1968 GMC - Ol' Blue

[TA_C10]

Dang man, it's been a while since i have been on the forum, nice work!!! I really like that color of blue. Fantastic results on the truck. Ready to see it 100%, it's killer man.

[MDPotter]

I've been dreading stripping the hood, but I got through it and it's in epoxy primer now. Some blasters won't even touch these hoods since they're so easy to warp so I did the stripping myself. I used my Eastwood SCT tool with the grey stripping drum on the flat spots on the underside and the red drum on the topside and then went over everything with 80 grit on the DA. I spent a few hours with a siphon blaster getting all the edges and contours. Overall, a pretty time-consuming process but no warpage and basically free. I have to give the siphon blaster some credit, it did pretty well considering what it is. I found that fine sand worked the best. I finished with spraying two coats epoxy.

Also, the interior is as complete as it will be until I get Vintage Air.

I took the truck for its first drive with the bed on and it was a blast. Runs great, lots of power, just needs an alignment. I got back to the shop and temperature started climbing and the fans weren't coming on so I had to shut it off. I hate to shut it off at 230+, but couldn't figure out why the fans weren't coming on and didn't want to drive back down the gravel road at 10 MPH for half mile to get to pavement and get moving and risk temperature going up even more. Finally traced it back to the ignition trigger wire at the firewall bulkhead - the terminal wasn't fully seated in the connector and was not making contact. Pressed it back in and made sure it didn't want to come out. Glad it was an easy fix.

[MDPotter]

[Camaroguy]

Looks like you definitely beat us to the finish line. Beautiful truck, you should be proud.

[TA_C10]

It really does look fantastic, great job man. I'm glad the fan fix was easy! How do you like your seats now that your driving it more? It's hard to judge how high they are from pics. I want to go buckets too eventually and I'm pretty tall so it's gonna be tough picking seats. I will definitely go the used route Maybe a measurement from the roof to top of seat if you get a chance?

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[MDPotter]

Originally Posted by Camaroguy

Looks like you definitely beat us to the finish line. Beautiful truck, you should be proud.

Originally Posted by TA_C10

It really does look fantastic, great job man. I'm glad the fan fix was easy! How do you like your seats now that your driving it more? It's hard to judge how high they are from pics. I want to go buckets too eventually and I'm pretty tall so it's gonna be tough picking seats. I will definitely go the used route Maybe a measurement from the roof to top of seat if you get a chance?

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Thanks guys. Once I have the hood on, I want to clean it up and have some pictures taken. Nothing professional, but by someone who knows how to use a camera better than I do.

TA - yes, I will take some measurements for you this weekend. These 99-06 seats are getting hard to find in good shape, but you can get new leather or vinyl covers from The Seat Shop for a reasonable cost. For the next truck I'd like to find a sportier/slimmer set of seats to get more legroom. These seats are comfy, but they are bulky and aren't very sporty.

[MDPotter]

Did some filler work on the hood last night and shot a couple coats of epoxy. Should be able to finish sand and paint this weekend!

[MDPotter]

I was hoping to paint the hood this weekend but it wasn't ready, so another round of filler and blocking and more epoxy.

I also decided to black out my fender emblems. Red just doesn't fit in with the rest of the truck. The "1500 V-EIGHT" lettering was all faded so I went ahead and painted that block black as well. The letters don't show up well at all now, so I'm trying to think of a way to paint just the letters or I might have a sticker made that mentions LS or 6.0L or something custom.

[cornerstone]

Nice work Potter! The hood looks great. My hood will need the same treatment since I'll be doing a full color change. With so many things going on in my life now I can only dream of getting back to work on mine. Back to living vicariously through others...

[cornerstone]

Wow! Nice work on those emblems. What kind of paper did you use to mask off the chrome?

[MDPotter]

Originally Posted by cornerstone

Nice work Potter! The hood looks great. My hood will need the same treatment since I'll be doing a full color change. With so many things going on in my life now I can only dream of getting back to work on mine. Back to living vicariously through others...

I wouldn't be too envious, you're doing the honorable and right thing! I've been neglecting a few things so as soon as this truck is on the road I'll be taking some time to take care of stuff.

Originally Posted by cornerstone

Wow! Nice work on those emblems. What kind of paper did you use to mask off the chrome?

I used 3M precision masking tape over the whole thing and then used an xacto knife to cut out the areas for paint.

[1971Stepside]

Emblems look great...I like the idea of a 6.0 decal on them

[TA_C10]

Yeah they look great, and I like the 6.0 idea as well.

[MDPotter]

And the hood is painted. It's finally hit me that it's almost done. As usual, I forget to stop and take pictures.

Also got the emblems on which was a lot of work. The cheesy little nuts that are used to attach them didn't want to thread on, so we used a die to put actual threads on the studs and mount them with nylocs. My first attempt was to use 3M double-sided tape, but the way these emblems are molded there just isn't much flat area for adhesion. We ended up taking the inner fenders off and even then I could barely reach to get the nuts started. Lesson learned - apply the fender emblems before mounting the outer fender.

I've got a sway bar on the way and next weekend should be able to put that and the hood on and a few finishing touches and take it home.

