With the engine and transmission finally squared away, I moved on the actual truck. With help from my SIL, we pulled the front cap, extracted the old clapped out 305/700R combo and pulled the bed. Of course, being the deep south, we had to do battle with several well-entrenched wasp nests along the way. We also spent some time pressure washing everything. The old exhaust was cut out, too. After that, we moved it into my shop and looked it over.














Most of the original chassis build held up pretty good and if I wanted to, I could reuse everything as is. That is, except for the rear shackle bushings. They didn’t fare so well. Actually, they don’t seem to exist anymore! This would absolutely explain the horrible squeaking the suspension was doing when we moved it to my house.





I’ve had plenty of time to think about and plan this build in the last year. So, where am I headed? My original plans have changed a little bit, but, of course, they usually do on all my projects.


I’ve owned several square bodies in my life. Not because they were cool or the “in” thing. I drove them because they were what I could afford. I hot rodded them because they were what I had available, but I never could quite build one like I wanted. I’ve decided to build the nice truck I always wanted.


I want it nice, but not too nice to enjoy. A clean daily driver type truck, definitely not a show truck or trailer queen. It’ll get painted, but I’ll probably do it myself, so it definitely won’t be perfect. It might have a few custom touches here and there, but nothing that will hurt it’s usability.


It has to be as reliable as an anvil. I don’t have any desire to make my own personal Roadkill episode every time I take the truck out. My back is about as flexible as a 30 year old gas hose and crawling around in a parking lot making roadside repairs ain’t my idea of a good time and nobody is following me with a camera crew and refreshments. That’s why I’m keeping things fairly stock and simple in the drivetrain. The few hot rod things I’ve done to the engine shouldn’t hurt its reliability. The cam is a low lift version and spring life should be fine. Most critical parts should be available from any big parts store. The main exception to this is the Holley Terminator X Max ECU. I’m running a Holley HP on the Healey and am familiar enough with the software to tune it.


I also want it to handle and drive well. I’ll keep the 2/4 drop, but will definitely be swapping to tubular control arms to improve the geometry. It’ll get better shocks. The truck already has sway bars front and rear and those will stay. I’ll also be adding a quick ratio steering box, too. The front sway bar will have to be modified to use with the tubular arms, though.


The interior is where I want to do things really nice. Completely upgraded trim. Headliner that it never had. Upgraded gauges. Bucket seats. Custom console with a B & M Megashifter. Nice stereo. Decent speakers. Sound deadening to cut the drone. Rebuild the original AC/Heat. Modern cruise control. Probably GM, but could be a Rostra. Make it comfortable enough to be in for hours at a time and drive anywhere in the country.


That’s about it. That’s a lot, but not nearly as much as my last project. I want to do as much as I can in stages and still be able to drive the truck, but I have a lot to do in the first part of the build to make it remotely driveable again. Let’s see how that works out!