Crushing Gumby 71 Shortbed Patina build

[shawno72]

Love what you have done so far. Maybe I missed it but what size tires did you go with?

[Rusbuilt]

Awesome friend! Turned out great!

[jasonvw]

Originally Posted by shawno72

Love what you have done so far. Maybe I missed it but what size tires did you go with?

Thanks guys! The tire sizes are Front: 215/70/15 on a 15x8 rim and the rears are: 275/60/15 on a 15x10 rim. Everything fits great and best of all, NO rubbing!

[jasonvw]

All my interior stuff should be shipping next week, and then its on! I can't wait to get rolling on the next step of this truck. More good news, between me and my buddy Russ, who has my old 74, we have all the stuff needed to buff Gumby back to a showroom shine (hardly) but a guy can dream right! Here is another of Russ's 74. Russ, you need to get on here buddy!!!

[VDOG]

Nice suspension build. So you have ECE Rear Suspension parts, and CPP front Suspension parts. How does it ride? I thought about using ECE for my truck so im curious.

[BB72CHEVKT]

looks good

[Zoomin]

Truck is looking good! I've never seen a two tone done like that before, that's a cool difference.

[lolife99]

Man,... your truck looks great.

Are you sure those are 8's and 10's?
Those tire sizes would be really stretched on those rim sizes.

They look more like 15x6's and 15x8.5's to me.

[jasonvw]

Wow, I totally slipped! I was thinking about the wheels on the old 74. Yep these are 15x6 front and 15x8.5 rear! They fit really well with this drop. As for ride quality, it's actually pretty good. I will say, the KYB shocks are a bit too soft for my taste and I have stiffer ones on the way for the front. The rear is actually perfect so I'm not changing anything there. I will be posting up a pictorial on the alignment I had the other day that you guys may find interesting! Stay tuned. Also today a huge box showed up full of interior goodies, so I'm going to be busy this weekend!
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[lolife99]

I didn't see a sway bar.
What do you have planned for that?

(I love this build!!!)

[truknut]

Looks great. Can't wait to drop mine!!

[jasonvw]

Thanks guys! I am loving it for sure. As for a sway bar, I think I am going to add some CPP sway bars in the near future but for right now, my focus is on the interior. I will be posting up some new stuff later today so stick around. Thanks for the comments everyone.

[sourkraut]

Very nice build
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[67cheby]

nice

[jasonvw]

Thanks thanks thanks guys! Im as into the build as you guys are! So as promised, here is some more content. I don't know about you guys, but as far as alignment is concerned, for me it has always been as case of me dropping off my car or truck and coming back when it was all done. I really had no clue how they got everything lined back up after slamming the suspension way down below what stock was. I decided that this time I would stick around and ask questions, take photos and really get a good understanding for how it works. In the past I have used a shop about 30 miles from my house that was quick, and cheap... and over time I figured out that this was not the key to getting a good job. This time I called around and came across North Coast Alignment and lucky me, they were 5 minutes from the house! During my first phone call I talked to Sean, the owner and found out that he is also a C10 owner and when I mentioned that my truck was really low, he answered, no problem! That sold me. Im sure we have all been to an alignment place with our lowered trucks and got nothing but dirty looks and a very high estimate on the job. I was determined not to go through that again and Sean said they could dial Gumby in for me so off I went.

When we first finished the truck at Teds, we had done a basic plumb-bob alignment to get it close so I could drive it home and get it aligned shortly after. I honestly felt like we were close as it tracked fairly straight, steering wheel was only slightly off etc. When I got to North Coast I had Sean come take a look and we talked shop for a while.

I asked Sean if I could hang out in the back and take photos and basically bother his tech Brock while he worked on Gumby so I could see what goes into a "real" alignment and he said, no problem. Awesome! So off we went to the rack and Brock got my truck loaded.

Brock and I had a conversation about the parts on the truck and the process of getting the truck to really go straight. Brock is a wealth of knowledge about alignments and he has been doing it for more than 7 years so I felt really comfortable letting him take on the job. First order of business was to get the laser boards on the wheels once the truck was up in the air on the lift

There is one board per wheel and these bounce back the laser light that is flashed from the machine mounted to the wall. Its a really trick piece of machinery and watching it work was really interesting.

[shawno72]

Looking good.

