70' C10 Work Truck

[docstheman]

I had a 98 Dodge Ram 1500 that was my dads from since it was nearly new. A car lost control on I20 headed to Dallas and hit me totaling it while I was on my way to pick up parts for my 1971 Blazer. Since I am a Chevy guy this was a blessing in disquise and I took the insurance money and went out and picked up a 1970 Chevy Long wheelbase pickup. I own a landscaping company and I can't tell you how handy the long bed is. So I will set up this thread similar to the one for my Blazer. Check it out when you get a chance. The link is in my signature.

The good: Pretty straight body. Minimal rust except in the usual places. new 350 Crate Engine, new TH350, Headers, new exhaust with dual magnaflows, Edelbrock Performer Intake, Holly 4 Barrel Carb, big tach on the column, B&M Shifter. Truck sounds great. All lights work and it was ready to pass inspection minus a rear brake light lens. Got the truck for $2500 and with the new driveline it seems like a pretty good deal at least for these parts.

The bad:
There is a transmission fluid leak. PO put a stupid 11 inch steering wheel on the truck. Without power steering I am gonna look like a body builder. Bent front passenger fender and tailgate, trim is missing and so there are holes all down both sides of the truck on bottom and top, Not an AC Cab truck and I live in TX, original seat is torn badly, no dash pad, ugly red carpet, door panels and arm rests are missing, rattle can black paint, no cupholders, The starter sounds a little scratchy and there was rust in the fuel filter that I changed as soon as I got it.

The Goal: This is a work truck, not a show truck. I want it to look good and perform great but I am not concerned with everything being perfect. Mechanical over cosmetic, but this truck will also be advertising for my landscaping company so I want it to be cool. The main thing is I am trying to keep the investment to a minimal. So this is a cheap freshen up. Not actually a build.

Process for getting it there.
Fix the transmission fluid leak. Check out the starter and replace if necessary. Get a seat cover and replace the tiny steering wheel with a bigger one. Do a tune up/check up. Get updated registration and inspection stickers. Get a new dash pad (I need one for the Bazer too). Replace the front passenger fender and possibly the tailgate. Put a set of 20"s on the truck to give it a hotrod look that will match the sound. new carpet or floor covering and install a cupholder. Later I will probably want to relocate the gas tank, install power steering and power disk brakes.

[docstheman]

Ok, so the first thing I did was get it home and take out all the random crap and drive it to the car wash. It hadn't been washed in a couple of years. I also went to autozone and picked up an antenna, window roll up handles and a fuel filter. I threw on the parts except for the filter in the parking lot. When I got back I loaded up the girlfriend and took her out for a blizzard at DQ. The truck died on the way back and I had to push it into the CVS parkinglot. I could smell gas. Somhow it flooded while it was running. Mindblowing to me. After it sat for a bit it cranked right back up. I imagine a little piece of rust got into the carb and hung that float. The next day I installed a new fuel filter. The other one was disgusting and was full of rust. I went back and got a another as backup and I plan on cleaning out the tank pretty soon. In the past on old motorcycles I have used muriatic acid and then ospho to neutralize the acid. Truck runs great again, but the starter sounds a bit scratchy. The next item to fix is the transmission fluid leak.

[docstheman]

I have a buddy with a lift in his garage. He replaced the cork seal on the transmission with a poly one and replaced the o-ring. It was leaking so much there was oil dripping off the rear frame from blow back. When he was working on it he found a broken transmission mount and replaced that. He also tidied up some of the wiring and adjusted and greased the wheel bearings. The next day I found a junk yard in Troup, Texas - Red's. I got two rear side marker lenses and two brake light lenses for $20 in decent driver condition. I got the truck inspected and registered and I am finally getting to use it. I had a big party coming up that I am hosting and my GF and I wanted to build a cornhole game and giant Jenga. I need wood from lowes and finally get to use my "new" work truck for actual work. It is so nice to have a bed this big. Wow!

[docstheman]

The cornhole and giant Jenga games came out great. I will post a pic of the cornhole set later but here is a pic of the giant Jenga set being played. I highly recommend not playing either of these games in the house by the way. The morning of the party I was on a meat run picking up 9 racks of ribs, 60 pieces of chicken and two pork buts when I was genuinely worried the truck might not crank. It sounded like I threw a lug nut in the gear. That will have to be worked on ASAP.

