My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

I've yet to name it, maybe I wont name it at all, but this thread will follow the progress of my latest project....

The specifics, truck was purchased as specified/pictured....

1975 cab, new floors/cab corners/rockers
Chopped ?inches, I was told 5, dont think its that much
Lexan side/rear windows
1981 chassis/bed/front end
New front fenders
Full belltech lowering kit, c-notch and flip in the rear, spindles and springs in the front
305 V8, engine code says its out of a 1985 B-body. Its kinda tired...
Rochester Quadrajet, still trying to figure out what its from
TH350 3 speed auto
mystery open rear end, have not de-coded it yet
beat-up interior featuring flower planter centre console, massive shifter, wrong/half unbolted dashpad, grey leather bucket seats, spray painted carpet and door panels
mostly rust free, only bad part of truck really is the firewall

My main goal for this project is to have a reliable daily driver that looks kinda cool. The 305 may get a minor rebuild just to make it reliable until I can save for a crate engine of some sort. Main focus over the rest of this year/until next spring is re-do the interior properly, fix all the wiring issues, re-align all the body panels, fix as much rust on the firewall as possible, minor engine freshen up, build a posi or limited slip rear end, replace tires, alignment, and just cleaning up/refining lots of little things. Hope you enjoy following the progress of the project, any suggestions or opinions, good or bad, are always welcome...

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Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

I like it, where did you get the chrome strip for the grill? and is the tailgate band just stock but painted in the middle? They look good

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

Previous owner told me that he just removed the paint from the grill strip then polished it up

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

That shifter is awesome. :metal:

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

First thing on the list, gut the interior. I absolutely hate crummy interiors, so this one wasnt going to do. Say bye to the spray painted suburban carpet, falling apart spray painted floor mats, falling apart spray painted door panels, flower planter centre console, ghetto rigged stereo system, wrong year dashboard that was not bolted in, and bucket seats that were welded to homemade seat brackets using old wheel nuts.

Will be converting back to a bench seat hopefully. This will require moving the floor shifter forward a bit (maybe), and figuring out how to lower the seat a bit due to the chopped roof. Going to go find a decent seat at the pick'n'pull tommorow and see what I can do. Debating on whether to go with all new interior panels (doors/dashboard) or find some decent wrecker ones and have them covered with tweed. Will be ordering new/proper carpet, and whatever sill pieces may be missing to hold it in place. You can see some of the cheese I found in the firewall above the heater box, gotta fix that along with some other holes here and there, but theres no major rot...

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Camaro floor shifter

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Firewall rot

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All the crap I pulled out. Carpet/speaker box/floormats/centre console all went into the trash.

Also pulled off the door panels and trim rings/centre caps from all the rims today. Tommorows plans, hit the junkyard for some interior parts, maybe start pulling the grill off...

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

Payed a visit to the pick n pull today and found some new interior parts today.


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My hauler/beater/daily driver, a 1990 Ford Festiva, also flat black, loaded up with interior goodies.


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Base door panels to replace the other ones that were falling apart. A little rough around the edges, but some time/elbow grease/paint should get them looking good as new again.


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Bench seat. I went to three different trucks, and this one had almost no wear/sag in the drivers seat. Its blue vinyl with a mexican blanket seat cover thats falling apart. It will be getting re-covered. Its actually pretty comfortable.


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Old door panel on the right, "new" one on the left. I Like the look of the plain panel without the trim strip and the carpet. They are very dirty...


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I grabbed the door handles while I was there. The '75 door handles on the right, '81 handle on the left. The old owner had the older door handles installed with the newer door panels, and you have to cut the door panel to allow clearance for the older style handle. You can see why they have to be swapped.


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Bench seat in. I thought for sure I was going to have head clearance issues with the bench, but theres actually headroom to spare. I still may try to lower the seat a bit as the seating position is a bit high. I much prefer the bench over the buckets.


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Test-fitting the door panel with the newer style handles. I have to drill a couple mounting holes, but the fitment is pretty good otherwise.


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Due to there now being a seat where the shifter was mounted, I'm going to have to re-locate it further up. The bolts you see welded to the floorpan were originally the front mounting posts for the shifter. They will now be the rear. A new hole will have to be cut in the floor for the cable and the old one patched up, and new mounting posts welded in further up. No big deal.

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

welcome! and awesome build! i like it... what size tires are on those rallies? and are the coils 2" drop? love the stance...

