1967 Chevy C10 FULL BUILD: Building the Copperhead Street Truck from the Frame Up

[Applause] [Music] welcome to trucks I've got a cool project planned for you today now if you're a regular viewer of the show you've probably been following along on some of the build ups like the Harry Haller or crazy horse and they'll be back here in the near future but right now well the Harry haulers in the paint booth wait in its turn and of course the frame of Crazy Horse and it's at the sandblaster so this is the perfect time to start a new build up and you are gonna love this one first of all it's gonna be a high street truck second of all it's gonna deal with one of the most popular body styles of truck ever built the 67 through 72 Chevrolet one of the reasons why these trucks are so popular is the styling it's just so cool man everybody likes these things now the suspension is modern enough to where you don't have to subframe them they're relatively easy to find pretty inexpensive and you can build them stock completely custom or a combination of both like this prime example that belongs to Dave Clark of Fresno California but one of the best things about these trucks is since they're so popular you can get almost any piece for these things in the aftermarket matter of fact if you start with just the cab and the frame you can build this truck and most of it is just bolt on stuff now I know a lot of you are probably saying now when I wait a minute no the old truck you got it you got to prove that to me well I thought you'd probably say that so the only way to prove it to you is to build one and that is exactly what we're gonna do okay what I'm starting with is literally a 67 cab a frame and of course a title you got to have a title you don't have a truck without that now if you look around and do a little bit of wheeling and dealing you can find a decent cab and frame for around 500 bucks give or take a little bit now if you take the cab down have it stripped and primered have the frame sandblast like we did well you can literally be into one of these things for about a thousand bucks once again give or take a little bit and that is a good starting point now one big question that people always ask is do you have to box the frame for strength the answer is no remember a lot of these trucks came from the factory with the big block so the frames are plenty strong you can leave that just the way it is now the first thing that you need to decide about any project is what direction you're gonna go now this project is gonna be nice and low and smooth but it's not going to detract from the original classic lines of the truck gonna pretty much be the ultimate Cruiser but it's not just gonna be about looks under the hood is gonna be lethal matter of fact that's why I'm calling this project Copperhead because just like the snake it doesn't have any rattles to warn you that he's around there's no way you're gonna know what's under that hood until it's too late and you have been had and I own your pink slip okay to upgrade our suspension we went to a place called early classic enterprises you need to write that down we got their whole front and rebuild kit now this includes lower ball joints upper ball joints tie rod ends idler arm pitman arm shocks heck everything we even got a kit to rebuild the upper control arms and this includes a pivot shaft bushings and of course the seals now the good thing about early classics kits they include all the hardware right down to the castle nuts and the cotter pins and that it's a really nice touch to install the new pivot shafts into the stock control arms you just slide them into place then take your seals put them on your bushings and just thread the bushing onto the shaft now it is very important that you keep that pivot shaft centered in that control arm so you'll need to keep checking it as you tighten those ends down then all you have to do is bolt on your upper ball joint and you're done now for the lower ball joints those need to be pressed in so do not try to do this with a hammer you need to take it down a good machine shop just charge you a few bucks to have that done now once your a arms are assembled all you got to do is bolt them on the chassis the top control arm bolts right to the factory studs on the chassis I'm gonna use about three shims on each stud to give us a nice starting point for our alignment now the bottom control arm it's just held in place with these u-bolts that come with a kit next we're ready for Springs and spindles now we had to have something that will give Copperhead just so tonight stands not too low but stock Heights won't work either so we went back to early classic enterprises got a set of their 2-inch drop spindles now these are the strongest spindles on the market they've got a lifetime warranty to back them up and that's a good thing because all the weight on the front of your truck is balanced on these little stubs now we're gonna use those together with a one inch drop coil spring that's going to give us a nice three and a half inch drop for that nice slinky slithery look that we got to have all right to install the springs and spindles just slide in the spring make sure it seats up in the top pocket then bolt on your spindle now if you're working on a bare frame like this you're not gonna have enough weight so you're gonna have to add something so you can jack up this lower control arm compress that spring so you can bolt this spindle on now to tie those two spindles together we're gonna bolt on the tie rod ends and the idler arm and the pitman arm and those just bolt into the stock location now this is one area that a lot of people overlook when they're restoring an old truck and they end up with a truck of wanders all over the road now these parts are inexpensive and they really should be the first thing that you replace on a restoration now we're gonna take a break and after the break we are going to continue project Copperhead now we've already got most of our brand new front suspension pieces on but there are still a couple things I need to talk to you about now for our steering box we went back to early classic enterprises got one of these awesome quick ratio power steering boxes now this thing obviously bolts right to the stock holes but it turns from lock to lock in three and a half turns a stalker is four and a half now this doesn't come with any particular kit it's definitely worth the extra money though to go ahead and get one of these and put it on especially if you're gonna stuff a big old heavy big block under the hood I know you're dying to know what's going in here now the last thing that we're gonna put on the front is a sway bar now the kit from early classic enterprises is just the ticket now it features a huge inch and a quarter bar and of course all the polygraph ID bushings and hardware you need to bolt this thing in I'll tell you you add this to a lowered suspension and your truck will handle like it's on Rails now one of the problems with dropping an early c10 truck is that the sway bar is gonna hang down looks kind of like a growth down under there it doesn't look real good so the kit comes with these brackets what that does is raise the bar up against the truck for a really cool clean look like everything so far it just bolts right into place that takes care of our front suspension for now now we're gonna deal with the rear and these big hole trailing arms and the springs now we got new polygraph ID bushings from early classics for this pivot point in these trailing arms just grease them up real well tap them in place now for the springs we also got dropped Springs so the rear of the truck sits down low like the front and the arms just slide into the stock location then jack up the arm and bolt the spring between the arm and the frame all right now we are ready for the rear end now since we are going to put a significant amount of horsepower under the hood of copperhead hint-hint enough to churn a stock axle into a pile of dust well we went to drivetrain specialists and had them put together a huge dana 60 for us now this thing features massive 35 spline axles a 373 gear and a power lock posi are stuffed inside and then they also put on the girdled cover that's got preload bolts that go down onto the carrier bearings and this keeps the housing from flexing now if we tear something like this well we've done something now for brakes we went to aerospace components got their really trick rear disc brake kit this thing features polished aluminum four piston calipers drilled and slotted rotors and of course all the bracketry to just bolt this onto your rear end now speaking of a brake we need to take one but don't go too far because we're going to be right back onto this project we'll see you in a minute now we've already got new suspension components on the front and on the rear of this old Chevy now it's time to deal with this big old Dana 60 axle now I've already got it jacked into place I'm sitting over the top of the trailing arms but I don't have these saddles welded to the axle tubes yet and there's a reason for that once you weld those on you permanently set your pinion angle but the only way to properly set the angle of your pinion is with the chassis sitting at ride height so I'm gonna have to wait at least until I have a drivetrain in this thing before I can weld those on but it doesn't mean I can't go ahead and assemble it for you now this trailing arm system on these old trucks is very much like a heavy duty ladder bar system which means you got to have some sort of lateral support keep this axle from move in side to side now it came from the factory with a padded bar that ran from the frame rail to the center chunk but we've changed the axle and we've also dropped the truck which means we need something better so we went back to early classic enterprises and got one of their super track bar kits this eliminates all the geometry problems that arise when you drop the rear of one of those old seat ends now the kit includes an adjustable track bar hardware and of course the brackets but while we're in there we went ahead and got one of their shock relocation kits - now this not only comes with high performance gas shocks but also all the brackets and hardware to mount these in to install the track bar take the bracket that comes with the kit slide it between the axle and the trailing arm on the passenger side now to make sure that everything stays even you've got this spacer that you've got to stick into the driver's side in the same place then we'll take our shock relocation bracket slide it on to you bolt and then just bolt it up then we'll