Green Gus the 68 shortbed convert

[rusty76]

Awesome work. Digging the wheels and color choice.

[SKT]

Originally Posted by rusty76

awesome work.

Digging the wheels and color choice.

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X2!

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[Bennett68C10]

Nice job on the wheels, love the deep dish on rears! I think you made the right choice on the white, matches the grill and bumpers nicely

[hewittca]

Yesterday was a big day for my build. After a few scheduling conflicts I've had to push back painting the sides; so, I finally decided to just put the truck back together because I've been anxious to see how it all fits. This was the first time I've had the short bed or wheels on the truck since shortening the frame.

Here it is after getting the sides back on and aligned. Since I had the bed mocked up before the frame was shortened, there really were no surprises here. The nice thing, however, was to see that the body lines matched up perfectly after shortening the frame 12" and raising it 2.5".




After taking in the first view of my truck as a shortbed for a few minutes, I moved on to the next step, bolting on the wheels! This was the part I was most worried about. I chose to go with a 4" backspace on a 9" wheel with the stock rearend, even though all recommendations I read were no less than 4.5". Since I removed the outer half of the inner fender, I figured I had the room so I went with 4" and it paid off! Even with that BS, I still have about 1" of clearance to the outer fender and have plenty of room to go lower if I want. It was almost comical seeing the difference in size between the new setup and the old setup, but after getting used to it for a few minutes it looked right.






All that was left was to bolt on the fronts and sit back and enjoy the view.





Of course, it still looks a little goofy because I don't have the stance where I want it yet. All four corners have been lowered about 2" thanks to heated springs by the PO and the rear has an additional 2.5" by raising the frame during the shortening process. Ideally, I'd like to swap out the springs to 4" rear and 3" fronts with 2" blocks in rear and 3" spindles up front. That will get it down to where the top of the wheel just meets the fender. That's a project for down the road though, so for now I'll just have to enjoy it like this.

[Bennett68C10]

[Graham57a]

So sweet!! Do you plan on running the clips for the hubcaps?

[hewittca]

Originally Posted by Graham57a

So sweet!! Do you plan on running the clips for the hubcaps?

I sure do, prsgtrman was kind enough to give me a good deal on an extra set he had. I do actually like the look without caps though, so I'm sure they will be off and on frequently.

[GR8-68]

Looks great Corey, mine has 3" 4" springs with 3" drop spindles and 2" drop blocks
I hope to have my front sitting on wheels tonight so I can see the true stance, really need the motor sitting in it though

[hewittca]

Originally Posted by GR8-68

Looks great Corey, mine has 3" 4" springs with 3" drop spindles and 2" drop blocks
I hope to have my front sitting on wheels tonight so I can see the true stance, really need the motor sitting in it though

I didn't realize that. What 3" spindles did you go with? I'm still undecided because I like the convenience of the 2.5" spindle/disk conversion kits but haven't found one that includes 3" spindles. Plus I need to keep it 6 lug so that also narrows my possibilities.

[GR8-68]

I actually have converted mine to square body spindles, they are actually 2.5" I did this so I could jump up to the heavier ball joint and heavier tie rods

http://www.ebay.com/itm/371137936487

[hewittca]

After being at my dad's house for three months, I was finally ready to test drive the truck and then bring it home this weekend! Before the test drive, however, we noticed the master cylinder was leaking pretty badly, so we replaced that and then it was good to go. This was also the first time I had the truck outside the garage with the bed on. With this better perspective, I noticed the bed was really misaligned and the front was much too high for my liking.




I had to lower the front some or else I would not be content until I was able to do drop spindles, so I ended up cutting one coil out of my front springs. The change was subtle but it brought the whole look together.




After that, I added the appropriate spacers to level out the bed and then took it for another test drive and everything felt great.




The next two things I need to do are start body work on the sides in preparation for paint, and mount my stock caps that came with the truck. The paint was flaking off quite a bit so I am going to repaint the caps in the stock '68 colors.



That's it for now.

[rusty76]

I like how you attach the hubcaps. Lol

[hewittca]

Originally Posted by rusty76

I like how you attach the hubcaps. Lol

I like to innovate. Not very effective at speed though.

[hewittca]

Since having the truck back at home, I've been working on a few small things at night, trying to work out a few bugs since doing the shortbed conversion. Surprisingly, the only "issue" I had as a result of the whole shortening process was a squeaky carrier bearing/bushing. One other aesthetic thing I wanted to take care of was the rear step bumper position. I kind of like this simple step bumper over the idea of replacing it with a sport bumper, but I never really liked how low it was. This became even more evident after raising the floor that opened up a gap below the tailgate.



So, after raising the frame 2.5", I thought instead of dropping the bumper to compensate for this, I would just raise the bumper up with the frame. Now the bumper is tucked up as high as it will go (without interfering with the tailgate operation). I think it looks much cleaner this way.



After taking care of the bumper, I had a chance to take it out for another drive and snap a few new photos. It's still not done yet but it's fun to take some pics, especially when my son is so excited to go out driving and play in the truck once we find a dirt road to stop on.

[1970Chevrolet]

Loving this truck. Can't wait to see the bed painted.

[GR8-68]

Looking great Corey, I bet it feels great to sit in the seat again

[Low Elco]

Great Job! I'm diggin' the look!

[rusty76]

Like it.

[hewittca]

Originally Posted by GR8-68

Looking great Corey, I bet it feels great to sit in the seat again

Definitely. Since I bought the truck less than a year ago, I've spent more time working on it than just enjoying driving it. That's ok though because I love having something to work on too.

[Bennett68C10]

Very nice, I do like the way the caps look on the wheels.

[hewittca]

I haven't had much time to work on the truck lately, so I wanted to throw together a few extra photos and info I haven't posted yet. This is just a quick look at the progression of my truck so far. When I bought my truck, the current owner only had the truck for several months and never even transferred the title to his name! He still had the title from the previous owner who had the truck since 2000. Since it was that title that I had to transfer to my name, I got the address of the previous previous owner and decided to look it up on Google maps. Since I didn't have any history on the truck, I was hoping I could at least get an older photo of it, and sure enough, there it was parked out front of his house! From the date of the photos, it appears the truck was sitting since at least 2007.




The guy I bought the truck from basically took it from the state above and cleaned it up, got it running, and put the 15x8s on it.



I liked the background of the previous photo so I'm trying to use that as my backdrop for all the progression photos from now on for consistency. Here is the truck in it's current state.



On the way home from taking the above photo, I ran across a cool spot to stop and take a few quick photos of the truck. This day, it was my daughter's turn to tag along in the truck and she was thrilled.





I am currently in the process of doing the body work on the bedsides and getting the hubcaps mounted. My goal is to have those steps done within the next month or so since I would like to have this stage completed before cruise in season starts.

[wolfsden]

Really digging how this build is going, you've done an incredible job so far!

[zicc1835]

https://sandiego.craigslist.org/nsd/pts/5996577550.html
take look at this

[1971 for fun]

Enjoying your thread, the pictures are great.

[hewittca]

Originally Posted by zicc1835

https://sandiego.craigslist.org/nsd/pts/5996577550.html
take look at this

That sure is a nice tailgate, too nice for my truck I think!