(upbeat country music) (car engine roars) - We've had an amazing 48
hours in Bozeman, Montana, and we have 48 hours to go. We just got a lead on a Shelby about 35 miles outside of Bozeman, and we're heading there right now. So maybe this is your first time watching "Barn Find Hunter". Every two weeks a new episode comes out and we go all over the United
States looking for cars, so if you like this program, go to YouTube and subscribe
to "Barn Find Hunter", and it comes on your laptop
every two weeks, no charge. Well, the Shelby was a bust. It's there. We got there and the
people who own the Shelby are away for four days, and we're only in town for two more days, so we can't see a GT 350
that was parked for 30 years, but we do have a great lead on a row of Power Wagons and that's where we're going right now. I don't think we've featured any or many Power Wagons on the "Barn
Find Hunter" series. Whether they're restored or
hot-rodded, I like them a lot, so here we go. Key suggestions for barn find
hunting, go down dirt roads, roads that have no outlet, and dead-ends. Well, this kind of fills
all those categories. - [Man] Do you think this is it? - Even if it's not,
that's worth looking at. - A couple of Power Wagons
is around here, you know? That's how it's done. (laughs) (car engine revving) (upbeat country music) How you doing? Tom Cotter. - Jim Ely, nice to meet you. - Well, you've heard
about the Power Wagons. Well, this is the man that
owns the Power Wagons, Matt. And thanks for taking the
afternoon off from your job. - Certainly, no problem.
- To meet us here. And so how many Power Wagons do you have? - I tell people I have nine in various states of disrepair. Initially, I wanted to pick up, I wanted an old pickup that I could drive, and I was looking for an
older Ford, '70s Ford. And I was driving down the street and I saw a Power Wagon. I had no clue what it was. Pulled off, it was for sale. Talked to the guy, wound up
buying it and brought it home. And then started researching them. And at that point I really
developed a love for them. - And so, do you actually use any of them? - The first one I bought, actually we winched a
log out of the creek. - Wow. - That was when set the
a winch up and it ran and it had a plow on it, like I said I used it to plow the roads. I actually wound up selling
that one, which I regret now. But, and then from then I
just started developing. I wanted to go to more originality. - Well, so show us this,
what are we looking at here? - This is a 1946. So 1946 was the first
year that they were made. The reason Power Wagons were
made was GI's went to war and before they went to war there was no four-wheel
drives that were available. When they're in a war there's
four-wheel drive trucks, so that they can actually
get around and escape or do whatever they got to do, get to places that they wanna be at. And when they came home there were still no
four-wheel drive trucks, and so Dodge says we
have all these old parts, let's build a Power Wagon. And it actually started as farm utility is what
they called it initially, and then they changed it to a Power Wagon 'cause they were the
first four-wheel drive vehicle that had a cab on it, and between '46 and 1968 and then in '68 the government said you
can't build any more because you didn't have
the safety features and Dodge said it was too
expensive to change them over. So, they exported them til 1976. - '76, man!
- Yep, and they sent them out of country, but they could not sell
them in the United States, or Canada, or Mexico,
or anything like that. They built 94,000 total,
is all they built. - So, I mean, was this a fire truck? - This was actually, yes it's
painted red, but it's not. It was modified for force service. - And I can't believe how
heavy these fenders are. That's not sheet metal, that's steel.
- That's steel, yeah. - So your intention is to restore this? - Yes.
- Wow! - [Tom] Now, it's a flathead six. - [Matt] Correct. - [Tom] Were they all flathead
sixes, or did at some point they become overhead valve? - [Matt] That's kind of a gray area 'cause some people claim that
they did put the slant-six. - Oh, slant-six? - That what some people claim.
- But If they sold these until '76, they couldn't
have still had flatheads, could they?
- Yeah. - [Matt] Now most people,
most of the purist say that they only put these in. So they started with a 230, '61 somewhere in there
they switched to a 251. So they just made it slightly bigger, and it goes from a 23 inch
engine to a 25 inch engine. - [Tom] So it's got 34,000 miles? - [Matt] Yeah, if it continued to run. - [Tom] What's top speed
on something like this? - Depending on the gearing, they either came with 5.83
rearends or 4.89 rearends. The 4.89 could get you
up to 55 miles an hour. - [Tom] Will you take
the body off the frame, that kind of thing on here? - Yes, yeah. So this one here, the
difficulty with it is he beat it to crap, I mean he beat. So the frame has been
spliced a lot of places. If you can look under here and look at the shock system that he has, it's rather interesting. (laughing)
It's shocking. - How many years did the guy own this car? - [Matt] Yeah, they're not
sure, but probably 25 or 30. - Oh that's cute.
