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Recovery Day!
Well, we did it! We recovered the M756A2 today!
My brother, Chad, and my dad helped me load a ton of tools, fluids, etc... in the pickup this morning and then we headed out to the storage yard where the pipeline truck has been sitting for the last 16 years. We last had the truck running and driving around 6 years ago when my dad was trying to sell it. Everything seemed to work just fine then, so we hoped we wouldn’t have too many issues today, but you never know what will happen after things have been sitting for a long time.
Once we got to the yard, we gave the truck a good looking over. It was a little rustier than we remembered, but everything seemed to be in good order. We popped the hood and checked all of the fluids. The coolant was a little low, so my dad topped it off with some 50/50 pre-mix. While he was doing that, Chad and I got ready to put the batteries in. Unfortunately, when Chad opened the battery box door, he discovered that some stinking copper thief had cut off the battery cables! Fortunately, we found a set of cables on a junk refrigerated trailer. Chad crawled underneath the truck and spliced the cables into place. After that, we installed the batteries and tidied everything up for a test run. We cranked it a little to get some oil circulating. Then, we pushed the fuel shutoff in and it cranked right up!
We let the engine warm up while checking all of the vitals. Once we had air, we used a glad-hand air hose to air up all of the tires. Then, we were ready for a test drive! I ran it around the storage yard a few times checking out the trans, steering, and brakes as I went. Everything seemed to be in good working order, so we packed up all of our stuff and headed for home. We stopped in town for fuel and then made the 30 minute drive cross-country to my house. The truck never missed a beat! We hit a bunch of steep grades and that LD465 pulled like a champ!
Now, the real fun begins. I am looking forward to getting the rear winch and gin poles installed and operational. Once all of the mechanical and electrical systems are working perfectly, I’ll start on the rust repair and painting. It’s going to be a big project, but it’ll be so worth it in the end!
Here is a video of our recovery:
https://youtu.be/On-_QZQ-xbo
I’ll post some pictures tomorrow and will keep doing regular video updates as this project progresses!
Well, we did it! We recovered the M756A2 today!
My brother, Chad, and my dad helped me load a ton of tools, fluids, etc... in the pickup this morning and then we headed out to the storage yard where the pipeline truck has been sitting for the last 16 years. We last had the truck running and driving around 6 years ago when my dad was trying to sell it. Everything seemed to work just fine then, so we hoped we wouldn’t have too many issues today, but you never know what will happen after things have been sitting for a long time.
Once we got to the yard, we gave the truck a good looking over. It was a little rustier than we remembered, but everything seemed to be in good order. We popped the hood and checked all of the fluids. The coolant was a little low, so my dad topped it off with some 50/50 pre-mix. While he was doing that, Chad and I got ready to put the batteries in. Unfortunately, when Chad opened the battery box door, he discovered that some stinking copper thief had cut off the battery cables! Fortunately, we found a set of cables on a junk refrigerated trailer. Chad crawled underneath the truck and spliced the cables into place. After that, we installed the batteries and tidied everything up for a test run. We cranked it a little to get some oil circulating. Then, we pushed the fuel shutoff in and it cranked right up!
We let the engine warm up while checking all of the vitals. Once we had air, we used a glad-hand air hose to air up all of the tires. Then, we were ready for a test drive! I ran it around the storage yard a few times checking out the trans, steering, and brakes as I went. Everything seemed to be in good working order, so we packed up all of our stuff and headed for home. We stopped in town for fuel and then made the 30 minute drive cross-country to my house. The truck never missed a beat! We hit a bunch of steep grades and that LD465 pulled like a champ!
Now, the real fun begins. I am looking forward to getting the rear winch and gin poles installed and operational. Once all of the mechanical and electrical systems are working perfectly, I’ll start on the rust repair and painting. It’s going to be a big project, but it’ll be so worth it in the end!
Here is a video of our recovery:
https://youtu.be/On-_QZQ-xbo
I’ll post some pictures tomorrow and will keep doing regular video updates as this project progresses!