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Should I buy this beat to hell dump truck

Baconator

Well-known member
Joined
Jun 1, 2020
Member Number
1740
Messages
314
Im a sucker for beat up shit that needs way too much work.
I have a guy thats been storing a truck at some property of mine for the past few months. One item is a 1985 Peterbilt Dump truck. It looks ok from about 500' away, but is beat to shit up close.
It has 920k miles, supposedly the engine and trans have been replaced in the past few years. I will say the engine runs great, starts well in the cold and doesnt have much blowby at all.
The rest of the truck is trash though, the cab is nasty, tires are a mix of steers and drives, has lots of air leaks, hydraulic ram has a pretty good leak, box is beat to shit and needs a few patches, and the list goes on.
I am considering having a truck for farm duty, I would like to get it up to par to drive on the road if I need to get a load of rock though.
He wants $6k for it, I was thinking $4-$4500 though. I want to see what others think, is that too much for a mega POS?

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We have something almost exactly like that except it’s a KW. We gave 5k for it and it needed the ram rebuilt. 1200 bucks. Leaks air like crazy but runs good. I’d say go for it.
 
Hell yea you need that, and it will improve your life in every way possible. Shifting gears hauling whatever the hell you want. Nike that shit and just do it.

Hope this helps. :flipoff2:
 
I’m not a fan of these light semi trucks turned into dump trucks. Give aways are large fuel tank and skinny 12,000# front end. Hop in the cab and see if it has lockers in it. Check the frame it’s prolly a thin single frame. Air ride rear ends blow for any off-road work. I’m kinda a dump truck snob.

For a homeowner use it will prolly be fine if you don’t get pulled over by the dot guys. If that does only have a 12,000# front you won’t be able to put much of anything on it before your over on axles.

I run dump trucks every day for a living so there is a very narrow spec I look for when shopping for trucks.
 
If it's been there for a couple months and the drives haven't debeaded then I'd call it a solid truck :laughing: Every time I want to use the 81 KW at the cabin that's sat for a month I have to spend 2 hours fucking around trying to reseat a tire or two. My opinion's skewed though, there'd be a 1 in front of that price here.
 
ThePanzerFuhrer said:
I’m not a fan of these light semi trucks turned into dump trucks. Give aways are large fuel tank and skinny 12,000# front end. Hop in the cab and see if it has lockers in it. Check the frame it’s prolly a thin single frame. Air ride rear ends blow for any off-road work. I’m kinda a dump truck snob.

For a homeowner use it will prolly be fine if you don’t get pulled over by the dot guys. If that does only have a 12,000# front you won’t be able to put much of anything on it before your over on axles.

I run dump trucks every day for a living so there is a very narrow spec I look for when shopping for trucks.
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Yep, it has a 12k front axle and 19k rears. No airbags in the rear, just springs.
DOT seems to hang out between me and the quarry, so the odds are higher, it would be registered as farm, not sure if they would hassle me less.
 
I'd pass on it.

Trying to get that legal for the road again is gonna be more headache than it's worth.
 
Baconator said:
Yep, it has a 12k front axle and 19k rears. No airbags in the rear, just springs.
DOT seems to hang out between me and the quarry, so the odds are higher, it would be registered as farm, not sure if they would hassle me less.
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I'd offer 4k

Farm tags makes it a no brainer.
 
ThePanzerFuhrer said:
I’m not a fan of these light semi trucks turned into dump trucks. Give aways are large fuel tank and skinny 12,000# front end. Hop in the cab and see if it has lockers in it. Check the frame it’s prolly a thin single frame. Air ride rear ends blow for any off-road work. I’m kinda a dump truck snob.

For a homeowner use it will prolly be fine if you don’t get pulled over by the dot guys. If that does only have a 12,000# front you won’t be able to put much of anything on it before your over on axles.

I run dump trucks every day for a living so there is a very narrow spec I look for when shopping for trucks.
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Lots of truth here. Place I used to work had a highway truck that was converted to a water tender. Had issues with the air ride rear and the front tires would sink in any remotely soft ground. It did have about twice the power of any other water truck I've driven though :laughing:​​​​​​

Do you really have any other options for $4500 though?

