Previous Owner Stupidity

[toddtheodd]

Ok y'all.
What all have you found on your 67-72 trucks that the previous owners did that makes you want to track them down and slap them so hard it makes their underwear twist around backwards on them.

For me:

1) Soda can tabs and pennies in the fuse box. I still don't know why they used them, because when I replaced them with actual fuses, none blew...

2) PO had put a CB radio in where the radio was supposed to go. Dash is now cut to accept radio. Not too big a deal, BUT! There is now a hole in the top of my cab towards the back in the middle where the antenna used to be. If I knew how to weld, I would plug it. BUT WAIT... THERE'S MORE! Instead of running fresh wire up to the antenna, he cut the dome light wire, and used it. After I reconnected the wire both under the door trim, and behind the dome light, it started to work.

3) Letting an idiot at Pep-boys (or wherever) tell him what temp sending unit he was supposed to have. I bet he thought the gauge was broken. After arguing with a guy at an O'Reillys , I went through about 15 different ones at that O'Reillys, with an LMC catalog laying next to me, until I found one that "looked" right. After putting it in BOOM... gauge worked just fine. (On a side note, Autozone now lists 2 different ones. One for the idiot light, and one for the gauge)

4) I kept getting pulled over for License Plate lights not being on. When I finally lay down underneath the truck to figure it out, the PO had cut the wires up to use them for a trailer light harness...

And that's just SO FAR on my 72 c-10. You don't even WANT to hear about the crazy stuff I found on my 70 Chevelle that caused me to blow the motor.

[Boog]

Yet more horror stories of things we have found. It is amazing how many people will do things to em not knowing just how dangerous they can be. Up in smoke for shotty electrical work. Maybe while the owner sleeps. Brake and suspension failures due to makeshift or questionable work too.

[cdowns]

complain all you want about the previous owner BUT if he wasn't a previous owner you wouldn't have a truck

[Shyguy]

The '71 C-10 wasn't too bad, a bunch of live wires underneath the dash that were at one time maybe hooked up to a radio and CB radio. The rear lighting harness had been cut so trailer wires could be tapped in using wire nuts.

The '67 was a little worse, well it might have been worse than I realized because mostly all that we used from the '67 was the cab, front clip, bed and 4 speed compound transmission. When I got the truck the PO said he could never get the l6 250 to stay running so it is being stored for now. We used a running one we had from another truck.

The PO tried to hook up the carb linkage using wire from inside the cab hooked to a little pulley deal at the carb. There were two carbs laying in the seat, one from a F*rd. The cab on the engine is not original, still don't know what it was supposed to be on before the PO tried to use it on the engine. The dash had been cut for some kind of radio, maybe a CB. At one time it must have had a CB with the mike mount to the roof because there were holes in the inner cab roof and one of the holes went all the way thru to the outside. The key was missing and still is.

The running boards had holes cut in the same place on both which looked like at one time it had stacks for exhausts.

What makes these old trucks interesting to me is the stuff that was done to them by the previous owners and trying to figure out what the heck they were thinking, what was found in them and the history of the trucks.

I am sure there might have been other problems with the '67 if we had not just used part of the truck.

Danny

[brad_man_72]

lets just say my ls swap has less wiring than when it was runnin a smallblock.

[retodd7711]

Old license plate glued over rust hole in floor.
Edges were bondoed and sanded flush to the floor.
Seat welded to floor.
Vice grips for battery terminals.
Soup can and hose clamps for exhaust repairs.
Here in hillbilly heaven we see it all!

[FRENCHBLUE72]

My blazer had fiberglass covering the holes in the floor..

[Ben IV]

My panel truck was previously owned by tulsa public schools here in oklahoma. it spent its whole life on the buss lot with a generator and a compressor in the back. It had a big vent in the roof and a hole in the side where the exaust exited. Never had a radio but holes for switches and stuff in the dash. Apparently at some point the pass side window crank broke so they made one of steel and welded it onto the regulator. it had a 69-70 chevy hood on it and a huge battery box for a semi battery or sompthin. But only 9888 original miles when i got it but they were hard miles.

[Stew215]

my 72 was a wreck !

first the interior was painted with a hand brush and had stroke marks and didnt even paint the whole thing.. with a little bit of acetone it came right off ... and the original paint was spotless!

next there are random wires straight off the battery just hanging there.

thermostat wires are all cut and hanging around

tailgate was welded shut for no reason ... when i cut it free it works fine.

used masking tape and left it on some moldings so now its dried on there

guessing all the PO did was burnouts ... there is like 2 inches of rubber under the wheel wells

PO ripped out all the accessories in the engine bay like washer fluid tank and stuff like that

he also got the car painted for like 200 bucks so now i gotta dig into the paint to find all the rust he covered .... and there are runs and cracks all over the truck

he tried to tow the truck by sticking a hook under the front bumper... so now the bumper is all bent out of shape and has little dings from the hook

And the one that really got me was he took off the bowtie on the grill !!!

[mbgmike]

Remember back then trucks were used as trucks and most did not get a lot of respect Heck we used to use them to herd cows, bend rebar using the bumpers. Screw all kinds of brackets,radios,ac convertors,open beer bottles,
Haul way more than it could carry.pull down walls, etc and yes some got rigged when they needed to be fixed. Trucks were for working. If you wanted something nice you had a car back then.