- See that. - Oh, look at the other side.
- And this one over here. - Oh yeah, that's,--
- So he had an A frame mounted out here and it kept squishing the weight and squishing the springs down, and so he modified it to work. - (laughs) Geez. Okay, so before we go
look at the other ones, you've got a couple of
other vehicles here, it's worth looking at. Tell me about your Mustang here. - [Matt] It's a 1967 Mustang. It has 160, 160,000 original miles on it. It's an inline six and automatic. - [Tom] So this seems
like a very sound car. - [Matt] It's a very,
it's the original paint, which is shocking.
- That's original paint? - That's original paint. There's a couple, like the
front fender was replaced, the one that you have on right there, but the rest of it I have all the receipts on it from day one. It was owned by the little old lady. And the top is original, so that's really shocking
because a vinyl top that lasted 50 years. - Very nice. (upbeat music) - [Matt] Here we are. - Where do we start? Is there a pattern, the oldest? - There's no, unfortunately there's not. I'll go through the years. This is a '52 and this is a '52. They're within a hundred
of the serial numbers, '51, '49, '50, '63. - Whoa!
- And a '64. - [Tom] Yellowstone? - [Matt] Yeah. - [Tom] Really? - No, I'll tell you the story. So this is basically the
gem of the collection, if you wanna call it the gem. So it's all original. It was a fire truck bought by Sandpoint,
Idaho Fire Department. - That's a flatbed is that? - [Matt] It's a piece of junk. There's not--
- Did these come like, just a chassis cab and you could-- - Some of them did, some of them came with a Dodge Flatbed that they would put on them actually, but it was all dealer. That was a dealer option. It was never, came from
the factory that way. The reason that this one is more valuable than a lot of them, there's
an engine serial number, so I have the build card on this. So the day it came off the line, I have a photo copy of the build card. It has the original engine. It has the original winch. It has the original wheels on it. - Wow! - And so the wheels are all date-stamped and they all say '48. The winch, I'll read what it has. So this is a '49, so the first
two numerals are stamped. And then it's the actual
serial number of the winch, as it came out, right. And then the wheels, there's
a good one right there. - [Tom] Oh, look at that date code. - [Matt] Date code right there is 48. - [Tom] So without the freewheel hub, you had to ride in four-wheel drive all the time?
- Correct. - [Tom] I mean, have you ever driven a four-wheel drive vehicle
and forget to turn it off and your riding down the high.
- Oh yeah, yeah. - [Tom] And things start making noises? - Yeah, if you get into
any hard surface road you're all over the place, so that's the original hub
that would have come on it. And then they modified this, so that they could pull them out of there. - So these are were made
for farm use, timber. - Yes, yeah. - No, they weren't. And you could take them to town, but they were not a thing that you, you know they weren't a luxury vehicle. They call it a roomy three-man cab and you had to be small three men to get in there.
(Tom laughing) Especially the middle guy with the gear shifter.
- The hump in the middle. - [Tom] So this is a restoration
project do you think? - Yes, this is the one, if I only build one, this is the one that I would build.
- Really? Not the one in the garage? - This one has more or
means more to me I guess, because I spent a lot of the
time looking for original. - [Tom] Yep, so where did this come from, where did you get this?
- This one came out of, I bought it in Hayden, Idaho, and it originally was
shipped to Sandpoint, Idaho. - But the fender is so darn wide. - And they called them flatfender. I mean that's what they classify
them, but they're not flat, but it's flat this way. So the engines are stamped and there's a website called T137 where you can get a lot
of literature on them, and that was the original stamping for-- - [Tom] T137, yeah, yeah. - [Matt] T137 and then
this is the serial number and so this is the original engine that was put in it.
- So it was born with this engine?
