Still Hammerin’InTheGarageMedia.com
Mostly, my aforementioned bad luck revolves around my naturally aspirated possessions, the most popular of which has been the ’69 C10 project, aptly named the “Polished Turd.” Purchased when I was still back with Classic Trucks/Motortrend, it was one of those “ran when parked” claims from the previous owner. And it did, kind of, run, for a few minutes before the hydraulic-assist unit burned up from being completely dry when I fired her up in the garage to survey the amount of work I’d be looking at to get the truck roadworthy in a short amount of time (it was originally destined to be my son’s first vehicle). Seven years later, I’m still dealing with tackling that amount of work!
After that ill-fated initial fire up, I decided to surveil the rest of the truck—the air-ride system, the electrical, the exhaust, transmission, and so on—and at the end of the day I had finally realized, pretty much everything needed to be gone through, redone, or flat-out replaced altogether. Literally, everything minus the paint on the roof would require some amount of attention, and thus, the rebuild began … slowly.
Obviously, our transition to In The Garage Media put things on hold for a little bit, but thanks to Jimenez Bros. Customs (JBC), the work did proceed and my goal of having a Fleetside on the road during the Pandemic seemed like it was, well, just down the road! Throughout that early time period, we went through and gutted the suspension, replacing it with CPP’s Totally Tubular arms front and rear, and swapped out the wasted ’bags with CPP’s Viking coilovers; the stock 12-bolt, with all its booger-welded brackets and whatnot, made room for Strange Engineering’s C10 9-inch assembly, and ultimately, Wilwood’s six-piston brakes (with integrated Electronic Parking Brake) and Pro spindles were installed, so platform-wise things were looking really good!
Next on the list was to rip out all the questionable wiring—everything—and utilize American Autowire’s Highway 22 Plus full vehicle harness, as well as Dakota Digital’s VHX gauges and a few additional BIM modules (most notably their dual fan controller to help actuate the Afco radiator fans supplied by Speedway Motors). While we were on an electronics kick, the decision was made to drop the leaky Turbo 400 and, thanks to my buddy Greg Ducato at Phoenix Transmission, replace it with 4L65E. Again, things were definitely looking on the up and up at this point.
When my welcome at JBC had expired, the ’69 was brought into the ITGM Tech Center for all the final bits and pieces … you know, a relatively short stay!
With Ryan Manson’s help, we finished up the already-in-process stainless exhaust, plumbed the brakes (which prompted my good friend, Wilwood’s Mike Hamrick, to make a personal visit and assist with the process!), plumbed the trans cooler, installed Lokar’s Electronic Sport Mode shifter, and, a little curveball I threw in, swapped out the painted Fleetside bed for an all-new Stepside assembly from LMC Truck!
Since this industry is more like a group of close friends than business acquaintances, I struck up a conversation with an old coworker and good friend, Ross Berlanga, at TMI Products about possibly doing a ’67-72 interior kit, which he gladly obliged to and as you (hopefully) witnessed right here on these pages, came up with what’s undeniably the best-looking aspect of the truck so far! Granted, we/I did things out of order (the interior should have waited till “after” the truck was running), but we weren’t about to miss this amazing opportunity!
Now, long before the interior came to be, I convinced FiTech’s Mike Wahl (he’s a good friend, as long as we don’t sit next to each other on an airplane!) to do their UltraRam LS-style EFI system on my 454 big-block, for which he supplied one of the first prototype sheetmetal intakes. Well, that system was originally slated to be fully installed, tuned, and so on way back when TMI finished up the interior. Of course, obstacles arose, so many in fact that by the time I was finally ready to schedule the install with FiTech, the UltraRam was outdated! I was initially disappointed, as having an LS-influenced big-block (fuel system, harness, and all) was something I was really looking forward to … until Mike showed me the 4500-based Nemesis system, and I was good!
OK, so here we are this past April, the truck’s finally at FiTech to—FINALLY—become roadworthy, and just like that, my bad luck cloud not only reappeared, but dumped down on me with a vengeance! Thankfully, the other Mike (Sullivan) and Jeremy have more patience than I could ever muster up, and we (they) powered through all the BS the Polished Turd could throw at us—right up to the very minute before Mike and Jeremy were off for a three-week adventure overseas. Turns out the one thing that hadn’t been addressed or really evaluated up until this point was the heartbeat of the matter: the 454. She runs, and she will see her time on the dyno with Jeremy to dial in the FiTech Nemesis system, but I’ve still got some more work cut out for me before that “roadworthy” aspect becomes official!
Maybe by the time the ’69 is on the road, my son will have a son of his own about ready to get his driver’s license!