[jasonvw]

Once the reflectors were in place Brock got up and turned the wheels back and forth to get the truck squared up on the lift.

The computer matched the movements of the truck and when it was happy that the laser was showing it was square we were able to get the current setting of the camber/caster/toe

And once the wheels were straight, these are the readings we came up with.

Now thats a lot of red... not that it was horrible but some issues were obvious right away that to you or me, with a tape measure we would never be able to fully get perfect. Brock pointed out the obvious difference in camber from driver to passenger side. The toe was also off and the rear end was sitting off to the passenger side too far causing the truck to dog track slightly. Again, from my seat of the pants driving the truck up to this point, I had not really felt it was far off of spec. Now seeing this, I realized it was not really even close.

[jasonvw]

So now that we had a baseline of where the truck was to start with, Brock started to get the Camber setting correct. To do that he grabbed his shim box. There are tons of different size and thickness shims in here. He uses these to make big or small changes to the distance between the upper A arm and the frame and this in turn changes the camber setting of the truck on that side.

Brock then loosened up the Drivers side Upper A arm and slowly let it move out away from the frame, watching the computer the whole time. With each turn of the bolt the camber setting got better and so when we got into neutral territory he started to add shims.

Check this photo out compared to the screen shot when we started and you will see the front camber is now in the right place.

And just to confirm, we squared up the truck again and we saw the same green zone. Looks like we are good on Camber now. On to the rest!

[jasonvw]

The next step was to take care of the Toe issue we had going on in the front. Brock loosened up the tie rods so we could adjust them.

And with one Eye on the computer he was able to adjust each side until it moved into the green on the computer and everything was where it belonged.


This is the same thing we have all done when doing a tape measure alignment in our garages. The difference here is that this is squaring up the whole truck first and that ensures that once you set Camber, you can set the toe and the laser keeps its eye on all the other settings in case your new toe settings alters any of the others. Trust me, this is why you spend the cash on a pro shop to do this job.

Now that we had this toe dialed in, we locked down the upper A arms with the new shims since the Camber stayed right where it was supposed to. Time to move to the back of the truck.

[jasonvw]

The back of the truck is a much easier job than the front but just as important to how the truck drives. In back we have the adjustable ECE super track bar. This has a threaded end on one side that lets you lengthen or shorten up the bar and thus locates the rear end under the truck. My axle was over to the passenger side too much causing a bit of dog tracking.

First Brock undid the adjustable end of the track bar and turned it a few times before reinstalling it and checking the computer.


It turns out that we had to lengthen the track bar about 1/2 inch to get the rear end centered under the truck! Way more than I thought and like I said before, we had used a tape measure at Teds to get it close. Again, further proof of why you go to a real alignment shop that takes their time. Once we had it straight, Brock locked it down.

With that job done, we squared the truck up one last time and the computer told us, we had it dialed! Everything was within spec and actually better than stock!

Brock pulled it off the rack and I took the truck for a ride. WOW, what a huge difference. It went dead straight down the road, even with both hands off the wheel (don't try that at home kids! ) The steering wheel was totally straight up and centered and the truck didn't grab grooves or track funny at all. I was super impressed with the difference.

I honestly didn't expect much of a change at all in how the truck drove after this. I basically figured it would be the same, just give me more tire life. I am really happy to say I got a lot more than I expected. Brock and I talked after and he said one of the tricks he does is he sets the drivers side up so that the camber and toe will even out when the driver is in the seat since the weight of the driver can effect those settings. Again, thats why I called around until I found a shop that is happy to deal with lowered cars. These guys are awesome and if you are in So Cal and need a C10 friendly place to take your truck, North Coast gets my vote! The drive home was really nice, and all I could think about was the next step, and the next step, and the next... and when I got home, I was greeted by a giant box! interior stuff is here!!!!

[lolife99]

Thanks for the detailed data on the front end alignment.
Again,... great job on your truck!

[Slammed66]

Love this build!!!!

Great write ups as well
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[mooseknuckles]

thats some good info right there...

[jasonvw]

Right on guys! I thought it would be useful to let everyone see a step by step of each job Im going to do on this truck. Im sure there are plenty of guys out there that have never tried to lower their truck before and maybe seeing this build will help them out. I should be back on Gumby this weekend with new photos coming soon.

[shawno72]

Awesome!! Can't wait. What's next?
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