Revisiting A Mystery Truck From The Bottom Of The World

Yesterday I wrote about my delight that the Citroën 2CV I’ve been slowly fixing up successfully made its first real journey. Everyone was very supportive in the comments, and I absolutely appreciate that, more than you know, unless you’re somehow reading my thoughts, in which case please stop, and I can explain, don’t judge me.

A few of you had some questions about the Argentinian license plate I temporarily have on the car until I get my real plate, and I can explain where I got it, and, more importantly, revisit a bit of an automotive mystery I encountered when I was there.

I picked up that battered license plate in what I believe is the southernmost junkyard in the world, around Ushuaia, which is the capital of the Argentinian province of Tierra del Fuego, way down there at the very tip of South America, and considered to be the Southernmost City in the World. I’m pretty sure this auto junkyard has to be the southernmost one unless there’s some secret ones in Antarctica. I mean, look at the map location of the pictures I took:

That’s pretty far South; if there’s another challenger to the Southernmost Junkyard, I’m willing to listen, but I’m pretty sure this is it. It was an odd junkyard, mostly contained within this huge open-roofed building that felt like a colossal shoebox:

I got the license plate from the inside somewhere, amongst the piles of crushed and dilapidated former-cars:

The cars in there were mostly in an advanced state of decay, making the whole junkyard structure sort of filled with what could be described as an automotive compote, or perhaps a gumbo.

I was pretty excited to take home an Argentinian license plate, because it seemed so gleefully distant compared to where I lived, and I figured it’d look nice on my wall. Or, for short periods at least, on a car.

But what caught my attention when I was looking back at these old photos from, damn, almost eight years ago, was this interesting truck:

Back when I first wrote about this place and this truck all those years ago, I think I accurately called what it is: a DINFIO Rastojero. DINFIA (National Directorate of Aeronautical Manufacturing and Research), and yes, they also made airplanes. In 1967, the name seems to have changed to IAME (Industrias Aeronáuticas y Mecánicas del Estado), but the Rastajero name remained.

By the way, I absolutely adore that typography for “RASTOJERO” there; it feels like what so many midcentury travel posters used when wanting to show Mexico or Central and South American resorts and locations. I associate it with those places and feelings so much that I can almost smell rum when I see it.

The Rastajero started life in an interesting way: as a faulty tractor. There were a bunch of Empire Tractors purchased by the US government after WWII that were found to be inadequate for farming use. These tractors used Willys Jeep Go-Devil engines on “light metal frames” and proved to be, well, garbage. Argentina was stuck with about 4,500 of these useless tractors, so what were they going to do with them?

Easy! Turn them into trucks!

Here’s a video that describes what happened:

Clever engineers managed to re-work the tractors into useful pickup trucks with wood-stake beds that opened on all three sides, and specially-designed, very open fenders to prevent accumulation of mud, as you can see here:

The first batch from 1952 to 1954 used the Willys Jeep engines from the crappy tractors, and then switched to 42 horsepower Borgward diesel engines in 1954, which were already being manufactured locally.

These were interesting trucks, and the one I saw at the junkyard – the only one I’ve ever seen in person – was especially interesting because of the modifications it seemed to have.

Based on the cab design, I think this was a first-generation Rastajero, before the doors with the rectangular stampings were introduced. But what I find most interesting is that this one seems to have been heavily modified by whoever owned it to make it a bit less, um, agricultural than originally designed.

Look at those filler panels added to the fenders, enclosing the formerly open sides and filling in the gaps on the outboard side of the headlights! It looks like the grille area was enclosed a bit more as well, and more modern sidelamps and indicators added. I can imagine that the overall effect, when intact, gave the truck a much more modern-looking appearance, and maybe made it a more suitable vehicle to take into the city and not just be relegated to a muddy farm.

It’s fascinating, really! The modifications sort of tell a story about this truck as it seems to have graduated from farm duty to other roles that necessitated a sort of sheet metal glow-up. I hope it led a useful and interesting life.

These are pretty much unknown outside of Argentina, but I feel fortunate I got to see one, even one in such a sorry state.

And that’s why I have an Argentinian license plate.