This was an interesting story, and it put me in mind of one of my experiences,
I wasn't fortunate to have a Cummins this particular time, I was driving an Astro 95 with an 8v92 318, 13 speed underdrive trans, I forget what ratio the rear ends were, but I had twin screw rearends, riding on Uni-Royal 10.00 x 20 tires, tube type. This was back about 1977, and I was on a single drop run from Austin to the 3 mile post on I-10 west of El Paso. I forget right off hand what was wrong with that damn Detroit, other than it was too under powered for the loads that I was pulling with it, and it was constantly overheating, and getting water into the oil. The trucking company that owned it didn't want to shut it down and put it into the shop though. They just bought and had me carry Bar's Leak by the case, made sure that I carried several gallon jugs full of water, kept my wagon loaded and sent me west to El Paso, my run was about 625 miles one way if I recall right. I was hauling quick lime in a 60 yard aluminum end dump, with a full coverage rubberized tarp. The owner told me just before my first run: "I want that trailer fully loaded, with lime running off on both sides. I don't ever want to climb up and check your load and see where you could have carried another 10 pounds of lime, but didn't. Don't worry about the weight cops, I have that taken care of" I reckon that he did too, I was never stopped and weighed by them. My average loaded weight was between 150,000-160,000 pounds somewhere, depending on just how dry the lime was when I got loaded.
Anyway, I was on US-190 headed westbound at about 2:00 am and about 20 miles west of El Dorado Texas when that 318 got hot for the last time. Even three more cans of Bar's Leak, the last that I had with me wouldn't keep any coolant in this time. That Detroit called it quits right then and there. Of course, this was long before cell phones, and there wasn't anything else in that country but me and some rattlesnakes at that time of night. This wasn't at the end of the world way out there, but you could see the end of the world from there. After I finally caught a ride back to El Dorado after daylight a few hours later, I called in and told the dispatcher the news. He said alright, he was sending a wrecker to pick up that truck, get yourself a motel room, and wait, you can ride back with the wrecker. I was very fortunate later on late in that afternoon, I just happened to be standing in the open door of my motel room when I saw the wrecker pull up to a stop at the town's only traffic light and stop. I ran out and jumped up on his driver's step and asked if he was told that he had to pick me up for the ride back to Austin. This cat had his girlfriend with him, and he muttered something that I couldn't understand, but he plainly wasn't happy that I'd caught up with him before he could leave the area without me. If he had left me behind, I would have had a long wait for someone to drive out and pick me up, there wasn't any kind of public transportation in El Dorado Texas. This was about 200-225 miles west of Austin as I recall.
Con