BAD DOG

I wouldn't mind having a GMC Astro cabover. I grew up around the corner from the Funk's seed corn plant at Cottam Ont. They had a sharp 5or 6 truck fleet of Astros, but by the time I was a teenager working over there during the summers and in the fall after school and weekends, they scaled back to a 1 79 astro tri-axle straight with a silver 6V92 Detroit,an 81 GMC single axle straight truck and a 73 astro with a 350 detroit just for shunting cob trailers at the plant during the fall harvest. I spent a bit of the early summers riding around with Art the driver of the astro straight truck picking up seed returns from dealers, which most of the time were just at small farmers where you would end up carrying every bag of seed across a barnyard and load the truck by hand that's why I got to go. My dad had a Freightliner cabover at the time and Art would always tease my about it, and hack on it and praise his astro and I used to tease him back by praising dads Freightliner and hacking on his astro, used to be fun. Generals Brigadiers and Astros were all pretty cool trucks back in the day.

Generals were pretty nice trucks back in the day. I always liked the one Jerry Reed drove in Smokey and the Bandit II. Thinking about that kind of takes me back to my child hood when they built cool trucks and cool movies, and when I was asked what I wanted to do when I grow up I'd tell them I wanted to be a truck driver cause it was a real mans job and it was a cool job. What the heck happened?

I think the Superliner and the GMC General came out around the same time. The Superliner was built longer, because General Motors sold the heavy truck division to White which became what we know as Volvo now back in the late 80's.

Both MH's are really sharp.

If it's got tits or tires it's going to give you trouble sometimes, but both are a lot of fun sometimes too. Just gotta take the good with the bad I guess.

I never liked those Transtars when they were new but, now that you don't see one very often especially in that nice shape, it's COOL to see one now. I have a friend with an 81 Transtar in his barn with a really strong 3406A Cat an it too is in really good shape. I need to get him to dig it out and take it to a few shows.

Sorry, about the pics being sideways guys . I just went from a Mike phone to an I phone yesterday, I'll get it figured out one of these days.

Yes 92 E9 450 with Robert Bosch inline injection pump.

Yes 92 E9 450 with Robert Bosch inline injection pump.

Here 's some pics of my Superliner I took this afternoon .

The stretch job looks good Ryan. Did you put the drop visor on ? I had intentions of coming home from MATS last Saturday with one of those for mine, the guy at Raney's booth almost sold me one last year but I hadn't had truck running yet so I left it there. This year they said they didn't bring one. Now I'm not sure if I'm going to put one on or put Lund fiberglass or short stainless one. Drop visor looks good on yours. It goes good with the dark blue paint. should go good with my black paint. I'll take a good pic of my truck this afternoon outside in the light and post it later, and see what every ones opinion on drop visors is and let peer pressure make the call.

That is true I always found that mine with under hood breather got dirty fast too. It's just finding a dual breather set up for a superliner in good shape a bit hard to find.

Yeah that's funny, never though about it till now. Up here in Canada the Volvo rental dealers all use Macks for delivery trucks too. you would think they would use there own trucks. Thats kinda like a Ford dealer owning a Chevy tow truck ??????

Spring is definately ideal for off road,and construction application, it's simple,and they flex and go through more than air ride. Most of us up here have gone air ride on trucks and trailers too. Just have to make sure driver knows enough to dump air when dumping and put it back in when finished. Our new Granite dump trucks have an idiot light on the dash so you don't forget. Our recently changed weight laws forced us to go all air ride and steerable lift axles. It lightens the tare weight a bit and allows us more on our gross. as fars as going into places where you might get stuck and usually it's some where a truck should't be anyway. I always tell the contractor if they try to send us ito some shithole to use there dozer to get the stuff in there that's what they make dozers for don't expect the trucks to do it for nothing. Nothig wrong with a good camelback set up as long as they are not all wore out they ride pretty good. As for a rubber block , we had a Hendrickson rubber block on as RB dump and it would get stuck on a dog turd so I would'nt want one. I'd have to say I think Hendrickson has the best riding air ride for any application, we have a Pinnacle tractor and do everything with it, and it goes were we need it to just fine. I see nothing wrong with converting a collector truck to an air ride either , so long as the suspension choice suits the truck make. I'm saying I would'nt put a KW 8 bag or a Pete air track in a Mack or vise versa. I took the New way out of my Superliner and replaced it with the Hendrickson air ride from a 2000 CH Mack and I 'd do the same if I was to put air ride under a B mdel or F model or what ever. I just think it makes it more usable for me. Easier to get brake and suspension parts too and the ride is better if you're just bobtailing to shows.

I put one in my Superliner. I just Tee'd it into the last air bag in the loop and ran a 1/4" plastic line to cab and put a gauge in my dash.

My first choice for power would be an E9 but you guys are right it would'nt fit in these new trucks so I probably would do up (and pardon my french) a 3406C Caterpillar to get about 600 hp 13 or 18 spd fuller behind it and a modern hendrickson style air ride like the new macks use and eatons for rears. I prefer mechanical engines but I would take any of the earlier E7's or an earlier DDC II or III Detroit series 60's too. I'm not keen on Cummins ISX's we have a bunch where I work the one I drive is a lemmon too many electronic issues.

I stored mine for about 5 yrs before putting it in my project. My E9 was competely rebuilt less than 10,000 mi before the accident. I had the oil out of it due to the oilpan being torn off in an accident but there was a good oil and Lucas film on everything. the block I filled with new antifreeze to keep the liner o-rings from drying out. I guess I took a bar and turned it a couple times maybee although it is a bitch to roll an E 9 over with a bar even when in the truck . dumped a bunch of oil and Lucas mixture down through the oil feed lin for a good month before I tryed starting it. I also put oil in the turbo too. Mine was hard to prime the fuel I have a Robert Bosch inline pump, no primer pump like v pumps plus all new fuel lines, but as soon as I turned the starer over I had instant oil pressre like 80 or 90 psi. just took me most of the day to get it started I was working alone too that didn't help either. Depending how long you're going to have it out I would leave the oil in it and fill it up with antifreeze and keep it in a dry place. Good luck with your project.

The guy I'm going with and I have to work all week so saturday was going to be our day trip. Otherwise I'd put that windshield in the pickup and bring i if you wanted it.

My thoughts exactly I found that last year that there were alot of deals satuday afternoon. If you still need another turn signal I have a new chrome one in the box up in the shop. I only had one and updated mine wth a pair of LEDs instead so I probably won't need it. I'll bring it wth me to Louisville next week if you want.