The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area General Truck Talk conspiracy theory.

I've been looking for a good truck in my area for as long as I've been on this site,4 years.Not once has one been offered for sale in my area .The closest I've found any thing is 6 hours away and they were nice stock ones which I didn't want to ruin by hot rodding them .All I want is a V8 AD for less than $20,000, is that such a tall order?

Hang in there! Just remember "Good things come to those that...
...Oh just come on down to the Southern United States and those AD's are everywhere.

Cliff59

Or........ come across the rocks

Or, go to eastern Washington and look at local papers. Spokane, Clarkston, like that. Even Walla Walla.

Do you buy the "Old Car Trader"?

Try looking on Craig's list for Seattle. There always seems to be several listed for sale in various configurations and conditions. It's not uncommon to see trucks in the Bellingham area listed there.

Just two years ago there was a '51 with a V-8 for $10,000 making the rounds here. I saw it at all the Seattle area shows I attended.

I've also noticed that $20,000 seems to be the base asking price on anything that is for sale. I bet most of them can be bought for much less.

6 hours is relatively close......go get that one!

I"ll sell ya mine for 20 G's. NOT!!!!!!!

It's all about location, my man.

Some areas, the local papers are flooded with old trucks for sale, while other areas might have one or two a year pop up.. if that.

Lots of factors to consider.. were many of those trucks sold in that area in the first place? Is the climate in the area the kind that kept the trucks from rotting away? Local laws also play a big role in availability.. for instance, some cities require a person to keep vehicles licensed even if they don't drive them.. such laws have resulted in countless very restorable vehicles getting sent to the scrap yard, or sold off cheap just to get rid of them.

Then there's local demand. Trucks for years have been far less popular than cars.. in fact, some argue that the surge in popularity of old trucks in recent years is due in large part, to the ever shrinking number of available cars.

In many areas, there just isn't much of a demand for the old trucks.. so they do exsist in those areas, but you don't often see them listed in the local paper.. because the people who have them don't figure anybody would actually pay money for them.. so putting an ad in the paper would just be a waste of money.

The thing to do isn't to just sit at home and look in the paper for an old truck.. go take a drive out in the country.. drive slow when passing old farms and buildings.. you might be suprised what you find.

Also check out old junkyards out in rual areas.. those places can be gold mines of old trucks.

Now if you're looking for a fully restored kind of truck, keep one thing in mind.

Many people spend tens of thousands of dollars in parts and time putting a restored truck together.. and such a truck could easily represent thousands of hours just hunting down parts.

When you have that kind of money and time invested in a project, it's difficult to sell.. mainly because you'll almost never get even close to your investment back out of it, not to mention, once you spend that kind of time with a project, you grow attached to it.

So finding quality frame off restorations isn't generally an easy thing to do, especially at a reasonable price, because they just don't often get sold unless the person just gets sick of it (or runs out of money) and abandons the project half way thru, or they fall on tough financial times and are forced to sell it.

Your best bet, especially since you've been looking for FOUR YEARS with no luck finding one in your area, is to bite the bullet, rent a trailer, and come down to the states and bag an old AD truck in decent condition for a grand or so, and then spend the other $15,000 you have in your budget to fix it up just the way you want it.

Even if you spend a thousand bucks on travel and hauling, you might be better off by going to a different market, one that still has inventory.

Bill

If you are willing to spend 20 G's locally and have been looking for 4 years at no avail. It seems you should be able to find one and be money ahead by traveling as far as even the southwestern U.S.

With that kind of a budget you should have no problem finding something you like! Set up an e-bay search limited to the miles you're willing to travel to see the truck and check it out. I don't live that far away from you and I get search results all the time within 500 miles. I bought my truck on e-bay from a guy in Yakima, WA for a LOT less than $20k. Somebody suggested Craigslist-Seattle, another good resource.

Thanks for all the tips guys,I guess maybe I'm just too picky.I've looked at a lot of V8 vehicles around the North coast here for between $10,000-$20,000 dollars and every single one of them were rusty.Every single one of the people I asked on the phone said they were rust free,and when I looked at the vehicle,the owners had lied.I simply cannot believe that over 40 vehicles that I looked at ,and every single one of them ,the owner was either blind,stupid or a liar,it's very frustrating.That is why I don't want to travel that far.In the mean time ,I've been plugging away on my 53 1/2 ton, it's a ground up restoration and I don't forsee it being finished for another year.That's why I've been looking for a finished one, so I could drive one now.Thanks for all your ideas, I think I'll start checking the papers again ,as the hollidays are all done and the weather is better again.

is there such a thing as a "rust free" truck in the PNW? i think not... you might be able to find a "solid" truck out there, but they all have rust here or there... and for more than $10k, they should have been repaired properly.

Lothar I saw a nice 52 with a 283 in Duncan last year. Only thing I didn't like were the racing stripes over the cab. BTW any of those nice stock ones available on the island? I am looking for another. Why? Why? Why?

There are lots of rust free trucks here in the PNW. But once they have been here a few weeks it begins...

I guess I'm not that picky, all my old trucks are rusty.