The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area General Truck Talk True Mileage?

I think, it’s the true mileage, but doesn’t everyone think that when they bring
home their pride and joy???
But the question I have is, and always has been, is it 69K, 169K, 269K????

http://www.pbase.com/dennygraham/image/159086223/large
Some of these trucks have actually been in service for 30, 40, 50 years so how
do we actually know that Precious only has those 69K on her
that's showing on her odometer???
After six decades condition doesn't necessarily tell the whole story.

Denny G

What I do is look inside the radiator and see if its pretty clean. If it is, then I check to see if it's original by carbon dating the bugs in the fins. This is not "fool" proof.
Seriously, if you had a murder case and wanted to prove you had 69,000 original miles, you may be able to tell, under extreme microscope, if the 7 or 8 or 9 had ever been exposed to sunlight or their gear tooth had ever been engaged.

For what it's worth, here are the things I look for to help determine usage.
Steering wheel and gear shift knob wear. If they both look the same then they are probably original, how much wear do they show? 69K, not much wear. 169k very noticeable wear, 269, wow.

Ignition key/switch wear. If you got more than 1 key and the numbers match, compare the wear. If you got only 1 key, does it fit all 3 locks? If so, likely all locks are original. Compare the feel of the key in the ignition to the glove box. Is the ignition really sloppy and the other much better. That would be a lot more than 69K.

Rubber on the pedals if they are still there. Corner of the brake completely worn off and the metal worn a bit, more than 69K.

I think Denny knows all those tricks too and a few more but they are not good enough to be sure. An "A" box title is good also. Pedals and things can be replaced. Someone can have a 169K truck that they have taken good care of and look like 69K condition. As Denny knows, there is no real good way except if you know the family that owned it or some extensive paperwork/receipts in the glove box. That's just my opinion.

Agreed: There is no way to know, unless you have complete family/truck history.

Well in the case of the pictured dash, it is, the original
mileage. I bought it with 53553 mi. from the original small
town where it was purchased and spoke with the mayor who
verified the mileage from the maintenance records when it
was sold in a sealed bid back in '05.

Also have a '54 here which came from the original owner who
was 15 years old when his dad purchased the truck for him.
So I'm sure of the provenance of that vehicle also. That's
an original 48843 mi. vehicle.

But I've heard so many stories about low mileage trucks it
just got me to thinkin' about it. When you look at the
patina, it's obvious that there's more than what shows on the
odometer. Another give away is the exhaust pipe. Low mileage
trucks probably had the muffler and tail pipe replaced at
around 25K or 30K back in the 50's, but the exhaust pipes
lasted about twice as long. The original exhaust pipe should
have a large sweeping curve from the manifold back to the muffler:
http://www.pbase.com/dennygraham/image/122229771/large
The replacement pipes will have a sharp 5" radius bend
below the straight section from the manifold as those are
standard shoes for the replacement pipe benders.

I was just thinking about the contrast between the old and new
vehicles, where the new ones are expected to turn over 100K
at least once and its recorded as such.
But like has been posted, without documented history, it's
really guess work on these old trucks isn't it.

Denny Graham
Sandwich, IL

Very interesting subject, not to take over the thread but can you help me on my 53 had 39000 showing on the original date coded speedo. The truck had a replacement engine put in it right before I bought it (month or so). The original 216 (splasher) with correct titled VIN from the block was kept and it had a standard bore. So what do you guys think 39000, 139,000. Steering wheel is well worn truck was a farm truck though, original 3sp and rear end and dated coded radiator-those three items dated coded same month with speedo as was the engine casting date. Would an un bored splasher engine last 139K?

Wait to hear from Dave & Jerry and others.

I worked in a shop in the early 70s and was told that a 216 would be lucky to make it to 50,000 miles without at least new rings and a head rebuild. Usually a engine rebuild and over-bore was done by 50,000.

Most of those trucks did not do much long distance or highway driving. Start/stop and many warmups and many short trips took a toll on the engine.

If your engine code matches your title/registration and the engine never had to be bored; and, the engine is not a replacement engine with your code put on it, it could be a low mileage truck. Have you checked the date casting codes on block and head?

Yes the head, block and manifolds all are the same month I believe for the 216. The replacement engine is out of a 56 passenger car. Thanks for your .02 Tim, appreciate it.

