Short story about how I came to own my SMB.
I had been coveting and searching for the right rig for a while when a came across a very interesting post on Craigslist. It seemed that a gentleman, who will remain anonymous, was driving through dense brush when his van decided to take a nap.
It took two large tow trucks to right the rig.
It sustained substantial body damage on one side
, but was fairly untouched on the other side. There was no engine, frame or suspension damage.
As fate would have it, I have a friend who’s been in the business of buying wrecked F-150s and rehabilitating them for over 50 years. I’ve purchased two trucks from him, put 109k miles on the first and 60k and counting on the second without any problems at all.
Among other things, he replaced the three doors, straighten the cab and replace the rear panel of the van. He was able to “skin” the entire rear panel of another salvaged van and rivet it in at the door seams. The van looked GREAT after a fresh paint job. I could not have been happier with their work. There are very few indications that it’s been involved in a wreck.
The most difficult part of the process was shipping the van, waiting for it to be ready, and dealing with the shop (which too will remain anonymous) that was storing the van for the previous owner.
This anonymous shop was storing the van for the previous owner (their repeat service costomer) in a vacant fenced parking lot at a rate of $150 a month. We discussed his storage arrangements while negotiating the purchase. I arranged for shipping, but had problems with the original carrier that I made the arrangements with. Who would have thought that shipping a 23 foot long, 11,000 lb van cross country would be difficult? Anyway, so I had to find a shipper with a flat bed truck to haul it from the West Coast to NOLA. As you may imagine, this isn’t going to happen overnight.
Upon realizing that the original shipping plans fell through and that I was having difficulties making other arrangements, this anonymous shop decides that the storage fee for me was going to be $50 a day!!!
They wouldn’t budge when I protested, but offered the solution of moving it to the street. Thanks guys, I can’t even lock it. The previous owner even tried to reason with them on my behalf, but they were holding firm to their price gouging methods. After all was said in done, this unscrupulous establishment extorted a large sum of bribe money from me. Sorry if I’ve offended anyone, but those are the facts.
Rant off.
So, here’s a finished photo.
She’s fully up and operational, with just the normal farklizing and projects to do. Hopefully you’ll see more of her in action, and/or see her in person soon.