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1975 Tucker 1544 - project and trips

Went out with the crew to put in the trail to the mountains on Monday and came home Thursday. We use an old BR400 that is 12 feet wide.
It started snowing while we were out there and got about 3 feet of fresh snow. The drive home Thursday was bad but we were traveling in the dark so could get up to 75kph. The guys that came out in the daylight could only get up to 50kph on the highway. Some big rigs were down to 35 kph.

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Finally did the maiden voyage for the new 360 Dodge motor. Temperature was about -3c and snow was minimal at about 8”. The trip was about 22 km each way to a weather site at 3,000 ft elevation.
The motor ran (and sounds) like a Swiss sewing machine, but constant over heat. Had to stay in 2st gear lots or the motor overheated. Even with the 318 I had to watch the temperature, and the bigger motor makes too much more heat.
So it sits until I get a better radiator. I ordered a 4 core aluminum rad that the said will cool 1,000 hp, so that auto do it!

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Bummer on the heat. Tstat is working? Ive had a few bad ones out of the new box. I see your shroud and mechanical fan. Ive seen crud inbetween the fins make radiators ineffective.
 
A couple years ago, when I was switching the manual transmission out for the automatic, I took this rad to our local rad shop and it checked out okay.
I guess it is just old and can’t take the heat, which is the exact opposite of us old guys I guess….
 
OK, you make my head hurt. temp -3c, snow 8", trip 22km, 3000 ft elevation, That's dang near as bad as the fractional metric ruler I bought.

One thing I have noticed about classic Tuckers, the exit air path is not unobstructed. You don't have solid shields below at least, but turbulent air hinders the air flow. Probably not a lot you can do with it, but it might be worth a look anyway to clean up the exit path and get better flow. It doesn't take much back pressure to drastically reduce the flow.
 
While I am waiting for the new radiator there was some grooming to do with the big groomer. There was another 3 feet of snow so the trail gets very bad and slow for the snowmobiles. The trip is from Kp32 to Kp85. About 53 kilometres (about 33 miles). We had engine fuel problems so the trip in took 30 hrs. And since we were the first ones in, the cabin was cold. So get the cabin liveable, heat, haul water, start the gen set and unpack. Finally got to bed 38 hrs after getting up. Long day.
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It snowed pretty much the whole time we were out there. We left the cabin at Kp85 to do the last part up to Kp90 and the front left idler wheel came apart only a couple hundred yards from the cabin, so there it sits until we go back in with parts.
We rode our snowmobiles back to the trucks, which only took a couple hours, and found this much more new snow on trucks. Lots of shoveling.
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Still waiting for my radiator.
Was out helping to fix our club 1985 BR400 broken front idler. We had a warm spell and snow dropped by 1/3.
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Stuck at home waiting as Canpar says radiator is out for delivery. (I’ve heard that before).
I have an electric horn on the Tucker, but I was thinking - what if that electric horn quits?
And I just happened to have the solution, because idle hands makes the brain work overtime I came up with an air horn. Now the Tucker is equipped with an air horn and electric horn. Safety! Serious business.
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The install for the new aluminum radiator wasn’t too tough. Had to make a new shroud, which sounds challenging, but with a little thinking and patience it turned out good.
Started out trying to modify the old shroud but it was easier to make a new one.
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Also had the trim an inch off each fan blade to make clearance. The web says Tucker used a Detroit diesel fan, so good luck finding a shorter fan.
 
The new radiator had a transmission cooler, so I plumbed in both the external transmission cooler and the radiator cooler.
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The window fan would hardly turn so I figured time for a new Amazon box.
But I got looking at the fan motor and it is a collector item. Made in Canada!
I had to drill out rivets and nearly wreck the fan blades but it works now. Another happy ending!


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So what is my 1975 Tucker worth? Old cars sell regularly and so have market value, but what about these old Tuckers?

I got an email back from the insurance carrier that is looking at insuring the Tucker. Do you have documentation to support an evaluation that we can send over to them? Otherwise, they may want an appraisal to bind at set amount.

Please let me know.
 
YamaDooPolCat said:
I don’t see many restored Tuckers for sale, mostly restoration projects.
Click to expand...

YamaDooPolCat said:
I don’t see many restored Tuckers for sale, mostly restoration projects.
Click to expand...
What is fun about this is the subjectivity. We had a glorious specimen show up at the clowder. brand new every thing. rollers pontoon shoes. paint, absolute beautiful...... When parked next to some of the survivors it would take a very trained eye to see the differences in fit and finish. restored remanufactured and rebuilt are all different in terms of value.

rebuilt is disassembled and reassembled.
remanufactured is disassembled and and reassembled to within a set OEM standard.
Restored is open for suggestion.

I have seen some beautiful machines restored outside of OEM standards and are simply display pieces. an auction rocket is/are not apples to apples.

$.02
 
YamaDooPolCat said:
So what is my 1975 Tucker worth? Old cars sell regularly and so have market value, but what about these old Tuckers?

I got an email back from the insurance carrier that is looking at insuring the Tucker. Do you have documentation to support an evaluation that we can send over to them? Otherwise, they may want an appraisal to bind at set amount.

Please let me know.
Click to expand...
I would recommend using clyde at tucker for this. The vintage side of tucker routinely sells reconditioned tuckers. They have a 3 door listed now.
 
YamaDooPolCat said:
So what is my 1975 Tucker worth? Old cars sell regularly and so have market value, but what about these old Tuckers?

I got an email back from the insurance carrier that is looking at insuring the Tucker. Do you have documentation to support an evaluation that we can send over to them? Otherwise, they may want an appraisal to bind at set amount.

Please let me know.
Click to expand...
It’s hard to quantify what a vintage Tucker is worth. Tucker built roughly 50-100 a year, so there just aren’t that many examples out there. Also, that production figure is across all models, with varying levels of options. Realistically too, some are in excellent condition, and others are pretty well trashed. Being able to accurately quantify differences is difficult.

My suggestion would be to contact Mary Guthrie at SnoTrans (208) 549-2501. She’s a nice lady and has a lot of experience. Very ironically she currently has a 1981 Tucker 1544 with a front blade listed for sale on consignment. It looks like a very nice machine.Here’s a link:

TUCKER SNOCAT EQUIPMENT, USED SNOCAT TUCKER SNOCATS GROOMERS SNO-CAT REFURBISHED SNOWCAT

High Quality Used Tucker SnoCat Implements for snow grooming, search and rescue and over the snow travel, Refurbished Newer Sno-Cat machines and Sno Cat tools
www.snotrans.com
 
YamaDooPolCat said:
How about that! The radiator arrived.
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That is a good looking radiator. Do you have a part number. Is there an automotive crossover number? I was hoping not to have to pay for a custom radiator. It looks like you had to build a fan shroud. Was there a fit problem with the factory shroud? Some detailed pictures would be appreciated if you can find the time. I will be doing the same job on my Tucker this summer.

Thanks
 
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