On the Road: These two classic Chevy pickups are like a pair of old friends

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‘Chuck’s Trucks’ is how the proud owner refers to his pair of Chevrolet C10 half-ton pickups. Chuck Young’s first, a 1972 C10, was bought used in October 1975. He recalls paying $2,340 for the truck, buying it from a private seller in northeast Calgary.

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“The Chevy was simply a daily driver, and we used it for travelling,” Young explains.

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With a smaller Blackfoot camper in the bed, he and his girlfriend—soon to be wife —Lesley proceeded to drive the truck to every corner of North America, including Newfoundland, Florida, California and Alaska.

“Back in those days, we’d go away for three months at a time, leaving in late October,” Young says. “We’d spend weeks on the road getting to the destination.”

Young worked in the trade show business, and supplied equipment to events such as the International Auto and Truck Show and World of Wheels on the Stampede grounds. He would be back in time to work the busiest part of the year when, just about every weekend, there was a show at the Roundup Centre before it became the BMO Centre,.

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When he bought the 1972 C10, there were 45,000 miles on the odometer. It got well used, and sat outside most of its life. Eight years ago, when Young was approaching retirement, he’d decided to fix up his old ’72. But advice he received from Harold Heninger, best known for his Car Crazy collector car auctions, made him change direction.
“Harold told me not to repair the old one but to buy one that had already been restored, saving me 75 cents on the dollar,” Young says.
Heeding that suggestion, Young went online, shopping for another Chevy. He says he found the perfect truck, a 1971 C10, in North Dakota. It was owned by a Chevrolet mechanic who’d bought the truck for his wife, but she didn’t like driving it. For close to 40 years, the truck remained parked in a garage. There were only 17,000 miles on the clock, and the truck was completely original. Young bought that truck and hauled it home to Calgary from North Dakota.

“It was pristine,” Young says. “I wanted something with a nice clean frame and body, because I wanted to build the truck up the way I’d envisioned, without having to do any body work, which can get expensive.”

Young’s vision? An old truck with modern running gear so he and Lesley could travel down the highway and keep up with the flow of traffic. To that end, he had a GM Ram Jet 350 crate motor installed and backed that up with a Tremec five-speed manual transmission. The rear end features 3.73:1 gearing and Young installed Wilwood disc brakes out back; 1971 was the first year the C10 got front disc brakes from the factory. To improve the handling, sway bars were installed front and rear.

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“It’s been a bit of a work in progress,” Young admits. “Every year I tweak or change something, and I’ve added air conditioning, cruise control, extra sound proofing and a good stereo.”

Now, the ’71 C10 hauls the Young’s 1983 Vanguard camper, a unit they purchased new. They’ve traveled extensively around western Canada and, pre-COVID, through the western United States. With the ’71 on the road, Young says he then looked at his original but tired 1972 C10 with 206,000 miles on it.

“I considered it a 40-year-old clunker, worth about $500,” Young laughs. “But as I was retired, I wanted a winter project to work on.”

Although competent with wrenches, Young admits he’d never really spent much time doing major tasks such as cutting out rusted metal, trimming new panels to fit and welding them in. In fact, he’d never welded before in his life. But that didn’t deter him, and ignoring Harold Heninger’s sage advice—and his own belief that bodywork can get expensive—he built a 16-foot by 22-foot single car garage in his backyard, He then drove the ’72 into the work bay.

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I thoroughly enjoyed the process, and thought of it as saving an old friend.

He bought a how-to book from Scott’s Super Trucks in Penhold, Alberta—Chuck says he was impressed by Scott’s, a shop that has every part needed to restore a 1967 to 1972 C10—and took the truck apart. When it came time to cut out rusted metal and weld in patches, he watched YouTube videos and then went out to the garage to give it a go.

“Working on a budget, I borrowed a MIG welder from a friend, learned how to use it, and got pretty reasonable with it,” Young says. “I took the box apart first, and did the work on that and then stored it out of the way.”

He followed with the cab, replacing cab corners and floorboards, and finally worked on the front fenders as they laid across the back of the truck’s frame. The doors, he says, were badly rusted out, but he managed to save them. Then, he enlisted Lesley’s help prepping the truck for paint. Having never painted a vehicle before, he sprayed the Chevy its original blue, and figures he achieved a seven out of 10 job. Meanwhile, the engine, apart from having the heads redone, is essentially stock, as is the rest of the running gear including the Muncie 465 manual transmission with buck low first gear.

“I thoroughly enjoyed the process, and thought of it as saving an old friend. We now have two good looking C10s to drive throughout the year, using the ’72 for winter camping adventures and the ’71 in the summer,” Young says, and adds, “Hey, every man needs two old trucks, right?”

Greg Williams is a member of the Automobile Journalists Association of Canada (AJAC). Have a column tip? Contact him at 403-287-1067 or gregwilliams@shaw.ca