My Dusty 71 GMCe Electruck

[Gregski]

they comes in blue and red (very patriotic) and have really easy to install and work with brackets / pedestals

Note: every 2 years or so the General likes to make little mods to them so try to get a pair born closely together, some differences are obvious like them adding head rests, but some are hidden like some will fold down but others won't I think I did a separate thread on that cause it was driving me crazy why one of my pair would collapse and the other would not

CAUTION: though they have a zipper on the back do not be fooled, the General played a trick on us and glued the front to the foam, it can be gently removed but that's why the reupholstery costs so darn much as they have to add foam and reshape them a bit

[Gregski]

hope that gives some of youz sum idears and here's what they look like done did! (brand new in the pic as I just picked them up from the shop, they will shrink up nice n tight over time)

here you can see the other newer style with the headrest (the one on the right (90-91 ?) never had a head rest, I prefer those cause they let me wear my cowboy hat in the truck, I'm not sure how easily you can delete it)

[Gregski]

I recall having an issue with the ignition switch, so I replaced it and it's plug

[Gregski]

it appears someone mounted a 3rd gen power steering pump instead of the 2nd gen and it sent us down the pulley alignment rabbit hole right quick

[Gregski]

so we learned about the Gen 2 vs the Gen 3 bottle necks

[Gregski]

and we were fortunate to source the right 2nd Gen power steering pump, bracket, and pulley

[Gregski]

but that was only half the battle as now we had to replace the crank pulley to match, I'm the sorta guy that if I aint gonna run AC I don't want the extra groves on the spinny thing, know what I'm sayin'?

[Gregski]

folks I assure you that mum actually wrenched on this truck right along with me, and this is not a click bait thread, I would remove the driver side valve cover, and I would have her remove the other side type of thing, I would remove one wheel to do the brakes, and she would do the other side, we are still missing some pics (we have sent the failed hard drive to a lab for repair - fingers and toes crossed)

here we see the engine crudely put together for a first fire up, I love those Ram Horn exhaust manifolds! 20 extra horse power on looks alone, am I right?

We don't need no stinkin' wheel wells! ha ha

[Gregski]

and here's the more civilized engine bay (God I love this little truck!)

Notice how the Alternator switched sides, ha ha that's one of the GM fun games they like to play, long (newer style) water pump means alternator on the passenger side (bolted to the water pump), short (older style) water pump means Alternator on the driver's side bolted to the cylinder head. Goodness I hope I got that right!

by the way I hate it when accessories depend and bolt up to other accessories, such as the alternator bolting up to the newer water pump, I think they also do that with the power steering pump bolting up to the driver side exhaust manifold, STOP IT ! hee hee

[68Gold/white]

Job well done on the Christmas lights!!
The most common later pickup seat swap I’ve seen is using a 88 and newer bench seat. The seats you have are a generation newer(I don’t know when they changed).
A friend of mine has one of those engines in the 71 he just bought, they are very good engines!!
Carry on!!!
It’s great to see what and how you’ve done!!!

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by 68Gold/white

Job well done on the Christmas lights!!
The most common later pickup seat swap I’ve seen is using a 88 and newer bench seat. The seats you have are a generation newer(I don’t know when they changed).
A friend of mine has one of those engines in the 71 he just bought, they are very good engines!!
Carry on!!!
It’s great to see what and how you’ve done!!!

Thank, you I think I saw that engine in another 71 on the InterWebs too so maybe that is native to the truck and what originally came with it, I say that because I thought it was a crate motor put in later!?

