It’s January and currently about 44˚, so there isn’t much getting done outside on the trucks in an unheated garage. In the interest of keeping my motivation level up, I suppose I should recap the events of 2023, as they were pretty eventful for the Dugan IH Barn (or whatever I’m calling this assemblage of vehicles).

March 2023

December 2023

So from the top, in rough order:

• Early in the year, I looked at a couple of crusty C-Series pickups, both in New Jersey, and found them both too rusty to bother with. And way too expensive to consider seriously.
• I was then the first person to respond to a Marketplace ad for a crusty red Travelall right across the harbor, and the first to drop cash in the seller’s hand that morning. I had it towed back home and dropped in the driveway.
• After changing the plugs, oiling the cylinders, swapping out the points and condenser and rebuilding the carb, I got it running.
• I used the Vermont title loophole to get it registered in that state and got a set of plates in the mail.
• I pounded out the dent in the rear passenger’s taillight area and filled/sanded the area, as well as the driver’s flank under the Travelall badge.
• I sanded longstanding hail damage out of the roof and raingutters, treated them for rust, and skimmed with body filler. It’s all primed but will need a finish skim before final paint. I also pulled the two front fenders off and began pounding the dents out of each; they are both still a work in progress.
• I rebuilt the entire brake system, finally tracking down a specialty brake hose, and replaced both the master cylinder and clutch slave cylinder. The truck still isn’t shifting into gear, but it feels like the brakes are working.
• At IH Nationals I found a bunch of C-Series parts specific to the truck and at Super Scout Specialists I found a good pane of rear passenger glass that was exactly what I needed.
• I gutted the interior and got it ready for original bench seats, which were sourced from a Binder Planet member up in Massachussets.
• I drilled out the screws and pulled up the wooden deck in the back half of the truck. I used a needle scaler to knock surface rust off the rear undercarriage, treated it with encapsulator, and painted it with chassis black.
• I pulled out the windshield, drilled out the spot welds on the cowl, and cut out both ruined cowl vents. Then I fabricated new vents and welded new metal in, sealed it up, painted everything, and welded the cowl back into place.
• I bought a new windshield from IHPA and had a guy come to the house to install both that and the rear glass successfully.
• Found a mechanic to take on the terrifying job of replacing the passenger exhaust manifold on the Scout without snapping all the bolts off in the block.
• Painted and installed a new battery tray in the Scout.
• I designed and built a locking steel cabinet to replace the pipe cage IH installed to mount the rear seat to.
• Got the truck titled and registered legally in Maryland, with vintage plates.

Wow, writing it all out like that really helps put things into perspective.

Driving out to Ellicott City yesterday, I spied the distinctive shape of a C series pickup parked in front of West End Service, our local IH dealer. On my way home I stopped to look it over and snap a few pictures. It’s clearly a heavy-duty model, sitting on a beefy front axle and sporting a dually rear, but everything else was a normal C-series cab. It had recently been painted and a very pretty design applied to each door, but there was a lot of overspray on the steering wheel and knobs in the cab.

I took a lot of pictures of the floor and seat base (the seat itself was missing) so that I’ve got reference for my seat install and eventual floor replacement.

Dan over at the Binder Boneyard posted a picture of a rig he worked on a couple of years ago that I remember lusting after; it started out as a 2WD Travelall that he converted to 4WD, lifted, and did a bunch of other upgrades to. What I’m looking at specifically is the roof rack, which is the setup I’m going for: an eight-point rack with a solid bed and a very minimal rail. Ideally I’d build the metal sections out of aluminum, but that’s a welding skill I don’t currently possess. I’ve got six of the eight drip rail mounts I need, and I intend to spend a cold winter sketching out a plan for the rack itself. I wonder how much a used TIG welder goes for on Marketplace….?

A Travelall popped up in Pennsylvania on Marketplace yesterday, and I of course clicked to take a closer look. It’s a 1962 4×4 with a transplanted 392 in the engine bay, and originally came from Colorado. There’s only one shot of the inside and none of the engine bay. It’s got a liberal coating of what the kids call “patina”, which is to say, the Colorado sun blasted off all of the paint on the horizontal surfaces. There are a couple of underside shots which look very similar in condition to the red bus in my driveway, and there’s rot in the front fenders in the same places. The seller wants $17,500.

As a 2WD, my truck isn’t quite as desirable, but if I can get the red bus up and running for half of that cost, I figure I’ll be far ahead of the market.