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An ex-fire truck no doubt based on the chrome bumper and the spot lights. These chassis's were very popular for fire apparatus and you still see quite a few of them around.

My bet is when you take them apart you will find they are pretty pitted up and replacing the pistons will not fix the problem. The ultimate solution for the wheel cylinders is to have them bored and sleeved. White Post Restoration in White Post, VA is one source and there are others out there. If you can find the part number on the casting you may be able to find new wheel cylinders. I found the front wheel cylinders for my 52 A model, but I had to have the rear cylinders sleeved.

Not to be Capt. Obvious, but are you sure the fork is engaging the throw out bearing? Have you also made sure the fork is sitting on the pivot point? You should be able to grab the end of the fork and feel if it is trying to move the clutch. The linkage itself is pretty straightforward. Hook the rod to the pedal, hook the linkage from the swivel rod to the fork via the turnbuckle type rod that provides the adjustment. Most clutches work by pulling back on the fork to push the throw out bearing forward. Is the clutch itself an adjustable clutch? If you turned the adjustment the wrong way it will not disengage. Been there done that. Had to pull a transmission twice to figure that dumb ass move out. There should be some type of inspection port on the bell housing that will allow you to see what is going on when the pedal is depressed. It's pretty hard to do, but the throw out bearing might be installed backwards. Is it the correct throw out bearing? Another one of life's lessons learned the hard way. PM me if you want to call me and we can run through it. Sometimes just talking it through provides the "aha" moment you need.

Are you talking about hooking up the clutch fork to the linkage?

GPS or even a cell phone app seems like the way to go if it starts heading down the road of complicated repairs. I use a GPS on mine since the speedo bounces around so much.

There should be a section on the proper method for adjusting the clutch in the manual you received from the Museum.

What a beautiful truck. Great job. When do you get it lettered?

This case is the classic "they did what?" scenario for senior management. Everyone has some degree of fault, but I'm sure senior management expected far more out of their employees than what was delivered. The gate agents should have bumped it up the line as soon as it became apparent that the situation wasn't going to resolve itself and the "police" officers should have asked some hard questions of the United staff before they took the actions they did. I'm sure 99% of the officers who would respond to a like situation would ask United what is it that this guy did before taking actions to remove him. When United replied most officers would tell them they are not going to forcibly remove the person for refusing to give up a seat in what was basically a civil, not criminal matter. And in turn United folks should have stepped in and told the officers not to use force if that is the road they were headed down. One of the things we always stressed to our folks is that every contact you have with a citizen maybe the only contact that citizen ever has with us and that if you do not make a positive impression on them you are letting every other employee and the organization down. That starts with senior management and it is pretty apparent that no one at United or the Chicago Airport ever cared enough to make sure their employees knew, and acted on, that. One rule to keep in mind when faced with a situation like this is "If that was my Mother/Wife/Sister/Child how would I treat them?" If everyone involved had applied that rule than no one would have ever heard about this.

My wife blocked all of those as part of my 12 step program to stop buying old trucks and fire stuff.

The 3208 may not be the best engine ever built, but they sure powered a lot of C cab Fords. The C cab was a very popular fire truck chassis and the 3208 was the power plant of choice for most of them after the fire service started getting away from gasoline power for most apparatus. I liked the 3208 in the C cabs I drove. It had adequate power and it was generally reliable. It had to be one of the most produced engines for Cat as they seemed to pop up everywhere from excavators to trucks to farm tractors. I can't help but wonder if their reputation comes from having so many out there that it was inevitable that some would crap out. Granted it really couldn't be rebuilt, but a crate engine was relatively cheap and it was a pretty quick swap to get a new engine into a rig when it went down.

May all your eggs be found.

Mack did, and still does, build their own axles, transmissions, engines, etc., but they never built their own fire apparatus pumps. The early pumps were specifically made for Mack and thus had the Mack or IM logo cast into them for Mack. Just because a part has a cast Mack or IM logo doesn't mean it was produced by Mack.

