New Engine, New Seats, Rebuilt Transmission!

1/16/2020

It has been a LONG while since my last post, since I bought the truck of my dreams. 4 months! The truck had a "working" engine when we bought it...supposedly. In actuality it was far from working. Whoever put the engine in there wired things all over the place and it was shorting out my starter. The previous owner told us we needed a new starter. Two starters later we figured that wasn't in fact the issue. The engine was not in good shape and all the weird wiring was messing things up. We decided a professional was the best person for the job so off to the shop it went. Several months and several thousand dollars later, HENRI, yes I named my handsome truck Henri, has a new engine, a rebuilt transmission, new seats (third row from an old Suburban), new tires and new rims!

Upon it's return to us we were able to install door handles, and one door lock. Apparently these trucks never had a lock on the outside of the drivers side door. It was for safety purposes. They wanted people to exit and enter through the passenger side door so they were standing in the street to get in or out. Weird huh? We didn't figure that out until after we drilled a hole in the door. Just one thing to add to the list for body work later. My husband had to learn a new skill to weld a frame together for my new bench seats. Our neighbor, Scott, was nice enough to let us use his tools and show him how to do it. We also put a steering wheel gear indicator thing on so you can tell when it's in park, reverse, or drive...apparently we don't have a neutral so on the indicator the neutral is our drive. Fun right? HAHA! Gotta love vintage restoration projects and all the quirks that come with it.

We still need to do a ton of body work, move the gas tank line, line the bed, and completely line the entire inside and work on the dash a bit. BUT..... IT DRIVES!!!! I got to drive my truck for the first time ever yesterday! I took him to go get tacos with my favorite person, my loving husband.