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Been out of trucking 5 years now and decided I wanted a play toy. So just bought a 1980 Ford L9000 with a 6V92TA Detroit Diesel and Allison transmission. Truck has 162,000 KM on odo but has way less in reality because when the PTO/pumps are engaged it runs the speedo at around 10 MPH. My intent was to pull the body off and put a flatbed on it to haul my 1967 Ford tractor on it to the shows and use it as basically my pickup truck. But it's in such good shape and so many people have shown interest in preserving it as a fire truck, I'm going to keep it as is for now. That 6V92TA seems to be pretty good on fuel. It's no big expense to drive around. And boy does it sound sweet! It's been oil sprayed every year, so the rims and everything are black right now, I haven't washed it all off yet.

Oh, the new Zinamobile- almost forgot 😁. It's got a 351M and C4 transmission out of a '78 Mercury Cougar in it. Runs great, her only issue is the lack of power steering but I think she can get used to it. If not we'll have to look into some sort of aftermarket power steering setup.

Since we didn't have any pictures taken at our wedding, my wife wanted to have some buffessional type pictures taken of us. We went to this farm just a couple of miles from here and had some taken Sunday afternoon. The pictures came out good, but I'm a bit peed off- I don't understand why she cropped me out of the pictures and put this old fat guy in them- all of them! I'm gonna give her a piece of my mind when it's time to pay her for them! That doesn't make any sense, i'm just gonna- oh,..wait a second...I figured it out...never mind.

Ever heard of two sisters or brothers that grew up together than went separate ways, one settling down and starting a family and the other taking off to seek fame and fortune? ,, this story takes a lot of twists and turns. About the same time I talked to Wayne Hyatt about his Father’s truck and the missing picture, I remembered reading the great article in Wheels of Time magazine about the LTH log truck that Dan Thomas had purchased from the original owner’s family in Oregon ,I still knew very little about a LTH ( a guy about 20 miles away bought 2 LTLs from out west and would bring one to our show, but I never talked to him about it very much) . I remembered the build sheet showing the next truck after mine was sent to Medford OR. I didn’t know Dan but found a number for his company on the internet, I called and asked to speak with him, the lady asked me what the call was concerning,, I told her “ A Old Mack “ if I remember correctly he called me within a hour, I told him about the truck and was wondering about the truck after it on the build sheet, I gave him my vin number and immediately he said that’s the sister truck to his! I told him about talking to the original owners son , he said he would call me back, I think less than a hour he sent me a picture of my truck ( left ) when it was about a year old and the new 56 that Kay Hyatt had bought,, it was the picture at the Booneville fair in 1956 ! “ MACK DADDY “ is the Perfect nickname for him! So his unmolested LTH spent its whole life in the same area,,, the older sister is just getting started!

Good evening everyone and thanks for having me! I have already asked a few question's but wanted to post on here and introduce myself. My father and had a 1966 Mack R600 twin stick when I was younger and that's what I learned to drive truck in. Since then we have sold that truck and have had a few trucks since then and nothing really compared to that old R600. Well I finally pulled the trigger and found a nice sold superliner( 1986, RW613, E6 350, 9 speed, Neway rear air) that seems to Have good bones and cab. Few mechanical issues but for the price I can fix that. Need and little inspiration on what direction (looks) I want to go because I will be painting the cab and frame. I like more of the classic look with some 24.5 talls. So lets see the restored Superliners!! Thanks Again!

I’ve made some progress on the RW 753 I’ll try to put some fuel in it and pull it out this week a take a better picture, I just put the tanks on Thursday.

I’ll start with a picture of the first time I saw this truck, and is probably good that I start a topic on it so later on I can read it and remember some of the things I have learned about it, and some of the interesting people I have talked to concerning it, and hopefully someone will have some more information on it. It may take me several days to remember and post what I have learned so far. I saw it parked on the side of the road leading to a truck show we were having in Waynesville NC in May 2022 , it wasn’t up where all the trucks were, just setting with no one around it . My Grandson and Me walked down to see it ,, it’s very rare for a LT of any kind to be seen here in the mountains of NC , we stayed till the show was over and never saw anyone, no one knew who brought it but I did look under it and saw it had a V8 Detroit,, so I took a couple pictures and left scratching my head! With no clue who brought it or what the meaning of the odd name “ 10 Tucky “ was all about.

