1978 Russet Metallic 4x4

[buffydores]

I've been lurking for awhile and, through the help of some good folks on this board, gathering hard to find parts. I wanted to share a few interior photos of the project with some explanation.

This is my Dad's 1978 K5 Blazer he bought brand new from Nehls Chevrolet in Marshall, TX. He needed a good truck to run around oilfield roads to check on the family's gas and oil wells. It's also the vehicle my brother and I learned to drive in. Dad hasn't driven it much over the past 20 years because it wasn't dependable anymore and it rode like poopoo. That's where I come in. We installed a Ramjet 350 in it about 10 years back. Now we're really gonna line it out. We're adding Offroad Design suspension components, restoring the interior to awesome and adding new paint.

In the mid 90's he sent it over to a conversion van outfit over in Shreveport where they unsurprisingly made it look like a conversion van: super plush velour, high gloss woodtrim accents and shag looking carpet. It was new feeling, but they removed the center console in favor of a combo bench. They eliminated the flip-up passenger bucket and the ability to access the rear bench easily. It just was wrong ultimately. I wanted to restore the vehicle to 1978 like condition. But I also wanted to pick and choose pieces from adjacent years that spruced up the vehicle (like the mid-70s woodgrain stuff).

Let's get started. Here's some woodgrain stuff.









Getting the carpet down.



The truck originally came with the mandarin orange vinyl. The '77/'78 interiors came in blue, red, buckskin and mandarin. The first three had a custom cloth option, the mandarin did not. All you could get was the custom vinyl, I suspect, due to the low take rate of the mandarin interior. In fact, mandarin was only available for two years.



I had one of the storehouses send me some pictures and samples.





What I suspect is that the 7438 was designed to work for both the buckskin and the mandarin interiors. It just never was delivered in that combination. Well.......I fixed that. I'll provide updates as they come.