just bolt in the track bar now just like the pinion angle this chassis needs to be sitting at ride height before you can get your final adjustment with that track bar so we just have a ballpark for now we're gonna finish everything up with the shocks and we're done now one final very important thing these new axles like this are always shipped empty so you're gonna want to put in a good quality gear lube like this royal purple synthetic before you try to drive this thing down the road now it's easy to forget so do it now welcome to the truck shop now you might as well just plant it down for the next 30 minutes or so because if you've ever been interested in rebuilding or restoring an old classic truck when you're gonna want to see this show now last week we started to build up on a little 67 Chevy pickup started with nothing but a nice solid cab a bear frame and of course a clear title and we're gonna call this project Copperhead now the first thing that we did is totally rebuild the front suspension Springs spindles steering and in the meantime we also picked up a three and a half inch drop then we move to the back rebuilt the rear suspension picked up a four inch drop and also stuck in a huge Dana 60 rear axle so we can handle some serious horsepower now we're going to continue the build up right where we left off now when you're rebuilding an old truck you really need to put some serious consideration into what you're gonna do about your gas tank now the reason for this is these old trucks had the gas tank behind the seat in the passenger compartment not the most desirable situation so to make things a lot safer and to give us a little more leg room we're gonna relocate the tank from behind the seats to the rear frame rails now the tank we're gonna use is from Kent performance and it says handmade aluminum piece got the mounting flanges already installed all the bones you're ever gonna need for fuel injection or carburation whatever are already on there we'll just plug the ones we don't use sending unit is already installed and the filler neck is here on top which means to get to this we're gonna have to go through the bed floor all right to mount this tank first of all clamp it into place then just drill through the mounting flange through the frame and bolt it on now before you bolt it on make sure you take a little strip of rubber and put it between the tank and the frame so you got a little bit of cushion there alright since we're here at the back of the truck now that was a good time to start thinking about some sort of hitch so we could tow a trailer if we needed to well we didn't have to think very hard because early classic Enterprises has got this super slick clasp for hidden receiver hitch now installation is really easy it just bolts to existing holes in the frame and the best part about it is it's a hidden hitch nothing looks worse on a nice slick classic truck than a big hitch hanging down now this one bolts up tight against the frame and it's hidden behind the bumper or a roll pan now the way you get to it is you have a flip down license plate that is cool okay now we're gonna talk about front brakes I've got a couple of options here for you first got a kit from early classic enterprises now it includes everything you're gonna need to completely upgrade your front brakes it comes with these huge drilled rotors new calipers and pads brake hoses dust shields master cylinder proportioning valve that's really nice all the lines all the hardware all the bearings to put this thing in and go now this kit goes for about 800 bucks and that includes the spindles that is a smoking deal now if you drive your truck everyday if you tow a trailer if you go out to the drag strip once in a while this is the kit that you want now let's say that you want something a little more fancy than that show situation or you're gonna be running some road courses or maybe you spend a lot of time on the other side of a hundred miles an hour you're gonna want to upgrade a little more than that early classic Enterprises has this kit from aerospace components that features these really cool polished aluminum four piston calipers drilled and slotted removable rotors all the hardware and bearings and check out this polished aluminum tapered hub this will fit just about any custom wheel out there now of course since copper head is going to be very fast this is the kit we're gonna use but I need to warn you this kids a lot more expensive than that one and it doesn't just bolt on like that one does but now you've got two different choices two different price ranges and two completely different applications now we're gonna show you how to put this on now the first thing we need to do is modify those spindles so we can mount that new caliper now these ears that held the original caliper well those need to be cut off and we've got us a template to show us where to make our cuts now to mount the caliper you've got some good news and bad news the good news is these original holes are in the perfect spot to mount a new caliper the bad news is they're the wrong size they're gonna have to be drilled out and recapped when you're using a tap make sure that you use plenty of cutting Lube and go slow so you don't break the tap or thread it crooked [Applause] once you're done with your grinding it looks like you've completely destroyed your spindles check with your caliper to make sure that you've got enough clearance and we got just a little more to go then you're ready to start putting things together but we need to take a break first but don't go too far because we are gonna be right back on this project welcome back to trucks we are coming down the homestretch of building a really cool chassis for project Copperhead now before the break put on a cool trailer hitch and a custom gas tank now these were both pretty much just bolt on applications then we had to do some modifications to our new spindles to mount these really trick front disc brakes now that our modifications are done well it's time to put these guys on so here we go pack and install the bearings then tap in the inner seal then install the caliper mounting bracket to the spindle follow that with the freshly greased hub and rotor combination finally bolt on your calipers slide in your pads and your brakes are on look at these these are awesome of course those fancy brakes need to be plumbed so we went back to early classic enterprises got their complete brake and fuel line plumbing kit now these aren't just a bunch of old lines that you have to bend in form mm-hmm these are stainless steel preformed lines that go right in the stock locations check this out all the fittings and flares are already done now using a kit like this can save you hours of cutting and flaring and fitting now like I said these lines are pre bent to slide right into the stock locations don't be surprised if you have to duel just a little bit of bending to make them just perfect once you have your lines in well that pretty much takes care of the chassis of project Copperhead now while you're checking it out I've got some numbers I'm gonna give you now if you use the other early classics brake kit stock rear end and the stock gas tank well you can build a chassis like this for around eighteen hundred bucks of that there's a smokin deal now of course ours is a little more expensive with that rear axle and those front brakes but that's the magic about these trucks they're so popular you can build them any way you want you got a thousand different choices unfortunately the only choice we've got now is to take another break so we'll see you right after this welcome back to trucks and the build up of our chassis for project Copperhead now that we've got everything assembled we come to the crowning touch the part that really sets the personality to any vehicle and that is the wheels and tires now for tires we went to Toyo and got these Praxis STS because they're a very high performance Street tire a really cool directional aggressive tread and they've actually got a sidewall rating for trucks so they're good and strong now the size we're gonna use in the front is 250 560 are 17 and in the rear we're gonna use these great big 285 60 are 17 now that is going to give us a really cool look it's also really gonna feel those fender wells out now for wheels we had to have something cool so we made a call to Colorado custom and got a super trick set of these lazier 5 spokes now notice they've got a really unique shape in the spoke in the hub but take a good look at those spokes there's little flutes cut right into them that's really cool not only that but it'll just sparkle like a diamond when the light hits it of course everything is completely polished now the size that we're using on the front 17 by 8 size on the rear seventeen by nine and a half but that's not all oh there's more come and check this out Colorado custom also makes custom steering wheels to match the regular wheels we had to have a lazier wheel now it matches the wheels in the polished aluminum and the spokes but they also will put on custom leather to match whatever color your interiors gonna be man that is awesome now you're probably wondering why I didn't stick 20s or 22s on this thing there's no doubt that the big diameter wheels look really cool but this is gonna be a real high-performance truck it's gonna be driven hard and fast so I need a tire that's got some sidewall to it and 17s give me a lot of choices not only that oh look killer well there you have it the complete rolling chassis of project Copperhead now hopefully this gives you some ideas and some options on how to build something like this for yourself now unfortunately I kind of tell you there's only gonna be one Copperhead and I'm gonna show you why next week but I can give you a hint so come on back here you see this crate this is the poison for Copperhead this is the biggest baddest crate engine that Chevy Ford dodge anybody has ever put out and you're gonna have to wait till next week to see it which means you better not miss next week's show this is we need to put a drivetrain in our 67 Chevy truck now for those of you that don't know anything about this project let me bring you up to date and what we've done so far now the first thing that we did is completely upgrade the front and rear suspension and brakes with kits from early classic enterprises then we put in a huge dana 60 and brakes from DT s now it is time for the drivetrain but not just any old drivetrain keep in mind this project is called Copperhead and I've been teasing you the last couple weeks telling you that that engine is gonna be super nasty