Maybe just a 14k dump trailer might be a decent alternative? Not sure how often or what OP is trying to do with it.
 
ThePanzerFuhrer said:
I’m not a fan of these light semi trucks turned into dump trucks. Give aways are large fuel tank and skinny 12,000# front end. Hop in the cab and see if it has lockers in it. Check the frame it’s prolly a thin single frame. Air ride rear ends blow for any off-road work. I’m kinda a dump truck snob.

For a homeowner use it will prolly be fine if you don’t get pulled over by the dot guys. If that does only have a 12,000# front you won’t be able to put much of anything on it before your over on axles.

I run dump trucks every day for a living so there is a very narrow spec I look for when shopping for trucks.
Click to expand...

All I have to say is that in Michigan, using OTR trucks to 11-axle or dump trucks is where non heavy duty trucks go to die. We can haul 164,000 on 13,000/axle, but you twist the driveline out of them, tweak the frames, ruin the cab mounts, etc. I never dealt with them, just plain Class 8s, but there are a lot of fat tired trucks here so if you see a regular Class 8 under a dump box or hauling 11-axle, it is junk. That's the end of the line for them.
 
ThePanzerFuhrer said:
I’m not a fan of these light semi trucks turned into dump trucks. Give aways are large fuel tank and skinny 12,000# front end. Hop in the cab and see if it has lockers in it. Check the frame it’s prolly a thin single frame. Air ride rear ends blow for any off-road work. I’m kinda a dump truck snob.

For a homeowner use it will prolly be fine if you don’t get pulled over by the dot guys. If that does only have a 12,000# front you won’t be able to put much of anything on it before your over on axles.

I run dump trucks every day for a living so there is a very narrow spec I look for when shopping for trucks.
Click to expand...

I understand your point, but by this point that truck has probably hauled hundreds of thousands of tons already.

I would farm truck that thing all day for the next ten years.
 
evernoob said:
All I have to say is that in Michigan, using OTR trucks to 11-axle or dump trucks is where non heavy duty trucks go to die. We can haul 164,000 on 13,000/axle, but you twist the driveline out of them, tweak the frames, ruin the cab mounts, etc. I never dealt with them, just plain Class 8s, but there are a lot of fat tired trucks here so if you see a regular Class 8 under a dump box or hauling 11-axle, it is junk. That's the end of the line for them.
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Thats exactly how it is in Texas. Lots of OTR trucks converted into dumps at the end their lives. Some companies don't even bother taking the sleepers off. They just cut the cab protector off the front of the dump box and call it good. Its hacktastic! :laughing:
 
evernoob said:
All I have to say is that in Michigan, using OTR trucks to 11-axle or dump trucks is where non heavy duty trucks go to die. We can haul 164,000 on 13,000/axle, but you twist the driveline out of them, tweak the frames, ruin the cab mounts, etc. I never dealt with them, just plain Class 8s, but there are a lot of fat tired trucks here so if you see a regular Class 8 under a dump box or hauling 11-axle, it is junk. That's the end of the line for them.
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Jesus, you're just an expert in literally everything out there huh? From the medical field to truck driving :laughing: Farming to astrophysics. Zoo keeper to airline pilot.
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HillbillyDeluxe said:
Jesus, you're just an expert in literally everything out there huh? From the medical field to truck driving :laughing: Farming to astrophysics. Zoo keeper to airline pilot.
​​​
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No, I haven't done farming which I really would have liked to do, only raised a few animals. Need to learn animal husbandry, especially horses, to round out the apocalypse knowledge. People who can look after horses from start to finish have quite a trove of knowledge, and they'll be galloping ahead after the asteroid.

I don't know anything about piloting, but I always intended to at least get into flight sim. I'm more into ships, I'm probably just below average in knowledge of aviation history. Flight sim is so good these days that a good portion of private pilots have given up ownership of light planes in favor of elaborate sim rigs and immersion in that community. Flight sim guys have had input on NTSB investigations.

