First Squarebody: 1979 Chevy Short Bed

[Orion88]

I've been driving a 71 Chevy long bed since October. It was a great truck. Reliable, pretty, sounded good, etc. But like most Midwestern trucks her age, she had her fair share of rust issues. So I decided it was time to move on. My friend is currently redoing a long bed 4x4 but he also has a short bed 2wd. I was originally looking for a stepside, but he offered to paint the truck for me and the deal and the truck were just too good to pass up.

About the truck: it's a 1979 C10 swb that was strictly a show truck all its life. The original owner put a custom paint job on it, lowered it, put a custom exhaust, aftermarket carb/intake on, and only drove it to and from car shows. Here's the best part: THE TRUCK HAS 10,000 ORIGINAL, DOCUMENTED MILES!!! And it's never seen rain. However, recently the distributor caught fire and torched the cab. So my friend managed to find a good, rust free Arizona cab, and slapped a new distributor and wires on the engine and it fired right up. He is doing the body work while I am out of town and if I'm lucky it will be painted by the end of June. I will then continue to restore the interior and engine bay as I drive it, but to be honest it doesn't need much. A few parts under the hood are burnt, they will get replaced. But with 10,000 miles there's no point in doing any engine mods, just dressing her up a bit. The interior will need redone because the cab came from Arizona so everything is baked. The truck will be hot rod black with a red interior and I am leaning towards chrome smoothies and custom red pinstriping down the road. I also want to swap the 79 grille for a 73-74 grille. The idea is to have a 50s style hot rod look on a squarebody. It will be unique and it will be done right. Pictures and more details to come soon but I will be out of town until June.