and just how bad well let's go take a look at it okay you've probably guessed that the engine I'm going to use on this project is some sort of Chevy crate engine and you'd be right oh but before I show you what it is I need to tell you how this thing came into existence now a few years ago when crate engines started to get popular well Chevy came out with their huge 502 and it was great it was the biggest thing out there well it wasn't long until Ford came out with her 514 man it was great everybody loved that well Dodge decided to get in on the act and they not only reissued the Hemi but they punched it out to 528 cubic inches everybody was happy about that everybody except Chevy they were not happy matter of fact they were ticked off because the 502 was now the smallest big-block out there so they decided it was time to pull out the big stick and kick some butt and this is what they came out with what you're looking at is a 572 cubic inch crate engine it's kicking out 620 horsepower and 650 foot-pounds of torque now wait a minute let me repeat that to you this is a 572 cubic inch engine it's been dyno at 620 horsepower at the flywheel and it's kicking out 650 foot-pounds of torque now I know those numbers can be a little bit mind-boggling but wait a minute it gets even better this thing is pulling nine and a half to one compression and it's pulling those kind of tore and horsepower numbers on 93 octane pump gas which means this thing won't overheat in traffic it'll idle in traffic it's street-legal you can buy one in the crate now let me put this in perspective for you most of the classic muscle cars of the 60s had for 450 horsepower in the hood the awesome Shelby Cobra had around 500 even the Dodge Viper only kicks out around 500 horsepower am i making my point nobody has built a more powerful crate engine now this thing has been in development for over a year and what you're looking at is the very first production engine we got it before any of the magazine's any of the other TV shows we got the very first one for Project Copperhead matter of fact most people don't even know this thing exists including Ford and Dodge which means that if they're watching the show they just spilled their pretzels all over them and they're running for the phone in a state of panic I love it now as you can see this is a gearheads dream of all the best stuff you got forged steel cranking rods you've got forged aluminum pistons you have huge aluminum heads filled with monsterous valves you have a special tall deck intake topped with a demon 850 carburetor you also have an HEI distributor wires plugs everything's installed this is ready to drop in and go now so you don't mistake the new 572 for any other big-block they come with special valve covers and they're all powder coated Orange okay if you are not weak in the knees yet well just bear with me because you will be now the question that comes up is what kind of transmission do you put behind an engine like that motor like that would snap most transmissions like a matchstick well we went to BM and got one of their super strong turbo 400s had them put a shift kit in it and we also had them put on their trick aluminum pan that will help out in the cooling Department now to go with that they also got one of their 2500 stall torque converters a new transmission mount they're super cooler to keep everything cool for us finally their light truck mega shifter so we can control the whole thing now this combination will easily handle the output of that monster motor to install the torque converter pour in a quart a fluid now we are using BM synthetic trick shift because it is specially formulated for performance transmissions now make sure you're well lubed around this stub shaft as well as this seal so you don't rip it when you put the torque converter in then take the torque converter just slide it on to the input shaft there we go now make sure that the torque converter seats all the way in now it needs to sit at least seven eighths of an inch by high in the face of the bell housing very important if you don't get it seated all the way in when you bolt that transmission to your engine you're gonna destroy the pump inside the transmission so make sure you do it now we are ready to bolt this to that big old engine we'll take care of that during the break after the break we're gonna drop it all into the chassis make sure you come back welcome back to the shop now if you're just joining us well shame on you you've missed some really important stuff first we gave the world its first public viewing of Chevy's humongous 572 crate engine then we bolted a turbo 400 from BM behind it for a bulletproof drivetrain now we're gonna put that whole assembly into the chassis of project Copperhead now obviously we've got to have some motor mounts and a transmission crossmember to hold that combination but it's not as tough as you think remember the 67 through 72 trucks one of their options was a big-block so we made a call to early classic enterprises got one of their transmission cross members a couple of new motor mounts and their engine pedestals alright the first thing we'll do is both the engine pedestals into the chassis then I'll get this new crossmember into place I'll follow that by bolting the motor mounts to the engine then just lower the engine and into place and bolt it in awesome or what man now like I said before that built turbo 400 transact our output a 700r4 would not have a prayer now a lot of you guys might be thinking well that's too bad because it'd be kind of nice to have that overdrive like a 700r4 has when you're tooling down the interstate and that would be right so we are gonna put an overdrive behind this but something that'll handle that kind of power output come on over here this is the gear vendor's overdrive now this thing bolts right behind the transmission and it'll handle up to 1,200 horsepower now the kit includes the adapter a new yoke all the harnesses and hookups and of course the overdrive unit itself now the best part about this is you can shift it manually let me show you how this thing works okay with the overdrive in the automatic position you get a 22% overdrive this is like having a whole extra gear on the top end very similar to a 700r4 now let's say you want to shift this thing manually well you can get this foot switch or you can get there's really cool shifter handle with the button installed kind of like nitrous but this is a lot better let me show you how say you shift down to first go to first overdrive second second overdrive third third overdrive say you're getting ready to climb a steep hill and you need to go down to second but second is going to be too low go to second overdrive this thing literally turns your three speed into a six-speed now this is great if you're road racing or drag racing or if you're hauling or towing equipment or trailers or trail ride and even serious rock crawling now you've got some shifting choices I'm gonna show you how easy it is to put that overdrive in but I'm gonna have to wait till after the break we'll see you in a few minutes welcome back to trucks and our awesome drivetrain for project Copperhead now we already have the engine and transmission in now it is time to deal with that overdrive now to install the gear benders overdrive this stock tail shaft has got to come off grease the bushing and the seal in the extension and then install the extension then grease the coupler inside and out and slide it into the extension onto the transmission tail shaft then just slide the overdrive unit on and bolt it up okay that takes care of the installation of this overdrive unit but not the overall installation up to now we have been really lucky that this engine and transmission and stuff is just pretty much bolted into place but as you can see we got a little problem here overdrive is hitting this crossmember but the solution looks pretty easy so we're just going to jack up the transmission and we'll just tap this crossmember forward until the mount sits right down on top of it well that seemed like a pretty easy fix now in doing this we have actually raised the mounting point of the transmission about an inch now there's some things you need to be really aware of when you start doing this first you need to make sure that the engines has the proper tilt to the rear about three to four degrees oh that's right on number to take some measurements make sure that your transmission assembly is not going to hit the floor of the cab if it is you need to lower the mount or modify the floor of the cab and number three take an old driveshaft make sure that you were gonna have clearance through the crossmember through the full range of motion now this is going to be close we have plenty of room okay now that we've got everything fitting properly we'll go ahead and just redraw our holes in our crossmember and we will bolt this sucker on finally now that we have the drivetrain in we can lower the rear of the chassis down to ride height according to the measurements we got from early classic enterprises then we'll Center up the axle and set the pinion angle to match that of the output of the overdrive then we'll just weld these perches onto the axle yeah that looks good all right another thing we are going to deal with today is the issue of headers now for those we went to Sanderson got a set of these long tube headers for the 67 through 72 Chevy truck with the big-block now like all Sanders and headers they have a very thick flange so that's not going to warp on you they have a nice smooth Bend so these things will flow like a mother and they also have the jet hot coating so they'll always look good now the big question is how well are they going to fit that new 572 block and the answer is well like a glove the engineers at Sanderson did their homework on these and you can see we've got just enough room to clear everything alright that finishes up the drivetrain for project Copperhead is this awesome or what man I told you it was worth the wait now we're gonna finish up some of the details on the frame here to get it ready for the cab that's coming out the paint booth here in a week or so now details details now that is an area they can absolutely make or break a big project like this it's also an area where most people get never start hacking things together because they're impatient want to finish the project or they ran out of money because they forgot about the details everybody knows you need an engine and a and a rear end and of course wheels and tires but that's not all there is to it and oh man you still need to put on brackets and pulleys in a fuel