1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

More progress. I am purchasing a Jerr-Dan rollback bed off a wrecked GMC/Chevy Medium Duty truck. The bed has been removed and is being prepped for installation. The bed was purchased from Jon Wickham and Associates, a Danco Products dealer in the Dallas area (jonwickham.com).

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Picture taken by Jon Wickham & Associates of the truck awaiting bed installation.

https://www.facebook.com/jonwickhama...ciates/photos/

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

What is the bed Weight? I am so envious..lol
Man that's gonna be one sick truck.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

I weighed the truck, without the bed it was 9,600 lbs. I do not know what the bed weighs.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

PTO is installed, awaiting hydraulic pump which will be bolted to the flange.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Jon Wickham & Associates is making good progress on getting the bed installed.

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Excellent! How long is that deck?

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

It is a 21 foot bed. In the pictures it is moved back about 3 or 4 feet from the cab. It will roll forward to within 4 inches of the cab.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

More pictures of progress by Jon Wickham and Associates installing the rollback wrecker bed. The first pictures shows them installing the wiring (had to add additional wires in the traveling loom for work lights. The second picture shows the bed rolled all the way forward for the first time.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Another picture of the progress:

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

That sir is a cool truck! You should get many a thumb's up with this rig!:chevy:

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Thanks!

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Here is a picture of the donor truck the rollback bed was harvested from. Picture by Jon Wickham & Associates.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

More progress by Jon Wickham & Associates on finishing up the bed installation. The Jerr-Dan had damage on the loading end structure. In these pictures they have straightened up and welded the cracks in the bed support ribs. I believe the next step is to replace tail skid (not sure what you call it). Stay tuned it is getting close.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Ok, for all you folks that have been asking for a video of the 4-53T screaming down the road, here it is. I was in Dallas yesterday and needed to pickup a tow bar from a supplier. The bed installation is not done, however it was far enough along I could use it to fetch the parts. This video (brief) was taken on our drive back to Jon Wickham & Associates. I don't have very good internet so I made the video very short.

Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUs4F0madQQ

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Sounds real good, but I never knew Dallas had that much traffic!!

(Most of our Hi-ways around here are 2-Lanes).

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

That video is the last straw.

I f&@*ing love your truck. Jealous as all heck. :D

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Thanks!

I was in California a couple of years ago and a salvage yard North of Modesto had one of these for sale. It was red with tilt hood. They were asking 5k for it and claimed it had a fresh motor. As I recall it was a 5 sp tran and 2 sp rear. It was a cab and chassis only and was parked behind their building. It was a self service U-Pull type junk yard, they also did vehicle maintenance and repair.

I would have bought it but it was too far away for me.

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

The truck looks and sounds great! Keep them RPM's up though, those 53's were made to scream and will run better and longer that way.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Jon Wickham & Associates got more work done on the rollback bed installation. The rear underside of the bed had some damage which they agreed to repair.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Incredible work they are doing restoring it to original condition. I doubt Jerr-Dan welds would have looked that nice!

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Eugene is preparing the toolboxes for installation. We have a 48" going on the driver side and a 72" on the passenger side.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

More progress, the bed lock has been installed.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Jon Wickham & Associates replaced the roller fairlead or "roller guide" on the winch. The old one was bent and damaged.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Still making progress, this is a picture of the new chain basket floor. Bed installation should be finished this week.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Finishing up the chain box floors. Bed installation is almost finished. Hope to pick it up tomorrow afternoon!

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Picked up my rollback C70 from Jon Wickham and Associates, their attention to detail is amazing. I am very pleased with their work, all of it exceeded my expectations. It is obvious Jon and his crew know wreckers. They spent a lot of time educating my sons and myself about proper use of a rollback bed, what to do and what not to do. Very very helpful information.

Pictured below is some of the crew:

Left to Right

Eugene, Tracy, and Jon.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

The trip home was uneventful except we got tied up in traffic due to a couple of wrecks. I thought for a minute that Noah (my son) was going to put the truck to use hauling off wrecked vehicles. The truck is well lighted from behind.

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Truck looks great.

Should provide many, many years of great service.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Thanks Bill. I will post some better pictures when I have a chance. The toolboxes are real nice, a great addition to the truck.

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

The truck looks great, and now it has a useful function again! Did you solve the wheel balance problem?

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Have not solved the wheel wobble problem. I talked with a local shop familiar with these Dayton wheels, going to have them align the rims. Also going to change the rear rim spacers to 3.75. It has 4.0 now. The narrow spacer will get the wedges closer to the hub which will help with the wobble.

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

I'm sure you'll get it figured out. Hopefully get some highway use!

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Had to use the truck today to recover my Suburban. My son Seth called and the burb had quit on him. It appears to be an electrical problem. Given the location where it was parked, we just pulled in on the bed backwards (it was raining). Weight distribution would have been better to load it going forward. The truck did not seem to care about the distribution, it handled the load well.

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

It's nice to have a Roll Back in the family.

Especially a nice one like that with a great engine to boot.

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

I know this may sound elementary, but I had a set of ultramega OLD tires on my truck and it wobbled pretty bad and was worried about something serious. My wheels were at the time normal hub widowmakers.

Got new tire on modern tubeless rims and the truck is fine.




I have also found that when using a 9k lbs truck to pull your friends 5k lbs van, it does not care that he steps on brakes or hits a curb.......lol.......it pulls the damn thing come hell or high water.
The weight distribution hardly matters with as much as that truck probably weighs...

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Did you convert from Dayton style to Budd wheels? I have new tubeless 11:00 22.5 rims and radial tires. My old rims and tires did not wobble (bias ply), however they had flat spots from sitting for 20 years. I spoke with a tire shop and they seem pretty confident they can install 3.75 rim spacers and align my tires which will fix the wobble problem. I did not plan to use the truck before getting this done. This was an unplanned deployment of the truck.

Re: 1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

No, it had conventional bolt on wheels, and still does today. I really hope it works out to be easy, but it sounds like you already changed your wheels and tires, so I'm no more help...

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Unloading our Suburban. The rollback works very slick, an amazing tool! The Suburban rolled all the way off the bed using the winch to regulate the speed. Once on the ground I set the parking brake on the Suburban and then retracted the bed out from under it. Once it was clear, I lowered the bed and rolled it forward onto the bed locks. Way too easy. Turns out the alternator had failed, made a trip to O'reilly Auto Parts and it is back on the road again.

1979 Chevrolet C70 Conversion to OEM Air Conditioning
 

Micah, my son at the controls.