man, driving this thing after fixing it today was an experience. talk about sitting out infront of your steer wheels, and nothing but air in front of you! an odd feeling, it feels like your in an extra wide egg atop the front bumper in the cab, that and the shifter is so freaking loose from the slop in the pole from the trans to the shifter that getting it up to speed was even a chore. the little mitsui/izuzu cabovers arent bad, but this thing is just odd! got the normal once a year mantience. GOF, front brakes, towed in due to a cam flipping over, brake chambers, auto slacks, 1 drive tire set, clutch adjust. what a fun worn out pile
You get used to it after a while.... I prefer conventionals, but we have 11 cab overs (like pictured) compared to our 4 conventionals.
One of our guys slammed into the back of a school bus on the freeway in LA last year in janruary. The two lights that stick out the back of the buss at the top went through the windshield. Scared the crap out of our driver, which walked away.
Yep, you get used to it. Your mirrors will tell you more about road position than looking through the windshield. Put a lot of otr miles on Macks, Petercars, and Cornbinders like that one. They were good for bustin the cities since they turned tighter than a hood. A real plus with a 53' wagon. What gear box did this one have? I drove a Mack Cruiseliner for a while that had what I called a "Guess a Gear" shifter for the 13 over RR. When I got it to the shop the mechanic got in it to pull it around to the other side. I stood there and watched as he tried four times to get it in reverse. Everytime he lurched forward I had to laugh and finally he shut it down and got out. He wanted to know how I drove it in the first place and could I pull it around for him. He got in the passenger side and I backed up and high five shifts in the parking lot. He shook his head and said one word: "Amazing". He took the linkage out and the u-joints fell apart in his hand. One thing that I really hated was the short shifter that came out of the dogbox, no wonder those John Boy and Schnieder rookies couldn't shift worth a crap. Old Trucker