system and an exhaust system well there's a lot to do and I'm gonna show you how to lay these systems out and in the meantime introduce you to some really cool products that you can use on your project so hold on because this is where it all starts to come together first up is the engine now just in case you forgotten this is Chevrolet's brand-new 572 cubic inch crate engine it's kicking out 620 horsepower and over 650 foot-pounds of torque it's also the very first one ever made oh yeah it's pretty special but all that aside it's also a really example of what you get when you buy a new engine very rarely do you ever get pulleys and brackets and hardware but that's ok because the answer is over here on the table the name to know here is soups products and we're using what they call the super cool pulleys and these are available for big block and small block Chevys they're forged aluminum so they're very strong and they're highly polished but they're not just for looks they overdrive the accessories so the engine will run 15 to 20 percent cooler also your alternator and air conditioning will work better at lower rpms check out the bow ties built right into the pulley see it's all about the details the next question is what about brackets well you can go to a junkyard or swap meet hoping and praying that you're gonna find something that would work or you can go to Zeus and get these really cool aluminum brackets that hold alternators and air conditioning compressors and power steering pumps and they bolt right here to the front of the engine also they're completely adjustable so lining up your pulleys is not going to be a problem for the power steering pump we also got that from Zeus and it's this little tiny thing it mounts down on the driver's side low on the engine of course we got a Polish pulley to go with that now you might be wondering how come this thing is so small well if you'll notice it doesn't have a reservoir on it that's because you use this remote reservoir and mounting bracket and you can put this on the firewall or on the inner fender anyplace that you've got some room and that's really nice when you have a tight engine bay now to put this thing on it just goes on the bracket that we put on earlier for the starter and the alternator well we needed something that would match the look in the performance of what we're building here so we went to tough stuff performance got one of their cool charger polished aluminum alternators now this thing kicks out a hundred and forty amps of raw current has a one wire hookup and an internal cooling fan if you use a lot of power accessories this is a must of course you know where we got the pulleys and now you can see how this is all starting to work together there's your adjustment for your belt tension for those of you that have ever run headers on a Chevrolet you've probably experienced their unique ability to cook a starter that's because the original starter is really big sits right in this area here and the hitters run right down alongside of it you might as well just stick the starter in the oven and bake it because that's what the headers do well tuff stuff has solved that with these high torque starters that have a super strong electric motor gear reduction and a little tiny body that keeps the starter away from the headers these will eliminate your starter problems forever the last accessory is the air conditioning compressor we got this from vintage air and this is a fully polished unit and it just happens to go with a complete air conditioning unit for the 67 through 72 Chevy truck and don't get impatient we'll tell you all about it later on of course like everything else it just bolts onto the brackets and that takes care of your pulley system pretty awesome huh now just a minute I got something I want to show you one of the cool things about this particular bracket system is everything is mounted off to the side so you can still look down on top of the engine you can get the valve covers off nothing's cluttered up but you can only do this if you've got plenty of room in your engine bay and here's how our inner fenders are gonna mount notice how everything tucked down into this dead area here like I said before then it's all about the details alright moving on it is time for the drive shaft and remember I've got some serious power kicking out of that engine heck I might even put some nitrous on it so I need a drive shaft that will handle that and for that three words Denny's drive shaft service now this is what they called their nitrous ready shaft and if you've done your measurements right it should just slide right in and bolt up now these shafts are completely balanced fully painted and they're built out of a special tubing that just happens to be Denny's trade secret but what's not a secret is his incredible warranty if you happen to break one of these welds or twist this tube he'll replace it for free matter of fact these are so strong I got two of them for the Crazy Horse Bronco welcome back to trucks we are right in the process of finishing up the chassis a project Copperhead we've already got the pulleys and the belts and the brackets on the front got the drive shaft in now it's time to deal with the exhaust system now the reality of one of these kind of projects is you are not gonna find a system that's just gonna bolt right in this gives you the opportunity to hunt the aftermarket find all the cool products that you want to use and then once you got all the products set aside you need to hunt down a place to bend you up some pipes now for that we went to Mike's muffler shop in Lebanon Tennessee they specialize in custom exhaust and they custom build us a dual exhaust system exactly the way I wanted it the first part we're gonna put on is the head pipe and it bolts right to the header but check this out it's got a flex coupling now what this does is allows the engine to flex and move and not the pipes these are gonna be solidly mounted got to use this if you're gonna solidly mount your pipes now notice Mike also built in a why here that's gonna split our exhaust and it's also gonna allow me to bolt on one of the coolest things we're gonna put on this truck check it out this is an electric exhaust cut out and we got it from Doug's headers now it uses an electric motor to slide a stainless steel door inside the pipe and close it off now if you're not familiar with the way that these things work no I'll explain it to you a little bit later you're gonna love this now keep in mind you have got a lot of mass out here you got a little shaft that sticks out when this thing's open so make sure you're leaving enough room around your transmission or a crossmember wherever you're mounting this thing next well slide in the pipe to go through the crossmember now to hold it in place we got these really slick aluminum clamps from the guys at early classic enterprises now these aren't in their catalogue but if you call them up and ask real nice I bet they'll make some for you to mount them just drill your holes and bolt them on now we're ready for the mufflers and these 304 series mufflers from Edelbrock are just the ticket these things are made out of polished 304 stainless steel so they're always gonna look good they flow like crazy and they're gonna just funder back behind that 572 after the muffler we'll put on the tailpipes that are held in place with these clamps they also go through a crossmember down around the gas tank and tuck up against the frame for a nice clean stealthy look you'll never see this system but you're sure gonna hear it the last pipe we're gonna put on are these dumb pipes they slide right under the frame and into the exhaust cutout and this whole system is gonna be held in place with these stainless steel clamps now I know you're wondering just how this systems gonna work so here's a scenario for you I'm sitting at the stoplight minding my own business some hotshot pulls up wants to run me so I flip the switch open up the exhaust cutout that bypasses my main exhaust and now I'm running straight pipe right out of the 572 out the side into the side of his head and this is the last thing he's gonna hear before I in cork this thing and give him a good look at my tail and then after I'm done so I don't add to my ticket collection reach over flip the switch close up the exhaust and Copperheads links off into the night waiting for the next victim and it's just a fun a lot all right done now one thing that you do want to do with the system like this is protected so we're gonna take the pipes down to a place called color-coded and have them put a high-temperature coating on these pipes shoot then they'll last forever now we're gonna lay out a fuel system because we got to feed that thing but now after the break stay with us welcome back question how do you feed a very thirsty big-block engine that's kicking out about 650 horses well you got to have a high-performance fuel system that's for sure so we went to Mallory and here's what we got first the fuel filter now this is a comp filter series 140 it features a replaceable filter element dual inlets dual outlets and this thing will handle flows up to 200 gallons an hour that's getting it for the fuel pump we also got their series 140 pump has a nice quiet electric motor and this thing will kick out enough volume to feed that big ol engine the problem is these are factory set at 12 psi that's too much for a carburetor you'll blow out your seats and stuff so we are going to use this fuel pressure regulator that way we can set our fuel pressure at 7 psi which is what you need for a carburetor now one problem that you always run into any time you're putting on an aftermarket fuel system and that is where are you gonna put it most parts come with their own mounting bracket but the problem is most frames are an open C channel so you're gonna mount them you can't turn them on their side you don't want to mount them to the outside of the frame matter of fact the perfect spot would be right here but what are you gonna do well you need to custom make your own mounting point that's a little involved take some special tools I'm gonna show you how to do it first take a piece of cardboard set it up against the frame in the desired area then tap down the frame edges with a hammer to get the desired pattern now cut out the pattern and make sure that it's gonna fit now I know you're wondering about these curves here those are for looks see it's all about the details now I'll transfer the pattern to 3/16 steel and cut it out using the plasma cutter or torch take your part and mark your mounting holes then drill and tap your holes