Shawno72's long overdue 68 daily driver build thread

[shawno72]

Ok so I been on this forum for over 2 years now and have had several trucks. I have been asked a lot about a build thread so I will start by bringing this year and four month build up to date. I am not good at taking many pics of my work in progress but do try and take as many as I can remember.


First off let me start by telling you a little about myself. I love these old trucks it don't matter. I am the manager at the Lodi Midas and have a deal to buy the place within the next few years. Until then I have access to everything in the shop including the guys to help me with the hard stuff like rebuilding the suspension and running the exhaust. Other than that I do all the work myself and love it.

Ok enough about me lets get to the truck, here she was the day I bought her. I paid more than she was worth but considering the overall originalilty of her I was happy with the purchase. Part of the deal was the po had to replace the rockers, luckily he was a body and did a good job. I am the third owner with the second owner, the guy who I bought it from, buying it long enough to flip it. I have all the original paperwork and it was sold locally, Chase Chevorlet of Stockoton, so these were key factors in my purchase. Clean title black plates and completely farm fresh, the way I like to find them. According to the original owner the truck was originally a stepper but back in 1972 he took it back to Chase Chevrolet and said "I need a bigger bed", so the installed a fleetside and painted the truck white. Originally it was 514 red and I will eventually go back to that color, one of my favorites.

Pics

[shawno72]

The truck came with a knocking 292 and a four on the floor. I drove that 292 for over a year and sold it for $300.

[shawno72]

New rockers and the rest of the truck is virtually rust free except for the right front inner fender and radiator support.

[shawno72]

Here is on the alignment rack getting an alignment....well sort of. This is when I decided its gonna need some suspension and brake parts.

[shawno72]

Ok so I replaced all the brake shoes, wheel cylinders, brake hoses and resurfaced the drums. The front suspension got a complete overhaul with new ball joints, upper and lower control arm shafts and bushings with new idler and pitman arms. I also replaced the inner and outer tie rods. Check out the po's Niss@n muffler and chevelle rear springs, boing boing gone.

[HotRod C/10]

subscribing!

[shawno72]

One of the first things I had to do was replace the heater core and master cylinder. Now its nice and warm.

[shawno72]

The next thing was to loose the barden bumper and install some rear lowering blocks to compensate for weight lose. Chevelle springs weak and tired gave it a 2-4" drop.

[shawno72]

Next was a feeble attempt at waxing it and installing some "Custom" badges.

[shawno72]

The tires were shot to begin with so a friend of mine had a good set of tires, thing was they came with rims

[shawno72]

Next was my first CL score for this truck. A guy had a 67 cst camper special listed with a "special" bench seat. So I call him ask whats the deal with the seat and he says that its kinda like bucket seats but the center folds down. I say would you be interested in selling it seperate? He says no he would need like $400 for the seat to do that, so I offer him $200 and an old bench seat that I had left over from my 72, he says ok. So I show up and tell him man thats pretty rough so he immediately drops the price to $175. I said let me think about it and I leave. What a dummy I am, or at least thats what my wife says She said you better call him back and go get that thing. So I call him and he starts the conversation by saying give me $150 and its yours. I said deal but I want the cab brace as well so he agrees. Here is what I brought home for $150.

[shawno72]

More

[shawno72]

Luckily I have a guy who loves the Persimmons off the tree in my back yard. He is an outside sells rep for a powdercoating company and trades me for that nasty fruit. Not only do I not have to clean those things up when they fall, cause he's picking them, he does my parts in show quality finishes. Anyways I wish I had taken better pics of the frame but he powercoated the frame, the box and all the hardware for free I had a local guy do the recover for me for $300 flat and he does great work.

[shawno72]

Here are some pics he texted to me as he was working on them. A board member liked the design that I choose which was black vinyl and a tweed center so he made a set for him as well.

[shawno72]

More

[shawno72]

Here is how they looked when I picked them up

[sduckworth13]

Your seats looks awesome

[shawno72]

So with the help of my little helper I removed the tired bench seat and old faded red belts and installed some black belts with a center belt and my new buddy bucket seats.

[DesertCat]

Shawno! Finally a build thread! I'm in

[shawno72]

Much better don't you think?!

[shawno72]

Early on I had decided that I want to bag it so I got some photoshop inspiration thanks to a board member. Thank you Mayo.

[shawno72]

Next CL score was a brand new tri plus chrome front bumper for $80. I then toyed with the idea of removing the front trim but have since decided to keep and glad I did. Since my old trim was bit tired I got a nice hood trim piece from board member Tooter, thanks Tooter! I was able to find a very nice oem d/s eyebrow at the Turlock swap for $7 and bought a NOS p/s eyebrow off eBay from CPP for $14.

[shawno72]

Next was to install a headlight relay upgrade kit and a CPP adjustable track bar kit.

[shawno72]

Now that I had new brakes all the way around it was time for a brake booster, and it was free from the same guy who gave me the rally wheels, thank you Steve. Next was a new rear chrome bumper off of eBay. Oh and the tailgate I got at the local A&W swap meet for $10, actually I got two for $20 and both were driver quality.

[shawno72]

Next I did the GMCPauls idiot light to gauge upgrade and I must say it was quite easy to do. The cluster I got from board member otsenre. It was in great original shape and the needles weren't even faded. I also had my mom paint the license plates since they were dated as well. Eventually I'll have Rene's wife (C/10 King) repaint them so the colors are spot on.