[Schumi]

I took part in a fun adventure today, many of you may be interested in. I had a friend who wanted to buy an old truck. My pal isn't from this hemisphere.. and is a bit appalled by the pricing of good, running vehicles in the state of CA. He sets out a budget for this truck of about $1200. I tell him he's insane, and there is no such $1200 truck for sale in CA that is going to get him up and down the highway safely for hundreds of miles at a time, which is his ultimate intention (we want to use the truck as a motorcycle hauler to trackdays)

He wants to go check a few for sale out up north this morning, and I volunteer to help. In reality, he needed to be heading up to Tahoe to meet his wife, and there were trucks for sale on the way, so I rode with as his intentions were to buy one of them and I would drive it back to my place and he'd pick it back up when he got back from Tahoe. OK, convoluted plan, but whatever.

Well, all the truck viewings fell through except one.

1970 Ford F250. Odd mix of white/baby blue/primer/rust. It's all there, barely. One thing that stood out was a brand new set of really, really nice tires riding on a set of newer alloy wheels. The tires were worth more than the truck.

So it's a bit rough, but we test drive it. It's the 360ci FE motor. It's not what I would call spry. We had one of these trucks when I was a kid and it was exactly as I remember it. The motor makes a quiet, chug-chug-chug sound as it accelerates. This isnt' a CobraJet, that's for sure.

So it drives OK, but my buddy is freaking out. The seat is all torn up and duct taped. There are wires hanging from the dash, not doing anything obviously anymore. The battery is held in the battery tray with a slight suggestion from a bungee cord. The valve covers and oil pan gasket have been weeping for 30 years, and built up a lot of grime. My comment: they are all like that, dude.

He thinks it's not worth more than 700$. I think he's lost it. It went down the highway at 75 MPH and didn't kill us... it's worth the $1200 the dude wants for it.

But my friend passes on it. We goto a coffee shop and try and figure out how I'm getting home. I then change his mind. We go back, buy the truck, I fill it up and take off- alone, mind you, as he keeps heading north to meet up with his wife as I head back south. I also have no cell phone and very little cash on me. Great.

The steering rag joint is trash, so it takes 100% concentration to keep the thing in a lane at 70MPH. I had an hour and a half drive, IN SAN FRANCISCO BAY TRAFFIC in this thing. It has a nice new aluminum radiator (hey, that's a $200 radiator, minimum) but the temp gauge is barely moving off C and probably not working. The dampers are probably original, so it's boating around a bit but not too bad. There is a mis-matched gas cap that is way off from seating right, so after filling up, fuel is sloshing out the side of the truck as I'm cornering. The guy said he wanted to get rid of it because the fuel mileage sucked. Well,, having an unsealed fuel tank probably didn't help that.

I thought forsure it was going to break down at some point. I had a small bag of tools and odd and end things like wires, tape, hose clamps, etc that I grabbed. Didn't need them. I made it the whole way, 120 miles down several packed stretches of highway.. no problems. Thing runs pretty damn well. I got a ton of looks and a few thumbs up from truck guys as well.. it's definitely a cool old truck.


This thing has been going with nothing but oil changes, tires, a radiator and some bungee cords for 40 years... and with just some small maintenance I think my friend got a pretty decent truck for $1200. SMOG EXEMPT! and registration paid for a year already.

I texted him the good news upon it's arrival... a few hundred bucks to fix the little odds and ends and it will run forever. Just don't F with it if it doesn't need it.

He texted me back- 'time for a carb, intake, headers, maybe a 390 crank and cam!' I see a long road ahead.