First Squarebody: 1979 Chevy Short Bed

[Orion88]

I've been driving a 71 Chevy long bed since October. It was a great truck. Reliable, pretty, sounded good, etc. But like most Midwestern trucks her age, she had her fair share of rust issues. So I decided it was time to move on. My friend is currently redoing a long bed 4x4 but he also has a short bed 2wd. I was originally looking for a stepside, but he offered to paint the truck for me and the deal and the truck were just too good to pass up.

About the truck: it's a 1979 C10 swb that was strictly a show truck all its life. The original owner put a custom paint job on it, lowered it, put a custom exhaust, aftermarket carb/intake on, and only drove it to and from car shows. Here's the best part: THE TRUCK HAS 10,000 ORIGINAL, DOCUMENTED MILES!!! And it's never seen rain. However, recently the distributor caught fire and torched the cab. So my friend managed to find a good, rust free Arizona cab, and slapped a new distributor and wires on the engine and it fired right up. He is doing the body work while I am out of town and if I'm lucky it will be painted by the end of June. I will then continue to restore the interior and engine bay as I drive it, but to be honest it doesn't need much. A few parts under the hood are burnt, they will get replaced. But with 10,000 miles there's no point in doing any engine mods, just dressing her up a bit. The interior will need redone because the cab came from Arizona so everything is baked. The truck will be hot rod black with a red interior and I am leaning towards chrome smoothies and custom red pinstriping down the road. I also want to swap the 79 grille for a 73-74 grille. The idea is to have a 50s style hot rod look on a squarebody. It will be unique and it will be done right. Pictures and more details to come soon but I will be out of town until June.

[CDNchevydude]

Congratulation on the truck!

[motornut]

sounds like a good deal

[Orion88]

Thanks! It should be a fun truck, and it looks brand new underneath. It still has the GM stickers under the bed and behind the rear bumper. The first thing I want to do is swap out the grille for a 73-74 grille. Does anyone know the part numbers for every piece I will need to do the conversion?

[CDNchevydude]

You may want to look the LMC catalog, classic industries or brothers...

[truckfan]

[Orion88]

Hahaha!!! I know, sorry. I made the deal with my buddy the day before I left town and the truck was buried in the back of the shop. I will be home from fishing in Canada June 8th and will provide ample SWB porn at that time, I promise!

[Orion88]

Ok, so I finally stopped by my buddy's shop this weekend to snap a few pictures and talk about what else we were doing to the truck. He says he should have it painted by the end of this week, and then we can start focusing on the interior and sound system. That's all I'm going to worry about for now. I'm currently doing my own restoration of a 70 Pontiac GTO so one project is all I need for now. After that's finished the truck will get custom pinstriping, a 73/74 grille swap, new wheels, and whitewall tires.

[Orion88]

Here's a few more. It looks pretty rough right now, but the truck is actually very straight. The cab got a little banged up in transit from Arizona but most of the dents came out pretty easily. The filler you see is a thin skim coat, and most of it will get sanded off in the next few days.

[Hankster]

Looks good! I want to see it with the white walls! I too plan to paint my truck black..

[rich weyand]

1973-74 CK grill (chrome) is GM#331572.
Mounting screws are oval head philips #8-18x3/4"

[Orion88]

I'm gonna hold off on the grille swap for now. Right now I'm just focusing on buttoning up my interior. If anyone knows where I can get a hold of a decent used red dash pad and/or door panels that would be helpful. I think I only need those and a seat cover to finish off my interior. Also, does anyone know how well the vinyl dye works? I've used the black before but never red.

[y5mgisi]

Subscribed

[flashed]

If you part with the old seat cover I would be interested .

[Orion88]

I'm going red with the interior so I have no use for it. PM me and I will try to get better pics this weekend for you.

[Orion88]

Updated Pic: Once we find a good hood she's ready for paint!

[Orion88]

Between Craig's list and pull-a-part I scored a ton of parts for my truck and my buddy's truck (the guy who's painting mine). Hood, fenders, weatherstripping, front end trim, core support, speaker grilles, kick panels, Silverado trim, door panels, vents, etc etc etc for under $300. I could have gotten a lot more at pull-a-part if I had the right tools and if it wasn't 90+ degrees out. All I need now is a new dash pad!

[Orion88]

I bought some speakers and a head unit today. I was going to order a powered sub but before I did I wanted to make sure it would fit behind the bench seat. It's a Rockford Fosgate P300-10, it's 14 inches tall, 9-3/4" deep at the base, and 6-1/8" deep at the top. I can't measure until I get home this weekend but I wanted to see if any of you knew if that was too big or not.

On a side note I sent my 70 GTO body off to the sandblaster yesterday! Gotta get the undercarriage, firewall, and trunk stripped down so I can get it all epoxied and start my body work. I got really lucky when I mounted it to the rotisserie because I never thought to check for height clearances going out my garage door. As we rolled it out of the garage I ended up with about one inch of clearance. That was almost an "OH F*&K" moment!!

[tucsonjwt]

As long as you have an AZ cab you are good to go

[Orion88]

She sure is sexy in black!!!

[Orion88]

Scored bigtime on craigslist this weekend. I found a guy selling an original 79-80 red dash pad, complete with air vents, trim, and the cheyenne emblem for $100! It only has one tiny crack in the speakers that I honestly wouldn't have seen if he didn't point it out to me. It should clean up quite nicely. Now I just have to decide if I want to go with Cheyenne emblems or Silverado.

[flashed]

Very nice ,good find .

[motornut]

Very nice shape, that's a score

[Orion88]

Grille swap complete, the interior should be finished by the end of the weekend.

[Hankster]

Lookin' Good!