- Yep, yep. - [Tom] Tell me what
we're looking at here, This huge stud and you got these nuts, why are they a combination? - [Matt] So what they could
do is they could take a wheel like this and they could flip it. - Ah, make a dually.
- Make a dually out of it. - [Tom] And they were just held on by just two studs.
- Just the, yeah. - [Matt] No, no they did, you did five. - Oh okay.
- You would do all five. So this is actually a, this is a nut backwards.
- Got it, got it, got it. - And then go on like that and then you'd slide the wheel over it and then you put your nuts
back on at that point. These are also, this is left hand thread on this side and right hand
thread on the other side. So you have to be, I learned that the hard way. Oh and this one does have, this has the 489 rear axle in it. - Hide the high speed axle.
- High Speed, yep. (laughs) - So if you get what, 45, 50? - 55 probably. - What would the other axles do? - About 45 is about all
that they would get. Okay, so you were asking about this truck, this Yellowstone park truck. I bought this, this is a '63. The Yellowstone Park doors,
and originally I thought, "Oh it's from Yellowstone
Park, it has to be." But then a couple of
years after I bought it, I saw a cabover cab for
sale, which was '47, which the cabs are identical. - Cab over Power Wagon? - Nope, no it was a cabover. It was just a cabover cab essentially, which is essentially the same cab as this, but it was yellow, and it was from Yellowstone Park--
- Oh, so it's a Dodge cabover.
- Dodge cab, yeah. And it was missing the doors. So I would say that these doors
went to that cab originally, would be my guess. - [Tom] And so the doors, that was brilliant engineering
to have the same door. Wow. - Well, you can put the doors, like from the carry-all fit on here, but they're a little different. I can show you on that one
'cause that's a carry-all door on the far one over
there, but otherwise they. Oh and I wanted to say deluxe package, so if you got a deluxe package, you would get the wing, vent windows. See where it's got the divider in there? - [Tom] Yeah, Yeah. - And then you would get
one visor for the driver, and you would get an
arm rest for the driver. - So, fancy. - And windshield wipers. - [Tom] That's pretty fancy. - [Matt] And that was basically
what the deluxe package was. - I'm learning a lot 'cause
you know I've seen these. I've been peripherally
around these my whole life, but you're never learning about it. So this is a '64? - [Matt] '64 correct. So this came from the CA Ranch, which was a very famous
ranch north of here and it is beat to crap. I think there's 27 broken welds on the cab and the frame's broken in three places. - [Tom] Can you imagine how hard you have to drive this to break welds? - [Matt] Yeah, oh yeah. - [Tom] This vehicle? - Going up there to get
it I can understand why. So the reason that I say that I don't think the winch was original is that this is a '51 winch, so I think that he had like a '51 or '52.
- A couple of them. - [Tom] Got it. - And drove it. And then either he traded it
in or it died or whatever, and he got another one and
then put the winch on it. - [Tom] So this frame is it
a frame extension right here? It looks like it's bolted on. - Yeah, and that's how they
would have done it originally, so they would either
have just the bumper on like that one there or they
have the frame extension to allow the winch to fit in there. The engine was two inches longer, so the way the Dodge
engineers dealt with it is they pushed the radiator grill forward, so originally it would've been here and they pushed it forward to there, and then they modified the
radiator back just a hair. So if you look here you can see the '63 that has the radiator pushed forward. There's a '50 and it's pushed in. - So you have to look
at it from the outside. - So they didn't have to extend the frame? - Nope.
- They didn't have to modify the firewall?
- Nope. - Isn't that something?
- Yep. They just thought about
it for a little bit and did a little modification. (metal clanking) And when you look at them you
can't tell the difference, except that you measure,
this is a 25 inch head, and those are 23 inch head.
- Got it. - [Tom] So this is where the
other one had an overflow for the radiator.
- Correct, yeah. - [Matt] And that's very,
very rare to find on a truck. - [Tom] Wow! Well, that's a neat collection. - [Matt] Enough said. - So if you come across
one, you'll buy another one? - It depends because
they've gotten to the point where they are so expensive now. Everybody and their brother knows them and they look for them and they
see them and they, you know. - Well, listen man, thanks. - You're very welcome.
