Winter Beater Build- '66 BBW Custom Short/Fleet with Heat!

[Ta2Don]

Diggin' the daylight pic!

[1963c-10]

Glad to see this build back up!!!

[LoRollinLS]

Well, there goes winter. lol Tell me that you did drive it some during winter though? Glad to see updates here also. Love "driver" builds on these trucks. A nice change to the perfect restorations and some of the botchings that you see from time to time. Thanks!

[theastronaut]

Originally Posted by Ta2Don

Diggin' the daylight pic!

Originally Posted by 1963c-10

Glad to see this build back up!!!

Thanks dudes!!

Originally Posted by LoRollinLS

Well, there goes winter. lol Tell me that you did drive it some during winter though? Glad to see updates here also. Love "driver" builds on these trucks. A nice change to the perfect restorations and some of the botchings that you see from time to time. Thanks!

Nah, first time I drove it I was wearing shorts and flip flops. I guess now it should be the "Spring has Sprung Beater Build".



Well, the truck is running great but I still haven't had time to do the rear axle seals/bearings and finish the brakes. The e-brake works though, and there's a huge high school parking lot near our shop... who needs brakes if there's nothing to run into? Had a few buddies over Saturday riding my '83 Yamaha 80 Enduro and we decided it would be a good idea to drive the truck over to the lot to see how it drives/shifts, which quickly turned into seeing how well the truck ran around the islands at the end of the lot, slolom style.

I need a good baseline to compare against Goldilocks, right? Once I get brakes on it (and all the junk out of the bed!) I'll take it back and see what kind of lap times it runs. It definitely needs sway bars front and rear, and a quicker ratio steering box would help immensely!


First vid is me driving, and the second is my buddy Logan.

66 C10 Slolom - YouTube

66 C10 Slolom - Youtube

[Bomp]

Thats some serious haulin' trash slolom style.

Nice looking truck and it sounds good.

[duallyjams]

Winter is just around the corner.

[theastronaut]

Originally Posted by duallyjams

Winter is just around the corner.

Hey, I never said which winter I've already had the heat on in the Conquest a few times.

No real updates on the truck except that the rear wheel bearings/seals are done and the cover is resealed. Nobody had a 12 bolt gasket in stock locally (checked with 7-8 FLAPS) so I used RTV form-a-gasket made for diff covers. Still need to bleed the brakes. Also needs a turn signal switch so I can get the lights working.


Haven't had much time for projects lately. The Conquest I bought to flip developed fairly extensive drivability issues that have been a pain to track down and fix. It's nearly back to 100% so I'll drive it through the winter and unload it once people start getting their tax checks back. On top of that the VW broke a valve spring so it's torn apart to fix that. Going ahead and doing new bearings, big valve/ported heads, and a cam swap to give it more top end power. Should go from 90 hp to 120-130 and pull north of 7000 rpm instead of falling off around 5200 with the old cam/stock heads. Hoping to drop a full second off the 1/8th mile et.

I'll be selling off the three Conquests early next year and eventually this truck once it's driveable. I'm up to ten cars/trucks now; I need to clear out the extras so I have time for the keepers like Goldilocks, the daily driver '64 VW, and my stalled-project '66 VW (first car).

[theastronaut]

Brakes are finally finished. Bought a Mityvac so I could bleed the brakes by myself, should have bought one a long time ago.




Got the short shoes on the front and the green springs in the correct position also. Glad you guys caught those details.

[duallyjams]

there was a lot of VW this year at run to the sun

[theastronaut]

I cut the bed floor out this past weekend and removed the bed last night. Going to use the maple bed floor that came with Goldilocks in this one, have another plan in mind for 'Lock's floor... The metal floor was only lightly tack welded in so it only took a couple hours to cut it out. Also installed a new turn signal switch to get all of the lights working, and cleaned up under the hood. We pulled the floor mat/padding and cleaned the loose rust off the floor with a needle scaler awhile back, then coated it with Chassis Saver to keep the rust from getting any worse. Found a cool mexican blanket for the seat too. Was hoping to have it ready to drive up to Pigeon Forge this weekend but the parts we need to finish it won't be here in time.

I'm thinking about scuffing up the body and shooting clear over it to lock in the patina. Would probably add 10-15% flattener to lose a little of the gloss. There's a local guy with a couple of cleared VW busses that look pretty cool.

