1950 Ford F-8 Semi tractor with Factory Sleeper

This truck is a rare 1950 Ford F-8 semi tractor with a factory sleeper. There were only an handful of these trucks made by Ford Motor Company.  The truck is owned by John Dupius. It was originally owned by the Barraco Distributing Co. of Beloit, Wisconsin.   John and his father found this truck sitting behind a warehouse in Marinette, Wisconsin in 1986 buried up to it’s axles in the mud with a six inch thick tree growing up through the frame in front of the fifth wheel.   John looked for the owner of the truck for quite some time only to find out that it was owned by the his sister’s boss at the time.

John bought the truck and he and his father dragged it home to start the restoration.   The old Ford saw it's share of neglect over the years and was in terrible shape.  All of the windows broke out and much of the sheet metal was either dented or rusted.  It took over six years to bring it back to the shape it is today.   John took the truck to his first show, the mid-west American Truck Historical Society show in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 1993.   This truck is also featured in the book Moving the Goods, published by Krause publications, 1995 and an issue of Street Scene Magazine.

After the truck was built at the Ford assembly plant in 1950 it was sent to an outside coach works company where the cab of the truck was altered by splitting the roof above the doors and the floor along the rocker panels.   Wedge shape pieces of metal were worked into the roof and floor to allow the cab to be widened to allow for the wider sleeping area in the rear of the cab.   You can see from the frontal view of the truck the doors are spread out wider than a stock truck and appear to be in a half open position.   The back wall of the cab is from a Mack truck, the tool box access doors on the sides of the cab are from a White truck and the rear quarter glass is from a 1942-47 Ford coup.  The truck has the original 337 cu. in. Ford flathead driving a factory five speed transmission with overdrive and a vacuum shift two speed differential.