shadow
Member
- 116
- 1
- 18
- Location
- Cedar Rapids, Iowa
My new deuce.
So I finally got a M35A2 after years of wanting one. (I settled on a M275A2 years ago because I couldn’t find one) So now I have 2 deuces, a genset trailer, a 10kw generator, and a Cushman Airborne clone. Yay me.
It was on a Craigslist ad and about 3 counties over. It has a diesel engine which I have absolutely no idea how they work other then they don’t have spark plugs. My deuce tractor is a gas 6 cyl so diesel is new to me. I downloaded just about every TM related to the M35A2’s and found that it is over 20,000 pages in PDF’s. That’s a lot of reading to do and I don’t know where to start.
The truck looked good and the engine is clean and does have a date plate/spec plate that I believe shows it being a re-built. (Too small of stampings for me to read without climbing up/into area to read)
The engine starts extremely fast. Now I admit I know nothing about diesels but it takes less than 1 sec to start. The tow guy even said to me he was impressed at how fast it starts. I looked on Youtube and see other trucks taking 5, 7 and even up to 10 sec to start up. I am a little worried after reading about “turning up” injectors or whatever. Could my truck actually be bad because it starts so fast? I know that sounds lame but I have never had any vehicle start that quick in my life. I am worried that maybe fuel pressures are too high or something and I don’t want any damage done. I’m not sure what engine it has but it does have a quite turbo (non-whistler ) There is no smoke from the turbo tube that points straight down. It does puff brownish/black smoke on startup but goes clear right away.
If I try the cold start up where it says to leave the fuel cutoff on and momentarily press the starter button to check for lock up, it cranks very fast in that 1-2 sec procedure. When I then disengage the fuel cutoff it takes a good 5 sec to start. If I do not do that procedure and just push the fuel stop in and press start it takes about 1 sec to start.
The seller said the breaks need bleeding as all trucks tend to leak when sitting. I was going to bleed them at his place but had a go-round with the DMV. I have a regular driver’s license and when I called them to check about if it covers driving a M35A2 I was told ANYTHING with a GVRW over 16,000lbs needs a CDL (a class c in this case) I am forced to have the deuce towed back.
Just about all of the towing places from here to there have no idea how to tow it and either can’t tow it or pass me off to another company to search for a hauler. I finally work with a local tower that is very close to me that takes about a week to figure out if they can tow it or not. At first they say it can be towed “flat” with wheels on the ground and transfer case in neutral the 100 miles at 75mph speed. I object because I thought there is something about speed restrictions and having to remove driveshaft’s or something along those lines.
They then say they have a doall(?) trailer that they can use but are worried because of its height. We set up the time/day and on that day they say their truck is having the tranny worked on and it will be another day. Ok, fine. The next day they are good to go. I am able to stay at the drop-off location and they pick it up from the seller. It cost me just under $700 in towing but I have it home safe and sound. I tried U-ship first and got quotes around $1,500-$2,000 to have it towed 100 miles. I didn’t think the going rate was around $20 per mile.
I call the DMV a few days later to inquire about taking the CDL test with this truck (because of its age I didn’t know if it is allowed) and after quite a bit of confusion on their end I am told that IF a truck is for personal use and NEVER for hire, I do NOT need a CDL as long as it is under 26,000lbs. My regular license is fine to drive it. WTH! I just had to pay out hundreds of dollars because I was told I couldn’t drive it, now I find out I could have driven it (after bleeding the brakes of course). GRRRR.
I check the title and it is a jumped title. It is signed, not dated, but not in cursive and the name is not the legal name. (EX: Christine Doe printed on front. Chris Doe signed on back.) I Google the guy and see he is both mentally and physically disabled. I assume he didn’t know how to write cursive as his printed name is very shaky like if you were holding the pen in your mouth trying to sign. The license dept tells me that it HAS to have a cursive signature. I tell the phone rep about his disability and am told “It doesn’t matter. It has to be signed in cursive or else a new title will have to be issued by the original owner.” I don’t even get to the part where the printed name is not quite the same as the signed part. I didn’t give any title number or anything, I just inquired about the signature.
Now after researching everything I noticed the weight is grossly off. I didn’t notice it is registered as a 3 ton like a pickup. Everything else is correct (maker,age,vin). While searching online for contact from the original owner I see his guardian/mother works for his county records dept. I have to believe she did something to change the title to a micro-weight as it shows the previous owner is the same guy but with a different title number reference. I know you can up the tonnage on a title but I didn’t know you can lower the tonnage. I figure if I can sort out the title I will wait on upping the tonnage until after it is transferred. I am wondering if maybe it was not a running truck when he sold it and it was missing parts/body to be titled so lite.
I got some cheesy video taken of the arrival of my new deuce. I went slow not using the break. Turning was a real pain. OMG. I swear this steering wheel is smaller than my M275A2. The seat is closer too. (different seat design altogether) I am over 6 foot and over 350lbs. The seat was too low so the wheel was right in my gut. I need to take out the seats back padding AND get the smaller 18” wheel if I have any hope at driving this normally.
You can see my bad take off in the video. The clutch has to be let out WAY higher than in my M275A2. In my tractor it is fairly close to the floor when it engages. In this truck it is way up in the air before it engages. I was thinking I didn’t have it in gear (because the tarp was in the cab with me so I could barely move the shifter into 1[SUP]st[/SUP].) so I kind of let out the clutch fast after not feeling it pull when it was closer to the floor. It looked like the truck was given birth when I was trying to get out of the cab.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ergyKxT3B0&index=3&list=UUEh4QklSD9HtnqLSo5Ul3hw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G27XSzdDyvc&list=UUEh4QklSD9HtnqLSo5Ul3hw&index=1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DopqENaQiB0&index=2&list=UUEh4QklSD9HtnqLSo5Ul3hw
So I finally got a M35A2 after years of wanting one. (I settled on a M275A2 years ago because I couldn’t find one) So now I have 2 deuces, a genset trailer, a 10kw generator, and a Cushman Airborne clone. Yay me.
