"Mossback" 1969 C20 Project Truck

[PileDriver]

Howdy. I'm new to the forum and would like to document progress on my latest project - a 1969 Chevy C20, 350, AT, long bed.

Last month, one of my local car buddies (Brett), passed away suddenly. To complicate things even more, his family was in the process of moving to Pennsylvania from Washington. His wife and daughter had already relocated so the daughter could start school while he took care of preparing the house and property to sell.

His wife has had to come back and take care of things as quickly as possible. Brett's best friend of 40 years (another car guy) has been taking care of the selling Brett's other vehicles. This included a 1970 Cougar (very rough), a 1971 Impala (even more rough), the 69 Chevy C20, a Chevy work van, and a running 1990 Ford F250. They were only able to find titles for the C20 and F250. I offered to buy the C20 to help out. It doesn't run, and I don't why it was parked. But, SBCs aren't too difficult to wrestle into submission, so I hope this won't be too difficult to make into a running vehicle. The body has patina which is en vogue right now. The floorboards are rusted out though, so I'll have to address that too.

However, nothing will be happening fast. The current government shutdown and lack of paychecks until the government reopens kinda puts a damper on everything. Brightside though - we are essential and will continue to work through the shutdown, so we are guaranteed to get back pay once DC decides to open shop again.

[PileDriver]

Here are a few photos of the truck when I first saw it at Brett's house.







The little cooler in the cab was full of unopened cans of Coca-Cola - that were advertising the 2012 Olympic Games in London. The license plate registration expired in 2013. I'm guessing it was parked in sometime in 2012.

The camper shell had a carpet of moss growing on top (hence the name "Mossback")

[PileDriver]

Two weeks ago, my parents were visiting, and Dad helped my pick up the truck and trailer it home. We placed it in the metal car port which displaced my wife's Suburban (a risky maneuver).

On Saturday morning, a young man and his father came over from Renton and took the camper shell off the truck. We connected through one of the generic Chevy truck Facebook groups. I had stated my plan was to get rid of the camper shell, and many people began to comment saying there were collectors and suggested I reach out to that community. This young man contacted me directly from that original post and asked if he could have it. I of course said, 'yes', and made arrangements for Saturday.

I'm happy to be rid of it, and he was happy to have it. Of course, it changes the look of the vehicle.

Here is some before and after...

[D.B]

Welcome to the forum. Nice truck and with or without the camper I think your truck looks cool.

[CG]

Great project. I dont blame the fella for being happy with the canopy, its a great model. I would have taken it and I dont even have a truck it would fit on.

[custom10nut]

My GOD that’s BEAUTIFUL!
Love the natural Patina.
Scrub it down, maybe a Clearcoat, and drive it
BTW, welcome to the board.

[PileDriver]

Originally Posted by D.B

Welcome to the forum. Nice truck and with or without the camper I think your truck looks cool.

Thanks, D.B.!

Originally Posted by CG

Great project. I dont blame the fella for being happy with the canopy, its a great model. I would have taken it and I dont even have a truck it would fit on.

CG, the camper shell did have a certain charm. However, it was going to need some serious work and the truck is already going to need more attention than I should be allocating to another project.

Originally Posted by custom10nut

My GOD that’s BEAUTIFUL!
Love the natural Patina.
Scrub it down, maybe a Clearcoat, and drive it
BTW, welcome to the board.

custom10nut, my plan is to preserve/lock in the patina ...but that will happen after I can get it running reliably.

[PileDriver]

So I've dug into the truck a little this weekend.

There is no SPID in the glove box, so it's pedigree will be a mystery for now. I'll eventually pull the bench seat out when I start cleaning the truck and see if anything is hidden there.

As for the engine compartment, I couldn't get the engine to rotate over by pushing on the fan belt and rotating the fan.

I pulled the spark plugs and discovered the first major issue... The #5 spark plug had been cross-threaded and forced in anyway.


I still couldn't get the engine to roll over, so I yanked off the fan and fan shroud then put a breaker bar on the crank. Voilà! It broke free and then rotated pretty easily.


That's about as far as I've got. I'm going to borrow a spark plug thread chaser and see if that will fix the #5 hole.