ohiosteve
Well-known member
I know I read a post today while working where Greybeard spoke of an old Autocar that he had worked on and how he would never forget it, but now that I'm home I can't find it. Anyways, the post really struck home with me as I had an old Autocar that I will never forget. I'm sure mine wasn't as old as the one GB spoke of it was a '78 'construcktor'. I got her as kind of a basket case and everyone thought I was crazy but I eventually got her 'Race ready' and man was she a beast. She was a Tri-axle dump with big 425's for steer tires and a 20' aluminum box with high sides. She had a 400 Cummins bigcam2 with a mechanical pump and a 13 speed. I got to be #1 choice on a few excavators list for on-site work with that truck since I had a big box and I was not the least bit scared to haul heavy. Unfortunately my outlaw trucker personality caught up with me and I lost my CDL for a year due to too many points on my license and I ended up trading the old girl for a nice baler and rake. I will never forget all the times I used to drop my daughter off at school in the old girl. I always had trouble with the door latch on the passenger side so I had a 3/8" stud welded to the door that went through a hole on the cab so I could put a nut on it and not be worried about the door popping open. We kept a ratchet with a deep-well 9/16" socket on the center console. Addie was in first grade i believe but she knew how to use the ratchet to take the nut off and get out. She brought it up a few weeks ago actually, something like "Hey Dad, remember that huge truck you used to have and I had to use the wrench to open the door?". Almost brought a tear to my eye.
