I found this truck on Kijiji out in the Winnipeg Manitoba area. I've been looking for some time now and I really like the look of this year, condition and the fact that it's a 3/4-ton.
It was located on a rural farm in Grunthal, MB and the owner originally planned to fix it up just enough to be able to run into town with it and drive the property. It did have a grain-box on it at one time, but it's from factory without a box\bed. Here is the history that the previous owner shared with me:
The truck belonged to a family in Woodmore, MB from 1948-2003. A gentleman from my community runs a septic truck business and had asked casually about the truck for about 15 years, having seen it in a shed while pumping on the property. In 2003, the owner asked if he was still interested and he purchased the truck for $450, the price the owner requested. Along with the truck, the owner threw in a Honda moped as well.
The only issue with the truck at the time was a sticky valve and rotten tires according to the business man. He drove it for a short time, not licensing it though.
The truck then went up for auction; an estate auction for the business owner's aging parents. Before the sale, an offer of $2,000 was made on the truck, however legally it had to go through the auction as it was listed on the auction poster. A $2,000 reserve was placed on the truck, and although the bidding came very close, it did not sell ... after which time it was sold to the fellow who had made the original $2,000 offer. The truck, to that point, included all the original paper work and had just under 50,000 miles.
I bought the truck in '07 for $2,500. The guy had a second similar truck (a 1949 1 ton) with a metal box which was not running. Although he wanted $500 for it, I could not afford to purchase it for parts and often kicked myself for not making the extra effort for a solid parts truck. The '48 had been sitting in a tarp type garage for a couple of years and had become mouse infested.
The guy I bought the truck from said that he would get me the original paperwork, but that never materialized (I don't think he knew where he had placed it).
I changed the oil, added brake fluid, put in a new battery and drove it around the countryside a number of times. It ran so quiet the first time I started it, that I didn't even realize from inside the cab that it was running.
I put about $1,200 into the truck with the brake cables being the major repair. It also had a loose part in the front end that was replaced. Before it was replaced, I had to watch carefully around 40 mph that I didn't shake right off the road.
I took the grain box off with the intention of placing a stake side deck on the truck, including a lift (which my Father-in-law) had. I did do one major haul with the truck after placing all of the around 2009 when I re-roofed our house and placed all the old shingles in the grain box. The suspension is so solid, the truck hardly dropped at all. No half-ton in this day and age would have hauled that load. We moved to a acreage in May 2011 and I could no longer justify another dime or any time into the truck from that point.Here are a few pix of the truck when the previous owner had just purchased it.
And here on the left is a pic of it as it was delivered this morning. There are a
few more pictures here, one showing the bare bed!
I will post more as I progress, but that's the history of the truck as I understand it. Next step, VIN decoding!
