I'm Back!

[Motherfrog402]

Hi all,

I spent way too much time without a Chevy. Today I was looking at Craigslist and found a '74 longbed with 6-cyl and manual trans...$800. I texted the guy and made an appointment to look at it this afternoon. When I got there, I was pleasantly surprised that it was a Custom-20. It had the 292 and a 4-spd. One spot of rust in the front passenger fender and a dent that can be pushed out on the driver side quarter.

I offered him $650 and he accepted.

It's not my '72 Burb and not my '72 K5, but it's a Chevy truck, it's solid and it will teach my little girl (who's not so little anymore, 17 next month) to drive.

It's too dark to take pictures, so I'll load them up tomorrow.

[EARNHARDT#3]

Congrats! But this is the 67-72 board ;-)

[Motherfrog402]

Don't care, Earnhardt, it's a Chevy.

[LockDoc]

-
The Mods do...

I will have your thread moved to the correct forum.

LockDoc

[EARNHARDT#3]

Off to the square body forum with you LOL

[Motherfrog402]

Says the guy who's been a member less than a year. The point of my thread wasn't to ask questions about my truck, it was to reconnect with the folks I first met on here 15 years ago.

[9teen69]

Welcome back !!

[Titomars]

Originally Posted by Motherfrog402

Hi all,

I spent way too much time without a Chevy. Today I was looking at Craigslist and found a '74 longbed with 6-cyl and manual trans...$800. I texted the guy and made an appointment to look at it this afternoon. When I got there, I was pleasantly surprised that it was a Custom-20. It had the 292 and a 4-spd. One spot of rust in the front passenger fender and a dent that can be pushed out on the driver side quarter.

I offered him $650 and he accepted.

It's not my '72 Burb and not my '72 K5, but it's a Chevy truck, it's solid and it will teach my little girl (who's not so little anymore, 17 next month) to drive.

It's too dark to take pictures, so I'll load them up tomorrow.

Welcome to the square zone motherfrog !!
I also own a square body and a CJ

1977 C/10 step side with a factory 454
1981 CJ7 258 4v, T-5, D44 locked, D30 limited slip and SOA

[Motherfrog402]

Originally Posted by Titomars

Welcome to the square zone motherfrog !!
I also own a square body and a CJ

1977 C/10 step side with a factory 454
1981 CJ7 258 4v, T-5, D44 locked, D30 limited slip and SOA

Pretty sure I know you on the jeepforum, titomars....I'm FLynes on there.

[Titomars]

Originally Posted by Motherfrog402

Pretty sure I know you on the jeepforum, titomars....I'm FLynes on there.

Well hi there Flynes yes I know you from the jeep forum. I think we have even bantered back and forth on a few threads.
Again welcome aboard

[Motherfrog402]

Went out, turned the barn lights on and snapped a few pics.

[Liz]

welcome back, its been a while lol

[Gregski]

save that truck bro, she's a beauty, and welcome back

you can shove another six banger in that engine bay there's so much room, no seriously make it a V 12, LOL

[Motherfrog402]

Hiya Liz! It HAS been a while, huh? I got tired of waiting for the guy to sell me my Burb back, LOL!

[walkerb]

Nice survivor. Love the truck. Especially for 650.00

[Motherfrog402]

Originally Posted by walkerb

Nice survivor. Love the truck. Especially for 650.00

The price WAS nice, nice enough that even the wife is happy.

I spent the entire day cleaning the interior. The gauge lenses were foggy and I couldn't see the gauges, so I took everything apart and used Never Dull...worked like a charm. I also took the vinyl flooring out and found surface rust, but the floor is still nice and solid. I then took the torn saddle cover off the bench seat. The driver's side of the bench is torn, but nothing bad, especially for a farm truck that's going to teach my daughter to drive.

I found out that the spare tire is a real mother to wrestle back into its cradle, took all my strength to get it back into position.

The only thing on the dash that works is the speedo, but the odometer doesn't; the oil pressure works too, I think. As you can see, the tailgate is beat to hell.

Next up will be cleaning out the bed.

[Motherfrog402]

Oh yeah, at some point one of the PO's (there are only two, the guy from whom I bought it and the original owner) replaced the Rochester MV with some ancient looking 1bbl that might possibly be a Carter.....that's getting replaced next month.

on edit: it's a 60's Rochester 1bbl...found a pic matching mine.

[greg64]

Nice truck, especially for the price. That carb you have is a Rochester B.

[Motherfrog402]

Originally Posted by greg64

Nice truck, especially for the price. That carb you have is a Rochester B.

Good to know.

It's a total POS, no idle adjustment whatsoever. The fuel mixture screw doesn't do a damn thing either. Putting the original 7044026 Rochester MV back on will give me back the divorced choke and allow me to get rid of the manual choke that the PO installed; it doesn't work worth a rip anyway.

