I’ve run several Mack trucks. My brother-in-law had a mid-1970s R model with a 300-hp Maxidyne engine and five-speed Maxitorque transmission. We called it a “purebred,” because it was built with all-Mack parts. While it was a really good truck, it was kind of crude. It didn’t have a fuel gauge — you unscrewed the cap and looked in the tank. Another Mack I’ve driven was also a purebred, a 1988 R model that had a 350-hp Mack engine and 10-speed Mack transmission. It offered a little more comfort but was still pretty crude.
I hadn’t seen very many Mack Super-Liners and certainly not any in the last 20 years. So when I saw Junior Elmore’s sitting there in his former small fleet’s yard, it commanded my attention immediately.As shown at the top, there is a gold bulldog on the hood. I always thought that meant that the truck was a purebred.
Opening the hood I was stunned to find a Silver 92 V8 Detroit (445 hp) in it. Whoa! Never saw a Super-Liner with a Jimmy in the circles that I ran in. The alternator and air compressor drive off the back of the motor. The transmission is a 13 speed.
Ralph Pike drove this truck pulling heavy loads on a lowboy for Elmore’s towing and recovery business. Pike says it was a hot rod in its day that would really go. I can just hear an overloaded Detroit-powered Mack coming down the road.
Pike says the Super-Liner was still running when parked 19 years ago, and it’s all there, with no parts removed. It has been vandalized, however, when some kids got into it and set it on fire back in the sleeper, burning up the mattress and the headliner. It left the rest of the interior kind of sooty. It’d be something to see this truck restored.The steel buds on the drive axles are chrome-plated 11/24.5s, while the steer axle has aluminum wheels. It’s riding on four-spring Reyco suspension. I thought that was unusual, too.
The Mack bulldog is stamped into the door panels.
The interior of the cab and sleeper was all carpeted and button tucked. There is a custom Sawaya sleeper on back; you can see it would have been very nice before the fire. This would have been a comfortable truck to drive.A few more images from the interior follow. Catch more from trucker-photographer Don Christner’s series of truck profile’s from Wyoming-based Junior Elmore’s former small fleet yard via this link.