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

I cant tell you what the drop is on the coils, all I know that this thing is low, almost too low. Air-ride may be a future consideration just from a practicality standpoint. The rear tires are 275/60R15 and the fronts are 225/70R15. Have four brand new BFG Radial T/A's waiting to go on after the rims are powedercoated. Thanks for the good comments!



Next bump in the road. My truck came equipped with a craptacular set of bucket seats attached to a home-made seat rail. It worked, but I wanted a bench. At some point and time, the truck was converted to a floor shifter. You can see the old setup here...

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I picked up a bench seat at the local wreckers, and put it in the truck to see how the seat would affect the shifter. You can see here the bolts that were used to mount the front of the shifter before. They will now become the mounting points for the rear of the shifter.

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I disconnected the shifter cable and mounted up the shifter on the two existing mounting points, just to see how it fits. I've not made the mounts for the front.

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Here you can see how the shifter will now be sitting, and should give you a rough idea of where I will have to cut a new hole for the shifter cable based on previous pictures.

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I believe it is do-able, but I'm afraid that the shifter cable may have to bend too far and will end up kinking. In order to make it work, I'm going to have to bend the cable into a "s" shape, which I wanted to avoid doing, but as far as I can see, its either do that or just forget the bench seat and go back to a bucket setup. Pic below is of the cable mounting to the transmission, you can see in the upper right corner the existing hole for the cable to go into the cab. I know the pic quality is bad, but you may be able to picture where the new hole will be cut and how the cable will have to bend.

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I'm also debating on whether to toss the automatic out completely and convert it to a manual transmission...

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

nice project whats wrong with the dash

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

that thing looks pretty sweet

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

Theres nothing "wrong: with the dash, except that it is for a 80+ truck, and does not mount to the metal dash frame properly. The only screws that were attached were the ones just above the glovebox.

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

my truck is 80 with 81-87 dash and it fits just fine, its looks like your missing the gauge bezel

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

I have the gauge bezel, its just not installed at the moment. I'm having some gas gauge issues, so I had the cluster apart. As for the dash, the proper dash for this truck has mounting tabs that slide into slots in the metal dash frame, then it bolts to the front. The dash that was in it also has mounting tabs, but they are screwed into the dash frame or firewall, I've not looked all that closely.

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

Had it up the road to a local cruise night this weekend. Truck was well received, which suprised me as it was mainly an older crowd filled with gorgeous classic cars. They asked me to do a burnout, so I obliged them.....

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Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

nice truck! looks good, i think it needs bogger wheels to look right tho with the chop, and about the dash, my 87 has tabs that slide into the metal frame, only 4 screws above the glove comp hold it, the bezel and gauges hold the other side

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

Cool burnout!

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

The organizer of a local cruise night asked me to come back and blow up a tire. It didnt actually blow up, but it was good enough for me...

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

Can you say new tires? That looked cool, is your truck ok after that?

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

It didnt like it that much, but the entire driveline is going to get tossed or rebuilt, so I dont really care what happens to it at this point.

I stand corrected on the dash thing, the new dash does actually fit, I just wasnt looking at it properly.

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

Like the interior upgrades.

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

Have not gotten much done lately. Just not been in the mood. I have done a few things though.

Got the door panels cleaned, prepped and painted. The wheels are going to be green, so I'm doing green accents throughout the truck. Some people hate it, some like like it. Also figured out that the new dashboard that came with the truck that I thought wouldnt fit really does fit. Its now painted and ready to be installed also.

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Picked up the proper air intake assembly this week. GM actually did pretty good on this one, it pulls cold air directly from the air stream. I read one thing on the chevy forums that A guy went from an open element K&N filter just sitting open in the engine bad to this setup and gained 5hp on the dyno.

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Worked some more on swapping wiper motors. The older style has an integral washer pump, and it was pretty ugly, so I grabbed a newer style motor and washer bottle. Had to swap the arms off the motors. I've not yet finished the install...

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Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

And some pictures from the cruise/burnout night at the bar last weekend. I talked to the organizer tonight, and apparantly, he has a picture of me doing the burnout with a cop car parked on the road watching me.

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Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

Preety cool so far. And the green accents are looking good also. It's all in the execution.

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

I was liking the red door panels and there's a little red on the steel dash. I could have seen you going with red like an SS truck. I just saw the green and I'm glad it's only an accent color but it looks good. Definitely better than I thought it would.

Re: My '75/'81 C-10 project...
 

I thought of doing red accents, red rims, ect, but everyone does red. I like to be different.