Anyone near Angola/Freemont IN?

I won't swear to it, but I may have some time available tomorrow as I go past there. if I do, and the road conditions are okay, I will try to swing by. That's the good news.

The bad news is that in most cases, the stuff that he offers on cash purchase is pretty well worn. They do a lot of "lease purchase" only deals, and they have a bookkeeping service that "handles" the income money for you.

This is the guy that used to own the Western Star dealership there, and his business now is kind of fluky. I have swung into there on occasion and looked over his stuff, but 99% of the time, it's on his L/P deal only, or it is simply too big and heavy of a truck for me to even look at.

 

My understanding of it is that his Western Star dealership died a pretty horrible death due to his business practices. From what I have heard from a couple of people, there were some games being played that were undermining W/S and they pulled the dealership out from under him because of it. the problem was that people were not talking about this guy, but were talking about Western Star in angry terms.

Anyhow, I have a run from Chicago to Napoleon Oh tomorrow, and if I have a chance I'll stop in. But don't be too hopeful.

 

Okay, I stopped in ther late friday nite on the way home. Dealership was closed, but I kind of prefer it that way. Truck was there, so I'll give my first impression of it. It's a typical Western Star, so it is not a truck to my particular tastes. It's larger and longer than anything I can ever use, so it is going to be more suited to a van or maybe a flatbed. Heavy truck, with my guess that fueled it is going to clock in close to 21,000 pounds.

Interior looks decent enough for the age. No real problems that I could see. The interior is that heavy, darker color that I am not impressed with, and the interior of the sleeper is in red material that sort of makes it look like the interior of a trendy 70's bar

The engine looked clean enough under a flashlight, no major leaks or signs of exhaust leakage evident. Oil on the dipstick looked okay, but that means zero on the used truck lot. Tires are as reported, and since you talked to the previous owner, you know the story there. With the cost of replacement tires, add 1/3 to the cost of the truck. They are good enough to get home on, but that's about all you could count on.

In your earlier thread about rebuilding but no paperwork you encountered the same situation as this one. Without the paperwork, you can't really determine what was done on the engine, so it adds no financial value to the deal.

Bottom line, it is a 15 year old truck, so taking it to daily work is a crapshoot. It is probably a decent enough buy at it's price. It's really too big and heavy to be attractive to the farmers around here, and it's older than what most O/O's want, which makes it kind of an orphan. If you can buy it and get a year out of it, you wouldn't lose any money operating it. The question comes down to risk management, and how much you can afford to risk. If you bought it at the stated price, put the tires on it and started running it, I would run it as long as it seemed okay. If a major component started to go bad, then it becomes worth more for it's parts than it is as an entire truck.

 

I'm guessing, but as it sat, with the big fuel tanks, the long wheelbase, and the steel wheels that were on it, combined with the extras it had in the interior plus the 18 speed trans, it would appear to be a fairly heavy truck to me. I had a guy that I worked with that had a Star similar to that one, without the 18 speed, and he routinely clocked in 3000-4000 pounds heavier than my truck. I would pick up a trailer and weigh in at 78, he would pull the same loads and be in the 81+ range.