Mack R Model Semi Truck Has a Bad Day - Fan Hits Radiator and Battery Issues 

As an old retired mechanic I get a great deal of satisfaction from watching your videos. You're a fine mechanic. Thanks for putting these together for us.

A little "Mack History". I you have a gold Bulldog on the hood that is considered a "Petagree " truck. Which means it's all Mack. The Engine, Transmission, and rear differentials are all Mack components. If your Bulldog is silver, then you have a "Curb Stone Setter" which means your truck is made up of a mix of drive train components. Just a blast from the past. .

If Permatex doesn't start selling Ultra Grey with Wes' face on it, I'm gonna have to start a stern letter campaign.

The covid seems to have increased shipping screw-ups and delays. Just a crowning glory on the shit show that is 2020

FedEx - when it absolutely, positively has to be lost overnight.

This truck owner doesn't know how lucky he is to have you as his mechanic. Who else would go the extra mile,,, 400 miles,,, to make sure he got his truck back in a reasonable amount of time. Another shop would have taken months, if they would fix it at all. No one else would have taken the time to research the parts like you did. Great job my man. I just wish there was a mechanic near me as good as you.

another episode of "watch wes fix everyone else's stupid mistakes"

Sucks thats such a nice truck. she was pretty clean. At least they take care of it and bring it to a good mechanic

I'm a simple man, Sunday morning coffee and a Wes video is a pleasure

"Stealership"...yup

Wes vs mustie on a Sunday. Tough choice. Wes first.

That oil filter trick was nice. I never would have thought about that.

The farmers is extremely lucky that you were working on his truck. Any other mechanic probably would have given up a long time ago.👍

love my IH 9300 and parts were for the most part available but came with a complimentary jar of vaseline. Macks been screwed since Volva got involved with them. Might be best with Western Star or Paccar now

Nice old Mack. Shame it got thugged by a JD. Another good vid and more Wes wit 😁👍

My Lord, how Hard did they hit, for Cripe Sakes? They had to hit it pretty hard! Somebody did NOT know how to tow a Truck!!!

"Every tool has a hammer side" - Eric O. of SMA

Good old Mack trucks. I remembered getting a Hess Mack truck for Christmas when I was a little boy. Good Stuff Wes🇺🇸 👍🏾👍🏾

Bad day for the poor old Mack. That thing was very clean looking too. Like seeing the old iron still working

You must be a gentle soul Wes', If these things had happened to me, there would have been very little suitable for youtube, lol. Great video.

Holy smokes, talk about an ordeal. A lesser man would have bucked under the all the setbacks, but not Wes

I bet you a Coke there wasn’t anyone in the cab when it was being pulled, a one man operation.

I assume hammering the pulley back into "round" was a high cussing job

WOW like walk through a minefield. You should get an award for this one Wes,

Geez the amount of part issues you have been having i thought this was a video on a Euro car

Why the weird battery set up? Just found your channel, really like the content! Subscribed

I HATE FED UP EX.!.! ONLY Consistant in, inconsistency, inconvenience, and inconsideration.!.!.!

Yeah FedEx is just not that great nowadays. I have much better luck with UPS.

It might be old but that Mack is a great looking truck! Hope they see fit to fix up the bodywork eventually. Love the way you go the extra mile to fix it as soon as , so as to help the guy out. Great viewing as always best wishes from the UK 🇬🇧

A moment after you said FedEx lost the package, an ad for FedEx started haha

Shame it got damaged, it looked very nice before. The owner should think about some decent bull bar, maybe make one Andrew Camarata's style :D

Remember the shipping commercial , 'When it absolutely positively has to be there over night"? They're still working on that.

Clearly this is a job for the mechanic on the "Road Warrior"

I've never left a dealership interaction feeling like "that was a good experience"

Another outstanding video. Appreciate you bringing us along in real life situations and how they're dealt with. Should we contact Mrs. Wes to remind you to hit the record button so that we don't miss all the good stuff you do? Mundane as it may be to you, watching a pro at work is educational for those of us who aren't so skilled.

Good thing the owner was able to drive it to the shop. Can't imagine getting another tow from your spouse.