Back to polishing and cleaning, the weather has been nice for this time of year so i took advantage of it while it lasts.

I had these two extra trucks, took a long time to sell them and get them picked up. Saturday the hauler came over and we loaded them up; they're finally off my property!

Put some fuel in this morning, Spent most of the day cleaning the interior, Took it on a spin to the post office, Drove good.

Didn't find anything on a search. I have a 1989 R688ST with a FAW5371 12k steer axle. I need to redo the wheel ends. I know the outer bearing is a 45280. Does anyone have the inner and outer bearing and race numbers handy? Also interested in a wheel seal number and a spindle nut number. Some jackwagon used a chisel before.

as some of you may know, i had a few issues over the past two years. as a result of those issues, i determined it was damn well past time to address the biggest elephant in the room which was my size. well, i am proud to announce i am now under 200 pounds for the first time on over 30 years. a few years ago at 335 pounds. and as of 4:30 pm yesterday, the new skinny me, at 199.5 pounds. i plan on holding this weight until i see the doctor beginning of January to see if she feels i should stay here, or drop another 20 pounds. as for now i feel great and am no longer taking blood pressure meds. in fact i am adding a pinch of salt to water bottles to raise the blood pressure, the first time i have used salt in over 25 years. the only real issues i have no are the arthritis that kicks my butt especially withing 12-18 ours of it raining, and no more "built in" insulation keeping me warm. i had to turn the home temperature up from 65 to 72.

I’m sure a V12 would fit! You were also commenting on the color, I think FarNorth helped on the color origination , and hopefully I’ve given some insight on John C Miller and Alaska .and why out of all the equipment he had he picked the LTH to make a show truck for his horses. When I first bought it I thought it would look great Black ! Because the paint was old, faded and chipped, it didn’t really look Yellow, kinda brown. If you notice it had the wrong Mack emblem on the hood and no stainless trim, because when they customized it they made new hood sides, when I removed the Mack emblem it was bright yellow, so I sanded the whole truck with scotch bright to bring out the yellow, a friend of mine at the paint store matched it with base coat the best we could, because the fenders and lower door panels were terrible. I sanded and sprayed them then taped the complete truck and sprayed it with a semi gloss clear to seal it and preserve the original paint, I couldn’t bring myself to strip it and kill all that history. The doors originally said 10Tucky Stables, Lewisburg TN . I found a fellow who still does hand painting like it was originally,, we added a little extra! I think Tennessee Miller would approve of my addition .

no money for snap because demonrats refuse to vote yes on the bill 13 times so far unless it contains full funding for free health insurance for illegals. as for the 200million for the ballroom, not 1 dime for that is coming from the government. it is fully privately funded.

We got the truck home! 2 tires went flat on the drive home, and we lost all brakes. The foot pedal is rusted stuck and gave out, and the parking brake knob isn’t up to snuff like it should be, but luckily we didn’t make a 755 sized hole in anyone’s house! I’m gonna need to find some tires and some brake equipment for this old truck. Motor runs like it shut off last week, no hesitation on startup what so ever. Does anybody have any questions about this truck? I’m new to Mack’s in general and understand that I struck gold with this clean machine sitting in my driveway, I’d love to share with y’all’s community any important info.

We’re down to 3 Superliners , He’s probably going to sell the white one he’s using. Brocky you will love this story, Like the guy working on the Superliner that his Dad once drove the LTH . A friend of mine that ran about 5 trucks back in the 80s , he’s retired now and has a few trucks setting in the weeds, and a couple of old trailers with some old parts in them,He told me I could have any thing I needed for the rear suspension for the Freedom Mack ,, I was over there cutting weeds trying to see the rear axles on a 95 Volvo,, Kyle stopped by and was nosing around up in the old parts trailer,,, I heard him start yelling,, said he hit the “ Mother Load “ he came carrying out a box with a Brand New Heat/AC unit for a Superliner , My friend NEVER owned a Mack ! Never worked on a Mack , No one knows how it got there, The trailer is about half full of nothing but junk ,,, talk about a Needle in a Haystack! What’s the Odds of that happening ever again!

