A view of the Past, Vintage Photos

Pretty sure it's a 80's ish 4070B Transtar ll , possibly an Eagle. These were darn good trucks, Pumpkin had a whole fleet of these, 290 Cummins, 10 speeds. A friend bought one once, cheap, and made money with it. I drove one like this for a short time, it had that God awful Reyco spring ride, shiny 290 ( 300) and a 13 speed. I remember, it was real doggy going through the gears, but get 'er in the big hole, and that truck would do 65 loaded down and up. It was also the worst riding truck, aside from the Mack. Aside from the shaking, it was one of the few cabovers I actually liked. Sure backed in places easy. Nasty blind spot on the right side, it's why you always saw these with scraped right fuel tanks. It was these trucks that put IH on the map.

 

Then International did everything in its power to destroy its name .

 

We had 2 of them leased from Ryder around '82. 350 Cummins,10 spd, and that Reyco suspension you speak so highly of... Also the company owned a single axle Transtar cabover with a 335 Cummins and 10 spd. Something had been done to that old 335 cuz boy would it run! Unfortunately, seemed like the whole truck couldn't have been more than about 7 ft long so it was like riding a bronco!

 

Criminy, I'm not THAT old. The DCOF 405 or "Emeryville" was a bit before my time. While grossly underpowered, I heard many drivers liked them, better than the "Crackerbox" GMC. To be clear, it was the IH 4000 that predated the Transtar.

 

This old gurl sits in our yard. They move it once in a while to keep it movable.

 

I think I just fell in love!

 

Ha! Oh, it's not that bad. I bet it has a 238,( 1 stack) tube tires, manual steering, spring ride, wedge brakes, what's not to like? Typical yard horse, we used to put off telling the boss of any problems with our regular truck, because then we'd have to take the yard horse. That would be a long day. It was almost an incentive to be careful with your regular truck. Judging by the artwork, somebody at one time liked this rig.

 

The owner of that unit use to live in the Pueblo Colorado area but moved down somewhere around Santa Rosa New Mexico. When the Pinion Truck Stop was still in business I would have coffee with him once or twice a month. That truck has been retrofitted with a Big Cam 400 Cummins and yes a 13 spd. I think he told me that the truck was totally rebuilt about 5years ago. He's a turkey farmer and raises and slaughters then takes them to Denver somewhere around where LONECOWBOY works. I personally have not seen him in several years. Thanks LONECOWBOY its good to see he's still at it with the same truck and trailer.