Rare Pair Travelettes

Rare Pair Travelettes Sharing the adventures, and wrenching stories of our 1958 A120 and 1961 C120 Travelettes...

I got the seats installed in the Jubilee Jalopy! These came off an old junkyard Dodge Dakota, same truck my mom's 99 dur...
06/15/2026

I got the seats installed in the Jubilee Jalopy! These came off an old junkyard Dodge Dakota, same truck my mom's 99 durango front bumper was pulled from. Due to the fact that there is an IH dash sitting on top of the Dodge dash, I had to raise the seats up significantly in order to see out the windshield and over the hood. I removed the brackets from the original durango seats, mounted them, then built a box on top using the flat surface that created. The Dakota seats are actually a little different, the rear mounting bolt holes are kicked to the side, and don't drop down as much. Luckily that didn't really matter for my needs as I built new mounting surfaces regardless. The front C channel is actually one of the cross members from the 1957 IH A100 frame. The seat belt mounting location is on a tab coming off of the original Durango seat brackets. The Dakota ones were bolted to the floor. I was able to use the original durango seat belt mounting locations because I used the original seat brackets as the base for the box. Very excited to finally have seats installed!

I've been avoiding the inevitable floor, and A-pillar structure work, by fixing up my doors. Last week, I replaced the ...
06/15/2026

I've been avoiding the inevitable floor, and A-pillar structure work, by fixing up my doors. Last week, I replaced the lower hinge on the passenger rear door (no pic). The pin was completely sheared, and it was hanging by the top hinge. It took ½ a day just to get the old hinge off of the door, and I beat on it so much, I ended up having to weld the door skin back on at the bottom.

Then I started fabricating a new driver’s door bottom from some 4" C-channel that I had laying around. I basically cut one side off, to make it 3"x1½" angle iron. So I tech screwed everything, then welded seems, then pulled screws, and plug welded screw-holes...

This weekend, I sanded, seam-sealed, and primed the driver’s door. I also drilled drain holes in the door bottom.

I globbed undercoating inside the door.

I also painted the inside of the driver’s side rear door (black to match the others), that I swapped on like 12 years ago, which was annoyingly gold until today. That took about 45 minutes total, lol. So I should have taken 45 minutes to do it 12 years ago, to avoid years of annoyance.

Next, I'm going to paint the yellow fender (which I've already bodyworked quite a bit) brown, to match the truck.

Then I'll start the floors and structure work 😆

~Mike

Lots of work done on the Jubilee Jalopy! Last weekend we installed the windshield. From all the beating around on the co...
06/13/2026

Lots of work done on the Jubilee Jalopy! Last weekend we installed the windshield. From all the beating around on the cowl due to body swapping, the pinch weld was sitting pretty low in the center so I smeared in two tubes of 3M black gasket glue. It actually worked pretty well. I will go back and clean the excess with a razor. I got both doors assembled with glass and everything functions. The bed is sitting on the frame on wood blocks to mock everything up. I got the tailgate to function but it still needs some work. It was severely dented/twisted so getting that functioning has been a pain. Before I installed the windshield I cleaned and painted the pinch weld, as well as the roof. Rustoleum "Heirloom white satin" seems to match the faded IH "whitecap white" almost perfectly. I can barely tell where it starts and stops, and only $5 a can! I will be painting the hood, top of the doors, and the top of the bed sides white. As for gold I will only paint the bottom of the doors, I'm leaving the old beat up Jubilee "anniversary gold" how it is. I'm also leaving the scratched up "white cap white" back wall alone. Now that the cab is sealed up, (and after heavy rains, it actually stays very dry in there), I can start installing seats! I took the brackets off of the original seats to create a flat mounting surface. I need to raise the mounts about 7 inches to be able to see over the hood, due to the fact that the IH dash is sitting on top of the Durango dash. Next thing I need to do is finish making the seat mounts and bolt the seats down permanently. It's surprisingly pretty comfortable. Still lots to do before Harvester Homecoming in August, but I should be driving it around town soon! Seats, bed, rear bumper, gas pump plumbing, and some wiring and I can drive it around!