NYC's future! .....Hippy

I need to interject this story before I get ahead of myself, it’s one of the most coincidental stories that I’ve ever heard ( I couldn’t even make this one up) . Finding out that My LTH and Dan Thomas’s was consecutive numbers were 200 to 1 , because that’s how many LTHs were built. This Coincidence is 18 Million to 1 ,, the population of North Carolina and Tennessee ! Here we go, My best friend in High School, Brian has been a manager of a hydraulic hose business for 35 years and knows NOTHING about a truck. He stopped by my shop about a week after I brought the LTH , I was showing him the engine change, we talked a bit and he left. About a week later he stopped at a older fellows shop near Hickory NC that had been a customer of his ( about a mile off I40 ) years ago, the shop was locked up, he saw a man across the road working on a truck, he walked over and asked if he had seen the older gentleman lately and was told he had retired but came by from time to time. Brain said the guy was setting on the tire and the hood was up on the truck, he noticed it was a Mack Superliner with a Detroit,( RW770 8v92 ) He told the guy that his friend (me) had purchased a old Mack with a Detroit a few weeks ago,, the guy asked him what color it was, Brian told him faded Yellow with 10Tucky on the door, He said the fellow looked at him as he had seen a ghost, and about fell off the truck! He said he had ridden in that truck when he was a kid his Dad drove it some for the Millers , His Dad also was the Blacksmith for 10Tucky Stables !! Brain had me on the phone with him ( Alan Abee ) within 10 minutes, I talked to Alan for about a hour. He has given me a lot of information, some pictures from his old magazines, I stay in touch with him often, him and his brother use the Superliner hauling their equipment, he also is a Blacksmith for the Tennessee Walking Horses. I had a better chance winning a lottery than meeting Alan this way! It’s over 400 miles from Hickory NC to Lewisburg , TN !

At this point after talking with Dan Thomas and having the picture I called Joe for more information, he told me that Mr Miller had a lot of equipment, Along with swapping the Cummins out for a Brand New 318 Detroit ( By the way, the younger sister was built pretty much identical when they left the factory) Then they reinforced the frame, you can see where they shortened the frame when it was converted from a log truck to a 5th wheel, the frame reinforcement is very precise for a shop in Alaska in the early 60s . It’s still unclear how it got to Alaska but it was a fairly short period of time between Kay Hyatts trade to Peterbilt and when the Engine was switched and frame modifications,, according to Joe , Millers nephew he thought it was in Alaska for about 8 or 9 years. John C Miller , the guy who hobobed a train with no money, no education,,, but according to his nephew had brilliant mind when it came to road building and moving any kind of equipment had amassed a huge fortune by the 70s .

That part is original, the fellow ( Johnny ) I got in from took me inside before I left and gave me some information on the truck, he had a magazine, the information from the Mack Museum with all the information and gave me the name and number of the fellow ( Joe) he had gotten the truck from near Kingsport TN a few years before whom was a family member of the fellow that had it in Alaska , John C “ Tennessee “ Miller . So here is where several questions were answered, I called Joe ,here’s his story of the truck, His Uncle John C Miller had hoboed a train near Newport TN in the 50s and worked his way to California , there he started in the construction business until he started his own, then moved up to Alaska, continuing to build a bigger company in Anchorage, he had a lot of equipment and most of the trucks he brought up there he would change the engines out to 2 cycle Detroit Diesel, because they would start better in the colder climate . He had a top notch shop in Anchorage, and you can tell it by the craftsmanship of the engine swap. He did a lot of road building, and in 1964 he put together a caravan of D7 Cats to take equipment to Prudhoe Bay for Richfield Oil , Joe said he has the missing fingers to prove it from frostbite! They had to go from Fairbanks north in the middle of winter so they could cross the Yukon River when it was frozen, This was not the way the Dalton Hwy runs today, they basically went around the mountains , I have a good article about it from the Anchorage Museum. He said the LTH was used to haul equipment with lowboys to Fairbanks .

I was drinking this, but then one day I just decided that I should switch to Jim Beam. No particular reason.

We got the last truck show of the year in today,, great weather and show in Cherokee NC , good to talk to everyone. Its going to be time to put them away for the winter,, My Grandson and Me have had fun with the LJ this summer, hopefully we can do some next year, we took the LTH along today , it was a all day trip,, Rolling in at Sunset.

