1967 Custom Sport Shop Truck

[67ChevyRedneck]

I can't say it wasn't without incident though. The back was a bit of a nightmare. Those rear springs liked where they were! I hit this bolt with everything I had (including a pretty powerful impact) and it wouldn't budge. After trying for a long time to get it off, I even tried over tightening it to snap it... nada... and I saw why when it finally came out. Funny thing is that there is nothing more than surface rust anywhere on the frame.

The spring cup was a casualty of getting the bolt out, but I think I was able to save it.

[67ChevyRedneck]

Then came the real difference.

[67ChevyRedneck]

I got the nose set down Monday Night and was able to get a couple pics before it got completely dark.

The front was soooooooooooooooooooooooo much easier... well, it was... (see further down).

[slowcpe]

I somehow missed the lettering posts, but looks good. I like it

Wheels and drop looks good too!

[67ChevyRedneck]

I took some better pics the next morning.

I thought that I had ordered a 3.5/5 drop. Maybe I didn't. It was 2 years ago, but it looks more like I got a 4.5/6 drop. Nope, forgot to do "before" measurements. I really didn't think the truck would go down as much because the springs are almost 50 years old.

I used all ECE stuff. I didn't mess with the rear shock mounts. I have a blazer tank back there and with as long as it took to get the springs out, I'm not messing with those rivets. I have a local shop that should be able to help me out with removing those cheap... I hope...

[67ChevyRedneck]

Like I mentioned... I had to take a step back.

I rebuilt the front suspension in 2006 using all good MOOG stuff, however, I didn't rebuild the control arm bushings (I didn't know how or have the stuff to do it back then). When I pulled the DS the control arms had a tiny bit of side to side wiggle. I was going to throw it back together and rebuild it over the winter. The upper ball joint was torn, but still tight so I could just stuff it back with grease. Then I got to the PS. The control arms had a tad more wiggle than the dS, but the lower ball joint had damaged threads. I never hit it with the hammer, but it got stuck on the end... I had to put a pair of vice grips on the bottom side to get it out...

So I went ahead and stripped the truck Tuesday night and ordered all the parts. Hope to have it back together by Sunday night (will be at football game all day Saturday.)

I'm at a point in my life where I have slightly more money than time, so rather than clean up my nasty control arms and redo all the bushings (which I'm not confident in doing) I ordered new control arms with the bushings installed. I have a press to do the LCA ball joint. The LCA's arrived last night, and I must say, I'm very impressed with the weight/quality of them.

[67ChevyRedneck]

Originally Posted by slowcpe

I somehow missed the lettering posts, but looks good. I like it

Wheels and drop looks good too!

Thanks! I think the FB page takes a lot away from the actual site. And it annoys me because I can't post or reply to anything on there because my phone blows up with updates.

[raggedjim]

Truck really looks great. I like the steppers, are still planning on a fleetside bed?

Good luck, Rg

[michael bustamante]

i have a couple of rear spring cups if you need em. just cover ship

[67ChevyRedneck]

Originally Posted by raggedjim

Truck really looks great. I like the steppers, are still planning on a fleetside bed?

Good luck, Rg

Yes. This was more of a "I can't stand that my truck looks like ass, but is kinda nice, but not really, and I really want to do something about it" project, because in all honesty, it will probably not get the fleet bed for a year or two more. You can see the fleet bedside laying against the firebird in one of the pics. After I get this done, I have a camper trailer I'm cleaning up to sell, then I'm pulling the FB out of the garage to do the wire harness and motor swap in the C10.

That, and if I liked it, it's going to make it into the final paint scheme (same as now, but more like the original medium blue on the 67/68's). The answer is Yes, this is absolutely going back on the truck.

Michael, thank you! PM sent.

[Advanced Design]

Just went through your build. I love the shop truck look! Character. Tagging along for whatever is next.

[darkhorse970]

I have always liked this truck! The changes you are making certainly give it a a cool Shop Truck feel.

[67ChevyRedneck]

I really dig it too!

Played with another wheel option today. I think I like this one. I painted the center bowtie red.

I wasn't going to stay with these wheels (I have everything to swap to a 5 lug, including a complete 72 rear axle) so I wasn't going to buy new tires... but I may put a new set on and roll with these for a couple more years. The tires make me a bit nervous, they're from 2006 and have been outside in the SC sun 24/7 the past 9+ years.

I also got all of the control arms "built" today. I have a press but the lower ball joint kept popping sideways on me, so I went to O'Reillys and rented the correct ball joint tool. Very awesome! Had each side done in about 15 minutes each. I screwed with one of them for over an hour on my press... trying to stack stuff...

[67ChevyRedneck]

More steps back again today...

I've know this was here for a while, but it was a lot worse than I thought!

I found another 6 or 7 holes after I stripped more of the paint off the bottom, but it's all good now. I'm adding CST nose trim and plan to paint the nose white, so I put the trim on and marked as high as I could to with the repair and stayed below it. I drilled out the weak spots to good metal and welded the holes shut.