Hell ya first awsome day in Massachusetts when WWW new vid love the content

I can understand the parts frustration especially when the parts guys have zero clue what you are talking about. I had the same issue when we broke broke off four teeth of the ring gear in our 1980 Case 580D. Case has excellent parts diagrams online but the problem I had was we had a NON turbo 4WD 580. That is apparently a unicorn 580 as they are normally non turbo 2WD or turbo 4WD. The ring gear and pinion are very different between each configuration. (Thanks a lot Case) I had called so many dealers and parts houses looking for this and they gave that weird uhhhhh you have a what? when I told them the model of tractor, even if I gave the VIN! Of course nothing to be found on the internet either. I finally called one more shop in Buffalo, NY. Worked my way through the phone system and was greeted kindly by an old timer. I told him my situation and he started laughing at me! He says "Kid, we deal with heavy machinery for large companies. A Case 580 is smaller than the smallest equipment we service, we don't service light duty equipment like that. BUT, let me see what I can do for you." He searched around and found out that Case had superseded the original ring and pinion set for the non turbo 4WD models which was not updated in the parts lists online and the dealers didn't even find that. He found a new aftermarket set that matched the new Case part number and was only half the price of Case (if they had it in stock) with shipping! That old timer was fantastic and the huge service company he worked for has some good suppliers. The new parts came in and the ring gear was 1/4" thicker than the old one and the pinion gear was smaller. To replace the pinion you had disassemble the whole trans and t-case. Instead we took the new ring gear to a machinist who machined 1/4" off the back. This process took me months to get through. All the while our prized 580D was dead in the driveway with no hope in sight.

You should have had a bit of Mark Morrison playing on the intro..... “Return of the Mack” 😂

I had a similar problem with FedEx. They ended up having to REFUND my Money! Happened about two or three months ago!!!

Hard to get/expensive parts are often the cause of "farm fixes".

I was in the earth moving/ underground utility biz and ran R model macks for over 25 years they hade the best of every thing they are bulit proof. Not so nice cab wise but they ran and ran some more all mack motor rears and 2 stick tranys and you could put a million miles and more with little down time if you looked after them. And i still have a Superliner with 1.6 million miles on it . The new macks are not bilt mack tough

The double snorkel on the Aircleaner is a Canadian set up.

Omg the fed ex guy finally showed up with the gaskets and truck was fixed and already gone gotta love the delivery people @Watch Wes Work

You've done it again- taking an impossible job on and making it happen. I am impressed again by your attitude, neat battery tools and hard work dismantling the engine, finding the parts and reassembling it. Congratulations and thanks for showing what you had to do.

2:35 Not wanting to bust your chops, but you will find your battery terminal spreader pliers will work much easier if you turn them 180 degrees (line up the handles with the cable). The way the pliers pivot, you are trying to spread the back of the terminal opening rather than spreading the open part at the bolt. I have used dielectric grease for many many years and have had many, many "conversations" about it "insulating" the connections...

Ohhhh so that is what you mean by hard-to-get-parts 😂

Watts Mack , who run the bigmacktruck forum is a good place to get info for these old macks..I believe they run the Mack museum as well.The guys in the forum would have pointed you in the right direction when it came to the parts chasing.

Had one of these for years as a yard dog, she was reliable as hell but with no power steering was a bear for a yard dog

Oh man at the damage to the radiator yikes all that from being towed our from being stuck was a nice truck before the damage @Watch Wes Work

You were lucky it was warm out when you did the repairs on the Mack.

a video of you makes my day and the lesson is : never give up .......... thanks

I have found that most tools can have a hammer function, depending on the operator!

Good video-what a hassle! Just got a part for a Honda Acty out of Japan, 45 days by DHL. Has to ship to a country without wuhan flu mail restrictions, then sent here-

That fan almost friction welded the radiator whole again.

I feel your pain WRT the bitza machine. Got one here that was built out of 3 different model trucks (that we know of -- have encountered 3 different models over the years when ordering parts) by a body builder that went out of business 30 odd years ago. Fun and games.

FedEx must have shipped thru Chicago. Kinda like mail going thru the Memphis post office.

Good work big job done well to repair that rig love your channel

2 times a month I get someone else's packages from FEDEX.

I feel your pain, it's tough when you're thorough.

Driving through farm country, My Dad would breath deep and say: “Smells like Money”!

Love R model Mack trucks Great video!

Those pulleys just needed a little "Percussive Maintenance!" Lol

Should wash the top of the battery it's been tested that dirt can cause a battery to discharge due to the iron in the dirt when it's by the terminals

"Every tool is a hammer"!

Some times you have to manufacture tools and such to get the job done. I like how you think... Thumbs Up!

That was an expensive oopsie. I bet that liquid manure smells delightful.

That front cover, I would leave the timing cover bolts loose. Put the balancer on, then tighten the timing cover bolts. That would get everything nice and centered.

There's a Mack dealer in Summit Il, they may help you in the future. We have a few guys using R models to haul containers.

You should have gone to motion directly in the first place. They have parts that even god forgot.

