The Green Machine - 1963 C50 field rescue

[Pick121]

Put a crowbar in the wallet and got Green Machine his own brand new battery. Then proceeded to forget to disconnect it and left connected overnight, came out to a DEAD truck. Charged up and back in business, but now remember to disconnect until I track down the draw.
Also cleared out the bed, it was full of dirt, growing weeds, and half-barrels full of leaves and stanky old rain water. Next I’ll remove the old rotten plywood

[Pick121]

Since I was moving the trucks anyway (installing new driveway) I thought it would be fun to park the C50 and the C10 next to each other for some comparison photos. The C10 is stock height/suspension. And, the drivers front on the C50 was low! I topped off after the photos

[LT7A]

Originally Posted by Pick121

Just a photo…more progress soon!

Great sunset photo, and cool seeing the two trucks together in the other photos. Obviously, they're related, haha. Don't hesitate to take a bunch of pictures of your cleanup efforts. I think a lot of us live vicariously and wish we had something that cool to put back into service.

[Pick121]

I haven’t had a lot of time to work on this big guy but I was sad looking at how dirty he was and with the weeds growing taller than the bumper so decided to pull him around and give him a wash & quick brush out & vacuum inside, and weed-whack the weeds in his parking spot. Green Machine was parked 20 years ago and who knows if he was ever even washed back then?
Here are some before & after shots

[Pick121]

With the bath I unfortunately found some roof rust I found on the forward corner, drivers side -assuming from the inside out due to the drip channel seam sealer all but gone. There are some barnacles on the hood that would not come off, I think I’ll try a green scotch pad on it, it’s going to get new paint some day anyway.
I am pretty sure this will not be the last of the rust I uncover!

[cwcarpenter98]

A bath definitely makes a difference! The interior looks a lot better too.

[Pick121]

I decided to do something easy, to start removing the cattle racks from the bed, the wood is all rotted out anyway. It looks like just a few bolts holding it on to the flat bed (photos 3&4) unless there’s a bunch of hidden welds somewhere. My plan is to eventually put a dump bed, or at least stake bed but the cattle racks have to go. It was cool to expose the big back window!

[Pick121]

Now I can wash the back of the cab

[cwcarpenter98]

Very common on the bigger trucks to have the rear cab wall all dented up. Looks like the cattle rack helped keep that from happening

[Pick121]

Yesterday I got the back ramp removed (HEAVY!) and cut out all the rotten wood with the Sawzall of Destruction. Funny how small my 30HP tractor is next to Big Green! Ok to all my real farming friends with real tractors, yes size does matter haha.
I also removed what I think are the 4 bolts holding this rack onto the flatbed-seems like “under-kill” when transporting a bunch of 1000+lb animals around in the back! I will see if it budges later this afternoon and I need to decide on a place to put it since it is heavy and I don’t think once it is off it will be moving very easily! They built this thing like a brick outhouse. I am thinking if nobody wants it, rather than scrap I can screw some sheet metal on top and park the quad under it, or wire it in for a chicken coop run, ?? Any other ideas?

[Pick121]

So, I was able to scientifically (HA) figure out why there were only 4 bolts holding this cattle rack on, I tried pulling it straight back with the tractor to slide the racks off the flat bed. Well, this did not work all it did was pull the whole truck! Turns out the designer of this monstrosity welded in some V-shaped pegs to set in the stake bed pockets that I did not know existed. I could lift the frame but it would not slide, that’s when I noticed the V pegs. It makes sense, that 4 bolts were not all that was holding this cage on the flatbed! So with some pry bar and cribbing action I got the pegs above the diamond plate and now it is separated and slides easily. Now I need to find a suitable location for this cage, since this truck is probably all I have that can move this thing! I do have a plan to get it off the flatbed once I decide its final resting place.

[cwcarpenter98]

Since you can stand up easily in it, I like the idea of a shed for your atv

[LT7A]

Good progress! For sure keep that framework unless somebody is willing to pay you well to take it off your hands. It is well built and has a cool look to it. I think it would make a great garden shed or even a greenhouse. Looks like it could even be the basis for a camper that you could put back on the truck when you wanted to. Skin it with aluminum with windows in some of the openings and you could totally camp in there, or have a mobile workshop.

[Pick121]

Quick update, found a guy to pay me for the cattle racks so I removed them and now have a flatbed. Plan is to either make some wood stake sides or, a dump bed. Before that happens - I will get the brakes working! Definitely looks smaller without the cattle racks but still a beast compared to my C10

[jumpsoffrock]

Awesome truck, super jealous of the tubeless rims.

[Pick121]

Originally Posted by jumpsoffrock

Awesome truck, super jealous of the tubeless rims.

Super lucky, When I bought the truck from my neighbor I had no idea the different possible rims-split rims, budds, etc I just ended up with these and lucked out

[Pick121]

Well, we are selling our 19 acre Ranch and now I need to find a place to store the Green Machine. This is actually good news, because I think I will be renting a space where I can keep it inside and work on it inside a shop. That being said I wonder if the group here is interested in following the build project? Or should I move it on over to the ‘60-66 page? Hence the poll. Thanks for your honest feedback gang
Latest progress is, I bought a couple ‘63 doors that look like better shape than what’s on it now.

[Pick121]

No progress to report except I scored a pair of awesome front bumper hooks. Saw a heavy hauler (1962 C60 asking $500!) on FB Marketplace and asked the guy if he would take $100 for the pair of hooks. He agreed and well, he said they would be off the truck when I got there but they were not. Foolishly I did NOT have proper tools or equipment to get them off. Went to local Home Despot (probably the only one on the planet that doesn’t have tool rental) and bought a Milwaukee angle grinder (I had a couple batteries for impact wrench) and some cutoff wheels With a lot of cutting and banging and they were removed from their resting place. I did leave some blood and knuckle skin behind, even with gloves on. Got lucky, the wheel slipped and went through the glove and partway through a nail-lucky not to lose tip of the thumb!
The heat from cutting the bolt heads off made the bolt basically weld into the hole in the hooks so that was the banging part, to get the hooks off the remaining bolts.Oh yea I also got the 2 super cool metal plates that were under the hooks to level them out with the bumper.

[Pick121]

Found a place to move the Green Machine, from my ex-neighbor’s field to my son’s field in Northern CA. It was a challenge loading it on the trailer solo and with no brakes but made it work. Heavily strapped down and took it slow, 55-60 mph max for 200+ miles. My 2020 Chevy 3500HD was a champ. Yep I’m a Chevy guy. The trailer, I rented from an app called Neighbors Trailer, I recommend it for renting any kind of trailer (flatbed, dump, horse, gooseneck, enclosed…really any trailer!) so you don’t have to own and store it yourself.
And finally, the progress on my thumb nail has been more productive than my progress on the truck, a month and a half grown out from previous grinder mishap.

[Pick121]

Now that Green Machine is settled in its new home, it’s a good time to rebuild the carb as it has been leaking a little fuel. Got carb (it’s a Rochester 2 barrel) removed and brought back to Tahoe where my parts cleaner resides. Unearthed the carb rebuild kit I have been storing for a number of years that i got from Mike’s Carbeuretor Parts more on the rebuild later