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Nice; I think the first two are two different trucks. I cannot see the cowl mounted spot light in the first picture that is apparent in the second.

For a true restoration; in your dreams. A lot of folks call anything with fresh paint and Bondo restored. That you may find for that price. Having said that a restored truck is almost always cheaper to buy than you would pay to restore one. In the fire truck world most professional restorations sell for around 30 cents for each dollar spent on the restoration.

I do not, but I think I know where you are talking about. I believe it was a Case construction equipment dealer?? Steelman grew up here and I'm sure he would know him. As you well know every little scratch or nick will show through the plating. When you pay for "show quality" plating what you are really paying for is the extra time someone has put into polishing and repairing the part before it gets plated, not the actual plating.

They are the best. They also have shop drawings for almost every part Mack ever made which they will send to you if you need them for a restoration. I have gotten drawings of the 1925 AB's fenders as well as a soft sleeve holder for my 1952 A model. What a resource for anyone restoring a truck! Keep the donations coming.

Well actually more cold than cool! Taken by Bill Noonan who was the Boston Fire Department's photographer as well as being a Jake. The fire was the Plant Shoe fire which went to five alarms, an almost unheard of level of response in those days. This incident is well remembered by the Boston Jakes and buffs of the day because of the size of the fire and the weather conditions.The rig is E-7 which was still a two piece company and was most certainly a reserve rig at that time. While the picture is a tribute to what the firefighters endured on the incident it also speaks loudly about the toughness and durability of the L models. Based on the date, 1976, the Mack had to be at least 24 years old and was probably older. Considering that the BFD was one of the busiest fire departments in the country, and frankly did not have the best fleet maintenance in the world, it is remarkable that the rig was still in service after all that time. I especially like how you can see that the windshield wipers must have been going for most of the night since the windshield is almost clear of ice. My bet is the old girl ran for the entire operation and was not shut down until the incident was over. The funny thing is the BFD stopped using Macks after it's last purchase of some B models. As far as I can remember I don't think they ever ran a "C" or "CF" in the fleet. By the time this picture was taken they had been buying Wards, Seagraves, and Maxims for the most part.

The oldest equation in the world is time versus money. For most of everyone's life they have the money to do something, but not the time or you have time, but no money. I'm in the time, but no money phase of life, so I can spend hours prepping parts instead of paying a shop $60.00 or more per hour to do it for me. Besides which I'm pretty anal about this stuff and unless I went to a real high end shop like Paul's Chrome it probably would not be good enough for me. You just don't have the time yet. There will come a day when you spend a lot of time making one of yours right. Besides, it keeps me off of the streets and as I tell the wife it's cheaper than a girl friend!

You are right Vlad. That is why I did not even attempt to straighten the bent lug on the steamer cap and why one of the pump intake pipes will be plated with the same porous holes on it that it had from the factory.

If you have not been there Cole's museum is well worth the trip to go see.

Nice; I hope you have BIG signs saying this station is closed so folks won't come looking for the Hahn to ride again.

I'm making verrry slow progress. I have been trying to get all of the plating done first, so I am spending many hours at the buffing wheel in an effort to keep the cost down. I am probably one-third to halfway there with that after getting 62 items to the plater a couple of weeks ago. Some buddies came by and we managed to get the hose body loose from the frame and the suction hose racks removed from the hose body so those are ready to be blasted and painted this spring (I hope). With any luck I hope to get the plating buffing done by March so I can get on the front clip body work. One of the previous owner's left it in a carport, so the left front quarter is a little rough. I think it will take me a couple of weeks to get that done. The engine is finally on the way back from the machine shop in IL where I had the bearing work done after 14 months. When I get it back the local machine shop that did the other work on it will re-assemble it and I should get it back after the first of the year. God willing and my wife is happy to not travel as much, I hope to have it done for Macungie in 2017. We'll see. Here are a couple of pictures of some of the items all polished and on the way to the plater. I have 16 hours in the steamer caps alone. I'd love to meet the operator who felt he had to use a steel hammer on them to get them tight.

NAPA - Never Any Parts Available. God how I miss the old time guys who you could show a part to and they would walk in back and come back with it. Try one of the tool salesmen; Cornwell, Snap On , etc. There are also 114 listings for drag link sockets on eBay.

Try calling Dave Klein at D&D Truck Repair and Towing in Hagerstown, MD. He has restored a couple of LTL's.

Apparently VW found the solution; Cheat!

Generally there will be a small "L" stamped in the end of a left hand thread wheel stud.

Steelman and I recently visited the Fire Museum of Maryland in Lutherville, just outside of Baltimore. Here are a couple of pictures of two of their AC's and a 1927 AB. The museum staff was gracious enough to let me get a lot of close ups of the AB's various small items that I need to reproduce for the restoration of my 25 AB. The first AC is a 1916 that the museum had a new screen style hood made for in order to restore it to it's "as built" look. The second is a 1920 AC that served as Baltimore's shop wrecker. The 1927 AB is from Thurmont, MD. If you are in the Baltimore area the museum is well worth the time to visit. It is just off of I-695 on Rte. 45.

Rich has some beautiful trucks. I think he is still using an LJ for occasional rip-rap hauling.

I ended up buying a 24' trailer just to keep the parts from my AB in while I restored it. Nothing worse than losing a part you had and cannot replace, while doing a restoration.

My prediction is that DEF will be discontinued on new trucks sometime in the next few years which means that in 20 or 30 years you will not be able to find DEF anywhere. No DEF to keep old trucks on the road will mean no old trucks. Just my$.02.

With the brakes a TT has I hope it was somewhere flat!

I don't think Hobart is as well made these days. Like a lot of the "heritage" brands (Porter-Cable, Stanley, etc.) they are living off of what they used to be.

Send it to Automotive Manufacturers in Richmond. But why rebuild it? Put an electric pump on it and just by-pass the factory original.

If you weren't running an old LJ or a newer B-81 chances are you were running one of the IH 220's with a Cummins.They were everywhere in New England in the 60's.

Thoughts and prayers. I lost my Mom to Alzheimers so I know how hard these years must have been for him. Blue and White can; LaBatt's Blue

If you have a decent welding supplier near you they should have a couple of demonstration machines you can try out. My advice is to stick with a brand name such as Lincoln or Miller and to avoid the imported brands. There is a reason Hobart, Campbell Hausfield, Eastwood are less expensive such as using aluminum coils instead of copper. If you plan on keeping it having a brand name makes it easier to get parts, etc. as time goes by. Sometimes the on-line sites offer 0% financing that makes buying a new machine a no-brainer. As with all things in life you get what you pay for. A low price means a corresponding less quality. My philosophy is if I plan on keeping something more than a couple of years I buy the best that I can afford. You will not remember the low price if the machine doesn't do what you want it to do. There are some really decent buys on CL if you keep stalking the site. Make sure you try the machine out before you buy and I would look for an older machine from a home use setting that doesn't use digital controls. I assume you are going to redo the panels on the Hahn. If so you will probably want to run .023 wire, so make sure the machine can drive that size or it has the availability of the drive wheels for that size. The sleeves for the gun are inexpensive, so don't worry about converting the gun. Make sure you check the duty cycle if you are planning on doing long seams. Nothing more frustrating than having the machine shut down to cool off when you are moving along nicely.

Typical northeast heavy hauler; the only thing missing is the big air piston on the front to raise the snow plow. Nice pic.