[docstheman]

So the starter was snaggle toothed. I replaced it with a mini starter for high compression engines. It is a little over kill and probably the nicest thing on my old truck, but why not. It should perform great and it looks good if you happen to be under my truck. lol

[docstheman]

Been driving the truck almost daily and it really is fun to drive. I ordered a 17" custom steering wheel and a seat cover. I will have to get you some pics later. I got them from ebay on the cheap and I ordered two dash pads. One for the work truck and one for the Blazer along with a passenger side rocker for the work truck. I went back out to the junk yard and located a donor vehicle for a passenger fender. It is so hard to find one that isn't rusted out. After searching Craigslist for a bit I found some 20" rims that I thought would really look good on the work truck and picked them up. the guy was really cool and had a baby on the way so he was ready to get them out of his garage. I will need some tires, but it is a good start.

[docstheman]

Ok, I have good news and bad. The rims look amazing on the truck (IMO). The problem is the hub sticks out just a bit and it is slightly bigger than the hub on the wheels so it doesn't fit quite flush. Either the hub will have to be machined or the wheels will have to be drilled out. Rough measurement is that the hub about 1/3" too big for the hub bore but the hub only sticks out 1/3" of an inch, so it doesn't need a ton of machining. this is definitely not something that I planned on doing though. Here is a preview of what they look like mounted. There seems to be plenty of clearance and they really set off the truck.

[docstheman]

2 more

[docstheman]

Ok, so you saw the preview of the work truck with the 20s on it but the hubs were sticking out so far that I couldn't really get the lug nuts on. Last night I started grinding down the passenger hub and after about 3 hours of steel sculpting I was able to mount the wheel. Overall I am pleased with the how it came out. I am going to do some finish work and clean and paint the hubs when I get new tires. Here are a few pics showing the process of grinding down the hub. I put the lug nuts on the studs to prevent damage to the threads. That was probably my wisest decision ever. The lug nuts look like they went through a blender and I am so glad that I have zero damage to the threads (thus far).

[docstheman]

Transmission went out on the c10 a while back and I replaced it with a newly rebuilt 350 turbo. It has been great ever since except for one episode. I had never hooked up the kick down cable as it shifted fine without it. One day I hooked it up and after driving for 30 min or so it started acting really strange. The shifting points changed drastically. The car wasn't shifting out until 4k rpms. I thought it was a vacuum problem and found a missing cap on the carb next to the hose that goes to the transmission. That didn't fix it so I replaced the vacuum modulator. That didn't fix it either so I pulled the governor, but it looked brand new. I pulled the pan and the spring was working fine on the transmission where the kick down cable connects. I didnt know what I was looking for apparently. It ended up being that the plunger was stuck. I tapped it and it popped out and has worked great ever since. I guess that learning experience could have been more expensive. I have since installed a 2 post 10k lb automotive lift in my shop and am constantly working on something. I would like to fix up the c10 a bit but it really only needs cosmetic things. Here are some more pics and I also bought a new 2015 z71. There are some pics of it too.

[Palf70Step]

Glad to see the 70 is still kicking along!

[docstheman]

I rebuilt the carburetor last week. I haven't ever rebuilt one before. Its a Holley 4 barrel 5160. It runs great now. Really has a lot more power and seems to be getting better gas mileage however - it revs the engine up when you first crank it - without your foot on the gas. Its really weird. I have no idea why it would do that. Maybe something to do with the choke. I am worried about this increased rpms before the oil has had a chance to circulate through the motor. Additionally it has been involved with another situation. The truck will crank in any gear. I need to figure out how to put a safety on it so it will only crank in neutral or park. The truck died on the way home. I was at a stop sign. I just turned the key to crank it again with my foot on the brake. It was still in drive. It revved up the motor and broke the yoke on the drive shaft. What a mess. I tried to push it out of the road and the drive shaft hung up in the Ebrake cable. I had to cut the cable to get it out of the road. I replaced the yoke and u joint and its back on the road but I will have to be more careful til I figure out how to fix all that lol.