- This has been more educational to me than
almost any stop I've gone to in the past four years, 'cause I know about the Fords and Chevys and Porsches and Corvettes. I don't know about these at all. Thank you, that was great.
- Yeah, you're very welcome. - In the conversation we had, I just happen to ask Matt, "Which one of these runs, any run?" He said, "Well yeah, this black one "I think could get started no problem", so he did the ultimate sacrifice and took the battery out of
his late model pickup truck and this had been converted to 12 volt. So he's putting a 12
volt battery in there. We're gonna see if we
can fire this mother up. So this was a red truck originally? - [Matt] Red, yep. Kind of like Henry Ford did, all of the fenders were black until you got to somewhere in the '60s they started to change them
and paint them the body color. - [Tom] So they were always black? - Always black for the first few, first 10 or 15 years of production. And then they started
painting the body color and I personally don't care
for the body color look. I need to go to that side. (metal clanking) (metal clanking drowns out speech) - [Tom] Yeah, I'll take that. - All right, we're gonna put
this in first and see what. - [Tom] When was the last time this ran? - [Matt] Four years ago. - If there's fuel in the tank it's probably all turned to jelly. (car engine whining) (car engine revving) Well, we get the picture. - [Matt] You got the gist? - That's pretty darn cool. - You've got to be kind
of sort of an ignoramus to pour gas in there and ignite. (laughing) I was thinking it was gonna pop up. - Well, I (mumbles) how
smoothly it turned over. Is it really low compression or something? - I honestly don't know. - [Tom] Or it's the starter or something. - Well no. What it is, it's the 12 volts
on the six volt starter. - Ah, that's what it is. Okay, 'cause it was like pulling. Nice. Damn, that was a blast. (laughs) Wow! (upbeat country music) Now, were on our way to a
gentleman who's opened up the door to a lot of
collectors in this area to show us their cars, and we're gonna see what
he has in his garage. (upbeat country music) I got connected through
a friend with Lyle. And Lyle has sent me emails
and texts listing these cars, name, phone number,
cars, name phone number. And he's kept us busy
for a couple of days, so I really appreciate that.
- Yeah. - So we figured, well, we had to go over and see what makes Lyle
the guy that's in the know. He's got a reputation of knowing all the old cars in the area, and apparently he's got some
interesting ones himself. What do you got to show us? - Well, I got a car I'm
working on for my son. '66 GT, 4 barrel, 4 speed, rally pack, pony interior, vinyl roof car. - [Tom] Wimbleton White. - Wimbleton White. And just kind of getting to the point of having to do the interior. I found this car behind a guy's shop. And he was building a new garage. Well, for $1200 I picked
up the car unpainted, and I painted it, vinyl roofed it, but a GT, 4 barrel 4 speed,
rally pack deluxe interior car. - [Tom] Is it a code car? - [Lyle] A code 2000. - [Tom] That's a new
vinyl top too, isn't it? - [Lyle] Yeah, we just put
that on like 5 months ago, but nothings been restored under here. - [Tom] So for $1200
you got this thing for? - [Lyle] $1200 - [Tom] And it had the
engine and transmission? - Oh yeah. All I did is it had a little bit of wrecked front grill, and I just replaced the front grill. And I did a little patch
panel on the back corner on that one there, and that was it. So it was just original car. - Oh, that's a neat car, man. - [Lyle] Wife's '69 Convertible. - [Tom] Very Nice. - [Lyle] That's one of the '59
special order paint Mustangs that were made in '69
with deluxe interior. So you know Marty from Marty Report. - [Tom] Oh yeah, yeah. - [Lyle] So I sent off for a Marty Report, and he said, "Well also, Lyle, "there are '59 deluxe interior
special order paint cars", but he says, "50 of those were pink." So only nine other cars
were special order paint. (garage door clanking) - Oh, now you're talking my language. - [Lyle] Yes, sir. - [Tom] What number is this? - 1145, it's got about
108,000 original miles, carpeting has been replaced, but the seats are original
door panels, dash pad. It was repainted almost 30 years ago. - No, kidding? You bought it like this? - [Lyle] Yep. - Wow! How long have you had it? - Since about 2000. - [Tom] What a sweetheart, man! - I haven't restored the steering wheel or anything like that. I put a hurst shifter on it,
instead of the Ford shifter, but here's kind of the unique
thing on this car here. - [Tom] Original Spare? - Well, maybe not that,
but it's probably a repo. But take a look at that there. - [Tom] Oh, look at that, yeah. So Carroll Shelby.
