If you’re perusing a website devoted to old cars for sale, chances are good that in your mind’s filing cabinet, you have a folder for “ones that got away”; in fact, many of ours would require multiple drawers. One of my tales of minor-key woe involves an orange 1946 Ford half-ton pickup, very similar to this one you’ll find for sale here on eBay in Monaca, Pennsylvania. The big difference is that the one I didn’t buy needed all the work and cost $3,000 (this was more than 15 years ago, by the way). This rehabilitated example has had all the work done, and the seller is asking $19,000 or best offer. For fans of Ford “Jailbar” trucks, so named for their distinctive (and slightly polarizing) grilles, that doesn’t seem like too bad a deal.
The seller has owned the truck for about five years, and it’s been the subject of a YouTube video on the “Wheels of the Past” series. It was found in South Dakota and brought back to Pennsylvania, where the 100-horsepower, 239-cubic-inch flathead was treated to a complete rebuild. Aside from that and a conversion to a 12-volt electrical system, the truck is much as Henry made it back in the mid 1930s, and the seller says that he truck has only 36,744 miles on it, so all the major systems should theoretically be just getting broken in. There was no comment on why the engine needed rebuilding, but I imagine the years it spent sitting couldn’t have been too kind to the cylinder walls.
Included with the sale will be a binder filled with documents that verify the truck’s history since new.
Underneath the cab floor is the optional four-speed transmission (a three-speed was standard), in addition to a heater/defroster that looks an awful lot like a refrigerator from an Art Deco-themed kitchen. The interior looks as you’d expect for an original 80-year-old vehicle that’s been sparingly used.
The sales material says that the bed floor is actually made of steel, which is supported by a “hardwood sub-floor,” so without closer pictures of the bed, we’ll have to assume that the bed of this truck has either been converted to wood or painted to resemble it. Either way, it appears to be in good shape.
Sure, I can kick myself for not picking up the ’46 I found for sale years ago for three grand, but the reality of that hypothetical situation is always the same; I would have spent over ten grand in 2007-ish dollars getting it to a level where it’s not quite as nice as this one. So for $19,000, or maybe a little less if you make a fair offer, you can have a rust-free Dakota example where the work’s already been done. Plus, you’ll be buying a truck that isn’t a mere garage decoration, because the little flathead should keep up with traffic on anything short of a busy expressway (especially if it has the standard 3.54:1 gearset).
Yep, the regret is setting in. Maybe you should make an offer before you regret not doing it!
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