I have a near perfect original paint hood saved for this truck, but that's for the next phase. This one will do for now, but if I were to keep it, it needs that whole section cut out and replaced!

[67ChevyRedneck]

I did make some actual progress. There was finally enough time where it didn't rain every night to epoxy the drip rail and get the first bead of sealant in there. I was just trying to fill the metal gap/overlap this time around.

[67ChevyRedneck]

Man, do I love my pressure washer! Why did I wait sooooooooooooo long to buy one? I had the whole suspension area cleaned up along with doing a little under the hood, in like 30 minutes. Back in the day I would have spent hours with a wire wheel and brake clean! I didn't take a "before" pic but it was nasty... like in my parts pile pic. What's sad is that this was a full rebuild/repaint like 10 years ago. Considering the cheap 99 cent krylon paint I used, it's actually held up OK. I used a lot better stuff this time around, including hitting the new bare areas with epoxy after cleaning.

[67ChevyRedneck]

I got all the control arms painted and ready to go on the truck. The spindles are ready too. Problem is, it gets dark now at like 7:45 and I'm losing light everyday! I don't get home from work until 6:30 :/

I'm ready to put stuff back on!

I plan on cleaning up the rest of the frame and tie rods, etc, when I do the motor swap. I don't have the time to clean those up right now. Tie rod ends are still tight so I'm reusing all of them.

[67ChevyRedneck]

Made some more progress on the front suspension last night. Everything is painted and ready to go back together. I got the PS mostly done and hit a little snag... I was putting the dust shields back on and somehow snapped off one of the bolts. It didn't even go down that hard, just felt like there was a little too much paint on the threads, then the head just snapped off.

It has to come out. Of course it snapped flush with the spindle. I can't install the dust shield without it. Probably have to waste half a day getting it out, tapping it, and getting another correct bolt. Fun fun... I was so pissed I quit and went in the house and didn't put the DS together.

[67ChevyRedneck]

What a terrible weekend. It started raining on Thursday and still hasn't stopped. It has literally been raining/misting/or just dreary (then rain 10 minutes later.)

I managed to make piddly progress on the truck.

I broke one of the dust shield bolts off in my brand new spindles. What a pain in the ass that was. 4+ hours, about $20+, a broken extractor, new larger and tapped hole later I had my shield back on the PS. That was frustrating. The bolt I broke didn't even feel like it was going in hard, it just got close to down and snapped. It just felt a little tighter to turn, but not bad, like I had too much paint in the hole.

I also didn't know you had to trim a good chunk out of the dust shields with drop spindles.... now I know.

[67ChevyRedneck]

I got the DS done. It's ready for the brakes to be bled.

I couldn't get grease into any of the new upper or lower control arm brackets bushings. I've read from searching on this forum that it's a common issue with brand new bushings ("bushings" are really just metal caps around shaft, so the grease is really just to reduce wear on the threads as they go up and down about 10 billion times over the life of the truck) and I plan to just take it around the block a few times to hopefully loosen them up enough for grease to flow through.

[67ChevyRedneck]

I also found a "fix" including Part Numbers for those that have 71/72 trucks or 67-70 trucks with a 71/72 front suspension (including the cross member - the problem is the hose is too short with 71/72 cross members that have the hose mounting in front of the cross member, the hose is too short with drop spindles.)

http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...=681834&page=2

Old hose:



New 3" longer hose:

[knomadd]

Just found your thread. The truck looks a lot better with that drop. Nice work on the suspension parts so far. Keep it up.

[Advanced Design]

Nice work! Broken bolts are such a hassle. Glad you were able to remove it.

[67ChevyRedneck]

I got all the brakes/hoses back on and suspension tightened and ran into another problem:

[67ChevyRedneck]

So far this drop has been a major pain in the ass.

Kudos to the guys that get it done in a weekend.

So far I've run into delays (and major delays) from:

Frozen bolts in rear springs. Had to cut up springs to get to bolts.

Rivets in rear frame for the shock relocation brackets. With my blazer tank there's no way I can get to them. I plan on taking it to a shop that can torch them out for me for a few bucks.

+/-12 year old front suspension rebuild needed to be rebuilt, mostly due to shot control arm bushings (I didn't swap them, the originals were still tight back then so I re-used them), and damaged ball joints. Tie rods seem tight and were re-used.

Brake dust shields needed about 1/2" cut off the bottom (wasn't aware of this - sucks after you just primed and painted them.) I do have the 2.5" drop spindles, may not be an issue with the 2" spindles.

Brake hoses too short for 1971/72 trucks (or trucks with a 71/72 cross member) because the hose location mounts to the front of the cross member. Solution was found and posted above.

15" wheels simply don't with a 2.5" drop spindle without cutting up a good chunk of your control arm. It seems to be pretty well documented here that this is OK to do, so I'm going to give it a try. The aftermarket arms I bought actually appear to be thicker than the originals I have.

Oh, and it's been raining almost non stop for 2 weeks now.