Deuce Recovery (its home!) - Steel Soldiers::Military Vehicles Supersite

Rockfeild · 12-14-2008, 13:17

Deuce Recovery story

Well the trip started from Clearwater Florida to Jacksonville navel bases DRMO.
It was about a 4 hour drive to get to the base from the gulf beaches in the Tampa bay area and it was upon arrival to the DRMO that all the fun starts. I was told the batteries were low yet since I was having it towed off base I thought I would have the tow truck driver start it since he said he could jump the 24volt system. Well this guy didn’t know jack because it would have taken hours to charge the system with his 12volt set-up.
I was lucky that the lot supervisor took a little greasing to the palm and let me yank out a couple batteries out of a 5ton deuce ready for auction but not yet listed that started fine.
With the newer batteries she fired right up. One thing no body warned me about was the tow-truck driver sat in my deuce and cranked it up when we got the new batteries in it so we happen to be standing next to the battery box witch is right under the exhaust-stack.
From the truck sitting in the out-door lot the stack had filled with water so when we finely got her started it shot black oily water up in the air and rained on us, What a f*#kin mess! lol…. It was pretty funny after words!
chug-a-chug-a-chug she runs good!

I climbed in the seat and put her in gear for the first time when I got her a mile down the road to a target parking lot where we unloaded the beast and started the journey back.
The first mile was a trip learning that the shift pattern is a little different than a 5-speed BMW or mustang that I have owned in the past.
My friend Rick made the trek back with me in the deuce and when he saw me fighting the non-power steering as we had to make a U-turn to get on to I-10 he said “they let women drive these?” lol.
It is defiantly a hand full!
Once we got this beast on the interstate it’s not so bad aside from she likes to cruse at 45 to 50 and tops at about 55.
The seats, well lets just say their not exactly orthopedic seats!
It was a long ride back we got a lot of looks and people waving as we drove through Ocala and we had some “crack head” on a bike at a light ride behind the deuce and stand on his bike seat so he could see in to the back like he was looking for something to take.
I don’t know much about stealing from the military but it can be a smart thing to do!
Any way my father was following close behind and yelled some choice words at the idiot and he took off on his bike like a “crack head” scurrying in to the dark.
That was the I-10 and 301 stretch.
My friend Rick helped me and drove the I-75 stretch in to Tampa.
He described driving the deuce is like “if a B-52 bomber was a truck this would be it!” it’s a neat truck and the navigator/passenger had to help at night since there are no dash lights we had to keep tabs on the temp gauges and make sure the RPM’s didn’t creep over the 2500rpm “the cruising speed” since my foot was going a little numb and a sleep after a couple hours in to the trip.
For the temp being 58F out side the deuce stayed pretty warm we didn’t even need to try messing with the heater.
As we got in to Tampa we hit the first patch of rain all day and thank god since the wipers were not hooked up. We literally used our hands to operate the wiper blade manually for the last 25 minutes of the trip as we pulled in to Largo Florida where I own a warehouse were the deuce will be stored.
All and all the trip went great and was quite an adventure driving the deuce.
On the interstate you don’t realize what your driving till you get in to your home town and think no ones got one of tease running around town. lol…
A side from airing up the tires everything else looked pretty good.
I crawled under the chasse and notice the transfer case leaked quite a bit on the ride back and one axel seal on one of the back axels leaked a little on the inner wheel.
Aside from that its just some body parts and two side windows that need to be fixed.
Again I wanted to say thanks for all the support and help I received from the “STEEL SOLDIERS” forum.
I am now the proud owner of one bad ass M35A2C!
Thanks to all and I will try to post some pix up later.

m109guy · 12-14-2008, 13:25

Congrats on the purchase! It is always an adventure picking one up

BTW, there are lights in the instrument panel, but you have to turn them on so that they work. They do not turn on automatically with the head lights. It is the left, bottom switch on the light switch assembly. Not sure if you already knew that, and that the bulbs were burnt out in the instrument panel when you tried it, but I thought I would mention it non-the-less.

Can't wait to see some pictures of your new truck