Fenix Motorsports
Member
Here is the build thread for my personal 1974 C10 street truck, I will give some back story and cover the build from the day I bought it to current day.
I bought the truck in 2019 as my first truck and something more comfortable to drive instead of my CJ5, I paid 3k for it as a broke high school student and it came with everything needed for an LS Swap to a 5.3 lm7. The truck ran and drove, had A/C, the original interior (not in the greatest shape) and a passenger bedside that had been wrapped around a light pole, I eventually found out the most likely reason as to why later on, the master cylinder failed and wasn't putting any fluid out into the front brakes.
I drove it for about a year in this condition and just did some maintenance tasks like rebuilding the front suspension, rebuilding the distributor, and replacing the passenger bedside. I also started to haphazardly do some bodywork which at the time I really didn't know what I was doing and looking back I should've left it as I bought it.
Inevitably I had a rather large issue with the truck, I had been driving it and it blew a freeze plug and puked all the coolant out and proceeded to reach nuclear reactor type heat. I noticed before it did any significant damage but I pulled the motor anyway because the freeze plug it blew ended up being in the bellhousing.
I disassembled the 350 I took out and gouged the hell out of one of the conrod bearing journals, so I went on summit and got another crank, new bearings, rings, and a small cam. I rebuilt the motor and tossed it back in the truck.
It was after I had done this that I realized the jetting in the carburetor was wayyyyyy off and I was getting about 8mpg, working for $20 an hour and having to commute 14 miles one way wasn't going to work with gas being about $4+ a gallon at the time(would've come out to about $400 a week in fuel IIRC). So I did the next logical thing and tor the truck apart again and started to prep the LS, which I had stupidly sold the transmission for, and way too cheap at that (4L60E).
Since I had the truck pulled apart and I was daily driving my mothers CRV at the time (still hate that car to this day) I decided to do what some people may consider to be a horrendous act against humanity, I cut the frame to short bed length. I started by stripping the entire back half of the frame of all dirt and whatever factory coating was left and layed out tape markings to do a step cut since I didn't want to spend 300 bucks or whatever it was on a frame chop kit.
I lied to myself again and again and said it wouldn't be a frame off resto, so yeah, the cab came off and over two weekends while watching/listening to the 2023 toyo desert challenge and KOH I finished stripping the underside of the cab and frame and throwing a fresh coat of raptor liner on it to prevent any rust in the future, because this was actually an original AZ truck with almost zero rust on it. I also did some bodywork on the cab and got it primed in this period of time. I also had sold my banshee around this period of time and bought all the parts to rebuild the LS, and also do the suspension drop which is a 4/6 drop from CPP.
I got the cab back on the frame and totally stalled on the project until about Nov 2023 due to buying my GMC and a bunch of equipment/tools to try and get my own business started. Don't mind the KTM and the spitfire in the background, one is gone and the other is getting cut loose because I have too many projects that need too much money and time that I don't have. Anyway, I got back to it and had to redo a couple of patches in the body due to them cracking and was able to finally get the sealer and paint. I knocked out the paint on the hood and the interior and am currently working on the cab exterior, fenders, core support, etc. so I can get the front end on and get the engine/trans (ar5 manual from a Chevy Colorado of all things) in the truck to make the trans crossmember, then cut the bed floor down and finally figure out the fuel tank, and buy the rest of the bed.
The truck will end up being a two tone, black and red, similar to a c10 that was built for SEMA a few years back (buck the truck if anyone is interested). Don't mind the absolutely abysmal layout of the sound deadening, this was my first time using it. Currently the interior is completely painted including the interiors of the doors, I will be updating here as progress is made, hopefully faster than it has been going the past few years with this thing.
I bought the truck in 2019 as my first truck and something more comfortable to drive instead of my CJ5, I paid 3k for it as a broke high school student and it came with everything needed for an LS Swap to a 5.3 lm7. The truck ran and drove, had A/C, the original interior (not in the greatest shape) and a passenger bedside that had been wrapped around a light pole, I eventually found out the most likely reason as to why later on, the master cylinder failed and wasn't putting any fluid out into the front brakes.
I drove it for about a year in this condition and just did some maintenance tasks like rebuilding the front suspension, rebuilding the distributor, and replacing the passenger bedside. I also started to haphazardly do some bodywork which at the time I really didn't know what I was doing and looking back I should've left it as I bought it.
Inevitably I had a rather large issue with the truck, I had been driving it and it blew a freeze plug and puked all the coolant out and proceeded to reach nuclear reactor type heat. I noticed before it did any significant damage but I pulled the motor anyway because the freeze plug it blew ended up being in the bellhousing.
I disassembled the 350 I took out and gouged the hell out of one of the conrod bearing journals, so I went on summit and got another crank, new bearings, rings, and a small cam. I rebuilt the motor and tossed it back in the truck.
It was after I had done this that I realized the jetting in the carburetor was wayyyyyy off and I was getting about 8mpg, working for $20 an hour and having to commute 14 miles one way wasn't going to work with gas being about $4+ a gallon at the time(would've come out to about $400 a week in fuel IIRC). So I did the next logical thing and tor the truck apart again and started to prep the LS, which I had stupidly sold the transmission for, and way too cheap at that (4L60E).
Since I had the truck pulled apart and I was daily driving my mothers CRV at the time (still hate that car to this day) I decided to do what some people may consider to be a horrendous act against humanity, I cut the frame to short bed length. I started by stripping the entire back half of the frame of all dirt and whatever factory coating was left and layed out tape markings to do a step cut since I didn't want to spend 300 bucks or whatever it was on a frame chop kit.
I lied to myself again and again and said it wouldn't be a frame off resto, so yeah, the cab came off and over two weekends while watching/listening to the 2023 toyo desert challenge and KOH I finished stripping the underside of the cab and frame and throwing a fresh coat of raptor liner on it to prevent any rust in the future, because this was actually an original AZ truck with almost zero rust on it. I also did some bodywork on the cab and got it primed in this period of time. I also had sold my banshee around this period of time and bought all the parts to rebuild the LS, and also do the suspension drop which is a 4/6 drop from CPP.
I got the cab back on the frame and totally stalled on the project until about Nov 2023 due to buying my GMC and a bunch of equipment/tools to try and get my own business started. Don't mind the KTM and the spitfire in the background, one is gone and the other is getting cut loose because I have too many projects that need too much money and time that I don't have. Anyway, I got back to it and had to redo a couple of patches in the body due to them cracking and was able to finally get the sealer and paint. I knocked out the paint on the hood and the interior and am currently working on the cab exterior, fenders, core support, etc. so I can get the front end on and get the engine/trans (ar5 manual from a Chevy Colorado of all things) in the truck to make the trans crossmember, then cut the bed floor down and finally figure out the fuel tank, and buy the rest of the bed.
The truck will end up being a two tone, black and red, similar to a c10 that was built for SEMA a few years back (buck the truck if anyone is interested). Don't mind the absolutely abysmal layout of the sound deadening, this was my first time using it. Currently the interior is completely painted including the interiors of the doors, I will be updating here as progress is made, hopefully faster than it has been going the past few years with this thing.
