Yesterday afternoon, after spending much of the day working around the house, I sat on the couch and checked my email with the dog curled up next to me. I hit Marketplace and did my usual search, figuring I’d see the same ragged out Scouts and a couple of trucks before signing off. Cycling through my search terms, a new listing caught my eye, and the location made me sit up on the couch: Middle River, about 20 miles from here. The picture was of a red IH Travelall of unknown vintage sitting in the side yard of a house, listed for a tantalizingly low price. I immediately messaged the guy and about five minutes later added my phone number, then continued about my day.

A few hours later the seller called me and we set up a meet for first thing Monday morning. I got my usual kit together: a magnet, a flashlight, a strong screwdriver, a 15/16″ socket on a long bar (to put on the crank bolt to see if the engine is free), my $30 borescope, and some gloves. At 8:45 I was sitting outside his house with a cup of coffee, and he waved me into the yard to look it over.

What I found was, as always, worse than the pictures showed, but strangely better than all the other rigs I’ve seen around here. It was a mid-60’s C1100 with Custom badges on the doors. The seller told me his brother had bought it years ago and had it towed from Virginia to his house, where it sat outside for years before it was moved last week and put up for sale. The paint was rough all over the outside; there were blooms of open rust on the doors and fenders. The driver’s rear quarter was crispy around the wheel arch. There was obvious bondo in several spots. The passenger’s rear corner was crunched at some point. And the grille was completely missing. One thing that didn’t show in the photos online was that the passenger’s rear glass—the most unobtanium part of a Travelall—was cracked in several places. The windshield also was cracked in several spots. There were no brakes, but he transmission and clutch weren’t frozen.

Inside, someone had pulled all the seats out and replaced the rear bed with a custom carpeted platform, then bolted two seats of indeterminate origin in the cabin. There was custom upholstery bolted to every surface—walls, ceiling, over the rear doors, and over the windshield. But the dash was clean, the dashpad was in one solid piece (also a shock) and the switchgear all looked to be in decent shape. Under the floormats, the front floors were intact but very damp.

We talked for a good long time about cars and health and life as I looked it over, and he brought a battery out to see if it would catch. It had an International V8 of some size with an aftermarket AC unit plumbed in, and all the moving parts were present. It cranked right over, which was a good sign, but we couldn’t get it to fire with two different coils. The distributor was like no other I’ve seen on an IH motor; I was dumbfounded as to what make or model it was. As we talked, his phone beeped and beeped; he sheepishly showed me a list of 30+ inquiries beginning with mine from the previous evening. He said he’d been swamped with messages since he posted it, one guy even calling at 5AM.

I thought about it for a few minutes and asked him if he was flexible on the price; he thought for a minute and brought it down $250 less than the listed ask. I shook his hand and a deal was struck. This truck has no title, so I did a bill of sale purchase; I’m going to have to do the Vermont title thing to get it registered correctly here. But this came in at a fraction of my budget, so I couldn’t pass it up.

I’d done some research on towing companies the night before so I had a good one to call, and within 1/2 hour a rollback was beeping down the street to where we’d pulled it out of his yard. After heading back under the tunnel to the house, I moved cars out of the driveway and the tow operator dropped it to the side of the garage where it’s out of the way. The rear bumper on this thing is gigantic, and there’s a heavy duty hitch welded to the frame below.

After getting some lunch and work done in the house and giving the dog a well-needed bath, I figured I’d take advantage of the 60˚ weather while I had it and busted out the pressure washer to blast off several years of grime, moss, and flaking paint. This also removed one of the crumbling aftermarket trailer lights mounted above the barn doors. As I cleaned black gunk off the roof, I found a 1″ diameter hole in the center from some kind of radio aerial and figured I’d better cover that before tomorrow’s rain hit. I sanded the edges down with a wire wheel and used some basic painter’s caulk to seal it with a plastic lid. Temporary, but effective.

The passenger’s front tire is garbage—it would never hold air—so I jacked up the front of the truck, put it on a stand, and pulled the tire off. It’s a 16″ rim with a LT215/85 R16 mounted, so I threw it in the back of the Scout for a weekday dropoff. Tires this size are pretty plentiful, so I’ll see if I can find something inexpensive.

Because one of the barn doors wasn’t closing all the way, I got a screwgun out and popped the screwcaps off the upholstered panels and removed them. I was shocked to find both doors in almost perfect condition; the metal looks as good as new, even underneath. They don’t close perfectly, but they’re not held shut with a ziptie anymore either. Intrigued, I took off the rear driver’s door panel to find that door in similar shape. The passenger’s rear panel was hiding some serious dirt and debris, and was wet to the touch—so I was glad to have that one off and not collecting more moisture. Then I got caught up in pulling a bunch of the upholstery off the walls and made a pile of smelly dusty crap in the center of the truck. By 5PM I knew I had to stop, because I had more work to do inside the house, so I buttoned everything up and called it a night.

I’ve got a long list of things to tackle now, but the first one is going to be writing to the Wisconsin Historical Society for the Line Set Ticket on this rig to see where it’s from and what it came with. Then I’ve got to find a new tire and get it mounted so that it’s off the jackstand and on its feet. And I have to start the titling process to get it in my name, plated and legal.

