pdx-sanity66

[pdxhall]

Hi everyone. I've been a member here now for 1 year this month so I thought it was time for me to start a build thread. I've posted some pics on various threads and threw out a few comments and opinions but I want to get things more organized as to what I'm doing and where I'm going with my 66 long bed fleetside. I am going to give a little retrospective and bring things up to date as to what I've accomplished so far.
I got the truck about 12 years ago from the son of the original owner. He had died and the son didn't have a desire to keep the truck. I was leaving my girlfriends house (now my wife) one day and it was parked on the curb in front of a house just down the street with a for sale sign and a price of $675. I have always loved this body style truck and I couldn't resist. I paid the guys price and drove it to her house. The first pics here are the day I drove it there. It was a completely original, unmolested truck with a 135000 miles. Everything was intact on the truck including the owners manual in the glove box. No extra holes anywhere and very little rust except some in the normal places. The bed wood was totally rotted out, though, with a piece of plywood in it's place. the drivers side of the seat was shot, with a couple of springs broke and some padding stuffed in to make it usable. The rest of the seat was like new and the build sheet was still in place on the underside. Built in Fremont, Cal. and sold at a dealer here in Oregon.
I drove the truck a little for a few yrs but the clutch went south and I parked it. I didn't really have the time or a place to work on it at the time.

[pdxhall]

When my wife and I got married, we bought another house, which had a nice double garage and the truck was taken out of the weather and moved into it's new home. I was still raising kids and had a lot of other stuff going on at the time so the truck sat this way until the summer of 2008 when I finally had the chance to get serious on the tear down and rebuild. My plan was always to do a full frame off once I got started. I was limited on space because I had to share my garage with other "stuff" so I decided to tear down the front end first, then turn the truck around in the garage and do the rear suspension, etc., then rearrange things and pull the cab. Then I could complete the frame. Once the frame was pretty much complete, I would then start on rust repair and body work.
I managed to get the front end torn down to bare frame and the frame rails painted. I used Eastwoods Rust Encapsulator with a top coat of their Extreme Chassis Black satin paint. All new ball joints and control arm bushings were installed.

[pdxhall]

Just as I was going strong, in November of '08 I was laid off from my job. I knew in order to be able to get another reasonable job in this lousy economy I was going to have to get in school and get a degree in something, so in January of 2009, at the young age of 56, I was enrolled in college. With all the homework and classes the truck had to pretty much go on hold again. I did have some money saved for truck stuff so I got the okay from the wife to go ahead and purchase a complete Grand Slam Kit from CPP which included 2 1/2" dropped spindles, front discs, 1" dropped springs, front and rear dropped shocks, and 5" dropped rear springs. But it was going to be very slow going on getting anything done for the next couple of years.
Finally in the spring of 2011 my class load was lessening as I was close to graduation so I was able to get started on the truck again. I started assembly of the front end parts. I hung the manual steering box back on but the plan was for power steering.

[pdxhall]

During last summer I was finally done with school so I got quite a bit accomplished. I decided on a name for the truck and this build thread. Through all the stress of unemployment, going to school, and still having trouble getting employment after I finished school, the thing that kept me grounded and kept me going was my ability to go out to the garage and work on the truck and forget everything else for a while. I feel the truck kept me sane (well as sane as I can claim to be ) so it is officially the Sanity66.
The next thing to do was get some wheels on Sanity and get her turned around in the garage to start on the rear end.

[pdxhall]

Bed and rear suspension removed. Cleaning things up.

[pdxhall]

Rear clean up and painting continued. I also bought and installed new 5 lug chrome moly axles from Dutchman Axles and new seals and gaskets for the rear end.

[LostMy65]

Originally Posted by pdxhall

Through all the stress of unemployment, going to school, and still having trouble getting employment after I finished school, the thing that kept me grounded and kept me going was my ability to go out to the garage and work on the truck and forget everything else for a while. I feel the truck kept me sane (well as sane as I can claim to be ) so it is officially the Sanity66.

Stress of my Father-in-Law in major accident and death of mother-in-law and all the crap that goes with it just about took me over the edge. That's when the search for my lost 65 began. I knew I needed an outlet. So I sympathize with the name you've chosen. Many in these forums have stated their truck is therapy.

Thanks for giving us a peek into your personal life.

[pdxhall]

Thanks guys. I was real happy that the weather cooperated so I could get the last of the frame painted. It was keeping me from moving forward with my plans so now that it's done I can finish brake lines, crossmember, etc. My plan for the summer is to get the cab floor finished so I can coat the bottom of the cab and set it back on the frame. That will give me more room in the garage to start body work and fitting fenders and panels.

[Doug19]

Looks good. What did you use to get rid of the rust and crude on the frame. Also what did you paint the frame with.

[pdxhall]

Originally Posted by Doug19

Looks good. What did you use to get rid of the rust and crude on the frame. Also what did you paint the frame with.

I just used wire wheels, stripping pads, and a lot of elbow grease. I used Fast Etch solution on the bare metal after that and in a couple of small, hard to get at areas I coated with Rust Converter. Then it was 2 coats each of Eastwoods Rust Encapsulator and Extreme Chassis Black satin. It seems to be very durable.

