So it’s been a few months, and I’ve made a little progress on things. First, the ones that are hard to show in pictures:

1. The mini-overlander camper is towable and has functional lights and brakes.

Wiring is boring and hard to show, so just take my word for it. Still working on sealing and sourcing interior finishing materials, as well as re-working the coupler and some support stands so I don’t tip over crawling around in it while it’s not attached to a vehicle.

2. upgrades to the homelab / hosting

Similarly, photos of hardware in a rack is a particularly niche interest (/r/cableporn?) so I’ll spare the bandwidth for this as well. Suffice it to say I’ve more than enough CPU and memory headroom for expanding my internal systems, including the new-ish kubernetes via k3s and rancher.

On to the bigger project that I’ve made more measurable progress on…

I’m building a service truck

Some months ago, I came across a decent deal on an ‘85 Dodge W150 4x4. It was… rough, after having spent some years as a field hauler for a local firewood seller:

318 v8, 4spd manual with a manual 4x4 transfer case and locking hubs… All the things that people seem to want to collect nowadays. So I set about making it better. Rebuilt the mechanical clutch linkage, drove its noisy and gutless tonnage around town a little. Then one day (right before an 8mo layoff from the day gig) it hit me, I didn’t need a regular pickup, I occasionally need a thing to carry tools and equipment to onsite locations, and get the weight of those things out of my Cherokee.

So to FB Marketplace I went, looking for half-ton short bed size service bodies. This is harder than it might sound, they’re usually for ³⁄₄ ton and up, and almost always long bed pickups. But, perseverance saw me through and I found this old phone company bed, hastily mounted to a “trailer” frame:

I didn’t need the (I’m told) F550 frame, suspension, and Dana 75 drive axle under it, but it was part of the deal. More on that later. I did some prep work on the pickup (the fuel system was… crap. Sender didn’t work, tank pickup was clogged, the usual). This was made easier by just removing the bed:

And after some work building mounting spacers and doing really sketchy stuff with a Kubota tractor and some straps, I have the beginnings of a workable service truck. Not pictured is the front complete brake rebuild, and tearing into the dash to make gauges work etc. The joys of old trucks…

But like all good hobby style projects, it never really ends. In trying to get it back up and drivable after all this work (batteries die, fuel stagnates, it’s rained and snowed several times etc), a new issue has presented itself after years of misuse and abuse by previous owners…

I’ve got a plan together already for this though, involving yet another questionable marketplace purchase and a lot of swapping stuff around. More on that next time, dear reader.

Post Scriptum

But what of the old bed, you say? And the previously alluded-to F550 frame?

Well, it seemed a shame to get rid of either, so I have a new scrap metal / recycling trailer made from the bits: