Projects '66 Chevy C10 build

So I decided to go ahead and feed my ego by making a build thread for my truck. Actually, my son and I are building it together, it'll be his when he gets his license in August. Assuming its on the road by then, anyway...Its the first real project vehicle I've done, had old trucks before but never really did anything except keep them driving.

And yes, I know '66 is later than '65 and therefore out of bounds, but since the only difference between a '65 and '66 Chevy C10 is the emblem on the fender I am hoping for a little slack....

Here's the back story...I told my son that when he turned 13 we would find a car or truck to build together for him. He wanted a truck, so we scrounged up this one, I've always had a soft spot for the 60-66 Chevys. Got it off Craigs List, dragged out of the blackberries behind a guys barn for $300. Looked it over, and as is to be expected, immediately grossly underestimated the amount of work it was going to take....the rust was way worse than I thought it would be, the engine needed everything, the wiring harness was unsalvagable etc etc etc....But its been fun, and its satisfying knowing that his truck would have been gone forever if we weren't dumb enough to save it. They aren't building any more of these, after all...

Anyway, heres some pictures of it when we got her. This was about two years ago. 250 straight six and 4 speed with the granny gear....We want to do kind of a Rockabilly style build, Offy with dual carbs and cast iron headers, green Hot Rod Flatz or similar paint with Tommy the Greek style scallops on the hood and fenders, black and white interior, steel wheels with '67 hubcaps, a couple of other touches here and there. Been cruising the HAMB board, lots of cool ideas in here...

First thing we did was rebuild the brakes, all new wheel cylinders, turned the drums. Still need to put brake lines on though.


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My philosophy is to get the mechanical things fixed first, make it go and stop safely, then worry about making it pretty. So after getting the brakes and wheel bearings done we moved on to the engine. Pulled out the 250 and tore it down, it was pretty bad. I had to get a new head, and the block went to the machine shop to be cleaned, decked and bored to .080 over. Sure was pretty when it came back though!
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After we put it back together with all new guts and gaskets, it was looking cool...
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Got some tasty bits form Tom Langdon and Langdons Stovebolts:
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looks like a great start

 

Next up was cleaning the dirt and rust out of the engine bay. Lots of elbow grease, degreaser, and rattle can Rustoleum, and there you go...
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And then time to put it back in.
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We also got the Pertronix Ignitor unit to replace the points. Thinking I'll probably go with an internally regulated alternator as well...

 

Wow what a great project for a father and son. I love the truck and really like that you kept the inliner. it'll be a blast to drive. although I do suggest a t5 swap. really easy to do and it will make that truck so much more driveable and fun. Keep the updates coming. it looks like you both do very good work and have a good eye for detail.

 

Good to see. The sickness with no cure being spread to the younger generation. God Bless.

 

That was last June, still haven't run the thing. Partly cause I still need to run fuel lines, linkages, and make an exhaust, but mostly because none of the wiring is in place. It was bad. I mean, rats nest bad...The turn signals were two toggle switches on the dash. So I ripped the whole stock harness out and have an EZ Wire harness waiting to go back in to replace it. That means theres no wiring to the engine. But I also realized that I might as well get the cab rust squared away and paint down in there since I would just have to pull the wiring back out again to do it right anyway...I don't need to tell you clowns that rust repair takes a LOT longer than it looks like it will. But I can see the light at the end of the tunnel now....

Heres what I was starting with.

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Ok, theres still lots more but I gotta get off the computer and do stuff for a while...More later.

 

fun!!!! subscribed

 

Great father/son project!! Looking good,keep us posted.

 

Bravo! More! More! Encore!

 

Drivers floor pan and cab floor....This was a learning experience to say the least, but I was able to convince my wife that the boy and I needed a welder and got me a Lincoln wirefeed welder, wanted one for a long time...Pics are self explanatory. I bought a set of cheap Harbor Freight (boo boo hiss hiss) body hammers, turns out they are incredibly useful for making things the rights shape...I recommend them.
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AWESOME!!!! love the 6!

