Thanks guys (and gal!). This build has been a lot of fun, and quite interesting as well. The debugging continues, and so far nothing serious has popped up. The truck runs nice & cool with that Speedway radiator and electric fan combo, which is good as shows & cruise nights are underway. I did learn a lesson about fuses for electric fans though. My fan is rated at 16.5 amps, but that is the constant draw when running. I had originally tossed in a 20 amp fuse, but the start-up draw blows those. A switch to a slightly bigger fuse fixed that.
I have been working my way through squeaks and rattles. On paved roads I have very little, but on washboard stretches of gravel roads I have some. To be fair, even my new vehicles don’t like these stretches of road, so I shouldn’t be too excited. Lesson learned though: next time pay close attention during the build and always test things to see if they could possibly shake and cause a racket.
After adding a few bits of foam seal to the cab at the front of the passenger door, I was able to get rid of one loud bit of wind noise I was experiencing, and that cab is now pleasantly quiet. It’s not perfect, but some wind noise on old trucks appears to be somewhat inevitable. I can however carry on a normal conversation at 50 mph (this is a first for me as my previous builds were all noisy inside!). The combination of thorough weatherstripping, vibration damper, jute padding and vinyl covered hardboard really worked.
I added a beat up tool box to the bed to hold stuff like a jack, tools, hood props, etc:
The S10 seat still looks a bit out of place, but it is exceptionally comfortable. I can go for an hour’s drive and hop out just as fresh as when I got in. I’ve been searching for some old style rims that will hold a dog dish hubcap (you know the ones-GM made zillions of them) but they appear to have all gone the way of the dodo around here. The S10 rims were really sticking out, but I realized that the silver colour of those rims wasn’t helping matters so I coated them in flat black paint, and they no longer stick out like a sore thumb
I was pleased with the results, and all it cost me was a quart of Tremclad paint (in keeping with my ultra-lo-buck approach to this build).
I have over 500 miles on it now, and am pleased with fuel consumption. I’m getting just under 25 mpg as an overall average. With gas at 9 bucks a gallon, I’m very happy.
Best surprise was the total cost after going through my records for the build. I added everything up (and I mean every last penny, including bureaucratic fees, appraisal, taxes, etc), and I came up with a grand total of $9313 Canadian dollars (about $7200 bucks in US dollars). Not bad for a reliable, safe, fuel efficient truck that's 75 years old! I will post a more detailed breakdown of costs in the S10 Swap How To thread for anyone who is interested in the swap for economic reasons.
I am now keeping an eye out for my next project. This build taught me a valuable lesson about the drawbacks of building something that's kinda rare. As youngrodder pointed out, things would have gone way faster if there was an aftermarket to support my build (and if I wasn’t so cheap!). I probably spent a good ⅓ of my time fooling around making stuff that was either unavailable or unaffordable. My next build will either be something that’s very common and well supported by the aftermarket, or something that’s a little more rare as long as it has no missing parts at all (it’s way easier to fix a broken part than it is to fab up a new one from scratch). For now I’m gonna keep driving around and enjoying the attention this old thing gets. I can’t even gas it up without being accosted at the pumps (in a good way!).