electromanj

Hello all. Now that my 2500 is back on the road I am going to get back to a project that I have been working on over the past couple of years. Hopefully this is in the right place.

Background: I have been trying to build a crane truck for work. This has involved 3 separate vehicles.

Truck 1: The first was a white ford that had the crane and the utility box on it. The engine (cat) was shot, and since I have had come to love the Cummins power plant I started looking for a chassis to put the crane and utility box on. Which leads us to Truck 2.

Truck 2: Bluebird B700 school bus. Cummins. (My wife thought I'd lost it....). Bought it at auction from the school district. My reasoning here was a school bus would be well maintained, and after some research I concluded that an F700 cab should fit on a B700 chassis. Now I needed an F700 cab which leads us to Truck 3.

Truck 3: F700 furniture delivery truck (formerly a ryder rental truck.) Cummins. I got this one from a local furniture store. They were using it for storage only, and did not want to sell. I made a deal to remove the box and buy the truck. Same engine as the bus, according to them the flywheel ring gear had a dead spot and would only start if they manually turned the engine until the starter could catch. I have not verified this yet, but I may have a spare engine. And possibly transmission. And possibly rear axle. Along with assorted other parts.

Progress so far:
I have removed the bus cab and installed the F700 cab on the bus chassis. I have started the "new truck" and driven it a bit around the farm.

What's left:
Remove the crane and utility box from the white truck. Remove a box on from the utility box. Cut the frame a little shorter on the bus. Remove the original fuel tank from the bus. Install the crane and utility box onto the bus frame. Do a little body work on the F700 cab where I jacked it up when removing it from the furniture truck chassis. Oops.

A question I have:
I don't have a very good picture of the engine, but can someone identify the engine for me? I am under the impression that it is a 12V. The year is 1993. Is this the same engine or a close variant of the ones that are in the Dodge Rams?

Thanks.

electromanj

Ran out of picture upload space...

Below is the only picture of the engine close up that I could find. Also is a picture of the furniture truck cab mated to the bus chassis. It was a nice fit!

In the second picture you can see I creased the top of the cab just above the doors when I pulled it off the furniture truck...

Destroked F450

Ya it's a 12v, should make a nice truck. What size is the Deere ? 644 J

electromanj

Thanks!
Not sure about the Deere. My cousin was nice enough to let me use it for the tear downs. You can do about anything with a loader! I did the entire tear down with just me and the loader. Heavy equipment is very handy. Can't wait to get the crane on the road...

electromanj

Update:
I have had the truck on the road for less then a year, and it is really awesome!
Right tool for the job, and all that...

I will now remove the engine and transmission from the furniture truck and want to rebuild both so I have limited down time if the crane truck fails.

Can anyone recommend a good engine stand for this 6B engine? According to wiki it weighs in at 1100 lbs dry. I have seen some stands that have a nice gear system for turning the engine but those were rated at 1000 lbs. I can weld and if I build my own it will be a tank, but I would prefer to buy something so I can concentrate time and money on the rebuild

Here are a few pictures of the truck right before I put it into service. I was going to get really fancy with the paint, but in the end I decided to go "rattle can" with it. After all, it's a work truck, and the first job of a work truck is to get on the road and make money. It will earn a nice paint job eventually....

Thanks,
Travis.