1966 C10 Project Truck

[outfield]

Just put a few bucks of gas in it every time you drive it Scott, then once in a while it will be full... I did that with my old Chevy when the gas gauge did not work!

Dad

Originally Posted by scoot_mcgrute

Thanks!

The rescue truck is my dad's 69 K20. He bought it a few months ago, I may be to blame , and it was a local airport crew truck. I think he's at 36,000 miles on it now. It's all original and an awesome pickup!



I've been having so much fun driving this old pickup! I really need to figure out the gas gauge but for now I'll just make a note to fill it up

[scoot_mcgrute]

After putting a bunch of miles on it since Friday, I gotta say that I'm really pleased with the truck! There isn't anything that I would change right away but there are a couple things that I would've done differently during the build if I were to do it again. Things like ordering a disc brake kit with drop spindles instead of stock spindles and looking at the No Limit stuff a bit more.

I still have a couple things to get done, mount the steps and clean and paint the tailgate but I love driving this thing and can't wait for its first autocross, it's going to be a blast!

[scoot_mcgrute]

Just a quick update. Still no major problems with the pickup which has been great! I still need to go through the rear suspension and check all the bolts but the truck still feels very solid when I drive it. The factory steering wheel is quite large as well but it's ok for now.

I had a little fuel issue pop up when it would get hot outside, it started idling rough but was fine off idle. I am thinking that it's trying to vapor lock but it would never die on me. On Sunday, I was at my parents place for a retirement party for one of their neighbors and a couple of the neighbor kids wanted rides. When we got back from the 2nd ride, dad popped the hood to show off under the hood and while I was talking about it I noticed a slight fuel leak around the filter. Probably shouldn't run the plastic fuel filter above the intake/exhaust manifold .

I'm going to re-do the fuel line and put the filter right off the pump and also add a heat wrap over the fuel line from the filter to the carb. Hopefully that calms the vapor lock down a bit too.

I'm hoping to hit an autocross or 2 with it this summer, should be a fun time!

[scoot_mcgrute]

I'm still tinkering on it here and there but nothing real "post-worthy".

I've been having an idle issue where it gets real grumpy if it idles for a while like in a busy drive thru or long light, etc. I thought it was starting to vapor lock so I rebuilt the fuel line, moved the filter so it was right off the fuel pump and then heat sleeved the line. It was better but still getting grumpy. I started researching grounding straps and found that HEI isn't real happy without a good ground. Last night, I added 3 ground straps, one from the motor to each frame rail, and then one from the frame to the cab. Seems to be better now but the drive home will tell more.

I also cleaned the steps up and bolted them on last night. What a difference that made! Here it is "done"

[outfield]

Looks Good!

[scoot_mcgrute]

I'm starting to stage 1.5 of the truck. I really wanted to do a bunch of work to the suspension and an LS swap this year but it's not really in the cards. It'll have coilovers before too long but for now, I'll be swapping the 2/3 drop out for a 5.5/7 drop. Springs and spindles up front and springs and blocks out back with a front shock relocation bracket and outboarding the rear shocks. I'll also be playing with the rear track bar to get the roll center down a bit to increase it's stability. It'll be on an autocross course this year too

Good things come in brown trucks

[scoot_mcgrute]

Big weekend for this old pickup! Saturday morning, we started out lowering the truck more. It had a 2/3 drop in it and looked good but I wanted it lower. I opted for a 5.5/7 drop from CPP. The front is 3" springs with their modular 2.5" drop spindles and the rear is 5" springs with 2" blocks. It went together mostly without a hitch, it was sure nice only being in there a few miles ago

My buddy let us use his lift, it was so nice working on this thing not on the ground.


About an hour later, we had the front done






The rear challenged us a bit more, we had a burr on one of the u-bolts that hung us up but luckily it was low enough on the threads that we cut the bad part out and used the stock nuts. I also had to relocate my sway bar from on top of the axle to below the axle. Nothing major.


Had to cut the hitch off, it would have drug on everything


Tucking tire at full droop. Perfect!


Something that I saw when I put the truck together but never paid attention to was my passenger rear fender. It had been rubbed on something and pushed in pretty far. A little work with a piece of tube and it's mostly good as new.


Here it is, 4 hours after we started. It looks so much better and still rides ok with the factory shock mounts. I'll have no limit rear shock mounts on it and a relocation kit for the upper mount on the front shocks soon




Here's the part that I'm still in shock about. I came back by in the evening and my buddy that I've been helping on car/truck projects in the last year had a surprise for me. He picked me up a 2002 5.3 with about 160,000 miles on it and a few other things I wanted when I do the swap. It'll have a car intake on it, bigger injectors, etc. Should be pretty rowdy! There's a big C10 meet a few hours North of me in May so I'll have the truck back together for that. Time to get busy


Keep an eye on the thread in the coming months to check out my progress

[TJ's Chevy]

Drop looks great, Nice 5.3. Outta haul that thing perrty well and get decent mileage to.