fire up the welder and well dam in lying down your weld finally paint it to match see it looks like the frame came from the factory this way now like I said before this is pretty involved but it is the best way to deal with these open c-channel frames permanently now just bolt on the filter make sure it goes between the tank and the pump because this is what keeps any trash of getting in the pump and locking it up now the pump obviously you're gonna have to do the same thing for it that you had to do for the filter check this out look how nice and clean this thing's gonna fit around this exhaust system okay to tie this all together we're gonna use some of this braided stainless steel hose that we got from Russell performance because it not only looks really good it's also really strong now the size we're using is - 10 a n which is just about the same size as your garden hose now to connect it all we're gonna use some of their anodized fittings now the regulator we're gonna have to wait on that because we're gonna matter on the firewall and obviously we don't have a firewall yet but remember with a regulator that doesn't do you any good unless you have a gauge to go with it so for that we went to Auto Meter and got their fuel pressure gauge and we got one more thing to do here you're going to love it but after the break [Music] welcome back to trucks we're finishing up some of the details on the chassis of project Copperhead now there's one more thing that I want to do today before we're done that is rig up some sort of air cleaner now there's a lot of really nice air cleaners out there chrome polished aluminum things like that but I wanted something really unique and different for Copperhead check this out I saw the prototype for this over a year ago and now they are finally available to the public now Johnson's rod shop is where you get them and they look just like the old scoops that were on the top Fuel dragsters back in the 60s now they've got a top fiberglass shell then of course you have the lower plate and the filter and a whole bunch of options on how to mount this so this is not just a simple bolt on it's up to you to make it fit and look the way you want here's how you do it if you look closely the upper shells got these faint little marks so you can cut out a couple of openings here in the front but that's not all the kit also comes with these cool little grills that are preformed to fit right into those openings very slick we're using a dremel tool to carefully cut out the opening go slow because if you cut out too much you're gonna have a big problem once your cuts are made take some sandpaper smooth down the edges so everything's nice and smooth and flowing together don't forget to keep checking the fit of your grills so everything will be perfect oh that's gonna be cool now it's time to determine just how high you want this thing to sit a johnson's rod shop designs these with a tall base on them but unfortunately that will put it through the hood of most trucks so if that's not the look you're after they'll need to come in and measure see how much of the base you're gonna cut off about an inch and 1/8 will do it then just cut off the base and finally reassemble it all yeah there that should show you that the little extra time and work to make this thing fit right is definitely worth it man that is sweet now we've gone ahead and painted it orange to match the engine but imagine graphics or pinstriping or flames or something on here like I keep telling you if you want something special and unique and it's all about the details for the first truck gear I'm gonna take you back to a kit that we gave you just a little glimpse of earlier it's a complete air-conditioning unit for a 67 through 72 Chevy truck and you can get it from vintage air now the good news is this is a complete kit not just a bunch of parts to kind of help you put together a kit now you've already seen me put on the polished compressor kit also comes with a wiring harness and relays glovebox condenser and evaporator soft lines hard lines a firewall cover and of course an under dash heat and air unit already has the fan the wiring all the vents guys this is what Chevy should have put in them from the factory now if you're working on a vintage truck and you want to keep it cool vintage air can help you out one of the biggest hassles of working on an older truck is finding the little stuff like what do you do when you need bezels and knobs and handles and things like that well if the trucks an old Chevy you call early classic enterprises because they've got all the knobs the bezels the control units the vents for the heat and the air conditioning everything to make your truck as good as new just think no more hunting around in the junkyards for old nasty cruddy parts all you do is call early classic enterprises and wait for ups now for those of you that don't know this is a late 60s Chevy truck that started out live here in the shop as a bare frame and a cab now the reason is to show you what's available for these old trucks and some of the choices you have when you're putting one together now today I'm going to jump into the interior show you how to lay one of those out but before we do that I'm gonna bring you up to date on some of the stuff you haven't seen the chassis is pretty much finished we covered that on the show you got the Dana 60 rear end the custom dual exhaust system the gear vendors overdrive the electric exhaust cutouts the BM turbo 400 and of course the 572 crate motor but what you haven't seen is that a painted the engine transmission and valve covers a special copper color more on that later on but before I painted the valve covers I sent him down to the guys at advanced planing and had him not only chromed but also had them engraved with 572 copper head and since this is the first production 572 engine 0:01 yeah this is special okay paint yeah paint now a new copper head needed a special color so got together with Ron Payton at the PPG Custom Shop we started looking and paintin and mixing and looking some more found a lot of killer colors but not the right one until I saw that 2002 Ford Ranger color and I said Ron this is the color this is the right pigment it's just a little flat needs something to bring the depth out in it so we went into the mixing room and at a much bigger more aggressive flake and bam just brought the color to life notice that the bigger flake brings out the gold overtones adds a ton more depth it's hard to believe this is the same color with just a different flake in it now this color is available from PPG now it's one of their new custom colors it's called Copperhead metallic and you need to get it from auto body color and supply in Nashville Tennessee because they have the mixing code the paint and bodywork on this thing was done by Kevin Tate's who does the paint ucation video series and as you can see rocked on this thing now we kept the body modifications to a minimum shave the drip rails filled a few holes and heck that's it these old cabs don't need a lot they were pretty right from the factory then Kevin worked this thing down to perfection shot on the flawless paint let me tell you it is right incidentally he's got a new video out in his series you may want to check it out it's called Body Shop basics and it's perfect for the do-it-yourselfer you can get it on his website paint ucation comm check it out it's good stuff all right now that we're all up to date it is time to get to work now anytime that you lay out a custom interior it doesn't matter if you're working on a Ford Chevy Dodge import new old doesn't matter if you don't do things in the right order you're gonna have a big mess on your hands now most people think well first thing you put in the carpet right mmm only if you're doing something original if you're doing something custom it's a lot easier to do your mounting and fabricating with the carpet out so let's go look at some seats this is the c5 Corvette style seat from steel horse automotive but these are made specifically for trucks so they've got a thicker base on them they're little beefier and they come with great upholstery however the first thing I did was ship them off to cat skin and have them reupholster with black leather here in the center then around the sides is a tan naugahyde that's got just a little bit of a metal flake in it which is gonna be perfect with that paint now of course cat skin is known for the custom logos so we had them stitch this Copperhead logo in there because just like the valve covers and it's all about the details all right mounting a set of seats in an area where they were never supposed to go is a challenge that you're gonna run into whether you're putting in new seats like this or something out of a salvage yard maybe after three things here number one is seat height you want to make sure that the seat is sitting high enough so you're looking through the center of the windshield not through the bottom not through the top right through the center this isn't bad I can actually go up about an inch though number two is the angle of the seat and you want the bottom of the seat to angle back just a little bit so it supports the bottom of your legs around seven to ten degrees is usually about right finally make sure the seat is centered up with a steering column now a paper plate stapled to a broom handle makes a surprisingly accurate mock-up once all your measuring is done it's time to fabricate your seat pedestals now I'm making these out of old seat brackets that I had laying around when they're all together both the pedestals to the seats mark and drill your holes in the floor pan and then bolt the seats in the truck now if you took your time with the measurements they should be perfect next up is the shifter and for that we're using the BM light truck mega shifter because it's not only a high-performance ratcheting shifter but it also comes with a little taller base because like I said before most truck seats sit a little higher than cars and you want this shifter up where you can get your hands on it once your locations decided it's just a matter of trimming the base to match the contours of the floor then just drill your holes and bolt on your shifter now this particular BM is really nice because it's got a lot of adjustments so it's perfect for a custom application then just put on your shroud and that takes care of your shifter all right once you've decided the location of your seats and your shifter and a console if you're gonna use one anything that goes on the floor we'll sit back man take a break and enjoy your handiwork because yeah you guessed it