mattb73lt

Most of the bearings were easily found. I don't remember which one, but there was one bearing that took quite a bit to get. The shift covers aren't too bad to rebuild, but if the shift rail bores are worn you'll need new covers as I don't think there's a way to reasonably re-bush them. Finding new covers might not be too hard, Matt Pfahl would be my first go to. unless you know of someone closer to you? You can get the gaskets, I have the gasket kit Part number if you need it?

Made it to Lancaster and back without any issues at all. Met up with a bunch of people from here, Red Horse and 70mackMB and several people from FaceBook. Weird how you get to know people from social media, yet you've never met them face to face, no idea what they look or sound like. I suppose that's how we'll meet some of our acquaintances from now on. A good run this morning, before the heat and traffic. The return trip I could do without. About a three hour round trip and about 200 miles and no leaks from the transmission. Two whole days in the truck and a lot of fun was had.

Big day for the B73. Did the whole DreamRide motorcade through several towns in the central Connecticut area. About an 18 mile course with hundreds of cars, fire engines hauling Special Olympic athletes, about 600 of them paired up with drivers and cars. Truck ran perfectly over the route with no issues, but lots of shifting and Jake brake action. A long and fun day. I even rescued one of our vintage State Police cars the decided the quit about 1/2 mile from the end. A really good day. Tomorrow off to the Lancaster, MA show. It should be another great day. Fingers crossed for no issues!

Swapped the fluid today, all new and fresh. Full to the proper level. Ran it 20 minutes and rechecked the level, it’s spot on. Just came home now and checked my drip pan. Not a drop. Tomorrow, off to DreamRide and Sunday off to the Bolton Fairgrounds show in Massachusetts.

The ones on the bed? They were original to it. Thinking about adding some more, but I may just leave it as is. There all new LED types and all fresh wiring.

I went completely through the whole transmission. Replaced all the roller and taper bearings, seals and re-shimmed the shafts. Rebuilt the shift covers, split the cases. All new gaskets and seals. The only thing not replaced were the shell bushings on the sliding gears, which you can’t get anywhere. Everything was cleaned and inspected. It’s been very dry, so far. There’s a little noise from it, but it doesn’t howl. Shifts very smoothly. The original odometer had about 375K miles, when it stopped working. Just an odd occurrence so far. I’ll get it ready for Bolton. That’ll be its longest run so far. 2500 miles on the clock so far with no issues other than this one.

I don’t think so. I drained a little bit less than 4 gallons out of it. Capacity is a little over four. The only thing plumbed into it is the PTO/ pump assembly and there’s a 1/4” drain hole in the PTO case so it can’t transfer there, it would just drain out. I don’t think it was pressurized, there’s a big vent on the top cover and the main stick isn’t air tight. Still dry tonight. Tomorrow I’ll drain it again and put fresh gear oil in it. The weekend is shaping up that I might make the Bolton show on Sunday. My boss has the big DreamRide weekend he sponsors for his Special Olympics fundraiser. It’s a three day event and I think I’m going to skate on Sunday.

Thats a thought, but it was still leaking statically for a long time before I could get it drained down?

Triplex, TRTL-720. Still dry this morning and still scratching my head.

I had a weird thing happen with the transmission this week. Went out with the truck two Saturdays ago to put some miles on it. Get back and I smell some gear oil as I get out. I don't think much of it and go over to my neighbors for a few beers. Come back about two hours later and as I'm locking up the truck I see a huge puddle of gear oil under the bell housing. Pour some speedy dry on it and put a drip pan under it loaded with more speedy dry to catch what's dripping out. Next day. I clean up the mess and start investigating and from what I see it's coming from behind the clutch brake, on the counter shaft. I run it and watch and it's still dripping. I didn't have time to work on it then, so I drain it down to stop the leak. I thought I could get at it through the lower opening on the bell housing and change the seal that way. Nope, not enough room to get up in there and pull the parts down. The only way to fix this is to pull the transmission out and now that it's all together I can't do that in my yard. I was able to get a friend to allow me access to his shop and transmission jack. That was supposed to happen this morning. Late yesterday in preparation for today, I refilled the transmission and packed up my tools to do this. I was able to get a new seal and a speedy sleeve to replace the old ones. I figure screw it I'll take for a ride for the hell of it. Get back late yesterday after my joy ride and slide a clean drip pan under it. No drips/leaks, even after a few hours. Call my friend and ask for a raincheck due to work popping up for today. Check the drip pan this morning, no drips. Screw it, I take the truck to work, about a 35 mile run, and park it. Before I leave on my trip, I check the pavement under the truck, again dry. Come back seven hours later, still dry!! I can't figure this one out. It hemorrhaged almost a gallon of gear oil in my yard and now it's ok?? It's dry not even a drop hanging, ready to drip. On a bright note, I did finally get to drive the truck at night, with all the lights working.

