Hi Everybody, I've had a "shop truck" longer than I've had a shop! It's undergoing a lot of custom changes and I figured I'd post them up here. Plenty of people have seen what it looks like today, but it's getting cut up some more this year. I'll start off with some pics of what's happened with it over the years. It's got a small block ford and an automatic and it cruises well and still serves well as a parts hauler. It was the only truck I had for years as evidenced by this early pic I found: If you've ever driven the freeways of Los Angeles, then you already know the only thing I was missing on this haul - a bicycle tied with rope to the side of all that stuff, about to fall off! That was immediately before we painted it the "nice"paint job that it had for a little while. We then added some Kustom knobs to the grill and drove the hell out of it:
Nice I have posted more photos of it in the Kustom Ranchero thread: https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/the-kustom-ranchero-thread.1067341/
Thank you sir! I was pretty happy seeing it make that thread after years of making changes to it. Much appreciated!
Thanks guys! At some point during that black and red paint job, I made a new rear bumper for it. I was always bothered by how the rear bumper on these looks like it came out of a random parts bin. The stock bumper seems like it doesn't belong on the car and hangs pretty far away from the body at a weird angle. It took years of me owning the car/truck before I looked straight down from above while loading the bed, the factory bumper from that angle sticks out far enough to protect the tail light. Only sense I could make of it. So it had to go! I got some 58 caddy bumper ends and a mid 60s chevy truck front bumper and made the rest from 1/8 plate. Flipped the caddy ends and then flipped the stainless blinds in the inserts so that the angle of the rear bumper matched the back of the front bumper and the A pillar. We got the Bumper chromed and bolted back on hours before loading into "Ink N Iron" a few years back. I believe the model's name is Gabby Grave and obviously Chris Gomez Photography took some pics with her and the ranchero at that show Next up, Tail lights (first round)
Next I made some custom tail lights for it. I had a wood carving of a hannya mask that my grandpa had brought back from a trip to Japan. I made a mold of it and of a stock tail light and cast these weird tail lights, mostly just for fun, but they stayed on there for a few years. They never photographed great, but they did look pretty good in person (quality wise, obviously not everyones cup of tea!) I also had to make some aluminum bezels for them, that was a lot more fun than casting plastic! These pictures are actually a blem that had an air bubble in em, but they were the best close ups I could find of those lenses. I used a Pullmax machine to shape the bezels.
Thanks for bearing with me through the tail lights, I promise it gets better! Next I slanted the B pillar. This was rattling around in my head for a while and was a subtle change that made a HUGE difference! People on the street started saying "nice el camino", which I took as high praise. GM was always really good at following a design element through the whole car/truck/suburban and I felt like the B pillar change tied the whole ranchero together. The doors look like they were made for the ranchero, rather than just pulled out of a fairlane parts bin. Here it is with the pillar and rear bumper both angled to match the rest of the ranchero lines:
Thanks! Subtle change that required lengthening the B pillar and making some changes to how the glass works. More involved than I thought it would be, but well worth it! If I ever have another ranchero, Im doing this right away regardless of build style. This was basically "done" for a while in this configuration. It had a 408 stroker and was a beast of a shop truck. We drove it everywhere, and I even hauled my small lathe and mill (separately) back to the shop with it.
Someone hit the ranchero when it was parked and that was the end of the metal flake scallops. The front fender was repaired and we got it sprayed this gray color I wanted to feel out.
So, things were going well. I had done a ton of subtle things to the ranchero, but it still felt like it really needed something over the top to kick it up a notch. I found some early 50's ford/mercury trim and got to work making some custom skirts. I wanted skirts on there for a long time, but at this point I decided I was going to go big on them!
Hopefully its obvious, but I had a lot of fun making these! they were pretty big pieces of metal to potentially wreck, but I love how they came out!
Yea, every change you have made just ties the whole car flow together better. Excellent eye for kustom style! Love the rear bumper, skirts, and slanted b-pillar! Very kool Rancehero (I mean El Camino...)!!!
The Jalopy Journal
