Old utility bed work trucks are scarce, and are certainly a rare treat to see out on the road. Having spent its youth as a Electricians work truck, this International still wears its hand painted lettering and its utility bed. Old trucks such as this are great advertisements, and I often see some businesses with a restored vehicle representing their brand, so hopefully someone will step up and do the same with this truck for the $1,700.00 asking price. Check out this old beauty here on craigslist out of Madison, Wisconsin. Thanks to reader leiniedude for this cool and unique submission!
Inside you will find a simple interior with its bench seat bottom flipped up. The driver door latch or window crank is missing or possibly broken off, but the rest of the interior seems fine. There is no evidence of rot, but the curled up wires under the dash are interesting. Little information is given about the drive train other than it being in place, and that the transmission shifts.
The cab and utility bed were separated, but for how long is unknown. It almost seems as if they were split for a long time as the cab is mostly surface rust, and the utility bed is a light green color. The interior of the cab is just about the same color green. There is plenty of surface rust to be found, and there is even a little rot along the top shelf wall of the utility bed. The truck cab body and frame all appear to be in fair shape with no rot or drastic damage. This International would certainly be a unique ride once revived, but would you do with this old work horse?
Yeesh. I suppose you have to start somewhere. 1st, the service body will make a great storage shed, but the rest of the truck looks savable. Most assuredly, has the 220 Black Diamond OHV, inline 6, about 90 hp, Just because the ad states “it shifts” means they got it into neutral, but I doubt it runs. You want an old binder to fix up, this is probably all that’s left. Make a great little dump truck, and keep the motor, maybe add a 2 speed axle to get “double nickel” out of it.
The R series trucks used the silver diamond in 220 or 240 cid. You can’t tell which by outward appearances because the 240s often had oil pans stamped with 220. Nor could you judge by the size of the truck. I had an R-150 with a SD220. I would have thought a rig of that size would have had the 240, go figure.
Oops, Silver Diamond, thanks.
Talk about a work truck!
A nice work truck to restore . The minimalist engine at 90 hp I bet is straining in hills or loaded with tools.
One could bore the block out and put oversized pistons.
People must’ve had more patience back when I was growing up. I remember trucks like this running all over the place, and people never got upset about one of them being ahead of you on the road (gravel or 2-lane blacktop). If you were running only 90 hp it just took you a little longer to get where you were going; you just geared down on the hills and hoped for the best. I remember trucks like these, bigger trucks like the R-160 that still had that SD220, or the Chevys with a 216, or Fords with a flathead V-8, and they ran down the road with 250 bushels of wheat in them. Sometimes you were limited to 40 mph but considering the road conditions and the braking capacity of the trucks, you didn’t really want to go any faster than that….
Great restoration project for sure. I’d ditch the service bed and build a nice flatbed along with the restoration. I wouldn’t change a thing otherwise. Just give it a driver-quality restoration and use it. I saw a slightly older version show up outside of the coffee shop last year. Apparently the guy still uses it although it was for sale….
I was thinking along similar lines, flatbed and all.
It appears by the tow bar, this truck was pulled to a job site as an equipment trailer, long after it quit running.
That tow bar reminds me of the farm trucks back when I was younger. A lot of farmers would tow the pickup behind the tractor and cultivator and have something to drive home. I remember many times being out in the field in the springtime and I’d see the neighbor driving the John Deere 5020, pulling the chisel plow, and that beat-up red ’50 Ford F-1 behind, down the road to a parcel of land just beyond our place. Just after dark you’d see the F-1, trailing blue smoke, headed for home.
Around my area, you still see these old workhorses being used on farms. This truck would not see a retirement for a few more years.
Tow Mater.
That was the first truck I drove after I got my C license, so I have a special place in my heart for those trucks. True, they were slow, but with the gearing they had, they weren’ t gutless. Every kids dream back in 1959, to drive a Coke truck part time.
There is a nice, local 2 ton, that has been restored with the stock running gear, and it is driven daily. Tough trucks.
Bob
Manual steering, shift and hand brakes. 28 years ago. Drove school buses with similar control layout
I hope someone with deep pockets restores this. Slower time in America……
4 years later, looking for the utility box. Anyone know where it ended up?