J Mack

2020 has been a strange year with the China Flu and I’ve been reluctant to take the Kenworth cab off a perfectly good truck to save this old Mack if I wasn’t going to be able to commit the time and money to see it through to the end. Well for better or worse I’m fully committed now.

I'll take it if you're willing to ship.

I’ve been looking for better pictures of the factory running boards like the ones on this truck, I don’t believe I’ll be able to find a set in good shape and most likely going to need to recreate them here from photos. Would you happen to have anything in your photo archive? Thanks, Jim

Thank you @ j hancock , That is exactly what I needed. I was bending wire into a triangle like the top photo and it worked but wouldn’t keep the button tight and seemed like it would rattle quite a bit. I scaled your photo and bent a wire to fit and it works great!

I've checked Watt's and cant find anything but again I'm not sure exactly what I'm looking for. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you guys! I believe I need some sort of spring clip that would fit inside the tin cup in the middle of the steering wheel, trying to find a picture of the assembly now to see what it might look like.

Well about the time I was thinking I could make some progress on the old Mack we decided to build a shed to park the truck in and that took all of February. So parking shed is mostly done and now I hope to get back to the Mack. I’ve been trying to get a correct horn button but obviously I’m missing something here. The tan button on the right is the one that came with the truck and the ears are broken, I assumed that was the reason it wouldn’t say in the steering wheel so I ordered the one in the center but it doesn’t fit either, I ordered the one on the left thinking it would be what I needed but no luck. Can one of you guys tell me what parts I would need to get one of these buttons to work with my wheel or what the correct button for my wheel would look like?

Sold pending funds.

Holidays set me back a bit from working on the Mack but now I’m back out in the shop and trying to make some forward progress. The exhaust brackets where a horror show so I needed to come up with something better to get me by for now. I found some Peterbilt mounts that fit the Mack body reasonably well so I’m going to run them until I find time and money to repaint the Mack. Next on the list was the oil bath air cleaner, I removed the guts and converted the housing to a Donaldson pleated air filter to go better with the turbo engine going back in the Mack. I figured while I was working on the air cleaner I would remove the mount and clean it up a little when I discovered this mess, looks like when they originally mounted the oil bath they attached the mount directly to the cab sheet metal and at some point in this trucks career the weight of the oil bath ripped out the bolts from the sheet metal sides and the fix was to add some flat bar over the side vent and drill through the A pillar and the added chunk of ¼ plate forward of the cab. I needed to find a clean solution to cover this mess until the time comes to do it right so I dug around the scrap pile and found some 3/16” flat stock and cut & bent it into sections big enough to mount the air cleaner and cover the $hit show underneath. The mounts looked a bit chunky so I added some speed holes. Both mounts are done and now I need to make some doubler plates to go on the inside.

Good to know, thank you!

I was thinking $20.00 a piece should buy me the lights when I set out to find them, the only set I've been able to find with the thicker gaskets was on eBay. I'll keep looking and at some point might be willing to give close to $100 each but for now I need to keep moving forward within a reasonable budget if I want to get this truck back on the road. I had no idea how much some of this vintage truck parts could cost when I started but I'm getting a quick education.

Pretty close to my fabercobble plan, I laser cut some 3/16”EDPM 40 durometer rubber gaskets, sandblasted the rusty bases and coated with POR-15, glued the glass lenses into the tops with DOW 999-A glazing sealant in the hopes of keeping the bulk of the water out of the light fixture itself, I bought some self-contained water tight LED light modules to replace the rusted out original sockets. I’ll run a bead of DOWSIL 795 silicone building sealant under the gasket to help seal the difference in shape between the light and roof, probably less than ideal but should get me by for a year or two while I find time and money for the next phase.

I have a fairly narrow window of time to get this cab ready to put on the chassis and without an unlimited budget I’m going to need to prioritize mechanical over cosmetic needs/wants and keep moving forward. The plan for now is to track down as much of the Mack L-cab specific parts like rubber, glass and interior panels and deal with paint and body work at a later date. Pulled the front glass, drilled out all the broken screws and welded up a few minor rust holes. For now the plan is to paint all the bare steel with POR-15 and hit all the seams with SEM 39377 seam sealer before I put the new rubber and glass back in. Today I need to come up with a plan for the KD 517 Marker Lights, someone installed the lights with the flat gaskets instead of the thicker gaskets for a flat cab and was letting dirt and moisture collect under them, I found a set of NOS lights with the correct gaskets but at $450 they are a bit more than I want to spend on lights right now.

I will definitely contact you if I’m able to keep the factory L firewall. At this point nothing is set in stone for the firewall and floor in the L cab, floor is pretty rusty and has a few sketchy patches. The firewall also has some patches and most of the pass through holes appear unusable for the Kenworth power and air needs. Kenworth floor and firewall are in great condition but they’re aluminum so I’m weighing the options of bolting and bonding verses fabricating new panels and welding them in.

Thank you so much. I gave them a call on the off chance they would still be willing to make one and they had one in stock ready to ship!!