Wow, a V12 Detroit powered R model!

This truck started its life as a B- 61 T. At some point it has been retrofitted into a twin screw tractor. Me and my brother pretty much strictly collect trucks from the former Latrobe Construction Company so it had to saved.

60 years strong! This week’s Mack Facts celebrate the R Series, the model that shaped Mack’s history in Australia. 1. The most popular Mack series ever built, the legendary R Series truly put Mack on the map, or more accurately, on roads all around the world! While this summary from Mack Inc. captures the global story well, it doesn’t quite reflect the unique Australian history. The last locally built R variant was the Australian-designed Metro-Liner, which rolled off the Richlands production line in December 1996, just over 31 years after the first R Series left the Rocklea facility in October 1965. 2. In Australia, Mack Trucks Inc. began local manufacturing in early 1963, producing the legendary B Models at the fledgling Rocklea, QLD operation as fast as demand could be met. But operators were soon calling for more performance, greater driver comfort, and increased hauling capacity, paving the way for the R Model, the perfect evolution and worthy successor to the B Model. The first two trucks were imported in mid-1965, an R403 and a more powerful R609. The photo shows the first R609 in Allentown in 1965, ready for shipment to Australia. 3. Almost 9,000 R Series trucks were built in Australia in an incredible range of configurations. Starting with the ever-popular R609, powered by the tough END711 engine, through to the heavy-duty R800 off-road model, the R Series proved it could handle virtually any hauling task in the harshest conditions. It’s only fitting that such an achievement is celebrated, marking 60 years of the R Series in Australia! The hero photo features the very first V8 R Series delivered locally, owned by Smiler Nilon. Paul

I am the second owner. It was originally used to pull powder and end dump trailers for a ready mix company in Chicago. I bought 3 of their 4 R models when they retired them. I reworked this one into a St. Louis Fire Dept theme styled like their 1968 Mack R model pumpers. This truck pulls one of the R model pumpers to shows.

I’m about halfway through this story so I will continue before I forget something, The last time I talked with Joe Janes , John C Millers nephew he told me all he knew about the truck and some of the details. John & Mary Miller were big into Tennessee Walking Horses, sometime around 1970 he sent the LTH back down to middle Tennessee where he had a farm, Joe said he was unsure who did the restoration & custom painting and chrome work . He said there were once some pictures of it when it was finished but he had no clue where they ended up. The old Mack had helped make John C Miller millions of dollars , and for a truck in the early 70s he wanted it to look like a million bucks. It was painted yellow, added roof a/c , lots of Chrome! Axles , glove box, heater cover, dash, twin exhaust and aluminum tanks ( personally i like the box/steps on a LTH , but this is the way he did it ) . It has a clock in the glove box cover, and a 8 track tape player ( I found a Jonny Horton “ North to Alaska “ tape that I keep in it ) . All the tires were branded with their names on them. A long way from working hard logging in Northern California & hauling equipment in Alaska. This Sister started wearing a lot of “ BLING” !

That’s a great explanation of the LT Models ! The summer went by and I really didn’t think much more about the truck, I was busy with the LJ , Grandsons baseball and was trucking a lot more than. So October rolled around and we went to the truck show in Cherokee NC I think I took my Dad’s C Model. When I pulled in the LTH was there! A friend of mine said a fellow dropped it off early and left because he had a business about 10 miles away. Well we walked around it all day, he had raised the hood, he had not returned when the show was over, so I left a note in the seat to call me about the truck thinking I would probably never hear from him. About 9pm that Saturday night he called me and said I found your note,, we talked about the truck a bit and I asked him if it was for sale, It belonged to him and his Dad and they had talked about selling it because they didn’t have a good shed for it . I asked him about the price and we agreed on it . I had to haul a big forklift down to the outer banks of NC Sunday and would not be back till Monday evening, he said that was fine. As it turned out my Son was trucking out that way Monday so he stopped and left a deposit with his Dad and actually brought a older bulldozer from him also. So Tuesday afternoon we went back with a Superliner and lowboy and got it and the dozer. This is where I started asking questions and after about a hour I knew some of the history,,, but the interesting part had just begun!

Here’s mine,not for sale,it’s from late 40’s early 50’s.

I found it and took a screenshot,,, I love that look!