1971 Frame Off Long/Fleet to Short/Stepside

[chad7757]

I am in the process of doing a frame off restoration of my 1971 C10. I bought the truck about 3 years ago and enjoyed driving it around for about a month.

It was a primer gray longbox fleetside still running the original 307 with manual 3 speed. It was fun to drive and my friend had me hyped up that at $2,300 it was too good a deal to pass up.

The column shift had been converted to a floor shift. The shifter was so sloppy that after just buying it and driving halfway home, I wasn't able to get it back from first to second and after winding out in way too low of a gear for too long, we finally made it home and replaced the worn out shifter.

The previous owner had heated up the springs to lower the stance, and lets just say it was a little too low a lot too rough.

Within a couple weeks I had replaced the intake manifold and changed to a Holley 4 bbl carb. Things were better, but not quite the look I was going for.

Quickly, I realized it needed much work and after figuring out many of the things that I wanted to be fixed, I started pulling it apart piece by piece, and here we are.

I have been using this board for a while now as the go to manual on my restoration.

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I have a construction background and I'm great with computers. Unfortunately, I am most definitely not good at either automotive or mechanics. But, I do have a friend who is helping me. I would still have this truck in a bunch of boxes in the barn if it wasn't for him.

Hopefully, I am going to be able to share some pictures and questions, and get some guidance and encouragement from those of you who have been down this road before.

Thanks for reading,

-Chad