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  • The Blue Truck

    This old truck has been sitting out in the backyard waiting for some attention for a couple years. Over Christmas a need to have a sturdy dependable vehicle came up, so I figured I would drag it out of the woods and do a spray-can rebuild on it to make it a runner.
    Attached Files
    Livin the dream

  • #2
    After scraping a lot of crud off and out of the truck I had it basically as a bare roller shell. no wiring, no windows, no interior.
    Attached Files
    Livin the dream

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    • #3
      With ^^^^ as evidence, there's just no way I can move forward without cleaning it up. So, I put a wire wheel on my 4.5" angle grinder and had at it. Gawd Amighty what a mess.
      Attached Files
      Livin the dream

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      • #4
        In the end this is what we have:

        1953 Chevrolet C1 series
        1951 Doors and latches
        P.O. said it was a 1985 305 H.O. motor. (shrug) maybe it is.
        A Turbo 350 case - you can't call it a transmission anymore.
        And all sorts of 1968 Chevelle parts laying around. The front crossmemember, suspension, brakes, and the rearend, maybe the steering column are from a donor car. The throttle pedal was something cable, and the brake pedal and booster were from a Pontiac power brake 1st-Gen F-Body, but it had an Impala manual master bolted to it (eek).
        Attached Files
        Livin the dream

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        • #5
          The body turned out to be a *lot* nicer than I had anticipated. It had gobs of bondo everywhere, yea the cab corners are crusty, and you would expect that the floors would be crusty.
          Attached Files
          Livin the dream

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          • #6
            Ummmm I still have been putting off taking out that aluminum plate that is sitting in the floor. I refuse to. The purpose of this build is quick and cheap and dirty to get rolling in six weeks.

            So what happens? We begin to find out that the builders of this heap had two of their most favorite and dangerous weapons at their disposal...

            What's that? Arc Welding and Acetylene Torch yeaaaah baby!!!
            Attached Files
            Livin the dream

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            • #7
              So, anyways... Continuing on I got some tires on some old rims I have had laying around, and started to trim up the hackery.

              The firewall is similar. These trucks had the brake master under the floor. This has an F-body brake pedal assembly "grafted" onto the firewall with no bracing. Hey, Mr Torch?

              This goes without mention at this point - it became evident that this project was going to have to go off track. There is zero support of a floor in the truck and the brake pedal moves the firewall 3" and the bottom of the steering column floats around.

              So, a couple more weeks work, but it blew the promised New Year's timetable.
              Attached Files
              Livin the dream

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              • #8
                Floorpan Repairs... I used a cut-off wheel on my 4" angle grinder and knocked 99% of the rust out of the way, and then switched to a 60-grit flap wheel on my 4.5" grinder to knock the rest of the snot off.
                Attached Files
                Livin the dream

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                • #9
                  Continuing with the wire wheel we take on the front suspension. The Arc Welding looks really really ugly but where the crossmember is grafted to the frame rails is not cracking that I was able to find, so proceed, pass go.

                  However, the idler arm mount was way too sketchy for my tastes.
                  Attached Files
                  Livin the dream

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                  • #10
                    Once things were cleaned up I had a friend make me a couple of plates for the firewall. I figured I could sandwich what was left of the poor firewall between a couple of plates and stop the buckle in the firewall when the brakes were hit. And produce the top half of the bridge to the floor where the column was beat through with the torch.

                    The second picture is because I had to salvage the brackets out of the old F-Body booster to bolt onto the back of the Impala booster that I had ordered.
                    Attached Files
                    Livin the dream

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                    • #11
                      Now that there is some support, hey the brakes don't flop around - and Bonus! - they actually point uphill.
                      Attached Files
                      Livin the dream

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                      • #12
                        That sketchy idler arm mount really needed some help. So I took a piece of scrap plate and fashioned some help.
                        Attached Files
                        Livin the dream

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                        • #13
                          One bad thing about this whole grafting deal was the steering column as described. The lower half wasn't much better unfortunately. It had been cut off (with a blade on this one at least) but a little unsquare. And then a crossways 1/4" bolt was drilled crossways through the coupler and shaft. We'd be welding the replacement on.
                          Attached Files
                          Livin the dream

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                          • #14
                            Another area that needed attention was a proper throttle pedal. We cannot describe what was in there as such, nope, we can't. I had the OE pedal assembly out of the old '65 truck, so I measured up against another 65 and my F-Body and mounted the truck pedal. It didn't fit all that well - so I stuck a spare F-Body pedal assembly I had in the hole and guess what... The F-Body pedal stays.
                            Attached Files
                            Livin the dream

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                            • #15
                              Coming along nicely.

                              On the brake deal - on my S-10 clutch master I made similar though smaller reinforcing plates then I found that I had the stock S-10 clutch master reinforcing rods that go from the steering column bracket to the firewall. I think there's a pic in my build thread. Anyhow, something like that might be a good thing for you if you want it even stiffer.

                              Dan

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