To find a truck like Denny's is very rare. He is lucky to have it. I have never really found one like that yet. Even if I think it has original low miles I don't advertise it that way when I sell. I just say mileage unknown. I see that sstock is asking about original miles or not. The codes being the same is really good. All you can say is that it has numbers matching original parts which is very nice. I think if the truck had only 39K you would know it by looking at it. That is real low. 630 miles per year seems like a farm truck or stored. Bottom line is that it does not really matter. It just means that if it really did have 39K, that is the one a Barrett-Jackson type restorer would want to spend his restoration money on. Hope you can keep the "original" motor to sell with it someday. Wonder what year they put in the 56 motor?

The 56 motor was installed in Jan. 2011 I purchased the truck the next month. I did keep the original motor and manifolds.

There is no way a 216 would go 139K without a major over haul
which would including a cylinder bore. You were lucky to make
it to 60L or 70K with out having to clean up the bore.
Both of my trucks, the 216 and the 235, with a little over
50k miles on them, had enough taper and wear in the cylinders
that it took .020" to clean up.
DG

I see where you are trying to go with this: So if it "had a standard bore" means it was never bored, and if that means it was never rebuilt and they don't last much past 50K and it is the original motor and it lasted til 2011 (meaning the original motor was the one immediately preceding the 56 in 2011).....maybe, I say maybe, the truck has 39K. Why was it replaced? Was the 216 running in 2011?
It may have, by circumstantial evidence, have 39,000 original miles if enough other condition items are present. Now let's forget it.

The big factor in cylinder wear is dirt ingestion, and the old oil bath air cleaners or the even less-effective wire mesh ones let a lot of dust and dirt through. Add some more dirt through the slots in the valve cover and down through the crankcase thanks to the road draft tube, and those old engines literally bored themselves by abrasive action! A re-ring was common at about 30K, and another at 50K or so. A rebore would be needed at 70-80 with the third ring job.

It's extremely unlikely a standard-bore engine would survive beyond 70K miles, let alone twice that much.
Jerry

A lot of it depends on what the things did. If they were out on the farm, they probably never saw many miles. Around here most farmers only came to town on Saturdays with a pickup. Most women the generation of my mother, who was born in 1906, considered it unladylike for women to ride in a pickup. On Sundays the family car went to church.

Pickups that were used commercially got a lot more miles. We put about 50k miles a year on dirt roads delivering gas and oil to farmers. I wound up with one of these pickups, a 1950 GMC, in 1957 when the block cracked and my father considered it to be too worn out to put a new short block in it. We routinely replaced the 228 short blocks with 248 short blocks. Very few commercial pickups survived. Most pickups that survived were farm pickups and very few have over 100k miles.

This is a picture of a pickup after over 30 years of hard service.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/crenwelgeoil/2825842005/

You can almost tell by looking at it that the speedo rolled over several times until it quit completely. It finally got so bad not long after this picture that I made a trailer out of the box.

"I see where you are trying to go with this: So if it "had a standard bore" means it was never bored, and if that means it was never rebuilt and they don't last much past 50K and it is the original motor and it lasted til 2011 (meaning the original motor was the one immediately preceding the 56 in 2011).....maybe, I say maybe, the truck has 39K. Why was it replaced? Was the 216 running in 2011?
It may have, by circumstantial evidence, have 39,000 original miles if enough other condition items are present. Now let's forget it"


Yes the previous owner drove the original 216 splasher up from Bend Oregon to Vancouver Wash to Chev of the forties. He had 26" tires on it and it began to make a noise in the bottom end about 1/2 way back. He limped her home right around the end of 2010 I think. The 235 went in and it didn't get but a few more miles on it because the new clutch he put in with it slipped and made noise. After I bought her, I trailered it home and found the clutch disc was in backwards. I decided to do a body off at that point. Thanks for the comments guys.

Love it when someone says it correctly: body off, not frame off. Except on unibody, then it's "ground up restoration"... or sometimes "frame up restoration".

My 1945 1.5 Ton shows under 16000 miles. I believe this to be accurate, for many reasons.
Engine appears original, has tiny spark plugs. has both tin pans between the oil pan and the frame. Radiator core support has NOT been hacked, as in an engine change.
The clutch and brake pedals show little wear, they DON"T move side-to side when moved, DON"T squeal on the floorboards either.
The 2-speed rear lever is NOT sloppy, the rod to the rear is straight and smooth where it passes thru the hanger (high use would wear down the diameter, where it passes thru the hanger) And the hanger is still a round hole, Wear would have the hole egged out.
Farm trucks of this size weren't used much. maybe once a month to town for supplies. Then heavy use for a short time during harvest season. Then put away again.