Because I like em odd, new (to me) Truck

While real patina is fantastic, count me among those who support your choice to paint the truck and put it back to work.

A snazzy old truck driving around might inspire some kid to become a car nut. I'm not saying that a truck with patina couldn't do the same, but based on my experience with children, bright and shiny beats original and rusty nineteen out of twenty times.

Yes I absolutely do love oddball Japanese wagons!! Keep me in the loop if you can...

dculberson wrote: Yes I absolutely do love oddball Japanese wagons!! Keep me in the loop if you can...

Its definitely going to sell, just trying to figure out if its before or after BABE. Will be cheaper than that last one we were talking about :)

JThw8 wrote:

Gearheadotaku wrote: I didn't Studebaker made medium duty trucks. That things just reeks of cool. Check with some Studie folks to see how many are around, and in what condition.

I'm fairly involved with the Stude clubs, I run the local club website among other things. Stude produced a whole range of trucks, this was at the top end of the size scale, same chassis they built their fire trucks on.

My wife wants a mid 60's Stud wagon with the sliding roof. Do you know any good sources for finding one?

bravenrace wrote:

JThw8 wrote:

Gearheadotaku wrote: I didn't Studebaker made medium duty trucks. That things just reeks of cool. Check with some Studie folks to see how many are around, and in what condition.

I'm fairly involved with the Stude clubs, I run the local club website among other things. Stude produced a whole range of trucks, this was at the top end of the size scale, same chassis they built their fire trucks on.

My wife wants a mid 60's Stud wagon with the sliding roof. Do you know any good sources for finding one?

Aside from the usual suspects (eBay, CL) find the local studebaker club and see if they have classfieds on their website. Or the national club is always good (www.studebakerdriversclub.com)

Problem is a large portion of the ownership base of Studebakers is well beyond "internet use" years so a lot of times its word of mouth or printed club newsletters. At 40 Im the "young kid" in our club.

If you're up for a last minute trip the York PA Studebaker meet, which is the biggest on the east coast is this friday and saturday, you might find one there. I may be out there saturday so if I see anything I'll let you know.

And the sliding roof model is the Wagonaire

After a long wait and a few false starts I had a delivery today :)

I love these old Studdy trucks. Just the best look from the 50's

You are indeed odd. The truck is sweet though.

bravenrace wrote:

JThw8 wrote:

Gearheadotaku wrote: I didn't Studebaker made medium duty trucks. That things just reeks of cool. Check with some Studie folks to see how many are around, and in what condition.

I'm fairly involved with the Stude clubs, I run the local club website among other things. Stude produced a whole range of trucks, this was at the top end of the size scale, same chassis they built their fire trucks on.

My wife wants a mid 60's Stud wagon with the sliding roof. Do you know any good sources for finding one?

I see your post is from February but I just started checking and found this over at Hemmings. For only $ 2450!!

http://www.hemmings.com/classifieds/dealer/studebaker/wagonaire/1169802.html

So of course I left on a business trip right after the truck arrived so I've done nothing with it. Well I got home last night and took today off to recover from travel so time to get to it. While I was gone a fuel tank clean and seal kit arrived so it seemed like a good place to start. Tank came out easy enough, no rusted on fasteners to deal with, that was nice. I figured this should be a pretty quick job, a quick clean and etch then seal.

Wrong...

It took 5 hours to clear out the accumulation of 60 years of sludge. Not to mention whatever fuel was left in there had been there a long time so it was contributing to the issue. On the upside the tank wasn't very rusty it just had a hardened inch thick layer of sludge in the bottom that had to be worked out.

Oh well, at least its done now, sealer is on a 48 hour cure then I can pop the tank back in and (fingers crossed) fire her up. Then it's on to the brakes, but that's a job for another day. Gotta spend some quality time with the family this weekend and get some work done on the miata, its convertible season, I need to get her on the road!

Count me among the "Do as you need to do" crowd.

Patina is cool, but as stated, isn't an all-weather, all day sort of thing. Nor is it going to help your business be your business.

Just take lots of pics of the damned thing before you paint it!

On a side note: There's 1 or 2 companies in the local area here that did the same thing, restored an old truck or wagon as their "company car". Even being nicely painted and all, by god do they stand out in the sea of generic trucks, cars and vans.