1981 Chevy C10 SWB.... rebuild ground up.

[MetalMan1975]

I posted in the welcome section back in the beginning of june 09' and this is when I started the teardown of my chevy.
This is a 1981 Chevy C10 shortbox. I bought it 2 plus yrs ago about 4 hrs from my home. I guy only wanted $900 for it and it didn't look that bad. It didn't take much to get on the road so I drove it for a 6 months until I was tired of the guttless 305 that was in it. Before I bought my house I was living in an apartment so I had a shop build me a motor, 350-4 bolt main, bored 0.030" over. I had a lot of issues with the new motor and I could make this post a nasty one about the shop I used but I'm not here for that so I let the past be the past. The motor runs great now but the rest of the truck needs help.




I started the teardown of the truck and found a lot of cancer. Too much in some spots to save some of the pieces. I was only going to make it a small teardown but I ended up getting carried away. The more I took off the more I thought "I can replace that. How hard can it be?" Well let me tell you, Its a lot harder then it looks. What did I get my self into, too late now....



The cab and box were going to cost way too much to repair. So I going with a southern cab and box that I'll be picking up next year when I'm ready.

After a good week of stripping the big stuff off I ended up with just the frame and stuff on it.



It took me a few more months to get to the stage I am now, but I did not(wish I did) take any pics of the frame in more teardown stages. Once the frame was sandblasted and painted with POR-15 I snapped away.



Sorry about the dust but I ended up fixing my winter car and that was bondo dust from doing the body work on it. I have it on the road now so the shop has alittle more space for my truck to get to the rolling stage before winter.



I bought most of my suspension parts that I needed. I just picked up the first load of all new parts this weekend. Once I get the new control arm bushings and shafts into the control arms then I'll be ready to install them back onto the crossmember. I'll be order new 3" drop spindles and everything new for the brakes. I haven't figured out if i'm going to replace the 1 wheel peel 2.42 10 bolt rearend with a 3.73 12 bolt posi yet or the 350th tranny with a 700r4. If I do though its both being changed.

Let me kow what you think of my truck and I'll try and keep updating the progress. Once I get it rolling I don't plan on doing anything over the winter. Too much fun going snowmobiling then working in the cold.

I'll keep you guys updated soon.
Metal...... aka Leigh.

[Irish_Alley]

welcome back. its always more than what it seams when it comes to a "little" resto

[oldyeller]

Lookin good so far.  Can't wait to see more

[bboyd]

nice job...i did the same thing to my truck i was just going to put a new motor in and thought id clean up the engine bay first then it started well if im going to do the front end and engine bay i may as well do....EVERYTHING lol my wife didnt think it was as funny tho as i told her 1g for the donor car for the motor and another grand for odds and ends well i just got my frame rolling again and have easily doubles the original 2g

[Layne]

Good start to a good project man! My vote is for a 700R4. I think it has more grunt than the 350 and overdrive!

[frito-bandito]

You sure opened up a can of worms, but have fun, the end result will be well worth it!

[4x4HighSierra]

if you do go with a 700R4 get an 86 and up one because the early ones were junk and after they were out for a few years GM finally got all the bugs worked out of them in late 85.

[1983stepside]

gonna be a nice project cant wait to see more of it 

[frito-bandito]

Overdrive is for sure the way to go

[clpete90]

Nice truck, I have an 81 short box with some cancer under the door and behind the rear wheels.  Haven't had a chance to fix the body but I did build a 73 350 2bolt .030 with 2.02 1.60 heads for about $4,000 including machine work.  It has a partially built th350 trans backed by a 12bolt with 3.73 gears. This is not the worst combo because my truck will pull 0-60 in 7 seconds and run a 15 second quarter mile. I would love to put a t5 manual trans in but that almost seems like way to much work for a kid finishing his 2nd year of auto tech school and getting ready to move to a 4 year college to get my engineering degree.

[bake74]

welcome back. its always more than what it seams when it comes to a "little" resto

     Ain't that the truth, should be a truck you will be extremely proud of when you are done, good luck..