This past Friday I looked out of the window of my sixth floor hotel room in Brooklyn, NY and what to my wondering eyes did appear? This Mack R Series cement truck in fantastically paired colors. I was instantly smitten.
The Mack R Series has long been my favorite big rig. A close second would be a Kenworth K100 with a Detroit 12V71TA, but that’s a whole other wet dream. Anyways, part of this goes back to childhood, spending summers in the back seat of Mom’s light blue on blue 1983 Plymouth Reliant wagon driving I-83 from our home in Towson, MD to Beaver Dam Swim Club in Hunt Valley and back five days a week. The roads leaving The Dam going to 83 went right past the GENSTAR mine and 83 was the artery of disbursement of product and to additional locations in the area.
I remember watching those big white Mack cement trucks hauling down the road with their purple and blue GENSTAR logo on the door. Plenty of matching Mack dump trucks too, my mom cursing their haphazard driving styles on occasion. I also recall a lot of Mack R dump trucks painted a dark green and thinking they were army dump trucks, but they likely were working the mine too. Of course, all of this was reinforced upon being exposed to Mad Max: The Road Warrior at a young age. The R has been a favorite ever since.
Immediately recalling the incredible bad ass factor of Max’s R was part of the reason I was so smitten on Friday: the two tones of paint bore a striking resemblance for me (Max’s was black on an orange frame). I also tried to recall when the last time I saw one of these pressed into daily service and could only come up with “It’s been quite a while.” Over the past 5 years I have lived in Gloucester, VA, San Diego, CA, and now Charleston, SC and don’t recall seeing many, to the point where seeing one requires craning my neck to catch a glimpse. I posted up on the hotel room window sill and sat there for a good five minutes watching this big rig work with the much newer concrete pumper truck at this site and admire its strength and the hard work it must have put in over its long life. A true Curbside Classic.
My trance was broken when I had to leave to go somewhere with coworkers and when we got to the sidewalk I had to snap a couple of pictures of my favorite rig. The name may be worse for wear but the lower jaw of that mascot never looked so good! This Bull Dog is obviously one of the U or DM models with the offset cab. I didn’t have the time to crawl under and see if that rear most axle is powered or not (likely is), but couldn’t help but wonder if it was a mighty straight six or burly V8 under that massive piece of fiberglass. Perhaps someone here can call out the year, model, and engine type? Having only a single stack to spew black smoke like a kid in a WRX blowing vape out of the window isn’t sufficient evidence to sway me either way.
If I had Jay Leno money I’d absolutely buy one of these blue collar Bull Dogs as a regular semi, orange frame and rear fenders much like Mad Max’s but with a dark green cab and orange stripe over the hood. Imagine driving that big stick shift in a Spartan cab? Now I’m going down one of Paul’s famous MM sessions…
Related bulldog reading:
Quarryside Classics: Mack R-Series – Rock Solid Since 1966
Curbside Classic: Mack RM-Series 4×4 – The Really Tough Mack
Curbside Classics: Dodge LCF And Mack U-Series Trucks – Two Big Gnarly Firefighters
What a treat to still see one of these hard at work, in NYC no less. What is it about dark green Macks there? Seems like they were all painted that color back in the day. I used to love to see big, gnarly RM series Macks hauling giant garbage containers early in the morning there.
Those Genstar Macks you saw in the Towson area had previously been Campbell’s, before they were bought out. They were red back then, all B series when we first moved there in 1965, and then slowly some of the new R series appeared in the fleet. They dominated the business there at the time.
Most likely this has the Maxidyne six, as the V8s were not very common, and almost invariably had twin exhaust stacks as well as this distinctive V8 badge on the sides of the hood.
Dark green was a really popular color for garbage trucks, although Irvington New York’s late 80s truck was an Autocar with incongruous option of chrome hub caps. The NYC cement mixers that always stuck in my mind were the polka dot one which used a Mack cabover chassis with a very long front bumper to accommodate the hydraulic pump. Their yard was under one of the East River bridges so I would see them whenever we drove into Manhattan.
I also used to see a lot of later Brockway trucks with Mack cabs.
The DM was a close relative of the R built for Dump or Mixer (or other construction) vocations. The offset cab and set-back front axle are the common identifying features. There was also a U model which was an R with the offset cab for highway service, the selling points were better visability and a shorter cab for increased body or trailer length. As far as engines are concerned, DM’s that size (likley a 600 series) usually had a Mack E6 or the earlier 675 Maxidyne diesel. The larger 800 series offered the Mack V-8. Your article brings back memories of all the Conrock Mack mixers I used to see!
This truck must be hot in the summer, as it is missing its “AC”.
Excellent find and photos!
One of my prized toys as a kid, was the Corgi Mack Esso Tanker my dad bought at the CFB Rockcliffe Canex Military Store in Ottawa, back in the 1970s. Very well detailed and constructed. All metal construction, only the tank was plastic. The Canex always had a great die cast selection.
I have something similar but made by SIKU with a triple axle box trailer. Neat to see Corgi had one too.
Ya Gotta love that wraparound windshield. It’s the official truck for the Terminator.
Great find! That is SO New York, in the best possible sense.
I did a quick search and found a lot of photos from this cement company. They are still using Macks it looks like and orange rear and mixers seem to be their trademark, but the newer rigs use a white cab. Hopefully this link works. Even has a few pics of #21 with less patina.
https://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&mediaurl=https%3a%2f%2flookaside.fbsbx.com%2flookaside%2fcrawler%2fmedia%2f%3fmedia_id%3d1769968456499176&expw=734&exph=960&cbid=AXPoVYyTlB4CVXA480x360&cbn=local&idpp=local&thid=AXPoVYyTlB4CVXA480x360&ypid=YN873x4317745259813142206&useBFPR=0&eeptype=PhotoGroups&dataGroup=local:datagroup.photos&PhotoGroupName=AllPhotos&PageTag=AllPhotos&selectedIndex=0&id=AXPoVYyTlB4CVXA480x360&q=DKN%20cement%20new%20york&FORM=LOCIMG&ajaxhist=0&ajaxserp=0
Today I was looking at a Mack RD dump truck with a drop axle that had stopped and the wheels on the drop axle were still moving, interesting to see.