In Part 3, I got the truck home — air line fix on the shoulder and all. Now it was time to go through everything, figure out what I was working with, and start putting a plan together.
The Vision
I knew from the beginning this wasn't going to be a period-correct frame-off restoration. That's not the goal. I want a clean, good-looking truck that I can actually use — pull a trailer, make moves, and still take to a tractor show or truck show and be proud of it. Something between a showpiece and a work truck.
The big picture: red paint on the cab, black on the frame. New fiberglass hood. New front bumper. New lights all around. Chrome 6-inch exhaust stack. Keep it simple. Keep it sharp.
What I Found
The truck came without a fifth wheel mounted. The seller had a fixed one that came with it, but I didn't like it. A fixed fifth wheel limits what you can do with trailer weight distribution, and I wanted the flexibility. I found a sliding fifth wheel on Facebook Marketplace and grabbed it.
The fiberglass hood had a lot of damage. Cracks, chips, pieces missing. I could've tried to repair it, but it wasn't worth the time. I ordered a new one online. Took a few weeks to come in, but that was fine — there was plenty of other work to do in the meantime.
The cab had dents. Doors, back of the cab, roof. Nothing catastrophic, but it all needs to be worked before paint. That's future work.
The wet line setup had been removed before I picked it up. The hydraulic tank that came with it had a cracked bung — not usable as-is. I fixed it to have as a spare, but I sourced a new polished aluminum tank off Facebook. That'll look a lot better once everything's together.
All the lights are getting replaced with LEDs. Every marker, tail light, headlight — all of it. I also picked up some strobe lights since we'll be hauling some oversized loads with this truck. Trailer wiring needed to be completely redone too. Not surprising on a truck this age, but it's one of those jobs that has to happen before the truck can pull anything.
From talking with the previous owner, the truck has somewhere around 600,000 to 700,000 miles on it. Hard to know exactly — the speedometer cable is broken. It drives off the rear of the transmission, so the speedometer doesn't work. That's on the list too. The front kingpins have some slop in them and will need to be done soon. Not unsafe, but you can feel it. That's the kind of thing you want to get ahead of.
The Interior
Inside wasn't great. I pulled all the interior panels out and I'll probably leave it as bare metal for now. It's not pretty, but it's honest, and I'd rather put time and money into things that matter more first.
The dash has some missing panels — the trim piece above the tach and speedo, and the glovebox and fuse panel cover. These are hard to find for an R model. I've been looking, but I'll likely end up making my own if nothing turns up.
Seats are another project. The ones in it aren't comfortable and they're worn out. I'd love to find original Mack seats with the bulldog in them, but those are tough to come by. More realistically, I'm looking for seats out of a newer Mack — something comfortable that still fits the truck's identity.
The List Keeps Growing
That's how it goes with a project like this. You start going through things and every answer leads to two more questions. But the bones are good. The engine runs. The drivetrain is solid. Everything on this list is fixable — it's just time and parts.
Meanwhile, I'd been searching for a trailer even before I found the truck. That search was still going at this point. More on that in Part 5, coming soon.
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