1994.5 C3000 frankentruck

[1Matthias]

So about a year ago I bought two not very good trucks with the intent to make one decent one. One was a 1995 C3500 with a rusted out bed, rotten floor, smashed cab (thank you trees)....but beautiful frame, perfect 4L80E, and a strong running 350. The other was a 1994 C2500 with a decent cab, amazing aluminium utility bed...and blown 4L60E, questionable 305, rusty frame, and worst of all for a truck in the south, no air conditioning installed. So I promptly set about combining the two, one painstaking piece at a time into one complete truck. Currently it's still a work in progress, but I'm entering the home stretch of near completion. Will actually be picking up a parts truck in the next few days to aid in sourcing a few of the last major parts needed.

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[1Matthias]

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Here's how it all started: 1994 C2500 on the right, 1995 C2500 on the left. The 2500 was a $1200 former plumber's truck with no 3rd or 4th gear, 220K on the clock, and a 305 that missed badly about half the time. The 3500 was a former VDOT/Department of Corrections truck that I picked up for $850 from a previous owner who though it had a blown head gasket. My original plan was to stick the bed from the 2500 onto the 3500 chassis and call it a day.....when a tree helpfully changed all of that.

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Although it doesn't look that bad in the picture, the cab roof was severely dented, including along the windshield pinchweld. Obviously the local glass companies declined to install a new windshield, and so began the saga....

 

[1Matthias]

First the 3500 was stripped down to a bare frame, including the daunting process of removing a steel utility bed. Luckily someone purchased the bed and brought a skidloader to remove it, otherwise it would have been a truly unenviable ordeal.

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After this was complete, the cab was also removed and the entire frame washed down and inspected. At this time, I was keeping the 2500 running and driving as long as possible for around town/local tasks, as it was more than up to the task if rather loud being limited to second gear....

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This revealed that the frame was nearly perfect...with the major glaring exception of the cab mount brackets.

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[1Matthias]

Unbothered by this setback, I purchased some washers with the correct inner diameter, cut the old rotten metal out, and welded the new in:

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The entire frame then got a coat of rust preventative paint, because as much absolutely lovely fun as this was I'd rather put off a recurrence for a *very* long time if possible.

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[1Matthias]

With the 3500's frame cleaned up, it was time to disassemble the 2500. First up was removing the utility bed....luckily this one was aluminium, because there was no skidsteer this time.

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After this, the cab was completely stripped, cleaned up a bit, then lifted off the 2500 frame and applied to the 3500 frame. The absolute best purchase I've ever made was an 8 ton air over hydraulic ram and a 2 ton engine hoist.....none of this would have been possible without them.

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[1Matthias]

Next up came the Challenges....IE the fiddly bits of putting a '94 cab and dashboard on a '95 chassis, electrical system, and transmission.... '95 swapped to cable shifter, vortec style dashboard, and revamped the electrical system quite a bit. I spend 3 days and combined the '94 and '95 harnesses so they'd plug into both the '94 dashboard and '95 body/chassis wiring. I more or less had to go through function by function, trace the wiring on both sides, then join wires as needed to make everything work. At some point I will be purchasing a silly number of terminals and creating my own harness from scratch, but for now this will work.

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Now, for the shifter...as my post history shows, there's a few differences between 4L60E and 4L80E column shifters, and that's before getting to the fact that the '94 had the PNP switch on the column and the '95 has it on the transmission - requiring modification of the shifter bracket to clear.

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[1Matthias]

After figuring that hurdle out (or so I thought......), I switched gears to prepping for and completing a paintjob. As much fun as the aesthetic of "failing GM white paint on a plumber's truck" is, wanted to learn how to use a HVLP and clearly the best way to do that is to paint a truck. In the process roughly 30 pounds of prior...."paintwork" and bondo were removed from the roof - seems someone had a slight snafu with this cab as well, but not badly enough to damage the pinchweld so all's well. I used rustoleum safety blue, mineral spirits, and japan dryer with astounding results - not too bad for a <$200 paintjob, even considering the cost of tools. Is it a *perfect* paint job, absolutely not. Is it one single color, better than before, and decent enough looking from across the parking lot for the price? Absolutely.

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[454cid]

Wow, that's a big project, especially for a driveway!

 

[1Matthias]

During this time I also rebuilt the suspension front and rear: new shocks, leaf springs, bushings, and balljoints. I also replaced all the brake lines with CuNi lines and new softlines as well as all new front brake rotors, calipers, and bearings. (Sorry for the abysmal/lack of pictures, was more focused on working than taking pics.)

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[1Matthias]

Wow, that's a big project, especially for a driveway!

We do these things not because they're hard, but because we had no clue how hard they would be. Unfortunately there's no access to a garage here, so I end up working outside rain, shine, snow, or cold. It's been a long journey, but an excellent learning experience. Around back is the truly crazy project, putting a twin turbo inline six from an early 2000s SUV sideways in a 35 year old station wagon....