[duallyjams]

Will be interesting to see how flat you get the clear to look, all the one's that I have seen all have a sheen to them that takes away from the patina that's why I just wipe down the 65 with WD40

[theastronaut]

My buddy's full gloss busses look pretty good but I think a little less gloss would look better on the truck. I don't want satin or full flat. I might do a few different mixes on test panels and then decide. Probably 10-20% flattener added in would be about right.

[Bomp]

When you do spray, can you do a full write up on it.
I have a candidate that I want to try spraying clear on too.

[theastronaut]

Went to Oreilly's and picked up a couple quarts of Dupli-Color clear, one matte and one gloss. I cleaned the gate with razor blade scraper and a red scuff pad with dish detergent to get the loose rust and dead paint off. Mixed the clear 50/50 and shot a spot on the inside of the tailgate, and also a license plate to see how it would look on a smoother surface like the top of the hood.


Before, paint was chalky and rust stained.




After scraping and scuffing.







And after shooting clear. It's very overcast so it looks like it has more sheen than it actually does.






The license plate shows the amount of sheen better.





Also sanded and painted the wood strips for the bed floor, and shot the metal strips with satin black. There is almost zero grain showing through even though I tried raising the grain by lightly misting water on the bare wood after it was sanded. This is why I didn't want to use it for Goldilocks, it just looks like plain black boads. Plus it's too heavy for 'Locks, she'll be going on a strict diet back there... It's fine for this truck though. I'm about halfway through grinding all of the welds down from the steel floor, so once that's done I can clean/scuff the inside of the bed and stick the wood floor in for good.

[duallyjams]

The license plate looks good.

[theastronaut]

Haven't taken much time to work on the truck until lately. Got the bed pulled off, scuffed it down with red scotchbrite pads and dish detergent, and shot it with satin clear. I was surprised at how much color came back. The bed floor is finished except for bolting in two boards. I didn't want to bolt through the wood like factory, instead I'll bolt the cross rails down and notch the back of the wood to clear the bolt heads. Gives it a little bit of a cleaner look without the bolt heads showing up top. Also picked up a pair of 15x8's for the rear. Dad bought a '66 short/fleet a couple months ago so it has some company in the parking lot now.

Before and during scuffing:








After spraying clear. I used Duplicolor lacquer, half gloss and half satin mixed.








Bed floor installed.




15x8's




Parked with dad's '66.

[rusty76]

Makes me jealous. Looks fantastic.

[aggie91]

The clear looks good on that paint.

Those 15x8's look to have more lip on the outside than normal. I found a pair that looked like they swapped the centers onto a 15x8 rally wheel, but flipped the hoop around. They have like 2.5" of BS. What is the back space on those?

[LoRollinLS]

This truck is still looking great, one year later!

[theastronaut]

Thanks dudes! Karl, the wheels have 3.5" back spacing. These are three nub with 60-66 style square slot centers. I've seen some versions that are four nub with straight slots.

[theastronaut]

I got the wheels prepped last week and shot them tonight. It already had new 235/75's on the rear but it needs new front tires. Not sure if I want to go with the same size up front or use 215/75's instead.




I mentioned it in another thread, but dad bought a '66 a few months back and has it driveable now. We're getting ready to change out the bed wood and shoot it with satin clear. I haven't been able to talk him into dropping it yet...

[rusty76]

Your Dad's truck is awesome. Bumper guards and all. Cool.

[theastronaut]

Yeah it's pretty well optioned. Gauges, green tint glass, bumper guards, 283, both Z61 and Z62 groups, radio, chrome bumpers, and panoramic window. Unfortunately the SPID is missing. They did cheap out and only ordered the thrift heater option. I got the old bed floor out of it today, hope to have everything here so I can get the new floor in it next week.

[theastronaut]

Got tires mounted today. Went with 215/75 and 235/75's.

[theastronaut]

I had Labor Day off so I worked on getting everything ready for the bed to go back on. I made a couple of brackets for the sway bar end links, and relocated the shocks.

Frizzle Fry posted a cheap, easy, and effective shock relocation idea in this thread so I copied that. Moves the shock outboard of the frame and stands it straight up.

http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...postid=4730005


These are the old rear shocks so the upper hole wasn't big enough to fit on the stud. I'll use the old front shocks on the rear. There was an existing hole in the frame that I used but I think I'm going to move the stud up to the top of the frame so the shock has more travel. The new U-bolts have long enough threads that I can add 1.25" drop blocks... I might be adding drop spindles and disc brakes. If so I can drop the rear a little more to match.




I also scuffed and cleared the back of the cab. We also pulled the bed off of dad's truck and tore out the old floor. You can kinda see it in the background. Hoping to have both of them ready for Goodguys Charlotte.