of a month.

Clients

They took a 41-ton transformer from Richards Bay to Kroonstad over a long weekend and never once phoned me for a decision. The permits were done before I thought to ask about them.
Werner Basson · Projects manager, electrical contractor, Richards Bay
We load out of Bellville every Monday and Laaibrug has been on the gate at six every Monday for four years. Twice they were late and both times somebody phoned me first.
Nadia Fourie · Warehouse manager, Bellville
The photographs of the load going on and coming off are the reason we stopped arguing with our insurer. Nothing else about our freight changed.
Sipho Mahlangu · Buyer, City Deep

One gate on the old Warden road

My father bought a single Nissan CM12 in 1997 and carried maize between Harrismith and Durban with it. I did my first solo trip on that truck at nineteen, in the rain, and got to the harbour eleven hours late because I would not overtake anything on Van Reenen. We are still on the same piece of ground, except that there are now six workshop bays on it and a diesel tank that holds forty thousand litres. My sister runs the office, my wife does the cross-border paperwork, and the man who taught me to reverse a trailer still drives the Cape run for us. Nobody here is trying to build a national carrier. We would rather be the yard that answers the phone at half past four on a Friday, which is when most of the trouble on this route actually starts.

Common questions

How do you price a load?

Per loaded kilometre between the two towns, plus a standing fee if we wait more than two hours at either end. Abnormal loads carry the permit and escort cost at what it actually costs us, shown as its own line. There is no fuel levy buried in the rate — if diesel moves more than eighty cents a litre we come back to you before the next trip, not after it.

What counts as an abnormal load?

Anything over 2.6 m wide, 4.3 m high or 22 m long, or heavier than the legal axle limits. We hold permits on the N3, N1 and N2 corridors and we run our own escort vehicles, so a wide load out of the Free State is not waiting a week for somebody else’s pilot car to become free.

How long does a permit take?

A routine width or height permit is three to five working days. Anything needing a bridge assessment or a police escort is two to three weeks, and we start it the day you confirm the load, not the day a truck comes free.

Are you insured, and for how much?

Goods in transit to R5 million a load, and the certificate goes out with every quote without you asking for it. Above that we arrange a specific cover note for the trip; the premium appears as its own line on the invoice and we do not mark it up.

What happens if the truck breaks down?

We phone you before you phone us. Every unit is tracked and the workshop sees a fault code the moment it happens, there is a spare horse standing in the yard for exactly this, and on the Durban leg we can usually have it under your trailer inside four hours.

Do you take one pallet, or only full loads?

Full loads and part loads both. A part load waits for a truck already going that way, so it is cheaper and it is slower — we will tell you which day it leaves before you commit, and if that day does not suit you we quote it as a dedicated trip instead.

Tell us what it is, where it is, and when it has to be there.

Book a load
  • Yard and workshop — Plot 14, old Warden road, Harrismith 9880, Free State. Weekdays 05:00 to 18:00, Saturday until noon.
  • Durban office — Unit 6, Bayhead Road, Bayhead 4052. Somebody is on the gate from 04:00 for harbour bookings.
  • Phone — 036 438 2071 in office hours, or 082 447 9013 for anything already on the road, any hour of the night.

Book a load

Get the details to us before three in the afternoon and a rate comes back the same day. Abnormal loads take longer to price, but you will know that day what the permit is going to need.

If it is over 2.6 m wide or 4.3 m high, give us the dimensions as well.