If you have a classic car or old truck you bought it for a reason. Or maybe your father left it to you. Whatever the case, what do you do with your classic? Do you drive it to work and back home every day? Or do you only have it for an occasional drive on a sunny weekend? I hope it is not sitting in your garage gathering dust and rust, which would be a shame.
If you want to restore it you have to decide whether you would do a frame up (total) restoration or change or restore only a few parts. Make a plan before doing anything and do some research on the Internet about it, go to classic car and old truck events and talk to other owners. Try to find professional restorers in your area and get information on the availability of parts for what you want to do, cost of the project and so on.
My truck is driven almost every day. This is why I replaced the drive train, the front and rear end and the seats. But that doesn’t mean that every classic car or truck has to be “modernized” like mine to be driven every day. It’s more of a matter of taste than anything else.
Modernizing an old truck is not that hard. Take the brakes, for instance. The old system of brake shoes is not safe at high speeds and may fail completely if you drive through a puddle of water. If you use your truck frequently you can completely replace the original front drums with a modern disc brake system in about four hours. You can do that in your garage or your driveway with no special tools and no fabrications. There are systems on the market today that will allow your truck to brake much better and will cost much less than you think. Your truck will no longer be “original”, but it will be a much better daily driver. And disc brakes are so important that they are implanted in very expensive classic cars whose owners insist on originality. In these cases the installation of a disc brake system is done inside the original drums so that if you look inside the wheel of one of these cars you will think that they have their original drum brakes. In some instances they actually have four wheel power disc brakes completely hidden from view.
There are front end systems in the market today that will make your old truck ride like a dream. But they are not cheap and I would leave the installation to a professional because certain modifications will have to be made to the frame.
If you feel the bench seat of your classic car or old truck is not comfortable for you to seat on it every day, go to a junkyard and choose a pair of good bucket seats that will fit in your vehicle. Be prepared to make some adaptation to the base of the seats.
Don’t touch anything in your original classic car or old truck if you want to show it at car shows where originality is an issue. I once became a member of a classic car club and felt very uncomfortable there, because my truck is no longer original. I used to go on drives with all those original cars and my truck was always going ahead of the pack, because I could drive much faster than the others.
But even an original car needs a complete restoration and you may be able to do it yourself, even if you never did that before. It just takes patience and care. Money too, but the money issue may be one good reason for you to do the restoration yourself. If you don’t have all the money necessary you can do the work in steps. As the money becomes available you buy some parts and install them. Later you can get more money, buy more parts and so on until the job is finished.
Another important thing to keep in mind is that a classic car or old truck is only as good as it looks. Think very seriously about the restoration you want to do and make sure you know where you’re going with the project, because an ugly old car or truck isn’t worth much. Make is look good and try to do a good job and you either have a classic for the rest of your life or a valuable possession you may be able to sell for a very handsome profit.
Read Full Post »
Old Trucks 