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ALANSD · 11-26-2006, 02:55 PM

I figure some of those crazy like me will like this little story.
A friend had a 74 Chevy C10 Pickup he bought from a couple leaving the area. They supposedly got it from the woman's dad who passed leaving it to them. It was the old guys pride and joy, but definitely not the same for the young couple, or for my friend for that matter. So since the couple got it in 1995 it has barely been driven.
Sat outside in the driveway, covered with leaves, and pine straw.
My friends wife has had enough of his cars that sit in the drive and he decided, making a smart move, to eliminate the ones he doesn't drive.
He offered to sell the Chevy to another acquaintance who just could not get it together, so he offered it to us, half a dozen times.
Realizing this would possibly be a good father son project for my 14 yr old and myself; we rented a car hauler and went to get the truck at a minimal cost.
7 hours later after trying to fix two dead tires, then replacing one, and then having the truck not want to roll on the trailer( did not want to start it until I got it home and did some service) and then rollin git on and almost off and then.....blowing a tire on the hauler leaving us stranded with my F250, the Chevy on the trailer and on a two lane very busy Atl road...........we made it home. Phew...
Started cleaning it later, emptying the glove box and assorted storage spots, and found that this old truck has 18,000 original miles in it! The original order sheet from 74, the manuals, spare parts, bedliner, all buried under dirt or in some storage box. All in surprisingly good shape too.
Underneath the dirt and green algae & mildew, a true diamond in the rough. After some basic servicing we started it up and it purrs like a 350 V-8 kitten.
I have begun to teach my son the basics of rust repair, luckily there is little, but it does need attention.
Meanwhile he learned how to tune it up, change the oil, polish out the chrome bumper, and a few other beginnings.
A nice end to our Thanksgiving adventure weekend.

klattu · 11-26-2006, 02:58 PM

1974 is old?

Crap...I'm getting old too then.

ALANSD · 11-26-2006, 03:07 PM

32 years might make it that way....remember its all relative! MAN... THE MID 60'S WERE 40 YRS AGO!!!

maxandgeorgia · 11-26-2006, 03:12 PM

This story is a keepsake

What a duo! ~G

clancy_boy · 11-26-2006, 03:13 PM

Had a tenant that had a C10 - bought it used from the local COOP Power Company. This one was high milage - but maintenance was textbook - very good records too. Anyway, this thing ran great and he used it to tow his boat to and from the boat launch - figured no one would mess with his "old" truck. Katrina took it - yet to be found, as far as I know. Last I saw him, it was the one thing he missed most.

hendrie42 · 11-26-2006, 03:53 PM

18,000 miles on a 1974 will be a great project--------

nymphfishin · 11-26-2006, 04:01 PM

Alan
When do we get to see the before pictures?
Then the during and afters?
Don

ALANSD · 11-26-2006, 04:01 PM

That's what we're thinking, inside and under the hood is immaculate. The body has rust in one door bottom, and a few spots in the bed, but we wil have a good time fixing that and then repainting it.

wahoonc · 11-26-2006, 04:02 PM

Yep 1974 is getting pretty ancient

Here is my wife's project truck. It belonged to her grandfather. He purchased in new in 1963. Currently it is under the barn with about a dozen or so other "projects"

Aaron

wkerfoot · 11-26-2006, 04:04 PM

OK, Here is one that is 33 model years old. But we have owned it for 34 years.

Bill

ALANSD · 11-26-2006, 04:11 PM

here are some shots. I wasn't gonna post em being the Airstream forum and all, but anway,

ALANSD · 11-26-2006, 04:12 PM

yeah Love those other two! Especially Grandad's that is so cool. So you guys think I can tow the 31 Sovereign with the C10? Its a 350 2 bbl 2 wh drive.

ALANSD · 11-26-2006, 04:15 PM

here is the inside. Its got added GM A/c and a pretty cool 70's stereo.

safari57 · 11-26-2006, 04:16 PM

Alan

What a great F/S team thing to do. And a great find. I have a special place in my automotive heart for '74 trucks. When my father passed in '85 I inherited his '74 GMC. It was tan and white and was a great truck. Sadly, when we moved from the prairies to the wet coast within a year it just rotted out completely. We think it was all the salt dust caught up in the body and box but it was unbelieveable how bad it got. Although I had to part it out I still have the engine, trans and a bunch of other stuff. Eventually I will find something like you have and put everything to good use.

Pics would be great. Have fun doing it up.

Barry

ALANSD · 11-26-2006, 04:18 PM

thanks Barry.. My other half does not quite get it, but the kid already buffed out the bumper and made it look great

overlander63 · 11-26-2006, 05:36 PM

Alan, does the truck have a 4.11 rear end in it? Is it 10 bolt or 12 bolt? Does it have a TH400, or TH350? It would be interesting to do some detective work on it. We towed our Overlander with our Chevy van, it had the 350 in it, and a lot of extra weight in the form of conversion doodads. For comparison, the Overlander grosses out @6200 pounds, your Sovereign should gross out only a few hundred pounds more (I think about 6500).

wahoonc · 11-26-2006, 06:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by overlander63

Alan, does the truck have a 4.11 rear end in it? Is it 10 bolt or 12 bolt? Does it have a TH400, or TH350? It would be interesting to do some detective work on it. We towed our Overlander with our Chevy van, it had the 350 in it, and a lot of extra weight in the form of conversion doodads. For comparison, the Overlander grosses out @6200 pounds, your Sovereign should gross out only a few hundred pounds more (I think about 6500).