Meanwhile, I messaged the guy up in New Jersey with the blue pickup to see if he would sell the NOS gas tank he had sitting in the bed of the truck; hopefully he hasn’t sold it, because the ad is now down.

Update: The seller couldn't find the VIN plate that goes with the truck, and I was unwilling to buy it without a title that matched the chassis, so I passed on the sale. I was fortunate enough to be the first person to respond to a Marketplace listing the Tuesday before Christmas for a ratty-looking 1969 Scout 800. What caught my eye was the fact that it was listed in Baltimore; turns out it’s right up the road in Owings Mills. The seller and I set up a time to look it over right before the holiday on the coldest fucking day of the year. I bundled up as warm as I could, figuring I’d be out in a field somewhere, but the cold got into my bones quickly the minute I was outside. He’s got it in a shed behind his house with minimal clearance on either side to see the driver’s sheetmetal, but the pictures online tell most of the story. It’s an 800 with a 6-cylinder AMC 232 that’s been disassembled for structural body work. He cut and formed new floorpans on each side, claiming they’re 12 gauge, and had a guy weld them in place. He claims the inner rockers were done, but I couldn’t get underneath to see how the stringers or rockers looked. The rear bed floor was replaced, and the side walls and tops were in good shape, but he welded angle steel on the tops of the corners. There’s also a low bulkhead welded in across the rear bed. From what I could tell the work was done well; it all looks solid and the welds aren’t garbage. There’s no hard top for it, but that’s not a dealbreaker; I’d put a soft top on it and leave it alone anyway. The only outward rust I see is on the driver’s side rocker behind the B pillar, and the thought of cutting that out and repairing it doesn’t frighten me. The tailcaps are both bent, so I’d need to pull those dents out. As mentioned before, it’s an AMC 232, a mid-60’s to late ’70’s engine IH offered as an alternative to their homegrown 4- and 8-cylinder options. I didn’t test to see if it spun, but that would be one of the first things to look at on my next visit. For some people this might be a dealbreaker; I don’t mind as long as it’s not either missing or locked up. He said he had a bunch of parts to go along with it—a hood, two cowls, two extra doors, maybe a front fender, and boxes of parts—but they were in two other locations. We talked it over a bit and he told me I was first in line; he had family obligations after Christmas break but would be available after that. I told him I was definitely interested but wanted to look over the other parts—that’s a big part of the sale—and that I’d want to see the truck out in the sunlight so I can crawl over it. I drove up to Mt. Airy today to look over the parts he’s got; he’d returned from York with two spare doors and a grille on his flatbed. On a trailer in a storage lot he’s got two hoods—one rough, with lights cut and mounted to the surface, and the other a patina’d blue in better shape. Under that was a step bumper in good shape. Next to those was a tailgate which was pretty well rotted at the bottom—more art than functional at this point. Inside an adjacent trailer was another tailgate in much better shape; apart from a section on the right side the metal looked to be in good shape. Next to that was the original 1969 cowl, which was pretty much crap. It’s definitely a project but a lot of the hard stuff has already been done. It looks like hot garbage but that’s never stopped me before; I’d look at buffing off the rattle-can black first to see what’s underneath, and painting it after pulling the dents later. For the price he’s asking it’s a good deal, especially after being cleaned up and made to run again. However, there’s a saying about buying someone else’s project; you never know what’s going to be there and what won’t. For this truck it’s not like there’s a ton of expensive chrome trim or unobtanium plastic that can’t be found; he might not have the original seats but I’m sure I could source some over the next couple of years. The biggest question now is that of the VIN plate; it’s not present on the firewall of the truck. He has a title but if there’s no VIN plate, I really don’t want to mess with the DMV to sort that mess out. So he’s looking for that and hopefully he can lay hands on it. We’ll see what happens tomorrow.

I picked up a neat little toy through the Amazon Prime Day specials, something that will get some immediate use and hopefully pay for itself down the line: a lighted borescope, for looking deep down into dark places like cylinders and inside frame rails and down into AC ducts. It’s pretty slick; the control pad has a nice wide screen a little smaller than that of my iPhone SE and a keypad with a set of sturdy buttons. The wire is permanently connected to the unit and is a good bendable but stiff material that makes things easy to direct the way you want it to. It’s got a video and camera feature with a 32GB card that allows for all the photos and videos to fit and be offloaded to a computer. Here are some pictures from the spare SV 345 in my garage:

Cylinder 1

Cylinder 3

(Cylinder 5 and 7 are missing because the engine is sitting next to a shelf, making access to those two plugs impossible right now).

Cylinder 2

Cylinder 4

Cylinder 6

Cylinder 8

There are clearly some carbon deposits directly on top of the pistons; I know the moisture is Marvel Mystery Oil so I’m not too worried about that. The carb on this engine wasn’t burning the fuel completely so it was probably knocking; hopefully it wasn’t run to the point where it overheated. If I get this thing on a proper stand I’ll maybe pull the heads off to see if I can clean the pistons and cylinder walls—but that’s in the future.

