359 Pete - What would you do?

Glad to see it worked out

 

A decent used bed is going to cost around $5k. plus the cost of the pump/pto and labor to install it. New beds will be close to $15k. installed. Unless you have enough dump truck work to recoup that expense I wouldn't rig it up. My thinking is there would be more available buyers as a tractor than as a dump.

 

John, if you keep it and pull end dump. You want to keep it light as possible cause you get paid by the ton. Keep that in mind as well. Nice to meet you guys.

 

Steel weighs IIRC 40 lbs per square foot x 1" thick. For two 20 foot insert rails you'd add around 400 lbs or so to the tare weight.

 

Yeah and at 3 loads/day that adds up even on short hauls.

 

A359 @ 205" will be a kidney buster. Better to auction as is than spend any more money on a $4000 truck

 

I managed to dig up some photos I snapped while I was disassembling mine. That big crossmember in the center was all welded together and a couple cast iron suspension brackets were actually broken right off from the rust jacking. Most of the frame bolts had broken or rusted away until there was virtually nothing left. Like I said the original frame rails cleaned up pretty good and I could have re-sleeved it and put it back together no problem.