Hey everyone! We're announcing this year's Rare Pair Travelettes merch!A somewhat little-known fact about our trucks is ...
06/02/2026

Hey everyone! We're announcing this year's Rare Pair Travelettes merch!

A somewhat little-known fact about our trucks is that they have names. Brody's 1958 Travelette is called Cowboy, and Mike's 1961 Travelette is called Bomber.

At Harvester Homecoming this year, our RPT crew will be sporting Team Bomber and Team Cowboy tees, and we thought we could share with you guys too~ If you can't pick a team, we also have tee-shirts featuring both of our Rare Pair Travelettes.

Head to our swag site and check out what we've got in store --
https://rarepairtravelettes.printful.me
Make sure you order in time to sport them with us at Harvester Homecoming!

(More colors are available online than listed in these photos)
All designs are by Brody's sister Addie

Yesterday on the Jubilee Jalopy build I got the driver door worked out pretty well. My dad is swapping on a better door ...
06/01/2026

Yesterday on the Jubilee Jalopy build I got the driver door worked out pretty well. My dad is swapping on a better door to his 1961 Travelette, so I was able to use the glass from it on this build. I also have a passenger window I bought at a big auction a couple summers ago. The glass on these doors was shot out years ago while sitting in a field. The wing windows are plexiglass I cut and gorrila glued in. The driver wing window flipper broke, so I drilled all the way through it, installed a nut, and welded it on permanently and that works great. The bottoms of these doors were returning to the earth, so I welded in a panel to get the correct length back. The window track support bracket had rusted away and needed to be welded on as well. I also added a piece of angle iron for structural support. Welded all the previous mirror mounting holes and ground smooth. Seam sealed and painted the rear wall white. Did some black touch ups on the frame. The doors and hood will be rattle can painted to match the Jubilee colors. I'm thinking of using a tan paint instead of gold to match the faded color better. Lastly we did some minor structural repairs to the Jubilee anniversary bed, and mocked it up. It's not permanently mounted yet, but that will be easy. I just need to make some quick mounting points. Its sitting on 3 stacked 2x4 blocks in front, and right on the frame in the rear. I will rattle can paint the underside of it black so it doesn't rust out too bad. It's actually very rust free, just severely dented. I need to make a rocker that continues the body line from the fender to the bed under the door, probably will just use some angle iron. Next up is repairing the passenger door like I did the driverside and mounting the bed.

Got the mirrors installed! These were on my dad's 1961 International Travelette until he swapped to his west coast style...
05/28/2026

Got the mirrors installed! These were on my dad's 1961 International Travelette until he swapped to his west coast style mirrors about 10 years ago. Perfect for my needs. I also chopped off the rest of the brackets for the mirrors that were on these doors. I forgot to grab a hood prop rod hold down clip when I was at the junkyard. I rooted around the nuts and bolts bin at work at the Ford dealership, and I found something that works great. It turns out it's a Ford Flex "headliner retainer plate".

Also... a baby groundhog ran into the shop and got trapped. Hopefully we can get him outta there. Momma hog was furious and attacked a bunny bystander. 😆

Got the hood figured out. I was trying to use hindges off a junkyard 2008 jeep compass but they wouldn't clear the hood ...
05/26/2026

Got the hood figured out. I was trying to use hindges off a junkyard 2008 jeep compass but they wouldn't clear the hood off the cowl. The International hindges, and the Durango hindges were both too big. I decided to swing the hood sideways like the older model Internationals using some door hindges. I did still use the hood prop I got from the junkyard. That was from a 2006 Pontiac G6. I can still use the factory IH hood latch, but I also added a shed latch on the cowl for extra support. That was on my dad's 61 international keeping the driver door shut because he had rust issues. (He is working on that project right now).

We got the front end off. Used a tree, and lowered it onto my dad's new truck bed trailer, then backed it into the yard ...
05/25/2026

We got the front end off. Used a tree, and lowered it onto my dad's new truck bed trailer, then backed it into the yard using the durango!

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