This weekend I’m going to use it to peek into the cylinders in Bob’s Chrysler and see what’s going on with the 440.

Well, looky here. There was rumbling on the forums and through the interwebs that someone was working on producing new wing window rubber for the Scout II, as nobody was making replacements and everyone’s rubber was/is cracked, rotten, hard, or about to be all of the above. I’ve got, between spare parts and whole doors, about five spare wing windows per side, and all of them have either  cracked rubber, a spring mechanism where the weld is broken, or a busted hinge. It was with great pleasure that I saw an outfit in North Carolina is going to be producing new rubber, for the eye-watering price of $375/set. Yeah, yeah, this isn’t an F-body Camaro or a ’66 Mustang, for which brand-new parts are everywhere, but I’ll have to really consider the purchase before I pull the trigger.

Tomorrow night, I’m headed out to the first proper welding class I’ve ever taken, and I’m pretty excited. My first “training” was in college in the sculpture lab after hours; a very brusque and attractive TA gave me a basic lesson in MIG welding for a six-pack of beer, and while she was detailed in her description, I had about 20 minutes of hands-on learning before she had to leave, and I was on my own to booger-weld anything I could find. I did a basic refresher in 2014 at the Baltimore Foundery, and while that was fun it didn’t improve my skills at all. This course is a professional 36 hours of training and in-class practice, and at the end of it I should know what I’m doing a lot better.

I took Hazel for a ride back up to York this morning. The plan was to pick up an NOS fender and the black rear seat from the guy I’d visited last weekend; my friend Mike mentioned on Instagram that he was interested in the fender so I thought I’d head back up, grab that and the rear seat I spied last week. It was a balmy 50˚ so I was happy to only need a fleece for the whole day, and the sun peeked through clouds that began to darken the western sky as we got further north.

The guy who owns the lot wasn’t available so I had another guy take me where they had the fender stored. It looked OK under the lights—dirty on the inside, a few scratches on the outside—and all of the bolt holes were clean (except one which held a rusty nut/bolt combination; clearly he’d had it mounted on the truck at some point) so I threw it in the car.

We needed some PB Blaster to get the hinges on the seat to move—they were frozen, probably from sitting outside for weeks on end. But when I was able to get it to fold, I was sold. I headed back to the shop and paid the money, took some pictures of some old British cars he had on the lot, and hit the road.

On closer inspection when I got the fender home, I wish I’d been more careful. After really cleaning off the dirt on the inside, my heart sank. It’s NOS but at some point the owner had let it sit, probably inside-up, where water had pooled and started a layer of rust bubbling on the lower edges. It’s not all the way through, and could easily be cleaned up with a soda blast or some other abrasive, but it’s not a perfect fender. I’m going to send Mike a video I took with the detail and show him exactly what I’ve got here to see if he’s still interested. Mike specializes in show-winning restorations, and this might not be up to his standards.

The lesson here, which I’m still trying to learn at my age, is: slow down and be patient. Check over everything before you pay the money.  If Mike doesn’t want it, I won’t be terribly upset; both of my other spare driver’s fenders are probably at best a 6 out of 10—the brown one I got last year might be a 5, and I paid next to nothing for it. I’ve also got to look at my parts scores on the whole: most of what I’ve gotten up until today has been very cheap. This is the most expensive part I’ve bought for the truck since I’ve had it, and it’s as closer to new than any other Scout parts I own besides the two lights from last week. So maybe it all evens out somehow…?

After I got home and got some lunch, I headed out to the garage to clean the heater box up. Now that I’ve got a proper sandblasting cabinet, I figured it wouldn’t be messy, but I had to do a bunch of prep work to get it ready.

First, I drained all of the sand out of the bottom of the cabinet and stored it in a bucket. The cabinet came with a gravity feed hose—basically as long as the bottom of the cabinet is full of sand, it sucks the sand in and mixes it in the gun at the tip, making it a closed system. But the tip it came with was broken and the Eastwood tips are larger than my Harbor Freight tips, so I figured I’d use what I already have. Propping the cabinet up on a box, I replaced both of the lights inside and filled my compressor. Then I loaded up my little HF canister with glass bead and got to work.

It did a really good job once I got the flow dialed in, and I a good bit of the box clean before I had to sieve the blasting media for big chunks that started clogging the tip. I also had to take frequent stops because the inside of the box isn’t properly vented yet—I need to get a hose with some kind of pusher motor to mount on the back to vent the dust out—but I got a lot done before the valve on the HF “gun” blew out on the side. It’s basically just a 3/8″  ball valve, not meant for abrasive use. After cleaning it up, I looked over the Eastwood gun and figured I’d give it a shot with the broken tip to see how the flow worked. I dumped the sand back in, hooked it up to the compressor, and was shocked at how well it threw sand even with a broken tip. Clearly the simpler system is the way to go, so I’m going to source some new tips from Eastwood and use that to finish off the parts.

When I was done with that I cut some lumber down to make a rolling cart for the cabinet with a shelf on the bottom, and with the addition of some HF casters I had it assembled and the cabinet on top in about 45 minutes. A panel on the back will keep it from being wobbly.