[RUN GMC]

This actually reminds of the Alan Jackson song Drive.......It was painted red with a white top.......

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQe3...uTv42MtdXhcrN5

[Motherfrog402]

I spent all of today recovering from yesterday's endeavors. My back and knees just aren't what they used to be.

Tomorrow's task will be to clean all the crap out of the bed that the PO left me. Brooke has told me that I can spend $300 per month on it, so a new Rochester MV and engine gaskets are first up in March; April will give it a new windshield; May/June's budget will get new dash and engine harnesses; July/August will get new tires and Renée will be able to start driving it at the beginning of the school year.

I'm still deciding on whether to stick with the 8.75-16.5 tires or jump up to the 9.50-16.5 tires.....ideas?

Eventually, once Renée is in college, the truck goes back to me and will get the restoration treatment. I'd like to turn it into a Camper Special (which is why I was toying with the 9.50-16.5 tire choice) and upgrade the interior to a Cheyenne Super. 454 will replace the 292. Oh yeah, color will be changed to Blue too.

By the way, who sells authentic restoration parts for our rigs? I'm not impressed with LMC at all, since they pawn the '77 grille for the '74. Particularly, I'd like to get the Cheyenne Super trim work.

This is what I'd eventually like mine to look like:

[Motherfrog402]

Interesting twist to my wheel question...turns out that the PO swapped out the 16.5 wheels for 16"......split rims. I'll be hitting the local junk yards for a set of original 16.5's

On another note, I scraped off some of the crud from the engine, to find the date code and was successful. The problem is that I'm more versed in the SBC and BBC, and AMC I6 engine decoding.

Does anyone know what this code translates to? I'm pretty sure the "F" is for Flint; 03I3=? No clue what the "P" means. Also, I'm used to seeing a three-letter suffix; my '72 Suburban 402 code was T0108TLM.

Here's the pic of the date code.

[Titomars]

Originally Posted by Motherfrog402

Interesting twist to my wheel question...turns out that the PO swapped out the 16.5 wheels for 16"......split rims. I'll be hitting the local junk yards for a set of original 16.5's

On another note, I scraped off some of the crud from the engine, to find the date code and was successful. The problem is that I'm more versed in the SBC and BBC, and AMC I6 engine decoding.

Does anyone know what this code translates to? I'm pretty sure the "F" is for Flint; 03I3=? No clue what the "P" means. Also, I'm used to seeing a three-letter suffix; my '72 Suburban 402 code was T0108TLM.

Here's the pic of the date code.

Weird it is like something is missing. The 292 that should be in your truck should have a code of THU. there is no code with a "P" in it. In 74 also all truck engine codes start with a "T". Your truck was built in 73 (I can't read the month) so even the date code is not right. as I read it the engine was built on March 13th Assuming that "I" is a "1". I don't think an engine built to 73 specs would have been put in a 74 model without reconfiguring and restamping. Well at least I never heard it being done that way and I worked in GM dealers for a lot of years. I wonder if this is a rebuilders stamping and not GM's

[Motherfrog402]

Originally Posted by Titomars

Weird it is like something is missing. The 292 that should be in your truck should have a code of THU. there is no code with a "P" in it. In 74 also all truck engine codes start with a "T". Your truck was built in 73 (I can't read the month) so even the date code is not right. as I read it the engine was built on March 13th Assuming that "I" is a "1". I don't think an engine built to 73 specs would have been put in a 74 model without reconfiguring and restamping. Well at least I never heard it being done that way and I worked in GM dealers for a lot of years. I wonder if this is a rebuilders stamping and not GM's

Could it be a leftover engine I wonder? My truck build date is 12/73, but would GM have used a nine-month old engine? My CJ's 258 has a build date of April 1976 and the CJ itself was built in May.

[Titomars]

Originally Posted by Motherfrog402

Could it be a leftover engine I wonder? My truck build date is 12/73, but would GM have used a nine-month old engine? My CJ's 258 has a build date of April 1976 and the CJ itself was built in May.

GM like the all of the Big 4 back then shut down all assembly plants in late July for retooling for the next model year. Next year production started in late August. Officially the model year ran from September to August. So take 74 for example. production started in late August of 73 with a debut of Sept. 73 and ran till the 3rd week in July 74 when the plants close for 3 to 4 weeks to retool for the 75 run and so on. Ever wonder why you never see an August production date on a car or damn few of them?
So a 08/73 built engine could be perfectly correct in a 12/73 built vehicle as a 74 but a 9 month old engine would not. even in 73/74 there were federal emissions and safety standards that had to be met. and an engine built for the 73 model would not be technically compliant for 74. Now GM could erase the data stamp and reconfigure it to 74 specs and re-stamp it but knowing how GM did things back then, They would have scraped the engine. It was too expensive and a legal issue. So they either generally melted it down or donated such things to school/college auto shops around the country for teaching aides only. Never to be put on the road.