Posted by David Sherman on Tuesday, October 03, 2006 at 5:50PM :
A neighbor told me this morning that he was out riding his quad and saw a shot-up "old utility truck" at a spot where there's a lot of junk, that he thought I might want the wheels off of because they looked the same as on my trucks. I went up and took a look and it turns out it's a FFPW that sure looks like it drove in there under its own power. It clearly belongs to somebody. I didn't see any bullet holes in it. It looks like it was once a wrecker, but the original wrecker boom is all bent over. It has a tall home-made A-frame on the back, very jerry-rigged, but it appears to have been used recently. The cab is not all that bad, considering, but then there's all the stuff that makes me say "WTF"? One rear axle is welded to the hub (the bolts were all rusted or broke off). One front wheel is on backwards so it sticks way out away from the drum! It has 3 spark coils and no cover on the voltage regulator. A large number of cloth-covered wires stick out here and there and go to nothing. The gas tank is on top of the cab with a rubber hose running to the carb. There is, naturally, no air cleaner. The wheels are attached with some random number of lug nuts, some of which are tight. I've got to find out who owns this thing. It's at least good to know an old PW is still working, but talk about "rode hard and put away wet". I'm guessing somebody brought it down there to drag some scrap out of the pile. I can understand the gravity-feed gas tank atop the cab, and I suppose welding the axle to the hub qualifies as a "field expedient", but why would anybody but a front wheel on backwards?
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