[1971Stepside]

Nice selfie!

I'm sitting around so bored without my truck that I don't know if I want to finish it. Wife had me painting a dresser yesterday....I'm glad you have another project waiting on you.

[MDPotter]

Originally Posted by 1971Stepside

Nice selfie!

I'm sitting around so bored without my truck that I don't know if I want to finish it. Wife had me painting a dresser yesterday....I'm glad you have another project waiting on you.

The hood reinforcement strap creates a contour in the hood that makes my left leg look like I skip leg day...

Painting a dresser sounds like scraping the bottom of the barrel haha

[TA_C10]

Yeah buddy! Looking good man. And don't lie, we all miss leg day after a hard days work on the truck, but chest is never missed

[MDPotter]

I can finally say that this truck is complete. 100% done? No. But I've reached the point where I am now driving it and it is paying off. Saturday we put the hood and the trim on and finished a few minor details and I took it home. Last night me, my fiancee and the dog went for a cruise and it was great. It's been 14 months since I took it apart and now it's on the road and it's a blast to drive. My fiancee is scared to drive it, but she made a couple laps around a parking lot was instantly hooked. Now she understands all the time and money spent on it. This thing runs really well. It's got a little chop at idle like I wanted and the tuner did a good job. I made one pull where it broke loose a little bit when it grabbed 2nd gear (probably a function of the torque management being disabled).

So to everyone out there still working on theirs-keep going. I know it takes so long and that you get frustrated and life happens, but one day at a time and eventually it will be done and driving something you built will be awesome.

Of course there are a few things that are to be done:
-Alignment - will be done this week
-Rear end swap - I picked up a 12 bolt this weekend that I will convert to 5 lug and rebuild the brakes so I can buy the wheels I want and it is a wider rear end so I won't have to run wheel spacers. It might also have 4:11 gears which will help with acceleration since the 4L80 has such a tall 2nd gear and robs some power due to its weight.
-Wheels and tires (because what I have is way too small and boring)
-Vintage Air
-Some cutting and buffing (the hood didn't come out as smooth as I would like)

[TA_C10]

Dude the truck is sick

Happy for you man. It WAS worth the time and effort. Sheet metal is back off my truck again, but when I had it all on there I was taking it around the block and down a back road. It's so roudy it chirps second gear everytime. I love it.

So. I am curious. What do you think your truck is worth on the market now? I've been having this conversation quite a bit lately and I have been seeing trucks of our caliber going to for very high numbers.

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[Jason Banks]

Congratulations, It has been great and inspirational following along.

[1971Stepside]

Congratulations! I have loved watching your build and I am happy your better half understands...although, I thought you might post a pic of her driving and not the dog

Interested to see what kind of bugs you find. I'm second guessing every bolt on mine now that I am getting close to driving it. Time for triple check and check again because that is how I am.

[MDPotter]

Originally Posted by TA_C10

Dude the truck is sick

Happy for you man. It WAS worth the time and effort. Sheet metal is back off my truck again, but when I had it all on there I was taking it around the block and down a back road. It's so roudy it chirps second gear everytime. I love it.

So. I am curious. What do you think your truck is worth on the market now? I've been having this conversation quite a bit lately and I have been seeing trucks of our caliber going to for very high numbers.

.

Thanks! I guess I've always thought somewhere around $35k for my truck. If it were a coil rear end and with a newer/higher HP drivetrain and nicer interior, then I would think over $40k.

Originally Posted by Jason Banks

Congratulations, It has been great and inspirational following along.

Thanks for following along, hope it was helpful.

Originally Posted by 1971Stepside

Congratulations! I have loved watching your build and I am happy your better half understands...although, I thought you might post a pic of her driving and not the dog

Interested to see what kind of bugs you find. I'm second guessing every bolt on mine now that I am getting close to driving it. Time for triple check and check again because that is how I am.

Haha she hates getting her picture taken for some reason. She's better looking than me, but thinks I'm lying when I say that.

There are a few things I've noticed:
-I overfilled the tank and it puked a little on the floor. I guess I need to fill it to like 3/4 or something because I haven't had that happen all the other times I've driven it and it's never been over 1/2 tank until I filled it last night to the top.
-There are vibrations at certain RPM's that reverberate through the truck and manifest into different noises. One is the brake cable touching the muffler, the other is somewhere in the rear half of the bed/tailgate, but the third is one I can't identify.
-The primary fan is always running, even at speed. The tuner lowered the fan activation temps which I'm fine with, but I'm thinking about changing it so that they don't run when I'm over 45 MPH or so as I would think it would impede the cooling capabilities at that point.

I did a lot of checking before I drove it home-lug nuts, engine oil, trans fluid, coolant, brake fluid, differential oil, leaf spring u-bolts, leaks in lines, engine mounts, etc. and so far no real issues.

[clay68c10]

Man, that looks good! The blue is perfect.
I bet you want to drive it everywhere you go.

You can play with your HP tuners now too. That should be fun.

[Kronald_70GMC]

Thats a nice looking truck you've built! Man I can't wait till I'm where you are with mine.

[Snake72]

Congrats bud, that is a great looking truck, job well done.