I’d use some high build primer over what you have there. It may take several coats, with sanding in between. Much faster and easier to do than skin coats of filler. Unless the pitting is really deep. Then you may need to use filler in those really bad areas.

h67st, did you purchase from him? I tried contacting him but never got through. I did get a set of windshield and the rear window seals from Neil Kaupila, from Massachusetts also. Those fit perfectly and were exact copies. I've sent numerous people to him for those.

Yes, there was a B77 and a B773. I believe it could be spec'd out with the Cummins 335. I would guess the rarest of the B70 series. B73/B75's are much more common to come across.

I'm assuming you mean the L cab. I can tell you from experience, these are hard to find as are most other L cab parts. While you may find the metal frames, locks and pivot hardware, no one makes the rubber pieces. I would suggest you keep asking about. If you're on facebook there are two good pages to ask on. One being for the Mack L Model and the other is for LT/LTL & B73/B75/B77 Trucks. There's a pretty good size audience there and you may find someone with those parts. The more you ask around the more you may find. The rubber seals are definitely the hardest to locate. I found a decent pair after asking a lot of people and finally found a serviceable pair I carefully cleaned and restored. Even after doing that I was very careful installing them as there were areas that were brittle and would brake/crack easily. They're out there, you just have to dig.

I do remember an article about a cab over some years ago. Modified with a lift to bring it's driver and the whole wheelchair up, then into the cab. the driver remained in his chair while behind the wheel. Did the Bisom line also have a nicely restored, twin screw B model with a sleeper on it, maroon in color? I seem to remember one from about 20 years ago at one of the national shows. It was very nicely done.

Great results from some hard and dedicated effort. Beautiful!

These are pretty rare. Out of all the B80 series I've see over the years, only a handful have had this tank. Do you need a replacement or are you looking to see if someone has one like it? There are a few different sizes for the different engines that were offered, this style I believe for the largest engines.

Most L model parts are pretty rare. A lot of my searches were fruitless, causing me to fabricate and get creative to solve issues. I shared almost all the parts I had accumulated with people restoring L cabs when I had my cab done, Dean can attest to that. What I had helped about three other restorers with their projects. Even my go to for parts, Matt Pfahl, said "Good luck!". He was only able to help me with some minor door and vent window parts. One of the FaceBook pages I'm on had some NOS parts posted for sale and they were gone almost instantly and for some insanely expensive prices. A NOS lower back panel that was still in the factory shipping crate went for $1K, A brand new LT hood for $3K(!!!) a stack of NOS floor mats for $500 each. Passenger side door skin. I've never soon anything like that before and I did and still do a lot of searching for L parts.

Mark, that horizontal line just goes over the top to the other side, just behind the radiator and in front of the cowl. Scroll back there's a pic of it fixed that way.

I was back and forth on that, too. But it seemed simpler and more straight forward with the right angles. The first draft had radius' in each corner of the lower door panel.

Damn, that's going to take some effort to close up that void, but one repair/problem at a time will get you there!!

Those look very workable and certainly better than what you were starting with!!

Here's a closer view of the right side during the second draft work. Some of these pictures are pictures of her computer screen as she was having issues sending them to me so they're a little degraded. I also notice whenever you post pictures they end up losing some clarity.

So, I'm trying to do a New England style, period lettering and striping job on the truck. I've taken lots of photos over the years and scoured the internet keeping photos of trucks that were original and restored. I think I've come up with a pretty good plan and I'm always looking for input. The basic plan it to "frame out" most of the panels and fender edges. Then letter up the doors. Most of it will be a two stripe plan, a yellowish main stripe and backed up in the inside with a thin green stripe. Colors I'm thinking are Cummins yellow for the main stripe and Emerald Green for the thin stripe. On lettering the doors, since I don't have a company I'll just use my name. This will probably be the only thing done in gold leaf and engine turned. Things get expensive quickly with gold leaf and added art work. I had a phone meeting with the artist today for about an hour and a half, which was very productive as we traded ideas and photos back and forth. We more or less finalized the plan and set a date for the last week in September that's her next opening. The main point of posting is to make sure I haven't gone off the reservation too far. The truck was heavily striped and scrolled all over by the original owner. Not my style and a little too crazy for my liking. It's sorta the last step in the restoration and the finishing touch. Trying to do two things, not have it look like a fire truck and not have it too cluttered up.The "KRACKERJACK" nickname I was on the fence about. But after sending it to the nephew of the original owner, who I've been in touch with shortly after I found the truck, said that it was awesome to put that back on the truck and several here thought it was a great idea. I'll post some pictures of the second draft from today. Bare in mind, that they're just drafts and may be missing some details and have some alignment issues. If you look at the picture of the left front fender, that one has the two stripes on it, yellow/gold and a thin green stripe. The side view of the cab does too, if you blow them up.

I don't think I'm going to do that. Over time it'll get used and would be much easier to touch up or respray if needed to keep up appearances with out the added expense of re-striping it.