An Abandoned '78 gets another shot...

[Jigme]

Hello all, new here... from Edmonton alberta canada. HD mech by trade at a Mack Truck dealership, but doing car and truck stuff as a hobby since I can remember. I was mostly into NBS trucks, however I started a project that never got off the ground and ended up in the junkyard. I found myself not only missing having a truck, but being in situations where I really needed one... the quest began.

I'll be honest, the last thing I ever pictured myself owning was a square. I always had a hard on for the 67-72's (I do now own a 72... that's another tale for another time). Around here, those are few and far between, and you can expect to pay a small fortune for a write off.

A friend of mine knew I was looking for a good work truck. He told me about a 78 gmc he had sitting on his parents farm. The price was right, $400.

This was early june of 2015. I didn't even go look at it before buying it. I seen a couple pictures, couldn't be that bad right?



Seeing it in person, it was very evident this truck had been sitting for many, many years. My friend didn't know much of the history, however he did know it had been sitting for at least 7 years. Last tag on the plate was 2001, and it had a 2001 eskimos grey cup champs sticker on the back window. Safe to say it had been a while since it seen the driveway... let alone drove down a highway... None the less, I aired up the 15 year old tires, topped up the engine with used motor oil, filled up the tank which ended up leaking, and got her running.

It ran really good, surprisingly anyway. The hood wouldn't stay latched, had to use a few bungee's to hold it down. Realized I leaked all my gas out and sputtered to a stop... Got some more fuel and put it in the other tank which didn't leak.... Did make it home without much trouble after that.



So I got it home, now the problems. Hood won't latch, gas tank leaks, exhaust is a write off, no passenger side window, tires are about to explode, interior is a mess... NO lights, NOT ONE, worked. To be honest... I almost for a minute had regretted the purchase.

But like all things mechanical, you start to bond a bit with some work.




After tracing wires, fixing rotten patches, and a good scrub, this was starting to feel like a nice truck. It looked like hell, but it ran good and drove straight... what more good a guy ask for.

This being a work truck... cheap is the name of the game. I didn't want to dedicate the funds at the time to a nice paint job. What's the next best thing? bed liner!!!





Time to address the exhaust.... had some spare tubing and flowmasters sitting around... why not....





Found some cheap 31's and nice gmc center caps to put on it.



No shortage of work for her!



The truck stayed in this condition since July, fast forward to Feb of 2016 I had put over 10,000 KM's on it without a problem. Looking deeper into, I found out it's actually a heavy half, and came factory with AC and the 454. The 454 and ac were long gone, replaced with a 305. However... the TH400 remained.

I had a 2002 silverado that was modded heavily... I parted it out mostly, but still had a ton of LS parts laying around. I also sold the rear diff, which part of the deal involved a low ish mile 5.3L. Now the ideas starting coming to mind.....



It's all downhill from there... traded some stuff for go fast parts for the 5.3. Camshaft, flat tops, 799 heads, ls6 intake....



Free harness



My make shift garage... works for now..... shop one day.



I am posting this now, however this is a longer process. I started this project back in feb of 2016, the last picture of this post. I will update this as the events unfolded, up until now. I will spread it out over a few posts however.