everything's got to come back out because now it's time for your carpet and we're gonna take care of that after the break man it's looking crazy here I knew you'd be back because the truck on the chopping block today is Copperhead and we're showing you how to lay out a custom interior now the cab floor is all clean Bowl holes are all drilled for the seats and stuff like that time for carpet now for that we went to early classic enterprises got this one-piece form-fitting carpet and it's gonna fit our floors like a glove now most aftermarket carpet comes with this jute padding like this and that's really nice but that's not quite enough especially when that big 572 starts bellowing so we're gonna soundproof the cab a little bit this kit is from quiet ride solutions and they call this stuff acoustic shield now the thick sound deadening pad that goes on the floor in the doors on the firewall the back of the cab any place where noise and heat can get into the vehicle now you also get these damper pads that go right on the sheet metal and they keep vibration from coming through the sheet metal and then of course we got these form-fitting covers for the firewall now the best part about this quiet right kit is it's made for specific applications so this will literally just slide into place the first thing you need to do is make sure the floor is clean and dry then lay out the damper pads according to the diagram use a wallpaper roller to make sure that the adhesive gets a good bond to the middle now you're ready for the acoustic shield pads first give them a good thick coat of the supplied glue then lightly set it into place and position it now you'll notice that I'm not glue in this front part yet that's because I need to be able to get to these body bolts when I bolt this body down on the frame make sure that you're planning ahead on your project because if not you might work yourself into a corner now all you have to do to make this permanent once you have it how you like it is just use some firm pressure on it smoothing it as you go once the panels are replaced the final step is to seal all the seams and edges with the aluminum tape then just set the carpet in place now once this cab is bolted down on the frame we'll go ahead and glue this in then we'll hold it in place on the sides with these new seal plates that we got from early classic enterprises now notice our carpet only comes back so far it doesn't mean we got a bad piece of carpet it means that this truck used to have a gas tank back here and a bench seat if you take your gas tank out you're gonna need to make a trip down to the upholstery shop get a strip of carpet about this wide and glue it in there next up is the dash and the gauges now even though the original gauge cluster was cool and it's still available we want to move beyond that a little bit and no-limit engineering had exactly what I was looking for and this is their gauge panel for the 67 72 GM trucks and it's a nice thick piece of ball milled polished aluminum this thing is awesome now notice that the wipers of the lights have been relocated down here to the corners the turn signal indicators have been moved out here to the sides and then to keep the look of the big gauges these big holes here are stuffed with huge Auto Meter speedometer and tach then the smaller holes are for the smaller Auto Meter gauges so you've got complete instrumentation so you've got performance gauges in a really nice package but wait there's more no-limit engineering also has a matching glovebox door with cupholders to round out your dash to install the panel you do need to cut the - just a little bit these little corner pieces have got to go so go ahead and mark your cut lines with some masking tape cut it out then just mount the gauges into the panel slide the whole assembly into the dash you'll be glad to know that the glovebox doesn't require any modifications it just bolts right on clean simple and and that looks good for a dash pad the guys at early classic we're waiting for my call because they knew what I wanted and this is it a genuine GM dash that looks and fits exactly like what came in this truck yeah now we've done a lot today got a lot more to do more copperhead after this welcome back to trucks and project Copperhead where today's subject is interiors now I'm showing you how to lay one out on this classic Chevy and we've already dealt with soundproofing and carpet seat placement and layout of the dash now we're gonna move on to an area that most people are a little afraid of and that is interior panels things like door panels kick panels that kind of stuff now on most vehicles you got a couple choices you can buy an original style replacement panel or you can do a custom panel and that of course is what we're gonna do now I showed you how to make custom panels before on the Wicked Willy's project first you need to make your panel out of some backing material to however you want it to fit the surface now this is a creative process so it is time consuming then when you have the panel made you have to upholster it and this is why most people run from interior work like a plague this kit will make that whole process a heck of a lot easier now this is from a company named rod doors and they specialize in plastic panels for your interior now the kit that I'm using is called the Danno made specifically for the 67 through 72 Chevy trucks and you've got door panels they've got arm rests this utilizes your stock door puller and you've got room out here for your stock window roller or you can mount buttons for power windows you've got a pillar covers that have little tweeters in them you have kick panels a headliner panel and you even get this huge piece that goes back behind this seat covers the area where the gas tank used to be yeah this is a complete kit now the best part about using rod doors is that now all you have to do is glue on your upholstery so all you bring to this equation is some adhesive some tools and your actual material and you can go from this to this in just a few hours then once the panel is done it just pops in place using the supplied velcro look at this covers the whole door that way you don't have to come in and do any repair work on something like these speaker holes and if you don't think using a rod or skid it's gonna you sometime you just try to do this the old way get all those contours right when you go to set a body down on a chassis of course the ideal situation is to have a lift like this and go jacks under the chassis so you can roll everything around and line it up perfectly however very few people are going to have these tools so the next best thing is to get about for your buddies in a couple of pizzas and have them help you set the cab in place once the cab is sitting on the rubber mounts four bolts as all the tails to mount it down with the cab bolted down on the frame then you can see how this is starting to lay out in here now it is tight you've got about an inch of clearance here at the back of the valve cover and about a half inch here at the back of the air cleaner but that's enough all right this thing's finally starting to look like a truck again we're gonna go ahead and turn our attention to the bed one of the great things about the 67 through 72 GM truck is that almost every piece for the bed is available brand new which means you don't have to go out and try to resurrect an old rusty bed unless of course you just want to now we've got this whole kit every piece from early classic enterprises here's what we got - new bed sides tell you a little bit more about those in a minute a new head gate a new smooth tailgate now we got the smooth one as opposed to the one that says Chevrolet in it because if you don't know this is a Chevy by now as we can't help you and we got two new wheel tubs a bunch of support braces for the bed and most importantly a big bag of stainless hardware so we don't have to mess around with old rusty bolts as you can see this kit from early classic is really nice but the two most unique pieces are these bed sides now these are made by good mark industries and when these things hit the market a few years ago people went crazy because until that time man find the two good bed sides was almost impossible remember these are trucks people used them to haul things with now these pieces fit just like the originals but notice our marker lights have been shaved stake pocket holes have been filled good mark does not make these like that they make them original so if you want it smooth down you need to do it yourself but you how to smooth panels in the past so you know how to do it to put the bed together it's best to assemble it off the frame now this is an area where you're gonna need an extra set of hands because you can't do this by yourself now I've got my good buddy Dave Clark give me a hand we'll start with one bedside and both on the rear crossmember next is the front head gate now make sure if you using a stainless hardware like we are you use some anti-seize on the thread so you don't gall him we got ours with the kit next comes the other bedside keep in mind our bolts are just finger tight at this point so we can square this thing up later also don't be surprised if you have to file and fit a little to get things just right and be prepared to touch up your paint yeah it's all part of the reassembly process now that we have a basic structure done it's time to put it up on jack stands so we don't damage the bottom edges of the bedsides then we'll just bolt in the wheel tubs alright now it is time to square up this bed and you need to take your time here because this is what's going to determine just how square and true this bed is going to sit and how nice these tailgate gaps are gonna be and nothing looks worse than a crooked or cockeyed bed now once you have it exactly how you want it go ahead and tighten down your bolts right now we're ready for the wood and the kit that I got for that also came from early classic here's what it consists of nice premium quality oak planks all pre-cut ready to fit your bed and then to go between those planks got these polished aluminum strips and notice you don't see any mounting bolts here this is one of their hidden mounting bolt kits and I'll tell you more about this when we go to put these in now it's important to remember that your bed kit does not come out of the UPS truck ready to just drop into your truck oh man you got a pre fit it which means you got to set it in place drill your holes make it fit your bed because each bed is different then need to sand it stain it and seal it like we showed you how to do a few weeks ago then