Winter Beater Build 2.0- '66 Short/Fleet BBW

[theastronaut]

Remember that time back in 2013 when I bought a second '66 truck to drive while the first '66 was apart? This is going to be a rerun of that, except I'm not planning on selling this one.

Ever since I've been into C10s dad has mentioned that he knew a guy that bought a blue and white '66 new and still had it. Dad had occasionally asked if it could be bought but the guy never wanted to sell it. That guy passed away about ten years ago and not long after his wife asked us about restoring the truck, but she wasn't expecting a full restoration to cost so much. She let a neighbor take the truck to get it running and redo the brakes to make it driveable again but he never did anything to it. I had kept up with the truck up until 2018, then it went missing from the neighbor's yard.

Fast forward to last December, I went down a road that I hadn't been on in awhile to avoid Main Street, which had developed a ton of potholes from all the rain we had last fall. I spotted a blue 60-66 bed corner barely sticking out from beside a building on a side road so I made a U turn and went back to check it out and it turned out to be the same '66. No one seemed to be home that day so I started checking back every few days until I caught the owner out in his yard. At first he said he didn't want to sell it but the more we talked we figured out that he had been to our shop for glass work in the past, so then he seemed to be more comfortable about talking to me about the truck. I showed him pics of the other C10s I've had, he talked about his other cars, I ended up staying there probably thirty minutes. Before I left I made an offer and left my number in case he ever changed his mind, and this week I got the call saying that he was ready to sell it.


This was it back in 2018 before it went missing from the neighbor's yard. I had friends that lived in that neighborhood back then so I would see it often.




The spot it was sitting when I found it in December. Since it was between those buildings only the very corner of the bed was barely visible from the main road. As much as I complain about how bad our roads are, SC DOT's slack road maintenance on Main Street gets credit for me taking a different route and finding the truck again




As found, after loading it. He had a set of 8" truck rally wheels and new tires that went with the truck and had already mounted two on the front to replace the old flat tires.




Back at the shop I immediately swapped a couple tires on the original rims and mounted them to rid it of the rally wheels.- I can't stand those things











Digging into it I found the original owners manual, protection plan booklet with protect-o-plate, the SPID, plastic storage sleeve, and old receipts and registration cards. It was registered up until 2000. The engine was rebuilt in 1990 and driven another 13,000 miles before being parked. It's pretty much original everywhere except for a repaint, seat cover, and it had a steel bed floor welded in.















Short term plans are to redo the brakes, fuel system, cooling system, and install a bed floor kit replace the steel floor. Pretty much just do whats needed to make it reliable and drive it as is for now. I'd like to get all that done in time to take it to Run to the Sun in March. After that I'll copy the suspension setup I used on the first winter beater '66, except I'll use air bags in the rear for added load capacity and add CPP 500 series power steering. Long term plans are still pretty simple, I don't want to do anything irreversible. Right now I'm thinking (*subject to change ) A/C, swap in taller rear gears, add a tach, hidden hitch, rebuild/lump port a spare cylinder head, Aussiespeed four barrel intake, Sniper efi, 6-1 header, and a small turbo that spools at low rpm. Basically build it into something that is more comfortable than our '79 C30 flatbed for light duty towing. I already have a set of old aftermarket chrome reverse wheels like I used on the last blue '66, but I'm also looking into 17" or 18" four slot/hubcap wheels and Diamondback Radial thin whitewalls.



I pulled all the drums off today to disassemble the fronts and adjust the rears in make it roll easier, the left front was starting to get sticky. The rear self adjusters were still free and easily adjusted.