From the right angle, Dwayne Groves’s personalized service truck looks like something from a Mad Max movie.
The front end of his 1983 Peterbilt 359 is framed by a massive Herd-brand “Big Tex” deer deflector. His 500-horsepower Cat Model B 425 engine defies EPA-standards (“Yeah, I’ve played with the smoke screw and air screw a little bit,” he confesses). Twin, chromed eight-inch diameter Rod Pickett exhaust pipes tower 13 feet, six-inches into the skies around Covington, Okla.
But for all the chrome and shine on the cab, the custom-designed service body is pure business.
Dwayne Groves Spec My Truck
Dwayne Groves shows his custom service truck to Dan Anderson of Service Truck Magazine.
“I had STI (Service Trucks International) build me a 14-foot service body along with a 48-inch
Groves Spec
wide custom-built STI box that I mounted between the cab and the service body,” Groves says. “The box has roll-outs that hold my welder/generator (a Lincoln Ranger 250) and air compressor (Mi-T-M Model 14 two-stage compressor). One rolls out the left side and one rolls out the right side. I had STI put remote keyless locks on all the doors on the service body, along with LED strip lights from top to bottom in every box.”
All the toolboxes and drawers inside the service body are Eagle Pro II, and a 14,000–pound Eagle Tiger crane handles lifting chores. The crane’s hydraulic outriggers serve double-duty when Groves needs a hydraulic press.
“If you put planks down under the left outrigger, you
Groves Spec
can use that outrigger for a hydraulic press,” he says. “The controls are right there and they’re easy to feather for precision work. (The outrigger) makes a better press than you might think.”
The truck’s PTO-powered hydraulic system is plumbed to special Pioneer-type agricultural hydraulic couplers mounted near the back hitch. Groves works almost exclusively on agricultural machinery, and as part of his business often transports large equipment
for hundreds of miles. The hydraulic couplers allow him to connect to the machinery’s hydraulic system and raise, lower, fold, and unfold equipment that might be 60 feet long and 60 feet wide when in field position,
then fold to a “compact” 23 feet wide and 16 feet tall for road transport.
A few harrowing experiences while towing ungainly equipment led Groves to install a wireless, rear-view camera system. From a screen in the cab of his truck, he can toggle between a rear-facing camera on the back of his truck (“It helps when you’re hooking up to equipment”) to a separate camera mounted on a magnetic base that he sticks on the rear of the machinery he’s towing.
Future plans for the truck include addition of an on-board power washer. Instead of using a powered unit, Groves plans to install a 100- to 150-gallon retrofitted propane pressure tank, fill it with water, and then pressurize it to 175 psi with his air compressor.
“That way I’ve got an on-board water supply and don’t have to take up space with a separate power washer,” he says. “My pressure washer and water supply will all be in one unit.”
Groves works nearly full-time for a local John Deere dealer, but instead of being an employee of the dealership, he is an independent contractor responsible for his own insurance, taxes and benefits.
“I started out just working on their lot, fixing things outside, but things have worked so well that they built a 65 foot by 100 foot shop for me and my crew to work in,” he says.
Groves’s dream truck didn’t come easily, nor cheap. He admits he and STI “tussled” over its design.
“I’d tell them what I wanted, and they’d say, ‘You can’t do that.’ So then I’d say, ‘OK, then can you do this?’ They worked hard to give me what I wanted, and I’m really happy with the results.”
Cost-wise, Groves values his truck and tools at around $350,000. “But that’s without the labor I put into customizing the cab and chassis,” he says. “I put air ride under the cab, a hardwood floor in the cab, and plan on upholstering the interior with cowhide. I keep thinking of new things I’d like to put on it or in it. It will probably never be completely finished, but I’m totally happy with it.”
Dan Anderson is a part-time freelance writer and full-time heavy equipment mechanic with more than 20 years of experience working out of service trucks. He is based in Bouton, Iowa.