65 c10 stepside build

[LiLDrumKing3]

Ok. Well I have been terrible about posting any updates, and let way too much time go between. Luckily, this time I've got quite a bit of progress to show! Although, it's not done yet, I got past some major milestones. I finally got it painted, and I'm very happy with how it turned out!

I'm going to go back and pick up where I left off. Hopefully I don't miss anything. The first thing I did when I got it into my shop, I started tearing everything down. Pulled the motor, and then removed most of the body from the frame. Yep, one thing led to another, and here we are into a FULL frame off restoration.


The firewall definitely needed a lot of attention, there were separate holes for just about every wire. I really wanted to clean all of that up and start from scratch leaving just a few of the original holes. It took some patch panels, welded up a lot of small holes, and some bondo, but I think it really it cleaned up nicely. I wish I had a before picture of the firewall, but I'm sure y'all can use your imagination.

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[LiLDrumKing3]

I wanted to clean up the dash as well. There were toggle switches in various places that seemed to have no use and a bird's nest of wiring under there. The radio cut out was all cut up and bent out of shape, so I bent it back and welded it up solid. I don't know what I'm going to do with this area yet, it may be a good spot for a double A/C vent.

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[LiLDrumKing3]

After all of the welding and filling on the firewall, I finally got some primer on and was able to see how it was going to look.
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All the Body work is done, and I was able to do a final primer coat over the whole truck before paint.
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Lots of wet sanding. Can I say I don't ever want to wet sand again?
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[LiLDrumKing3]

Thankfully I have a really supportive and skilled family. They have really encouraged me to keep pushing forward on the truck. My brother spent a lot of time with me lately, helping me get the truck through paint.

Here, he is doing one last modification to the roll pan before paint. In an earlier post I showed how there was a gap on the sides of the roll pan below the bed sides. My brother created a couple of templates and welded in filler panels.

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[LiLDrumKing3]

Now, we're all packed up and ready for paint! I started working on this in my high school Auto Paint and Body class. Fortunately, since my shop teacher had my two brothers and me in his classes, we have stayed close with him even after we all graduated. He was very nice and allowed us to come back and use their paint booth.

Got everything wrapped up, trailer loaded, and ready to go. I gotta say, it was a nerve-racking trip there and from the paint shop.
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All sorted out and ready to go into paint.
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Here's a sneak peek of the paint! I've been waiting for this moment for a LONG time.
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[LiLDrumKing3]

Here's the paint! I did a two tone, white on top and a darker metallic gray (almost gun metal) on bottom.

The white top and interior was painted first. It's hard to tell, but on the bottom of the doors I spray an undercoated similar to spray in bedliner. I was able to paint over it like normal but it covered the dents and dings from shoes and rocks hitting the bottom of the door. Also, made it more durable for the future.
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The dash turned out real nice!
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Here comes the gray!
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[LiLDrumKing3]

And more paint!

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