Terry,
I think the big Sovereigns of Alan's vintage gross 7200#...mine do. But the real world weight gently loaded is around 6500# or so.

Aaron

59toaster · 11-26-2006, 06:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by overlander63

Alan, does the truck have a 4.11 rear end in it? Is it 10 bolt or 12 bolt? Does it have a TH400, or TH350? It would be interesting to do some detective work on it. We towed our Overlander with our Chevy van, it had the 350 in it, and a lot of extra weight in the form of conversion doodads. For comparison, the Overlander grosses out @6200 pounds, your Sovereign should gross out only a few hundred pounds more (I think about 6500).

I use to moderate www.coloradok5.com I am a big Chevy nut on the 73-91 square bodies like that one.

That truck will have a 12 bolt and unless it was ordered with a towing package it probably has 3.08 gear since it is a long bed. some of the shorts got a 272...just an awful gear. 4.11 was pretty rare in a V8 1/2 ton. More common in the 292 I6. Usual if it wasn't a special order but had the right options it would get a 3.73.

GM did not start using the 10 bolts in the trucks till 81.

It will have a TH350.

Open the glove box and there will be a sticker that has all the options and if its anything other then the default 3.08 it will be listed. See if it has a G80 locker option as well. If the sticker is not in the glove box some of the early years of 73 and 74 had them under the hood on the driver side inner fender.

Look under the passenger side seat up in the springs and floor and back...see if a factory build sheet is there.

Shame the original grill is missing. It was a deep grill and I think unique to 73 and 74. Kind of rare these days.

Now some thing to warn you about....sitting that long has not been good on the old girl. Even with the low miles I would keep a close eye on the transmission. The age has made the seal hard. If it starts slipping park it.

Those transmissions are very easy to rebuild. Looking about $130 in parts.
http://store.summitracing.com/partde...5&autoview=sku
They have them in stock at the store in Hampton right at I-75.

Going to possibly run into some seal issues with the engine as well. Right off the bat I would flush the coolant system and replace the water pump. With the water pump off I would think real hard about replacing that front crank shaft seal. You need to get a balancer puller and Installer. you can still the threads out of the crank if you don't use and installer. Autozone will loan them to you.

RTV should be used VERY sparing.

Other things I would do
Thermostat
All new coolant hoses

New brake hoses and a complete system flush....Depending on what that fluid looked like I would seriously consider new callipers, wheel cylinders and master. Brakes are just not something to screw with. with so few of miles, that may be the original fluid and it may have collected a lot of moisture over the years and become very acidic and caused rust in the system.

DO NOT BUY A REMAN CARB FOR THAT TRUCK! they are junk. They are jetted wrong and just plain a pain in the butt. Give me a call when you want to rebuild it and I will come over. That's an easy carb to rebuild $14 for the kit. Pick up some JB weld as well. Little trick that needs to be done to fix a float bowl leak issue.

If it has a dead spot taking off its the accelerator pump. When they sit for extended periods the pump rubber will get stuck in the bore and pull off the plunger. New one in the rebuild kit.

take the air cleaner off and shoot a picture from the passenger side and post it. If it has the right choke set up it may be an easy conversion to electric. Much less temperamental then the stove or hot air style chokes.

Some sites of interest.
www.67-72chevytrucks.com Look for a guy by the nick of Woogeroo He's local to us and he sometimes get some of the folks off that site to meet up at swap meets an local car shows. Ask to be added to his mailing list, tell him "Grim" sent you.

This guy is in AL and has some good parts.
http://www.73-87chevytrucks.com/

This guy has some interesting stuff including some information on special package trucks. That Blue and White sub in the header is mine.

He has a great list of parts vendors in his links section

http://www.73-87.com/

Sheet metal
http://www.goodmarkindustries.com/HomePage.html they are in Lawrenceville and they supply most places including yearone, LMC and most of the other vendors.

The rotten battery tray I bet you need is still available at the dealer.

Restoration parts
http://www.lmctruck.com/ They will mail you a free catalog. Info on the site.

Year one is tempting but they are overpriced.

Cool find! Now dump it in the weeds and stick some 18's on it. It should have a 5 x 5" lug pattern. Lots of spiffy wheels show up on Craig's.

overlander63 · 11-26-2006, 06:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wahoonc

Terry,
I think the big Sovereigns of Alan's vintage gross 7200#...mine do. But the real world weight gently loaded is around 6500# or so.

Aaron

No, I just looked it up, and the dry weight is 4780 pounds, with 2000 pounds for "add-ons" Comes to 6780 pounds.

overlander63 · 11-26-2006, 07:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 59toaster

DO NOT BUY A REMAN CARB FOR THAT TRUCK! they are junk. They are jetted wrong and just plain a pain in the butt. Give me a call when you want to rebuild it and I will come over. That's an easy carb to rebuild $14 for the kit. Pick up some JB weld as well. Little trick that needs to be done to fix a float bowl leak issue Quadrajets are prone too.

Ohhhhhhh DO NOT mess with the top flap on the secondaries. Yes it isn;t opening as you rev it up. It won't open till there is load going down the road.

People messing with that flap is what got the name "Quadrabog" coined. If it has a dead spot taking off its the accelerator pump. When they sit for extended periods the pump rubber will get stuck in the bore and pull off the plunger. New one in the rebuild kit.

take the air cleaner off and shoot a picture from the passenger side and post it. If it has the right choke set up it may be an easy conversion to electric. Much less temperamental then the stove or hot air style chokes.

I read somewhere above that Alan said he had a 2 barrel on it.