My 1958 GMC 100 Stepside Budget Build

[Techie79]

Hello everyone, my name is Darcy. I have been silently lurking around the forums for a few months and have really enjoyed reading up on others builds and projects. Well it is finally time to start my own.

This is my 1958 GMC 100 stepside that I finally picked up in May of this year after about 20 years of watching this truck sit and wanting it so bad I couldn't stand it. I thought many times about asking the ower if he would part with her but I didn't really have the time or money for a project like this and I don't think the he was ready to sell her anyway. This year with a little coaxing and support from my beautiful fiancee I finally decided to hit the owner up about it and he sold it to me for a steal at $1200. So, I aired up the tires and towed it the 30 miles home.

Here are the pics from the day that I picked her up.









The day after I got her home I decided to see if she would run after so many years of sitting and the POs yearly ritual of pouring gas in the carb and running it for a few seconds. So I put a fresh battery on her, checked the oil which looked like it could use a changing but was clean, and ran a fuel line from the pump to a gas can. I could get her to start on carb cleaner but was not getting fuel through the carb, so after checking the fuel pump off came the carburetor for a good cleaning.

A couple of days later when that was finished it was time for attempt#2. This time she fired off and was running a little rough but would idle on her own. After a few minutes of idling I heard a clank in the motor and she sputtered and died. I was a little bummed at this point to say the least, but it was time to figure out what had happened so I broke out the compression tester and found that I didn't have any compression on cylinders 2,4, and 7.

So, time to tear the engine down and find out what happened. I pulled the valve covers off and what did I find.



A missing push rod on cylinder #2. Now it was time to go a little further. I pulled the intake and found this



I have been doing my own engine work and helping buddies rebuild engines my whole life and this is the first broken pushrod I have ever seen. Time to dig deeper, so off come the heads. I don't have any good pictures of this part but what I found were stuck valves on the 3 cylinders that didn't have compression caused by an unbelievable amount of carbon build up and sticky residue left over from the many years of dumping fuel down the carbs and firing it up for a few seconds. Up to this point I had thought what the PO was doing was a good idea. Boy was I wrong!

Since then the I have rebuilt the heads and replaced the stock intake and 2 bbl carburetor with an Edelbrock performer intake and an edelbrock 4 barrel carb. Now she purrs like a kitten. I wanted to get a little drive time in prior to tearing her down for a proper restore, so I Checked out the brakes, installed a salvage yard seat from a 1998 chevy pickup, replaced tires, and installed turn signals for safety. Here is a pic from our fist time out for a test drive.



After about 200 miles of driving and going to a car show and cruise near by I am finally ready to start the tear down.

Here is how she sits today and some of the issues that I am going to be dealing with.














I am looking forward to an comments or suggestions and want to thank everyone for looking.

[RockinKees]

Welcome Darcy!
Nice find

Well, after twenty years of watching this truck and finally tow her home, you must be really glad and proud now you have her!

What are your plans with the truck?

[Dan in Pasadena]

Welcome!

Can't really offer much in the way of opinions or suggestions if you haven't stated what your intentions are for the truck. If it's a full frame off restoration there are LOTS of threads on the Project subforum.

If you just want a reliable, clean driver I'll be immodest and suggest you look at the first 3/4's of my thread and get an idea what can be done with cleaning, fixing, repainting while still driving it.
But there are plenty of other threads that show a lot of the same.

Best of luck and keep the pictures coming!

[Techie79]

I apologize. I should have put what my intentions were in the initial post, but honestly I still have not fully decided what I want to do with her. This is my first project so I probably won't do anything too drastic like a front clip or bags but definitely want to make her into a nice looking driver. I am working in a single car garage with very limited space, so what I am thinking about doing this winter is stripping all of the sheet metal and the cab off of the frame and stripping it down to bare metal and priming everything while replacing cab corners, floor pans, and the damaged passenger step. I am probably being a little optimistic but I hope to have her back together and drivable again for next years car show season. Once the season is over Ill decide what to do the following winter.

[Kim57]

Welcome.
Looks like a nice truck to start with.
Kim

[FirstNation]

No need to apologize!
When you buy a project like this, ideas will formulate and change as you go! Getting it running as you did and taking care of any safety issues is the perfect start.

[Techie79]

Well here we go. The first evening of disassembly. I spent about 2 hours on getting her in the garage, removing the hood, grill, and headlight assemblies. Wow there sure is a lot of dirt hiding in there.

[Kim57]

That's a good start.
You're going to find lots of surprises as you go along some good some bad.
Kim

[Techie79]

For a truck that has been sitting outside since 86 I definitely expect some surprises but hopefully a whole lot more good than bad.

[Techie79]

After making a 180 mile trip up north last weekend to scavenge some needed parts and a few days of taking care of family duties I finally got in a good day of tear down today. No real big surprises. Just a lot more hidden dirt, a few broken bolts from being so badly rusted, and some rust holes on the inside of the passenger lower hinge pocket. I was kind of surprised to see that the truck was originally white and who ever did the last 2 paint jobs didn't even bother to remove the fenders or bed. Guess some people don't care what is hiding as long as it looks decent on the outside.