It was on a Craigslist ad and about 3 counties over. It has a diesel engine which I have absolutely no idea how they work other then they don’t have spark plugs. My deuce tractor is a gas 6 cyl so diesel is new to me. I downloaded just about every TM related to the M35A2’s and found that it is over 20,000 pages in PDF’s. That’s a lot of reading to do and I don’t know where to start.
The truck looked good and the engine is clean and does have a date plate/spec plate that I believe shows it being a re-built. (Too small of stampings for me to read without climbing up/into area to read)
The engine starts extremely fast. Now I admit I know nothing about diesels but it takes less than 1 sec to start. The tow guy even said to me he was impressed at how fast it starts. I looked on Youtube and see other trucks taking 5, 7 and even up to 10 sec to start up. I am a little worried after reading about “turning up” injectors or whatever. Could my truck actually be bad because it starts so fast? I know that sounds lame but I have never had any vehicle start that quick in my life. I am worried that maybe fuel pressures are too high or something and I don’t want any damage done. I’m not sure what engine it has but it does have a quite turbo (non-whistler ) There is no smoke from the turbo tube that points straight down. It does puff brownish/black smoke on startup but goes clear right away.
If I try the cold start up where it says to leave the fuel cutoff on and momentarily press the starter button to check for lock up, it cranks very fast in that 1-2 sec procedure. When I then disengage the fuel cutoff it takes a good 5 sec to start. If I do not do that procedure and just push the fuel stop in and press start it takes about 1 sec to start.
The seller said the breaks need bleeding as all trucks tend to leak when sitting. I was going to bleed them at his place but had a go-round with the DMV. I have a regular driver’s license and when I called them to check about if it covers driving a M35A2 I was told ANYTHING with a GVRW over 16,000lbs needs a CDL (a class c in this case) I am forced to have the deuce towed back.
Just about all of the towing places from here to there have no idea how to tow it and either can’t tow it or pass me off to another company to search for a hauler. I finally work with a local tower that is very close to me that takes about a week to figure out if they can tow it or not. At first they say it can be towed “flat” with wheels on the ground and transfer case in neutral the 100 miles at 75mph speed. I object because I thought there is something about speed restrictions and having to remove driveshaft’s or something along those lines.
They then say they have a doall(?) trailer that they can use but are worried because of its height. We set up the time/day and on that day they say their truck is having the tranny worked on and it will be another day. Ok, fine. The next day they are good to go. I am able to stay at the drop-off location and they pick it up from the seller. It cost me just under $700 in towing but I have it home safe and sound. I tried U-ship first and got quotes around $1,500-$2,000 to have it towed 100 miles. I didn’t think the going rate was around $20 per mile.
I call the DMV a few days later to inquire about taking the CDL test with this truck (because of its age I didn’t know if it is allowed) and after quite a bit of confusion on their end I am told that IF a truck is for personal use and NEVER for hire, I do NOT need a CDL as long as it is under 26,000lbs. My regular license is fine to drive it. WTH! I just had to pay out hundreds of dollars because I was told I couldn’t drive it, now I find out I could have driven it (after bleeding the brakes of course). GRRRR.
I check the title and it is a jumped title. It is signed, not dated, but not in cursive and the name is not the legal name. (EX: Christine Doe printed on front. Chris Doe signed on back.) I Google the guy and see he is both mentally and physically disabled. I assume he didn’t know how to write cursive as his printed name is very shaky like if you were holding the pen in your mouth trying to sign. The license dept tells me that it HAS to have a cursive signature. I tell the phone rep about his disability and am told “It doesn’t matter. It has to be signed in cursive or else a new title will have to be issued by the original owner.” I don’t even get to the part where the printed name is not quite the same as the signed part. I didn’t give any title number or anything, I just inquired about the signature.
Now after researching everything I noticed the weight is grossly off. I didn’t notice it is registered as a 3 ton like a pickup. Everything else is correct (maker,age,vin). While searching online for contact from the original owner I see his guardian/mother works for his county records dept. I have to believe she did something to change the title to a micro-weight as it shows the previous owner is the same guy but with a different title number reference. I know you can up the tonnage on a title but I didn’t know you can lower the tonnage. I figure if I can sort out the title I will wait on upping the tonnage until after it is transferred. I am wondering if maybe it was not a running truck when he sold it and it was missing parts/body to be titled so lite.
I got some cheesy video taken of the arrival of my new deuce. I went slow not using the break. Turning was a real pain. OMG. I swear this steering wheel is smaller than my M275A2. The seat is closer too. (different seat design altogether) I am over 6 foot and over 350lbs. The seat was too low so the wheel was right in my gut. I need to take out the seats back padding AND get the smaller 18” wheel if I have any hope at driving this normally.
You can see my bad take off in the video. The clutch has to be let out WAY higher than in my M275A2. In my tractor it is fairly close to the floor when it engages. In this truck it is way up in the air before it engages. I was thinking I didn’t have it in gear (because the tarp was in the cab with me so I could barely move the shifter into 1[SUP]st[/SUP].) so I kind of let out the clutch fast after not feeling it pull when it was closer to the floor. It looked like the truck was given birth when I was trying to get out of the cab.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ergyKxT3B0&index=3&list=UUEh4QklSD9HtnqLSo5Ul3hw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G27XSzdDyvc&list=UUEh4QklSD9HtnqLSo5Ul3hw&index=1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DopqENaQiB0&index=2&list=UUEh4QklSD9HtnqLSo5Ul3hw
