69 LWB Bagged Farm Truck Build

[slamgears]

Hey guys, i'm Jake, been lurking around looking at builds for a few months now, was originally looking for a 60-66 truck but when I saw this 69 it was far too clean for my neck of the woods to pass up.

This is most likely gonna be a slow build just due to money and time, and this is definitely gonna be a budget build. Plan is to do it right, but for as little money as possible. Plans are to lay frame + Turbo LS swap. Most likely going 4.8 due to budget, gonna see if I can boost the 4.8 to 600-650 hp range, but that's way down the line before I get to motor.

So here's the truck the day I went and made an offer on it:










So a little about this thing, the guy I bought it from had it sitting in a garage untouched since he bought it, he bought it from an old farmer that used it as a farm truck from 73 -2010 when the motor seized on him. All original truck, basically a 2 owner truck, was bought new in 69 and then sold in 73 to the guy that drove it til it died. Needs rockers and cab corners but that's basically it. Pretty unmolested which is awesome, other than the radio that looks like it was installed in the early 90's sometime.

So 2 weeks later after waiting for the owner to get the title transferred into his name (which he never did when he bought it) he delivered it to my house and we got it in the shop, I immediately started tearing it down.



Carb off, wiring harness unhooked, radiator drained and out, took off the puke tank and coolant lines, unhooked heater core lines.



Bedfloor was trashed underneath the cheap rubber bedliner, no big deal, she's going on air and laying frame, so it's all getting cut out anyways.



Drained the power steering, took off front bumper, and unbolted the front clip, and took off the back bumper so i could actually get to my car in case I needed to get out.





This is basically where I am today, we're supposed to get a foot of snow tonight, and it's been in the mod 20's here and I have no heat in the garage, but i'm gonna try to get the bed unbolted tonight, trying to get my dad and brother out here right after roads are clear from the snow in a couple days to help me lift the front clip off and lift the bed off and put them in my other building, so I can start pulling this shot motor and tranny to sell it, and start cutting on the frame for the SWB conversion

Once that's done the truck should fit in the garage normally instead of sideways taking up all my floor space.

[slamgears]

Finally got some help from my dad and brother to lift the bed and front clip off



Also got the driveshaft pulled and trans crossmember loose, so the motor and trans is ready to come out, so I can start on fab work to get ready for bags and SWB conversion.

[slamgears]

Made my cuts for the SWB conversion

now a little before and after:



As you can see from the heat marks, I also welded diamond shaped fishplates on the backsides of the welds, and now i'm getting ready to start boxing this frame.

Going to get the step notch and 4 link crossmember done in the next couple weeks before I start doing some of the bodywork.