Wid

So I've had this beautiful '79 pickup for a few months now, it's been a GREAT truck and WELL worth the $300 I paid for it. The truck had originally been in my boss' family for it's entire life, and has just under 200,000 miles. It was pretty well cared for aside from the one thing that my boss did to it. His daughter had driven the truck the day before, and parked it in an unusual place in the driveway, and he was backing his big diesel work truck down his driveway at a pretty good speed (not knowing the truck was behind him to the right) and backed the far back right corner of the work truck into the cab of the pickup. It crushed the window/door/and the cab behind the door.



He was so ashamed that he had done this, that he couldn't bear looking at it any more, and I asked him if he'd sell it to me, after some hesitation, he said he would gladly sell it to me for $400 if I was going to be rebuilding it. If not, then he'd just keep it. So I promised him that I would rebuild the entire truck, and so began my search for a worthy replacement cab/door.







Took me about 3 months but I finally found one at a junk yard about 150 miles from my house, for $200. Seemed pretty damn reasonable to me, so I bought it. We got everything unhooked, and got the cab removed from the donor vehicle in a little under 2 hours. I'm 6'2" and about 170 give or take a couple pounds and me and one other person of equal strength can easily lift and maneuver the cab for easy installation and removal. However, the truck I was transporting the cab with, was parked pretty far away, so the guys at the yard lifted it with the fork lift and drove it to my truck.

Soon as I got it home, I began removing the bed, it was very simple. For those of you who do not know, there are 6 bolts securing the bed to the frame, and the only things you have to disconnect are the plugs for the tail/side marker/license plate lights, and take out the 4 screws that secure the fuel fill neck to the bed and you can just lift the bed right off. Me and one other person removed the bed with no assistance, and we are not big by any means.



Then we removed the cab. Now I am not going to do a writeup on how to remove the cab, but it really isn't all that complicated. 6 bolts secure it to the frame, and there is just a lot of little stuff to remove and swap over to the new cab. Very tedious and time consuming. But worth it in the end.

Here's the cab removed...





I didn't take any pictures of the process, but we then removed all of the suspension, dropped the gas tank and removed a few other things, and stripped the frame down to metal (found only light surface rust in a few places) and coated the ENTIRE frame in a product called POR-15. For those of you who do not know what POR-15 does, it's used to kill rust, and/or prevent future rust. It is a really good product and it literally says on the can, that once it dries NO solvent can remove it. And trust me, DO NOT get this in your hair or on your skin, i had to cut a chunk of hair out, and it is a pain the ass to get off your skin.

Also another thing to think about, is to tarp the floor of your garage. You'll never get this stuff off so I bought a 25x10 ft. roll of painters tarp from a local hardware store for like $10 and laid it down on the garage floor.



And then began the painting, it took a full day to paint the frame, with 2 coats, and the picture below doesn't show it, but since then I have replaced the front and rear shocks.

Here's the truck once the painting was dry, and all the parts reinstalled on the frame.



And finally the new cab gets installed. Along with the doors, and the fenders.



That is unfortunately as far as I have gotten as of today, but more pictures are to come. Should have the truck fully reassembled in one more day, I will post pictures as soon as I finish.

Thanks for reading my boring post!

-Wid

Lons81

iTrader: (2)

Great pics of your labor of love to restore your ride. Gonna be a great truck for another 30 years.

westjohns yota

def a good write up even if you say it is, we dont have too many 2wd builds on this site sadly

Ocell

Subscribed. I'm excited to see where this ends up.

Wid

Thanks man, it's all worth it in the end!

I will actually be doing a few write ups a little later on, when I am repairing the rust and patching some holes. But I'm going all the way with this truck, not stopping until it's perfect.

You and me both man!



Last night I finally got the truck put back together for the most part, and took it out for a spin. Alignment is just god awful, and the truck sits a little higher than it used to with that new suspension but it rides SO smooth now.

I call it, Frankentruck!





The truck will be fully re-painted, have new tires/wheels, and have all new interior once I am done with this build, so Stay Tuned! More to come soon.

-Wid

17toyotaman

Very nice deal for $400!!!! Please put that visor back on it looks b a with it on if not I hope you live near Oregon so I can buy it!!! lol

Wid

I live in Washington. Takes me about an hour and a half to get to Portland International Airport. It's in great shape, I'll sell for the right price, if you're serious, make an offer.

17toyotaman

PM sent

NickMiller

Lovin that you're restoring it! It's just keeping these old yotas on the road even longer!

Wid

Well guys, it's been a busy couple months for me. And I don't have the truck running yet. Been having issues, one after another. But I'll be back soon with a progress report and some pictures. Stay tuned!

NickMiller

Lookin' forward to it! I love the 2wd 1st gens

Wid

Here's a more recent picture in Nevada where I'm visiting a friend. Rebuilding the engine right now but it's going well.



And one from about 7 months ago in Olympia, WA