[pdxhall]

This pretty much brings me up to date on where I'm at on my build. The best news and the reason I thought I'd get a thread started is I finally got a job. Now I will have money again to put in to Sanity66 and get some much needed parts and supplies. I've got to get some patch panels; primer, paint, and some parts to finish the frame; and get busy. It will soon be warm enough up here to paint and that will help me get going again. The down side is also having a job will mean less time to commit. I'm not in a huge rush, though (too old for that), but will try to make progress and post pics as I do.
the last few pics are of my radiator support which was rotted on the bottom mount area like most are. I had had a hard time locating a good one on my unemployed budget and I've read the nightmare scenarios of the repops so I decided to practice my welding and see if I could repair it. Worst case is I would waste some time, gas, and wire and have to find another support anyway. I'm not done yet but here's the progress. I also picked up a power steering gear and pump so I'll be ordering an adapter plate from Captainfab very soon.

[65Gregg]

Looks great,glad to see you starting your build thread. And congrats on finishing school and getting back in the ranks of the employed!
Posted via Mobile Device

[pdxhall]

Originally Posted by 65Gregg

Looks great,glad to see you starting your build thread. And congrats on finishing school and getting back in the ranks of the employed!
Posted via Mobile Device

Originally Posted by jimmydean

Congrats on the job and the truck is making solid progress (I wish mine was )

Originally Posted by gostranger

wow nice clean truck looks great!!

Thanks guys! I just finished a 4 day, 12 hr. work week and now I have 4 days off. The weather is improving and I'm hoping to make some more progress.

[jimmydean]

Congrats on the job and the truck is making solid progress (I wish mine was )

[gostranger]

wow nice clean truck looks great!!

[chad64chevy]

pdx, glad to see you getting some work done, and made a build thread! i had to paint my frame the same way in stages, i now all about being laid off! i was laid off for 15 mths., thats when i got a lot done on my truck as well, started working again and progress has slowed down!! anyways nice work and keep it up!

[pdxhall]

Thanks Chad, the only bad thing is when you're laid off money is short but when you're working time is short. Oh well, just gotta do what you can.

[C@rnut001]

It is looking really good. Congrats on your new job and good luck on it working out well for you and your family. Great to see that you can do some more work to your truck.

[pdxhall]

Originally Posted by C@rnut001

It is looking really good. Congrats on your new job and good luck on it working out well for you and your family. Great to see that you can do some more work to your truck.

Thanks, man. It's a slow process but satisfying to see progress as it moves along.

[markeb01]

Thanks for starting the build thread. What a great looking original. It must have been fate that put it right in front of you like that. Nice to see so much progress in spite of everything that gets in the way. It’s good you had a plan. It’s easy to tear down too much all at once and then become completely overwhelmed when it sits in pieces for too long at a time.

A minor suggestion, you might want to check the positioning of your rear shocks. Unless they were designed to be installed this way, they may be upside down which will negate their effectiveness. In the old days before gas shocks, we used to “bleed” shocks before installing by turning them upside down and cycling the shock, then turning them over and doing it again several times until they became really stiff. In the upside down stroke the internal valves were designed to have almost no resistance at all. Although I suppose shock design could have changed since then.

Are you going to keep the original engine and transmission or make any modifications? And congratulations on the new job! Again thanks for sharing the pictures and the history of your truck. I’m sure there are more than a few of us that find working on these things therapeutic.

[pdxhall]

Thanks Mark. You know I didn't even think about that when installing the shocks. I am used to the ones that have the piston covered but after you mentioning it and thinking about it some more you might be right. I'll check it out.
I'm going to go with a fairly mild GM 350 crate engine and I'm still deciding on a trans. The trans is coming down to how much I have to spend when the time comes. I was determined at first to stay with a manual and getting 5 or 6 speed but lately I've been considering maybe going with a 700r4 auto. I've always went with the idea that a truck or hotrod needs to have a manual but I'm getting older and lazier and an automatic is starting to sound better.
Right now I have to concentrate on finishing up the painting on the frame so I can finish the brakes and run the brake lines, emergency brake cables, and the fuel lines. Then install my front sway bar and get an adapter from Captfab and install my power steering gear. In between all that I'll be starting some rust repair on the cab.

[pdxhall]

I don't have too much progress to report. I abandoned my radiator support repair because I picked up a great rust free one from Perro13 here on the site.
I welded some patches on a couple of small areas of rust-through under my passenger side fresh air vent cover and prepped the area to weld in the rust free vent cover that I got. And I started cleaning and stripping the driver side floor area and rocker to find out what patch panels I'm going to need to pick up. The outer rocker appears to be in great shape. I can probably get away with just some minor patching on it and it will be good. I'm going to remove it, though, to check the inner rocker and the floor section that needs to be replaced. Very little rust through on the floor here but a lot of pitting. My main area of repair on the driver side is the seam area at the floor to firewall junction and a couple of areas above this seam, and a small area in the corner of the floor to kick panel area. I'll try to get some pictures posted up tomorrow.

[pdxhall]

I removed the center crossmember today and cleaned up the last of the rust on the frame section that was under the crossmember. I gave the whole center section of frame rails a soak of fast etch, neutralized it, and then shot 2 coats of Eastwood's Rust Encaplulator. A couple of coats of Extreme Chassis Black Satin tomorrow and the frame painting is finally complete. I also ordered a new dropped center crossmember from CPP.

[CRGRS 66]

I am subscribed, and look forward to following your progress. Nice work!

[pdxhall]

Originally Posted by furrydice79

really nice progress dude, i too have a 66 LWB fleet, and I am just about to start the restoration, in fact if you see a red/orange chevy around Ptown it may be me!!
Posted via Mobile Device

I'll keep an eye out for you. Good luck on your restoration.

Originally Posted by CRGRS 66

I am subscribed, and look forward to following your progress. Nice work!

Thanks! My progress is sort of slow but thanks for the interest. I'll try to keep things moving forward.