[elwood]

I was in the same boat about two months ago...

The '78 3/4 ton I had was a bondo trap. I didn't know this when I bought it. Got it home and over the course of about 9 months I found that most of the truck was held together by bondo. Since I live in arizona, you don't have to worry about rust, but come to find out,it was a michigan truck. Bought the truck for $1100. The dude told me the 700R4 and 350 (4 bolt main) were rebuilt recently, but had no records on it, but everything was spotless. And he got behind on his bills.

So 9 months later I was tired of the bondo and endless bodywork and came to a conclusion...

I took the engine and tranny out of the truck, looked them over inside and out and to my suprise the dude wasn't lying...all the stuff was new or close to it! It was actually a 4 bolt block with a pretty hefty cam bored 30 over. mated to a built 700R4 with all the B&M goodies.

I wanted a car, I was tired of riding around in my friend's small rice burners when we'd go somewhere as a group any larger than 3 people. Hmmmmmm...

I bought a mint condition '88 chevy caprice classic with 103K on the clock, and put the truck engine and tranny in it. Turned around and sold the truck to some farmer that had a drivetrain for it. Man does the ole' caprice fly, and I have a spare 305 and 700R4 with only 103K on them.

So what I'm saying is, yes...buy the other truck, swap all your crap over and sell the old truck. Personally I don't like body work, it seems like a pandoras box, I think you understand where I'm comming from.

Have fun dude!