Looking at dump trucks again, single axle vs tandem

[MG84]

I'm back looking to upgrade my dump truck situation, having a hard time deciding which direction to go. I currently have a 1980 F600 gas 429, 5+2 with a 10' dump (23K gwvr) and a 1988 F700 7.8 diesel 5+2 10' dump (30K gvwr). Would like to sell one or both of those trucks and upgrade to something newer and in better condition.

I'm looking at either buying or building a nice single axle dump (33K gvwr) and sell both current trucks, or buy a tandem and keep one s/a dump for small jobs. I don't need a tandem for a lot of jobs, but sometimes it would be nice. Previously I had never considered a tandem because there are(were?) a lot of guys around with them that hauled pretty cheap. I'm not sure why, but it's gone from having to wait a day or two to get material hauled to waiting a week or two, which sometimes throws a wrench in my project plans.

I'm primarily looking at trucks made between 1995-2003, with IH being my first pick, but may consider Ford/Chevy although the parts situation isn't as good. I'm not particularity interest in the 'high end' brands and the premium prices they bring, I just don't use it enough to justify the cost. Budget is $25K, but may stretch it to 30K if I have to. I've been casually looking for a couple years and it's very hard to find exactly what I want.

For a single axle the ideal truck would be a 4700-4900 IH, DT466, MT653 or 7-speed, 33K, air brakes, deep gears and 10-12' gravel bed, PTO driven pump, pintle hitch, air ride seat, A/C, cruise, all the options, etc. Tandem I'm looking for something fairly short wheelbase, 14-15' gravel bed with shorter sides(sometimes load with a mini or ctl), barn door tailgate, 300+hp, 8LL, walking beam tandems, prefer full lockup on the drives, etc. I'd tag it at 54K and haul whatever was legal. I know I'm giving up weight capacity (due to bridge law) with a shorter truck, but maneuverability is also very important for the work I do.

I'm fairly well versed on the medium duty trucks, but not as much on the tandems. What engines should I look for or stay away from in that vintage IH/Ford/Chevy? Seen some with L10 cummins, IH DT530, 3116 Cat, etc. I know these were all lower end engine, what miles/hours is too much? Not looking to burn up the road, but do need reliable and economical to operate. What about transmissions? 8LL is my preference, but also finding some with 9spd road ranger, 10spd Eaton, etc. My main concern is having a deep enough first and reverse for tough off-road conditions.

Any advice on the general situation of tandem vs single axle? I would probably use the single axle more and I could buy/build a nicer one for the money. However, my time is also worth something and making half the number of trips is appealing. My biggest concern with a tandem is lack of maneuverability, high sides on the bed, and increased cost of ownership. Thanks in advance for any advice.

 

[crane operator]

I've got a Mack R with a 300L engine, camelback suspension 9 speed, and it had a hard life before we got it, but that truck is tough as nails. High torque at low RPM's. Steel cab, simple gauges, and a million of them out there so used parts are plentiful. Might be tough finding rust free in your area.

I'm not a fan of IH. I have a 8100 which is the same cab as the 47-4900 and I think its cheap, the dash module is always blanking out, and I think its kind of a big pile of crap. But one of my guys loves the stupid thing, it does turn short. Mine has a M11 and that's a pretty good smaller motor.

There's always pete and KW, western star. Which is nice if its older because similar to the mack- there's a lot of them out there and you have some factory support. If you're going that far, just as well have big engine too. 3406/N14/ 12.7 detroit.

I'd go tandem, if you want smaller motor go M11 cummins or Mack. Camelback or spring over walking beam/ chalmers for off road bad conditions. Pick a short sided bed.

Find a old concrete truck with a worn out barrel and you'd have double or heavy frame, deep gears, usually small motor and heavy front axle and a off road rear suspension Everything will have a layer of concrete stuck to it on the rear, but you can't have everything.

 

[BC Placer gold]

We recently picked up a 1989 IH tandem with L10 & 8LL, walking beams/double frame & interaxle. Rear diffs 4.xx, super low overall gearing and really nice shifting. Excellent traction/articulation of axles, only limited acreage use so far but really liking the setup. Slow on hwy, but I am fine with that for our use (Off road site truck primarily)

Way better traction (side by side test on snow/ice) than our IH9200 single axle with full diff lock.…

The turning radius doesn’t seem great, compared to the single axles (has wide base 285’s on front). 198” wheelbase/16’ dump box.