 

The bottom of the front pillar was gone, somebody back in the mists of time had half ass welded the bottom hinge to a piece of 1/4" plate and gobbed it onto the rust. I wound up fabricating a replacement piece out of 16 gauge sheet steel.
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So now the floor was in place, the rocker was on and the pillar was mostly finished. It was really cool to look in the cab at what was just a Chantilly lace of rust and see solid metal......

OK, getting closer to caught up, but I've got to go to work since I like eating food and living inside....Hopefully get caught up to current tonite.

 

Nice keep up the good work!!!!

 

I love that engine! That's what I need for my 66 C10.

 

Nice.. always thought about doing one of these pickups. You're doing great and I can totally relate with the Father / Son project! Keep it up! Your rewards will be great!

 

Looks good.

 

Love it!

Please don't paint it...

Fix the rust, detail the under carriage and run it as is. I love the look of an original finish on a detailed chassis and with a clean engine bay.

 

I thought about not painting it because the faded green finish looks really cool. Unfortunately, the doors are shot, and so is teh hood, so I'm gonna have to replace those. Plus there are a bunch of spots that need patching in teh bed walls and cab corners etc. Bottom line is it will have like 4 different color body panels when I get her fixed, and that looks like crap. So its gonna have to be painted.

 

Thanks for all the comments, its nice to hear I'm on the right track, especially from this crowd, theres a lot of experience here and I've learned a LOT from looking at all the threads on the HAMB, some real cool cats that know their stuff on here. I was a little nervous putting my stuff up, especially compared to some of the amazing cars I've seen here....

 

Yep, I love the straight sixes...They look cool, sound cool, and if you mess with them a little they can almost hang with the 8's in the low end.

I would love to have a straight eight someday though....

 

With the floor, pillar, and rocker all in place, there was still quite a few places where the cancer was eating away at the old girl...For some reason the drivers side was a lot worse than the passenger side though. I got way troo much practice with a cutting disk and grinder making what felt like a million little patches. Even with the new steel in place, I'm caulking the hell out of the inside of the pillar, dash and every seam I can get at. Chevy designed the vent area so that all the water that goes into the wiper bay under the windshield runs down the inside of the dash and vent cowl, thus the rusted out steel. But there was no way to get a perfect weld on all of it, so I am pretty sure its still gonna leak when we hit heavy rain. Still, the beauty of starting with a truck this far gone is that no matter what, anything you do to it will be an improvement!

Kick panel and footwell:










And up under the dash. I didn't bother to grind and pretty up these ones, nobody will see them once its put back together. Plus I'm a lazy bastard.












Theres another 5 or 6 small patches I didn't post up, one on the front of the firewall, a few in the rear half of the cab floor etc etc, plus the cab floor supports, but you get the idea. The floor supports sucked because they were really just a rough approximation of the right part, looks like they were made by drunk Pakistanis using a faded polaroid as a technical drawing. But I made them fit, and the drivers side of the cab is done as far as rust repair. That brings us up to about three weeks ago, I'm working on the passenger side now. I'll update with those pics tonite, and then we'll be on real time. Its going a LOT faster though, partly because the damage isn't as bad and partly because I have alot more experience now and am faster at it. Looking forward to moving on to prepping priming and painting the inside of the cab....

 

wow look'n good.........

 

Thanks.

 

Way to do it RIGHT!

 

Looking Good, Keep it up!!!

 

great work...

 

Real nice job!!

 

That thing rusted weird for a Wa. state truck,maybe where it came from had alotta salt on the roads in the winter? Great work so far man!

 

Yeah, its got a key tag from a farmers supply place in Missouri (I think, been a while since I actually looked at it), so it came from somewhere else. The tag is cool though, if I remember I'll post a picture of it...Its one of those round deals with the four different screrwdriver tips on it, a gimme thing from the store. Its old enough the phone number isn't 7 digits...

I think its partly rusted that way because it was under a bunch of trees and the vents all got full of pine needles, which got wet and sat there rotting inside everything. I think thats also why the drivers side was so much worse than the passenger, it was more exposed to weather the way it was sitting when we got her.