- Carroll Shelby - Phil Remington, Bob
Bondurant and Don Gurney. Oh geez. So, well, were not here
to look at pretty cars. (laughs) Were here to look at unpretty cars. - [Lyle] Here's a '68 Cougar XR7 with 68,000 original miles on it. - [Tom] Wow! See, there's a 302 car? - [Lyle] 302 car, leather interior with the courtesy light group. Needs a vinyl roof. - [Tom] Wow, that thing is nice. Oh, 8 track tape. Let me see what you got in
the 8 track tape player. (laughs) 20 Monster Hits. Okay, whatever that is. - [Lyle] Tilt wheel, deluxe
interior wood dash, lights. - [Tom] Courtesy lights on the roof. That's a nicely option car. It's a 2 barrel car, right? - [Lyle] 2 barrel, yeah. This is actually a friend of mines. He used to be called
the cougar guy in town. And he had four different 67, eight, nine cougars through the years. This is the last one he has
left that I store it for him. - [Tom] He doesn't want to
sell this or anything, does he? - [Lyle] He might, you know, but he's thinking if he
could seven, 7500 bucks. I don't know if that's even fair. - [Tom] That sounds great. - [Lyle] Oh okay. - The way it works is they call Hagerty and Hagerty calls you and said, "Do you mind if we give
your phone number?" So this is your car? - [Lyle] Yeah, this is mine here. - [Tom] Is it the 428? - [Lyle] Yap, it's a
factory 428 Cobra Jet. They made 63 automatics - [Tom] No hood scoop. - [Lyle] It did have a hood scoop. If you notice the paint being different.
- Oh, the hood, okay. - [Tom] Okay, it's got the small hubcabs. - [Lyle] Yep, a deluxe interior, tilt swing-away steering wheel, select air, but a Q-code Non-Ram Air car. - [Tom] That is the craziest combination. 428 Cobra Jet, air conditioned, there can't be that many of
those cars that were built. - [Lyle] Well, also, with tilt swingaway. - [Tom] Geez. - And this is a deluxe interior, but one is called an EA deluxe interior. That has the deluxe door panels
and rim low steering wheel, but has the black dash, and there's like an EB deluxe interior, so deluxe decor that
has the wood grain dash and the wood grain door panels. - So, where's the original hood? - [Kyle] Had a carburetor
fire on it in 1973, and the people that had it said, "Yeah, replace the hood, "but don't put the hood scoop back on." - I'm looking in here that
P, what does that P mean? - [Lyle] Paint okay,
original tag paint okay. - So it's still got the tag on here from the paint inspectors
at the Ford plant. '68? - [Lyle] '69. - '69, wow! The interior is so clean on this car, the carpeting, I mean, all
my Ford black carpeting has turned brown from the sun. This is black. - [Lyle] When I found this
car, they had put foil and cardboard up against all the windows, so the car had sat
outside and got sunbaked, but the interior didn't get anything. - Isn't that something? - [Lyle] Interesting thing
under the engine bay, the spark plug wires, the positive, negative battery post cables,
and the upper radiator hose, the bottom radiator
hose is still original, all the smog system, all the snorkel, everything is completely
original underneath the hood. - Well, listen, thank
you, thanks for arranging all those people that we've met over the last two days, and thanks for showing us your stuff. That's a special car right there, and this is a deal. This cougar is a deal. Wow! (upbeat county music) Well, it sounds like its
coming from this side. That was it. (murmuring) This is crazy. It sounds like its coming from
underneath your seat, Jordan. - [Jordan] It's somewhere
in the hood I feel like. Do you hear that? It's right there. - [Tom] It sounds like its back there. - [Jordan] I feel it right here. Put your hand at the bottom. - [Tom] Put your hand on the frame over there you'll feel it. - [Jordan] Not as pronounced. It feels at the bottom
of the bushing area. - [Tom] Yeah, yeah, yeah, - You feel it?
- Yeah, yeah, yeah. Wow! Okay, well, I don't think it's
a life or death situation. (country music)