Will have a better review in a month when we take it onsite…. (Steep, narrow and muddy 10km access road will be a good test). Totally new to a tandem so just my initial observations!

 

[IceHole]

I've got a Mack R with a 300L engine, camelback suspension 9 speed, and it had a hard life before we got it, but that truck is tough as nails. High torque at low RPM's. Steel cab, simple gauges, and a million of them out there so used parts are plentiful. Might be tough finding rust free in your area.

I'm not a fan of IH. I have a 8100 which is the same cab as the 47-4900 and I think its cheap, the dash module is always blanking out, and I think its kind of a big pile of crap. But one of my guys loves the stupid thing, it does turn short. Mine has a M11 and that's a pretty good smaller motor.

There's always pete and KW, western star. Which is nice if its older because similar to the mack- there's a lot of them out there and you have some factory support. If you're going that far, just as well have big engine too. 3406/N14/ 12.7 detroit.

I'd go tandem, if you want smaller motor go M11 cummins or Mack. Camelback or spring over walking beam/ chalmers for off road bad conditions. Pick a short sided bed.

Find a old concrete truck with a worn out barrel and you'd have double or heavy frame, deep gears, usually small motor and heavy front axle and a off road rear suspension Everything will have a layer of concrete stuck to it on the rear, but you can't have everything.

Similar truck here. 1990 Mack R with 400hp E7 and 12 speed. Gave 15k for it a few years ago.

 

[hseII]

Does anyone have a DT530/8LL combo tandem?

I’ve seen probably 4-6 of those on marketplace in the last few months: spring suspension, 14’-15’ gravel tandems.

I wonder how they would do with 4:56 or similar rear ratios & a 300hp/1000ft. lb DT530.

A neighbor has a L10/13 speed General 15’ tandem & it has served him well.

Most of the L10s of that era were 280-300 hp.

 

[hseII]

Similar truck here. 1990 Mack R with 400hp E7 and 12 speed. Gave 15k for it a few years ago.

Something nice like that is now a $25-35k truck.

 

[skyking1]

My little Ford is a 12' ( at the top) bed and 8 CY struck without boards. The truck gets around in tight quarters.
Put tall boards on it and it can heap 10.
With short boards I can reach into it with the 35 mini and dip out rock. If that is handy (think bedding in tight worksites), weld on some hazlocks.


Sometimes less bed is more, and certainly when you have a shorter wheelbase.
55' bumper to bumper with the 20 ton tilt.


I put that forth because I remember how much you stressed the tight roads and conditions you work.
Look for a shorter tandem is my opinion. Frequently they come out of municipal fleets and are in really good shape.

 

[BC Placer gold]

Does anyone have a DT530/8LL combo tandem?

I’ve seen probably 4-6 of those on marketplace in the last few months: spring suspension, 14’-15’ gravel tandems.

I wonder how they would do with 4:56 or similar rear ratios & a 300hp/1000ft. lb DT530.

A neighbor has a L10/13 speed General 15’ tandem & it has served him well.

Most of the L10s of that era were 280-300 hp.

Right, our L10 is 285hp

 

[hseII]

Right, our L10 is 285hp

Those do well for tandem work with the right rear’s & transmission. Certainly more economical for someone that just supports himself & is not looking to stay in the road for others.

 

[skyking1]

Our 3406B has been getting spendy with repair work, I would look at something else too.

 

[MG84]

Another of my aversion to buying a tandem has been not wanting to work on anything bigger/heavier than I currently have. I keep telling myself it's all in my head though, the tires, brakes, axles, drive line is basically the same size as my class 7 trucks, just an extra axle and a little bigger engine/trans.

I looked at a '96 Ford L9000 last night, real clean truck, ran and drove great but a little bigger than I wanted. Was a 208" wb, 17' bed, floats on the front, dual steering boxes, L10 300hp, 9 spd Road Ranger trans, 485K mi. Reason I went and looked at it was I thought it had an 8LL and full locking rears based on the sellers description, turns out it had neither (came from the factory with lockers, someone had swapped the axles at some point.) He was asking $25k, I offered $18k but he wouldn't take it. Probably best, not exactly what I need.

