‘Destination unknown’: New project 359, cancer cure effort from Eldon Jaeger & co.

Regular readers will recall the custom project Peterbilt 379, christened the “Long Haul Survivor” as builder and small fleet owner-operator Eldon Jaeger toured the country through 2013-14 toward raffling the Pete off and gifting more than $100,000, ultimately, to the American Cancer Society’s “Relay for Life” project. The curtain is off Jaeger’s latest work-in-progress, in part in memory of his daughter Brenda, shown above.

“Destination Unknown” is getting under way — this one’s a Peterbilt 359 daycab with an 84-inch “extra extended” hood, says Mike Heiderscheit, Jaeger’s son-in-law and partner on the build.

The mirrored stainless grille design was created by uniquely positioning small cut-outs of individual ribbons all around. See more details in the video below.

Under that extended hood is a “Detroit V-12 for power and an Allison automatic,” Heiderscheit adds. “We are going to sell raffle tickets at different truck pulls in the Midwest for a chance to drive it at that pull. Also, we are selling tribute decals to put on the truck in memory of cancer survivors or those who passed from cancer.”

The truck will make its debut May 1 at Jaeger & co.’s Midwest Pride in Your Ride Truck Show in Earlville, Iowa, Heiderscheit says.

Local CBS2 news’ Kevin Barry in Jaeger’s home base of Worthington, Ohio, put together the following video report on the project with more on the puller. Well worth checking out.

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Find a video interview of Eldon Jaeger and a gallery of images of his prior Long Haul Survivor project in this 2013 story.