[special-K]

I don`t complain about 40 years of comprimises in upkeep.Anything seriously wrong just prevents me from buying the thing.We hear members now say,"These aren`t muscle cars,who cares about originality?" I do,at least I look for as unmolested as I can find or well done work.When I`ve found something that got by me I give myself a kick in the but.

[R.L.]

Originally Posted by mbgmike

Remember back then trucks were used as trucks and most did not get a lot of respect Heck we used to use them to herd cows, bend rebar using the bumpers. Screw all kinds of brackets,radios,ac convertors,open beer bottles,
Haul way more than it could carry.pull down walls, etc and yes some got rigged when they needed to be fixed. Trucks were for working. If you wanted something nice you had a car back then.

Amen to that brother, I grew up on a farm and my dad's old 67 was used for everything and I've seen the bumper dragging the pavement more times than I can remember he even disked a 10 acre patch one time when the tractor laid down on him.
He sold that truck in 94, I wasn't home to save it or I'd still have it. It wasn't rusty but boy it was beat up and wore out.
The old truck I have now wasn't cobbled up too bad just used and let things run down, guy didn't do too many repairs he just drove it let things go.

[Sinister]

My '69 wasn't too bad, though the PO had drilled about 30 holes in the bed and bed rails. Holes ranged from 3/8" to 3/4" and served no purpose that I could see.

[Legolas894]

Originally Posted by retodd7711

Old license plate glued over rust hole in floor.
Edges were bondoed and sanded flush to the floor.
Seat welded to floor.
Vice grips for battery terminals.
Soup can and hose clamps for exhaust repairs.
Here in hillbilly heaven we see it all!

Vice grip battery terminal clamps!!

I feel your pain. I still can't get the PO smell out of my '67 truck. I think he must have had a chinese food delivery service and set the boxes on the middle bench. The middle of the bench seat oozes some sort of wild funk each time I shampoo it. I've shampooed the seats three times and still more brown gold comes out of the middle!!

Then the owner was "selling" it, he had the bed full of old carpet and tack strips and the cab was full of coffe cups. Maybe only one working dash light, no speedometer, two wheel cylinders working (one of front and one on back), no turn signals, trailer harness nightmares etc.

It's mine now and that's all that counts.

[big_al_71]

I honestly cant remember as we took my truck completely apart within a week after I got it...I know that the next owner of my truck wont be able to pick one half ass rigged as the next owner of my truck is my one year old son......

[jkeady]

I have the benefit of having a pretty well-maintained '70, so I don't have too many horror stories there, but man, I have a '72 F-100 (shhhh...) that has seriously been beaten up and down.

Ended up making a custom wiring harness for it because the PO tapped the main ignition wire for... ta da! Fog lights! So lots of melting there. I replaced the dome light because there wasn't one, but later found the original had been screwed to the firewall above the fuse box, presumably so the PO could more easily see the wiring harness melting.

And of course, the obligatory holes drilled in the roof for clearance lights, looks to have had about 5 different styles of mirror over the years, holes in the bumpers, hood, etc for all manners of lights, and the worst offense I've found: a hitch welded to the rear frame, which by itself isn't terrible, but they must have been drunk when they did it because it's crooked.

[RW71]

He took a torch to it so the spkers would fit.

[dfwright]

My family has owned our truck since it was new, so I have no comment...

[jkeady]

Of course the are things that I've done a year ago, two years ago, and come back to them going, "WTF was I thinking?"

[oldgold70c10]

Originally Posted by jkeady

...looks to have had about 5 different styles of mirror over the years,...

I have found that to be one of the most irritating things that people do. Its always fun to find that 'perfect' door only to find about a gazillion holes in it for every type of mirrior they ever made.

[70c10-08]

On my truck the previous owner did a ****ty job replacing the floor he rivetted and cualked the repalcement panels and didnt bother to replace the cab braces i think if ur gonna replace a panel do it right weld it now i either have to buy a whole new cab or a whole new floor

[clinebarger]

The thing about a 40 year old truck is you dont even know it was the previous owner it chould have been the 1st 2nd 3rd on and on. So when you buy a old/used truck,car,motorcycle,house its YOUR responsabillity to look at everything. The seller is trying to make money, you have to make sure you dont get screwed.

[mr48chev]

My uncle had my 71 for about 25 years before I got it from my aunt. It has the cb antenna hole drilled in the middle of the roof, 30 something holes drilled in the bed rails and he drilled a hole through the inside of the box and through the fender and used a long bolt to hold down a tool box. Add to that about a dozen holes in the doors for different mirrors. One of his buddies welded a reinforcement plate on the rear bumper to mount The trailer ball and took out the license plate light.
I've got to go out now and figure out the extra wires that were put on it as there a break in the wiring somewhere and it won't start off the key. I had to jump across the starter Friday to get back from a road trip. Still it's a good solid old truck and It was free for going and towing it home with a rod out. That cost me a hundred bucks in gas and Pepsi for my buddy who towed it for me though.

[Big-Blue]

Heck, it's only the steering column. How important can that be?

[Big-Blue]

Yep, just like the wiring schematic shows in the manual...