And the endless wind farms. It is also the only place that I have ever seen driveways that directly enter an interstate highway.

That yellow field by the James River bridge on 295 is Canola. Happy travels.

I would respectfully disagree. One of the worst United flights I took was because of the rude behavior of a large group of Chinese passengers on a flight from Beijing to Dulles. They ignored the crew's orders, roaming the plane even when the fasten seat belt sign was on, and proceeded to put out what could only be described as their own buffet. People are people no matter their nationality, social status, or wealth. Either you are respectful of others or you are not.

I do not believe Mack made their own pumps. The pumps produced by Northern for Mack had the Mack logo cast into them. Just as they do now, Mack was an assembler of parts produced by sub-contractors based on Mack designs when the truck was built. I have been told that Mack even purchased the hose bodies of the early fire apparatus from Northern.

Back about 20 years ago when I was doing 50K miles a year I used United as my preferred airline. Then they steadily got worse and worse; tighter seats, lousy in-flight service, and higher and higher fares and fees. I used them once in the past few years when I went to Korea and it was as bad as I remembered. The best I ever flew was ANA to Tokyo non-stop from Dulles. The flight attendants cleaned the bathrooms every hour and they treated every passenger as a VIP. On the way back to the states Dulles was closed by a snow storm. ANA paid for a hotel room, gave us a $100.00 meal voucher, free internet, transportation to the hotel, and a long distance phone card when we had to stop in Chicago. The United passengers that had were on the shared flight had to pay for everything that ANA comped to us. I just don't fly that often anymore, but when I do I usually use Southwest. Good schedules, boarding is no more of a zoo than it is on any other airline, and their fares are lower than anyone else. I have never been on a flight that fully boarded and then was asked to give up a seat due to overbooking. The drill is that the ticket agent at the gate asks for volunteers and then selects the unfortunate ones who will be bumped if there are no volunteers. I blame poor management for ever letting it get that far.

You can patch it over, but it will never be quite right. The correct repair is to use a cutting disc on a small grinder to cut the rusted area out and then use the cut piece as a pattern to make a piece which can be welded back into the hole. If it is too rusted out to make a pattern then hold a piece of cardboard up to the hole and trace out what you need, cut it out to fit, and then make up the patch piece. I would wire brush the entire area to remove the loose rust and then paint it with a Chassis Saver or Por-15 type paint. You can also use rust converter and then paint over it.

Happy hunting!

Has anyone else noticed that the price of diesel at all of the major truck stops is pretty much the same no matter what state you are in? I drove back from SC yesterday and the price was $2.59 to $2.69 in every state despite the difference in tax rates. What really makes me suspicious is the price at local stations can run as much as 40 cents per gallon less than a major truck stop at the same or near by exits. I paid $2.26 at a Murphys in Dillon, SC when the Loves, Pilot and Flying J just south of there were $2.59 cash price. (I also watched an enterprising O/O squeeze his rig into the pumps to take advantage of the price; hats off to him if he got it out of there without hitting something) It's $2.65 in Carmel Church, VA just south of here and it is $2.29 at the local WaWa near my house. So, is it price fixing or do the truck stops just figure that the drivers have no choice and they have no reason to be competitive?

Not any different than doing it on a car. I use a pressure device (pump can) to inject new fluid into the master cylinder while I open the wheel cylinder bleed valves. Run fluid out of the bleeders until it is clear or you just figure it should be the new fluid coming through.

If you have a parts catalog it is helpful to have a part number for the item you need, but I think the museum staff will deliver for you even if you cannot find the PN. You will not be able to secure the information by going to the museum as the staff is just too busy to answer most walk in requests. Send them an e-mail or snail mail and you will get the needed shop drawing.

Thoughts and prayers go out to the family. Sounds like a life well lived.

If you have a way to get it to a Fastenal store and the receiver can pick it up, Fastenal is pretty cheap to use as a shipper. And even a regular LTL shipper is not that expensive. I sent the engine from my AB to IL for less than $300.00 using SIAI.

What is the chassis number?