This is why we only buy equipment that we can easily get parts for.

how do you find all the good jobs???.. I have machined rubber bushings out of hockey pucks. FYI

Everything is a hammer except a screwdriver and it's a chisel.

A Motorola two way? Usually I see those with both ground and hot fuses. Some of those radios are pretty sensitive to voltage issues and/or ignition switches. Good video as always!

the gold dog means the transmission, engine and axles are mack you dont see many of those

Going the extra mile to help the customer - Wow, have you time travelled here from the 1950/60's ?

Thats what you get, when you have a truck assembled from parts from several trucks .

Nice job. Sure hope they get the body repaired. Its a sharp old truck.

The front main seal itself is what is centering the timing cover on the engine block. The seal elasticity center it,then you tighten the screws. It's exactly the same method on all GM LS engines. Can't you install a smaller alternator pulley to get it charge the battery at idle as it should ?

Wes that Mack is a beauty. It's in good hands with you doing the work!

Love them old Trucks

Unbolting the hood and pulling the rad brought back painful memories of my dad's '87 freightliner.

You are an inspiration to all home mechanics! Thanks, Wes. Your site is just about the best thing on RU-vid!

Another excellent “day in the life of...” episode. Love how you never let a problem beat you. Man after my own heart. All power to you and yours.

OMG... fantastic video! The knowledge you have is impressive! Great job!!

2:38 you don’t need fancy pliers for that! You only need a hammer.

Ahh Fedex!!!!!! they have done that to me several times as well. You just have to laugh it off or go crazy.

Hey!!!! I watch several mechanics on youtube and along with entertainment I learn a lot... Being 81 yrs old I am somewhat limited to menial tasks but I recognize mastery when I see it... You are the most knowledgeable tech I have seen... You do your homework and don't stand back and throw parts (money) at a job.. I like that... If I had a major project to do I would drive from WHITNEY TEXAS to your shop to get it done... I am impressed... H

And probably the correct crank seal in that box.

If it’s any consolation shipping parts in Scotland is no better, I ordered two rear leaf springs for a Ford Ranger, received one, cyl head gasket set for another job vanished, a front brake rotor set, vanished.....maybe it’s C19 but it certainly is frustrating. Anyhoo, neat videos, good job 👍

Corn harvest is so much fun.......except when things break!! Great job!

You sir have the patience of a saint!!!! What a frustrating job!! The parts guys seem to excell at sending the wrong parts. Parts availability and wrong parts seem to be the major challenge to automotive repairs these days. Such a shame they busted up that nice rust free old Mack. Hope to see you at 100K subs real soon!!

I think I would have cried when the damaged that old Mack

Don't know if its already been mentioned but I believe those air cleaners are Canadian specific as well as the heat shields for them and possibly the hood. Bummer about the radiator and the body damage. It's a nice truck though and worthwhile to repair and maintain. Nice work as always! Take care Wes. 👍😎

I've come by your channel recently and spent a few evenings catching up. I myself have spent a majority of my life fixing everything under the sun and exited the industry as a Rolls-Royce/Bentley technician...and it took me days into your videos to find a mistake in your work. Don't get bent out of shape, compared to most youtube automotive repair videos, your work and diag ability is way up there. So I was a bit taken back to see you coat a battery post with dielectric grease. Dielectric grease does not conduct electricity and its printed on every package to NOT put it on the contact surfaces....anyway, you do you; I still enjoy the videos.

Got to love working on Big Trucks...... They really do Suck You start as a mechanic and when you finish you are a Blacksmithing Engineer......

When I was younger, "Maximum Overdrive" was the *must see* movie the summer. Since then I've been in love with Cab Over Mack's with the flat face. Always wanted to drive one down the highway blasting the AC/DC sound track to that movie. Fun Fact: Highway to Hell was an AC/DC album, renamed "Maximum Overdrive" and cover art was changed for movie release. A year later they discontinued the cover and went back to the original album name.

I've had Fed-x do the same stunt and I've spent many a day in an R-model with a 300 Plus with that tip turbine intercooler setup and a 2-stick 6-speed. It might've had a 237 and it was swapped over. That's where the cut cab and double air cleaner lines came from to get the 300 to work. Tough old trucks and someone ought to know how to pull one so not to kill it. You did a fine job and a pal of mine is running an R-model tandem dump with the same setup. That lad was READY to go! GBWYall!

I’ve watched you habitually for the last six months you are one of the best damn mechanics I’ve seen!!!

In Australia I just got priced for a core only. $ 4800. AUD Just the core delivered. Around $ 3150. USD.