[Advanced Design]

Congratulations on your truck purchase. Looks pretty solid. Have fun with the build! Will be tagging along.

[Techie79]

Thanks Advanced Design. Glad to have you along for the ride.

Finally got a full day in today and got the cab disconnected and off of the frame.

Dad helping me get it disconnected


Dad and my brother in law helping get it lifted off. Wow I didn't realize how heavy this cab is,


After a long days work finally got it on the dolly and back in the garage.

[Kim57]

Nice progress.
Great you have family helping you.
Kim

[RockinKees]

Well, you go pretty fast with the dismantle of the '58

[71'tahoe]

I like your project! Good start so far!
If you decide to get rid of that rear bumper if be interested in it.

[Russell Ashley]

Nice truck to start with, and I think you got it for a steal. You could get close to what you paid for it just for that GMC chrome grill.
Here's some advice from an old guy who just celebrated his 50th wedding anniversary: Keep the fiancé involved and happy that you have it.

[ptc]

Welcome and good luck with the build....

wish I could see the pics but the work 'putor blocks all photos from photobucket!

[Techie79]

Thanks everyone for the compliments and words of encouragement.

Kim - I agree, it is a great thing to have family that is willing to help with things that would be difficult to do by your self and I am very fortunate to have a dad that is there with me every step of the way.

Rockinkees - The quicker I can get her apart while still being organized as I possibly can be the quicker I can get to the long process of cleaning, repairing, and reassembling. Spring is going to be here before I know it and I sure would like to be able to drive her next summer.

71'Tahoe - I was actually thinking about posting the old work bumper for sale to see if anyone might need it. I plan on going back with either a chrome bumper or roll pan so it is not needed.. Let me know if you are interested and see if we can work something out.

Russell - Thanks for the advice. I am very lucky to have her in my life. She is just as anxious to get her cleaned up and back on the road as I am.

Not much progress to report in the last few days. Still working on disassembling the cab and trying to get it ready to start replacing bad sheet metal. Hopefully some progress this weekend and more pics.

[SCHRUMGMC]

Good to see anther GMC. I have a 59 Gmc that is a lot more rusty than yours. Take a look at mine throughout my sig down below my name. Eager to see your progress as well

[Techie79]

I finally managed to get a few hours in this weekend dismantling the cab. Between the kids tearing up their vehicles and the normal family duties it seems like there is never enough time for the important things in life like truck time. Anyway, I managed to get the cab nearly completely stripped of all hardware and glass. I think the only things that are left are the two lower door hinges and finishing removing the wiring harness. I ran into a slight snag when removing the hinges and the nuts broke loose on the bottom bolt on both lower hinges. Now the only way I see to get at those nuts is to remove the inner panel on the hinge pockets. I guess it is a good thing I need to do some rust repair on or replace those panels anyway. Also I uncovered some more rust problems that will have to be dealt with.

This one is kind of hard to see but I found a couple places on the top windshield lip that the outer layer of metal is gone. It would probably be ok but I will likely patch it up just to be safe.


The transmission cover is in much worse shape than I thought it was so it will need to be replaced.


And last but not least I found a badly pitted place on the driver side where the inner roof meets the windshield pillar. After seeing how badly it was pitted I poked at it with a screwdriver and the tip went right through it. It doesn't appear to be a very big area but I'm not quite sure how to correctly repair this one. Any suggestions would greatly be appreciated


and now some pics of how she sits today.








At this point I think I am finally just a couple hours of work away from being ready to start stripping paint and making repairs.

[SCHRUMGMC]

Loving the progress

[Kim57]

Nice progress.
The damage doesn't look to bad at all.
Kim

[Techie79]

I have been so busy the last few weeks with the holiday season activities, watching our high school football team win the Oklahoma 5A state championship, and getting our oldest son married so there hasn't been a lot of progress but I thought it was time for an update.

I have started the rust repairs by taking on the drivers side cab corner and now I understand why the body guys charge so much for these kinds of repairs.



In the builds and discussions I have read a number of good reasons to replace the inner cab corners and good reasons not to replace the inner corners and just cap them off in the cab. I decided to just cut out the rusted parts and not leave the pocket there to rust the corners again.








The corner definitely didn't come out perfect but a little body filler and I think it will turn out ok.




Next it is on to the damaged passenger step. They definitely put enough spot welds on these steps to hold them together.


I wasn't sure what I was going to find behind this filler panel but I knew it couldn't be good. When I started cutting it out I found that the floor support behind it was packed full of dirt and rust. and the bottom of the support was rusted out






Looks like I am going to be rebuilding the majority of the lower passenger side of the cab. So far it is the cab corner, step, front filler panel, inner lower door hinge pocket, outer lower hinge pocket cover, cab floor support, and floor pans. Some of the parts are already here and more on the way. Hopefully I can make some more progress this weekend.

[ChuckDriver]

Nice project and great work on the cab corner!

[Kim57]

Nice job on th repairs.
Kim