[Gregski]

so I went through my notes and confirmed that I bought the truck in April of 2017 and six months later in October it was running and driving

here it is out of the garage under it's own power, I remember mom and I took it around the block for the first time with huge silly grins on our faces, everything rattled, everything squeaked, there was a funny smell, but we didn't care

[Gregski]

I don't know what happens to tailgates with these trucks, are they in the same black hole as all my 10mm sockets? is there some dude with like a 100 of them in his barn in every county?

anywho this truck needed one and I bought one in really good nick, it must have been good I paid $300 for it (mostly cause it said GMC on it cause I'm an idiot and my OCD wouldn't allow for anything else)

well I am going to use this post as a place holder for when I find the pics, so I can show you how much bondo we chisled off of it when we suspected it was unusually heavy ha ha

[Gregski]

once the bondo was chisled and wired wheeled off, we saw a huge dent on the inside of it, the size of a cannon ball

now it is said these trucks built America, so their bed construction is no joke, you ain't gonna pull them dents out with a slide hammer (unless you're Thor of course) and you can't hammer it out from the other side cause of the double walled construction, so...

Note the different looking yard/house, yup we moved 4 times during the ownership of this truck (don't ask, ha ha) the landlords kept selling their rental homes, we used to joke, "want your house sold, rent it to us!"

[Gregski]

alright now this next set of pics is sometime in the future (how do I know, well, yet a different house, we got tired of moving so we bought this one, and yes all 4 homes were within .5 miles of each other, Halloween was a riot, kids trick or treating were like WTH weren't you just in that house over there, ha ha)

check out that tail gate, straight as an arrow, honestly I don't even know how you get an elephant to fit in the bed of that truck, let alone use the tailgate as a step to get up there

we welcome any tailgate straightning advice, I'm thinking lift the front wheel of the truck and put it under and let the weight of the truck flatten it out, maybe put a 2x6 between the wheel and the metal to spread the pressure ???

[Gregski]

decided to repairinate the battery tray next

[Gregski]

after wire wheeling all the rust off, then using Phosphoric acid on it, we painted it and we think it turned out OK

[Gregski]

after cleaning out the petrol tank we shoved a new sending unit in it

[Gregski]

and that may have been the last thing we did at mums house before making the 13 Mile Pilgrimage to my house (grinning all the way there) such a great little truck, so thankful to my buddy Al for letting me have it

Apologies for the messy garage, we've only been in this house for 4 months or so when this pic was taken, and having setup shop in 4 garages in the last 6 years or so I wasn't motivated to do it again, (although eventually I done did)

I LOVE THIS PIC!

[Gregski]

and here's a close up and a bit of a profile pic

Note: this garage is weird, yes it is a two car, but notice when facing it, there is no 2' space on the left the door is flush with the wall, then you get like 8 feet offset on the right, I learned this the hard way after starting to mount my fluorescent lighting on the ceiling, and they were off center, ha ha

[Gregski]

I think these are the Cooper Cobras, my daddy taught me the art of buying two tires at a time as we was poor growing up, so we would mount the new ones on the front and move the front ones to the rear, any of youz familiar to that game?

[dagnabbitt]

Those seats sure turned out well, I have a similar set in my 72 GMC, I like the firmness of the foam they used in those years. Is that a cover that is available to buy, or did your upholsterer make it from scratch?

Great job on the truck, its coming together nicely.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by dagnabbitt

Those seats sure turned out nice. Is that a cover that is available to buy, or did your upholsterer make it from scratch?

thank you so much, unfortunately they are not available as a cover, I did so much research and had so much help on my '54 build thread hoping I could just find some covers but no dice, so I took these in to a shop and the best deal I could get was $600 per seat to cover them with black leather hide and gray stitching, I think they turned out great, will be taking another set in soon for this truck, just so you know uphoslterers take forever, and I got quotes as high as $3,600 yes just for these two seats, so please shop around

[LT7A]

Glad to see Dusty get some air time! Those seats turned out really nice.it's come a long way since you bought it and would be cool to drive as is. I look forward to see what you've got in mind next.

[Gregski]

Originally Posted by LT7A

Glad to see Dusty get some air time! Those seats turned out really nice.it's come a long way since you bought it and would be cool to drive as is. I look forward to see what you got in mind next.

Thank you North Man, this is the truck I offered to sell to you by the way?!