The Propane Express

[John]

runs on propane and its as long as a train, so it got named the propane express. so i got this thing as seen here 2 years ago, been driving it except for in the winter since then. its got a recently rebuilt (by previous owner) 360, nothing special just a stock rebuild. rear end is just the original D60 with 4.10 gears. something else the previous owner did as well was put a lockup 518 in it, which MAKES this truck. its shifted with switches on the dash. i thought at first that i would get real tired of hitting the switches all the time but turns out, i like it that way, alot.

so far the truck has done everything its been asked to do, towed everything i hooked to it, quite well actually. mileage is the tricky thing. its not dual fuel, its propane only. i use to be able to get propane locally for $0.79 a litre. and around $0.50 a litre about an hour away. when i dont got the time to make the trip to the city for cheap fuel, it was getting hardly worth it to run propane. now propane locally has jumped to $0.95 a litre. i was getting about 12 mpg on the propane, the real cheap fuel was about half the price of gas. therefore, it cost the same as getting 24 mpg! not bad, if i do say so myself. the power is good but obviously its not cummins good. now that propane is getting more expensive around here, its time for diesel

i have been planning to go diesel for a while and last fall the donor i was waiting for came along for dirt cheap. donor was a 95 1 ton 2wd tow truck with cummins/nv4500 and over 500,000 kms and i drove the rig home to boot! yanked the motor and trans then sold the remains for what i paid for the whole thing, that means i got a free cummins and nv4500! turns out to be a 175hp motor. not planning for huge power, maybe 300 hp eventually, just want to to get the truck back into daily driver condition before messing with more power.

so heres the pictures, a few disclaimers:

the paintjob wasnt done by me, i got it like that with the massive runs on the passenger door, overall a terrible job. gonna paint it sometime, just did my ramcharger and im so sick of paint/bodywork for a while. my dad has done bodywork for 35 years, im terrible at it, i just weld, sandblast and sand, he does the stuff that makes it look good.

stuff here rots about as fast as anywhere, im done fixing up rusty stuff. this crew came from Alberta, my 93 short box came from there too, and my 79 magnum GT was bought new here then went to live in Saskatchewan for 25 years. i have found them all very close to me once someone has brought them here. you cant find anything here as clean as this western stuff

http://mob749.photobucket.com/albums/xx139/78magnumxe_photos/DSCF8125.jpg
http://mob749.photobucket.com/albums/xx139/78magnumxe_photos/DSCF8124.jpg
http://mob749.photobucket.com/albums/xx139/78magnumxe_photos/DSCF8127.jpg

thats the best i can do on the pictures, i cant get them to load directly to this page for some reason. maybe they're too big or something

soon im gonna start in on swapping the cummins/nv4500 in. really having a hard time deciding if im gonna go 4x4 at the same time. mostly depends on how i see myself using this truck, if im gonna drive it in the winter it has to be 4x4. on the other hand, i'd rather not drive it in the winter and risk it rotting out or getting run into. kinda thinking about getting flares and doing a dually setup too but that can be done whenever.

[mopar65pa]

You got that right that thing is as long as a train! 

[crazzywolfie]

that looks like my dream truck. a long box crew cab. my dad thinks i am crazy. my regular cab long box just barely fits in most parking spots. something that big would have to take up 1.5 parking spots and be a real pain to maneuver and i like it.