Also found a '99 IH S2554?, shorter wheelbase, 13' bed, N14 370hp, 9spd, supposedly only 150K mi, but due to the IH gauge cluster problems I never trust the mileage or hours. He was asking $30K, but there were two buyers already scheduled to look at it, if it doesn't sell I might take a look.

I'm still looking at single axle trucks as well, If I'm being honest with myself I probably need both a tandem and a s/a dump. It might come down to which ever I find a suitable truck first, then get the other later. Maybe I'm just too picky, or want something unique, but it seems to take forever to find exactly what I want in a medium or heavy truck. Looked for almost 2yrs before I found my flat bed IH 4700 that I recently bought, and it was only about 90% what I wanted, had to build/modify the rest.

 

[MG84]

We recently picked up a 1989 IH tandem with L10 & 8LL, walking beams/double frame & interaxle. Rear diffs 4.xx, super low overall gearing and really nice shifting. Excellent traction/articulation of axles, only limited acreage use so far but really liking the setup. Slow on hwy, but I am fine with that for our use (Off road site truck primarily)

My little Ford is a 12' ( at the top) bed and 8 CY struck without boards. The truck gets around in tight quarters.
Put tall boards on it and it can heap 10.
With short boards I can reach into it with the 35 mini and dip out rock. If that is handy (think bedding in tight worksites), weld on some hazlocks.

I've got a Mack R with a 300L engine, camelback suspension 9 speed, and it had a hard life before we got it, but that truck is tough as nails. High torque at low RPM's. Steel cab, simple gauges, and a million of them out there so used parts are plentiful. Might be tough finding rust free in your area.

Yup all of those sound similar to what I'm looking for, mostly short hauls 10-20mi or less, off road/site work, and durable/economical. I think a 14' bed is the longest I'd consider. I'd like the bigger engines, but I'm afraid with 11r22.5's they'd be too heavy on the front end for soft conditions.

Does anyone have a DT530/8LL combo tandem?

I’ve seen probably 4-6 of those on marketplace in the last few months: spring suspension, 14’-15’ gravel tandems.

I wonder how they would do with 4:56 or similar rear ratios & a 300hp/1000ft. lb DT530.

A neighbor has a L10/13 speed General 15’ tandem & it has served him well.

Most of the L10s of that era were 280-300 hp.

There's another IH I might go look at, another S2554 but with a DT530/10spd. Got a nice paint job but may have had a plow on it in a past life which would probably take it out of contention. If I drive an hour or two south I can find plenty of NC, SC, GA clean southern trucks that haven't seen salt, no need to buy a rust bucket from around here.

 

[cfherrman]

Might look to see if there's any county trucks for sale or auction. They don't overload them so they are often smaller dump beds which can give that feel of a single axle dump but with more capacity.

 

[hseII]

Yup all of those sound similar to what I'm looking for, mostly short hauls 10-20mi or less, off road/site work, and durable/economical. I think a 14' bed is the longest I'd consider. I'd like the bigger engines, but I'm afraid with 11r22.5's they'd be too heavy on the front end for soft conditions.


There's another IH I might go look at, another S2554 but with a DT530/10spd. Got a nice paint job but may have had a plow on it in a past life which would probably take it out of contention. If I drive an hour or two south I can find plenty of NC, SC, GA clean southern trucks that haven't seen salt, no need to buy a rust bucket from around here.

Floats on the front are the way to go.

 

[BC Placer gold]

Floats on the front are the way to go.

New to tandems (have always had single axles) but noticing the tandem with floats (double steering boxes) definitely doesn’t sink into the mud like the single axle (C12, narrow 24.5’s) truck…

Was pretty surprised at the difference; we are in ’mud season’ here right now.

 

[Truck Shop]

Two locally bought single axle dumps with L10's. Both ended up buying three axle dumps
three years later. I know both guys/told them not to at the time, ended up paying a bunch
more now in todays market. Your looking for what doesn't exist in that money bracket.
Screw the 300 horse power idea, you will only be looking wanting more down the road.
to get that kind of power with less weight it needs to be a C12 or 13. which puts it in a
higher cost bracket. It's not necessarily the age, there are good older trucks out there,
it's stepping up to the plate buying 400 plus hp truck with heavy rear drives/suspension.
No harder to work on than a single. But what makes me wonder is all this tight work
area you have, I don't know a contractor that doesn't doing residential.
*
another dump truck thread.