What you don't see is a common mistake: the billion threads that fly by here that I don't comment on.

My dad was a truck driver, had a Common Carrier Authority, I dispatched and worked on trucks, bought and sold a few, have never had a CDL, have only driven a tractor bobtail a few miles. Which should not have been done but it got done.
 
Yes you should buy it. Don't let the haters hate.
Post all truck repair bills here with loads hauled for comparison sake.
 
evernoob said:
No, I haven't done farming which I really would have liked to do, only raised a few animals. Need to learn animal husbandry, especially horses, to round out the apocalypse knowledge. People who can look after horses from start to finish have quite a trove of knowledge, and they'll be galloping ahead after the asteroid.

I don't know anything about piloting, but I always intended to at least get into flight sim. I'm more into ships, I'm probably just below average in knowledge of aviation history. Flight sim is so good these days that a good portion of private pilots have given up ownership of light planes in favor of elaborate sim rigs and immersion in that community. Flight sim guys have had input on NTSB investigations.

What you don't see is a common mistake: the billion threads that fly by here that I don't comment on.

My dad was a truck driver, had a Common Carrier Authority, I dispatched and worked on trucks, bought and sold a few, have never had a CDL, have only driven a tractor bobtail a few miles. Which should not have been done but it got done.
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Well I've got some respect for your dad.
 
Gunwalls_Buckthorne said:
I understand your point, but by this point that truck has probably hauled hundreds of thousands of tons already.

I would farm truck that thing all day for the next ten years.
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On site hauling it will work great. Going down the road not so much. With a 12,000 front you cannot haul much legally. It prolly weighs 10,000 on the front the way she sits. You’ll have to load everything on the tandems because you don’t have much before your over. Like I said it’s stupid making otr trucks into dump trucks. You need to have a 20,000 front on a dump truck.

will it work yes, does it work correctly no. The first 1,000-3,000$ overload ticket you get negates the cheap purchase price.
 
ThePanzerFuhrer said:
On site hauling it will work great. Going down the road not so much. With a 12,000 front you cannot haul much legally. It prolly weighs 10,000 on the front the way she sits. You’ll have to load everything on the tandems because you don’t have much before your over. Like I said it’s stupid making otr trucks into dump trucks. You need to have a 20,000 front on a dump truck.

will it work yes, does it work correctly no. The first 1,000-3,000$ overload ticket you get negates the cheap purchase price.
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Bottom line though is its a 359 Pete dump truck for hopefully less than 5k. For probably 15k total, it'll be a nice truck to haul material locally. Think about it, that truck has been running around for well over 2 decades Id bet in its exact form with no issues, so what's gonna change now? I dont think the OP is trying to gross 80-100k in a 52k gvw truck.
 
HillbillyDeluxe said:
Well I've got some respect for your dad.
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He would definitely not give a fuck given your bullshit. He was a very well-read man who respected learning, and hated ignorance and love of ignorance.
 
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HillbillyDeluxe said:
Bottom line though is its a 359 Pete dump truck for hopefully less than 5k. For probably 15k total, it'll be a nice truck to haul material locally. Think about it, that truck has been running around for well over 2 decades Id bet in its exact form with no issues, so what's gonna change now? I dont think the OP is trying to gross 80-100k in a 52k gvw truck.
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Why buy a pos and dump $10k into it then? May as well just buy a $15k truck.
 
Because it’s a Pete the first thing you do is replace the battery cables. Seen 2 of them burn down because of the stupid routing of the battery cables. I would never buy a Pete. I’m utility not flashy.
 
I made him an offer at $4k, he came back at $5, I countered at $4500. I havent heard back, maybe asking if he had a title for it killed the deal
I crawled under it and Im impressed by the level of riggery going on. I know he had it rolling down the road a few months ago, I cant believe DOT left him alone. Im as white as they come, so DOT definately wouldnt pass me by.
 
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