The Story - by Phil
One day in late 2005, I happened to park in front of a pathetic and very ugly Chevy pickup with "for sale" crudely painted on the windows. I called my dad and asked him about the truck he had when he was in college, having remembered that his was an early-sixties model Chevy. He told me his was a canary yellow 1961 Chevy C10 short bed stepside and he really liked it. I inquired about this one from the owner and he informed me that it was a 1961 C20 long bed fleetside. It was similar enough to sell me.
I paid him $700 since it did not run and was extremely dilapidated and had it flat-bedded home. On initial inspection, I began to uncover it's true ugliness. Apparently it had been repainted (unprofessionally) many times since its original color of Neptune Green. The last coat looks like it consisted of several dozen cans of white Krylon which had dribbled down the rear of the cab between the cab and bed. Whoa. The bed wood was so deteriorated it had a house siding panel laid in it over the wood and had ¼" of paint gluing it in. It had a late-model hood with a bowling trophy ornament on it! Wait, it gets better.
The engine is the original 283 small block but it had been slopped with orange-red paint and had been so precisely tuned that a parking light bulb was plugging up a vacuum hose for whatever reason. The wiring was melted all over and the battery and generator were missing. The exhaust consisted of flex-tubing attached to the chassis with bailing wire. The bed had the wheel wells crudely cut over size and had cracks patched with a cut-up license plate and Bondo. The left rear wheel had no brake line going to it because the junction at the axle had a screw plugging that side of it, rendering the wheel useless for braking. There was, in fact, no brake fluid so in order to get it around, we had to use the barely-working clutch around corners and at stop signs while under tow. Good times.
I've so far replaced the hood with a year-specific one, researched all the original specs, acquired reprints of all original manuals, removed the bed, and pulled the master cylinder for rebuilding. I'll slowly work on it and, hopefully, start making some progress in the next few years. It started out as trying to make it driveable again but it's too hopeless, thanks to the previous owners' inability to properly fix and repair autos. I'm presently planning on restoring it to near-original condition complete with rebuilt AM radio. I don't plan on upgrading brakes, steering, air conditioning, etc. I'd appreciate any comments or suggestions at the email address below.