 

[MG84]

Two locally bought single axle dumps with L10's. Both ended up buying three axle dumps
three years later. I know both guys/told them not to at the time, ended up paying a bunch
more now in todays market. Your looking for what doesn't exist in that money bracket.
Screw the 300 horse power idea, you will only be looking wanting more down the road.
to get that kind of power with less weight it needs to be a C12 or 13. which puts it in a
higher cost bracket. It's not necessarily the age, there are good older trucks out there,
it's stepping up to the plate buying 400 plus hp truck with heavy rear drives/suspension.
No harder to work on than a single. But what makes me wonder is all this tight work
area you have, I don't know a contractor that doesn't doing residential.
*
another dump truck thread.

All very valid points, but off road performance is as important to me as on road, hence wanting a lighter/shorter truck, at the expense of a smaller engine. My biggest problem with the quarry and some of the others I've had trucking for me is they aren't willing to get into the spots I need. They are all running tri/quad/quint axle trucks that are very much highway trucks, if it's the slight bit steep, soft, tight access, "nope, can't do it." That's the whole reason I've had to do several jobs of ridiculous proportion hauling on my single axle. Like hauling in 900 tons of base rock for rebuilding an old road up in the mountains. Quarry brought the first load and dumped it in a pile at the end of the state road. I'm 90% sure a tandem setup the way I want would have done that job.

On the other hand, I'm still trying to decide if spending $25K-$30K+ on a tandem is even smart business sense. I only put 10K mi on my single axle in the past year and a half, tandem would likely get even less. Still looking at all the options, went and looked at a single axle IH4700 this morning, looked great in the pics, not quite as good in person, but wandered all over the road, idled rough and died on me on the test drive. Got it back and we hooked up the computer to it, truck had 27,000hrs on it! Who knows if it had been rebuilt or not, but I decided to pass. They were asking $24K, are you kidding me? lol

 

[IceHole]

My little Ford is a 12' ( at the top) bed and 8 CY struck without boards. The truck gets around in tight quarters.
Put tall boards on it and it can heap 10.
With short boards I can reach into it with the 35 mini and dip out rock. If that is handy (think bedding in tight worksites), weld on some hazlocks.
View attachment 308060

Sometimes less bed is more, and certainly when you have a shorter wheelbase.
55' bumper to bumper with the 20 ton tilt.
View attachment 308061

I put that forth because I remember how much you stressed the tight roads and conditions you work.
Look for a shorter tandem is my opinion. Frequently they come out of municipal fleets and are in really good shape.

Nice truck.

Usually isn't volume but weight that maxes out.

Most our trucks at work max out at 12 yards, couple can do 15 (20k steer axle)

 

[KSSS]

Years ago I had a 2554 IH 33K L-10 with a 9 speed. Great truck, problem is it simply wasn't big enough. I had a 14' low pro bed on it. Sweet bed. You can always haul less with a tandem, but you can only haull so much with a single axle. Yet my costs to run it were not really any cheaper except for tires, but since every job took more trips than it needed to, not sure I saved any money there either.

Lesson learned from me was don't waste the time on a single axle. Your mileage may vary but, in retrospect it is hard to justify why a single axle makes more sense. It took me owning one for the point to be driven home.

Another truck I had was a County truck from somewhere, another IH series 2500 tandem with a L-10 and 9 speed. Really hard to find simpler trucks than those older IH trucks. Ran awesome, rough as hell, but it did the work. I have an 8LL in a Water Truck, since no one spends a bunch of time in it, that gear pattern throws everyone for a time, if your used to a typical H pattern, but the low speeds are nice. I think the 9 speed was just fine. If you can find an IH truck with lockers would be ideal. A lot of those County trucks that still come up for sale like that, and they can be had at a decent price.

 

[Tarhe Driver]

Try

https://www.govdeals.com/search?kWord=tandem

Most add 12.5% buyer's premium (cost to buyer).

Neill