you can set it aside so when you come to this final assembly step everything should just slide into place no scratched paint no marred wood everybody's happy to install the wood we'll start with these smaller side pieces around the wheel tubs then bolt in the remaining cross members this is where you'll be really glad you pre fit everything then just slide in your planks and your aluminum strips make sure that you leave out the plank that's gonna cover these mounting bolts or you won't be able to bolt your bed in all right Dave and I are gonna take a break get some to eat it's your turn to buy again now that we're putting all these parts into the bed a Copperhead you can see just how nice this bed's going to be now all we have to do is bolt it down onto the frame tighten everything up and Copperhead is two-thirds finished we'll be back after this alright go ahead and start lowering this down hey we're back for those of you that are just getting here we are reconstructing the body on Project Copperhead a 67 Chevy short bed pickup now speaking of bed we have spent the first part of the show reconstructing this bed now it's just a matter of setting it in place that's looking good good and bolting it on now if you don't have lifting equipment like this you're gonna need at least four buddies to come in here and help you set this down on here that's it so you don't scratch the paint buddy we are on before you tighten the bed bolts make sure that you recheck the squareness of your bed because picking it up and moving it around can cause it to move a little once it's right tighten them down now we're ready to tighten the bed strip bolts but before we do I want to tell you a little bit about these strips because they're pretty unique now running down the backside is a slot that goes all the way down and into that slot slides this very unique bolt that has that special shoulder on it now what this does slides into the slot and gives you adjustment for your cross members and then that shoulder gives you the grip it allows you to pull this thing down tighten into the wood and what this does is eliminate any bolt heads for a super clean look okay I've got the gas tank out doing some measurements and there's something I want to bring to your attention here if you are relocating your gas tank to under the bed of the truck and this is not just for this style of truck this is for any kind of truck you need to figure out some way to get the gas down into the tank and unfortunately you can't really lay that out until the whole bed is put together you see how it's all gonna fit now you can take this as far as your imagination to let you come in put a filler cap coming out here and put a remote door there hide it under a marker light you can bring it out through the tail light have the tail light pivot down like a 56 Chevy or the aftermarket is full of billet flipped doors that recess into the wood or kits that let the wood flip up maybe you've got a lot of options here but that's another project for another because we still have a lot of body parts to put on just don't forget you need to do that the last big piece to go on the bed is the tailgate once again this is a two-man job because it needs to be finessed into place so you don't scratch that paint all up once the gates in place put on the hard-wearing latches and you are done now we're ready to look at some taillights and we got these brand new reproduction taillights and backup lights from early classic enterprises now these are great these will slide right into the stock openings but they utilize this old-style technology a single dual filament bulb he's were notorious for peeing to dim now that was great for 1967 but there's been a lot of changes in lighting since then so to go with this we got this LED panel kit from early classic and this utilizes a hundred and sixty LED bulbs which is far brighter than this uses less power than this and it won't burn out like this the best part is slides right into the original socket lays down on the housing on goes the lens and you are ready for your truck and that is all there is to it an original look modern lighting now why went back here what about this big empty area right here well as usual you've got a couple choices you can put on a rear roll pan now what this will do is blend into these lower bed sides and roll metal down underneath giving you a really smooth clean look they're cool they've got a couple drawbacks number one you're gonna want to weld it in which means you're going to have to do some metalwork and some paint work number two you can say goodbye to that hitch and number three you're not gonna have any kind of protection back here from any kind of fender bender or your other choice would be to use an original style bumper which is what I'm gonna do and the reason is not only can I keep the hitch and keep some protection back here but also these trucks were built in an era where the bumper was actually designed to be part of the style the rig so they look really cool yeah we're gonna keep it the bumper bolts on easy using factory braces and that is it now notice the hitch is hidden behind the bumper and the license plate but when you need it there it is step back take a look at this is this sweet or what now this takes care of the assembly of the bed but don't go away we got a lot more to do after this welcome back to the shop if you're just getting here man you have missed some good stuff because we're putting Copperhead back together and it's going quick they always do at this point now it doesn't matter if you're working on a 67 through 72 Chevy like this or whatever the assembly steps are gonna be pretty much the same no matter what you're working on so for you late comers we're gonna walk you through the steps of what we've done so far starting with the finished chassis we bolted the cab on then we completely constructed a bed using new sheet metal wood floor with smooth strips so you don't see any bolt heads an original style bumper new taillights everything and as you can see this is turning into an awesome truck now one of the most amazing things though is the only original piece of GM sheet metal I've used so far is this cab everything else is reproduction parts and gives you a pretty good idea of the quality of aftermarket parts out there that's also one of the main reasons for this build up to show you what's out there hopefully get you excited about a build up of your own now the cab's bolted down the back half of the truck is assembled it's time to do something about this steering system now obviously we need a steering column and you got a couple of choices here you can try to hunt down an original column you can still find them but then you're gonna have to paint it you're gonna have to detail it and once you're all done with that you still have an original column now that's fine but you do have another choice this is from I did it this is their chrome tilt column and it is made specifically for this model truck so it's going to slide right into place and bolt right up and it will make a huge difference in the look at your interior and you got your turn signals tilt hazard lights and everything is wired up to plug into your wiring harness this is nice now to connect that column to the steering box got a stainless steel shaft and a couple of bourget's and u-joints now this big boy here is to absorb vibration so you don't get vibration up into your steering wheel now speaking of steering wheel this is Colorado customs lazier wheel I check this out Colorado custom offers steering wheels to match their custom wheels that is a nice touch and the leather on the wheel matches the upholstery inside and the wheel itself has got this polished aluminum adapter that's gonna mate right up with that steering column and it's gonna look perfect and that's the idea here build your truck to where everything matches and works together and you can do that no matter what budget you're on to install the column just slide it into place bolt it up with the factory Hardware with the column loosely in place we'll just slide on the steering wheel and then we'll position the column in the cab where we want it now you need to take your time here because this this is where you make it fit how you want it to fit now notice you've got two or three inches here that you can move this thing forward and back also when you're setting up a steering system ideally you want it to be a driving position and the steering column to be straight pointing right at you that way you've got full benefit of your tilt option now once you have it how you want it go ahead and bolt it up underneath the dash connect your steering shaft up at the box and that is it hey welcome to the shop I have got a great show planned for you today because I am buried up to my elbows putting Project Copperhead back together now like I've said before this is where it starts to get exciting this is where you actually see what the truck is going to be this is also where you need to be careful that you are taking your time because it's really easy to forget things and forget steps and the last thing you want is parts falling off your truck the first time you take it down the road now last week bolted the cab on put the bed together and I've been slowly working my way forward which means it's time to do something about the doors now these doors just like the cab are actually genuine original GM parts so I was really lucky to find these but if you don't have a good set of doors reproductions are available and they're nice but they're not gonna fit like an original piece you're gonna have to massage them a little bit now this does not mean that they're bad parts this is just the reality of it so picking up a nice clean set of originals is really nice if you can find them now these doors have been modified with a kit from early classic enterprises for one piece power windows and you can see this combination works extremely well and really cleans up the look of the door if you're gonna do this kind of conversion you're gonna have to modify the upper hinge so it'll clear the window channel with the doors assembled and the hinge is bolted on you're ready to bolt your doors on the way just a minute if you've just painted your rig you need to chase the threads with the tab make sure everything's clean so it bolts on nice and easy now you're ready to put your door on now this is usually a very awkward two-man job but I'm using this little tool called the door dolly from brute manufacturing and it allows you to position the door exactly where you want it now check this out this controls the inward and outward tilt of the door these down here make sure that everything's level and then this jack just lowers it right to where you want it so you can literally just bolt it right in place now this is a tool you won't use very often but man when you need it it is a lifesaver make sure you take the time to fit the door properly because nothing looks worse than misaligned body panels once your doors are in place and all your gaps are perfect it's time to mount the striker inside the cab here's how to do that you've got a threaded backing plate that goes in the back then the striker itself goes on the outside here now what about all these shims well these shims go between the body and the striker plate now this allows you to adjust the striker so that door fits and latches perfect now one other thing whenever you're fitting a door make sure you leave the window down because that'll keep you from accidentally locking yourself out and under crawl through a window start with no shims and Adam as you need them looks like we're going to need about three here also remember the striker plate can be adjusted in and out and up and down now this is what decides just how deep that door fits into the cab so be prepared to spend a little time here fitting checking tweaking until it's perfect and you can get it perfect even without weather stripping in there man that looks nice especially with that shaved drip rail now once the doors are done it's time to move to the front of the truck now up here I've got two new inner fenders and a radiator support all of which came from early classic and they're all reproduction parts but you're gonna have a hard time telling this from an original it's got all the stampings all the fittings even the captive nuts that the originals had so this is just a direct Bolton replacement to install the radiator support set on the new rubber mounts then bolt it to the frame using the new hardware now the reason that this one on first is that from here on out everything the inner fenders the fenders the hood the grill all either mount to the radiator support the firewall or somewhere in between so we've left our bolts loose so we have some adjustment when we go to put it all on now we're going to take a short break but we're gonna be right back on this project so don't start messing with the remote or you're gonna miss it hey welcome back to trucks we are concentrating on assembling a front sheet metal on this little 67 half-ton Chevy now we're working on the inner fenders right now and they bolt to the radiator support here in the front and then to the bottom of the firewall they're in the rear and as usual I'm leaving the bolts a little loose for now so I'll be able to adjust this thing move it around once I get it all together now you can see how those inner fenders tie everything together now they're not just for protection to keep mud rocks and junk out of your engine compartment they also supply a mounting point for your outer fender now a lot of people don't think to paint these inner fenders they just leave them black and that's fine but man if you want your engine compartment to really pop paint your inner fenders and your firewall and your radiator support you'll be glad you did all right fenders are up next and of course you've got some choices here originals reproductions or nos like these are now nos in this case does not stand for nos or nitrous it stands for new old stock which means these are brand new GM parts that have never been on a truck before now you're wondering oh man how does that work well it's very simple when a manufacturer makes a vehicle they also make replacement parts for it when they stopped making that vehicle few years later they stopped making parts for it and all the leftover parts down at the dealership become Nos they're new but they're old stock and these are without a doubt the best replacement parts you can buy however be prepared to pay top dollar for these and availability is an issue because once they're gone they're gone to install the fenders just slide them into place starting at the rear back toward the door and I notice I've got tape on this rear edge and up here on the front that's so I don't accidentally scratch my paint remember when you're fitting a body panel you're moving it around adjusting it having tape on is cheap insurance with a Fender in place and loosely bolted up it's time to set your gaps in your alignment now you'll need to keep checking these as you add more parts like the hood and the grill but the more time you spend now getting this right unless you'll have to do on the final adjustment once you have it all together yeah next up the grill probably the most unique feature of the 67 68 Chevy truck is the grill so clean so well designed now you sharp eyed Chevy guys might notice that that little bowtie emblem is gone we got rid of that to smooth that grill down even more now if you're looking for a grill like this I can't help you nobody is reproducing these yet an original one like this is like gold so keep that in mind if you're thinking of converting your 69 through 72 to this earlier style grill now the good news is everything else is available from early classic so the first thing we're going to do is rivet in these inserts follow that with the new marker light and then the new trim strips and then just install it and that takes care of most of our front end sheetmetal now step back take a look at this thing it's that sweet or what [Music] hey welcome to trucks today's show was one that a lot of people including myself have been waiting for for a long time because it's time to rolled Copperhead back into the spotlight now obviously I've got a few things to do to this truck still before I can call it done and I've got some surprises for you on this project still but before we do that I've been getting a lot of requests from people to take you back through the project and show you what I've done so far because there's a lot of people building classic trucks so here we go back to the beginning and the whole purpose for doing this project first of all it's going to be a high street truck second of all it's gonna deal with one of the most popular body styles of truck ever built the 67 through 72 Chevrolet if you start with just the cab and the frame you can build this truck and most of it it's just bolt on stuff now I know a lot of you are probably saying I want to wait a minute oh the old truck you got it you got to prove that to me well I thought you'd probably say that so the only way to prove it to you is to build one what I'm starting with is literally a 67 cab a frame and of course a title you got to have a title you don't have a truck without that with the frame stripped and powder-coated and the cab cleaned up and wearing a fresh coat of primer well we had a solid foundation so it was time to start building now the first thing that you need to decide about any project is what direction you're gonna go now this project is gonna be nice and low and smooth but it's not going to detract from the original classic lines of the truck gonna pretty much be the ultimate cruiser the first stop was to install new upper and lower control arms ball joint bushings so everything will be firm and tight now for the lower ball joints those need to be pressed in so do not try to do this with a hammer you'll need to take it down good machine shop just charge you a few bucks to have that done give us a nice starting point for our alignment now the bottom control arm it's just held in place with these u-bolts that come with a kit we followed that up with new drop spindles and Springs to not only give us better handling but also get the nose down where it belongs to round out the handling package we also tossed in a quick ratio steering box and bolted up a huge performance sway bar underneath now don't think for a second we forgot about the rear suspension it needed some help too so new bushings and trailing arms were mated together and then the trailing arms were installed with new Springs to make this thing sit down and have the right stance so far things seemed pretty normal but I did drop a hint of what I had in mind for this truck when I installed the huge Dana 60 rear end and track bar hmm people begin to wonder next it was time to get the fuel tank out of the cab not in the most desirable situation and relocated under the bed and this custom tank from early classic fits so nice it makes you wonder why GM didn't do something like this at the factory now to get the truck to stop like it should front disc brakes were attic and then to make the chassis a roller we slid on a hot wheel and tire combination to finish it all up now with the chassis done it was time for the drivetrain oh I had a lot of fun teasing you with this one tell me how cool it was gonna be but I don't think anybody including Chevy was really prepared for when I finally whip that cover off and revealed the very first production 572 crate engine the phones at GM performance literally rang off the hook as people try to find out more about this massive engine oh wait a minute let me repeat that to you this is a 572 cubic inch engine it's been dyno dat 620 horsepower at the flywheel and it's kicking out 650 foot-pounds of torque to go with that big old hunk of horsepower at built bnm turbo 400 was wrestled into place and then the whole lethal combination was laid to rest between the frame rails man is awesome or what but we weren't quite finished yet no no we needed more gears for high-speed driving so in when a gear vendors overdrive [Music] and then finally with the drivetrain in we were able to permanently mount the saddles to the axle and sent a painting angle we'll be back with more copperhead after this welcome back to trucks and our recap of this whole Copperhead thing now when we left off they had a rolling chassis and a drivetrain but I still had a few things to do before I could put the body on here they are the first thing was to mount all of our pulleys and brackets and check the fit and here's how our inner fenders are gonna mount notice how everything tucked down into this dead area here like I said before then it's all about the detail then we slid in a custom drive shaft that's not supposed to ever break okay yeah let's see about that one now the exhaust system took things even Wilder as I installed a dual custom exhaust system with twin electric exhaust cutouts that'll make this truck just as loud as it is fast I flipped the switch open up the exhaust cutout that bypasses my main exhaust and now I'm running straight pipe right out of the 572 out the side into the side of his head and this is the last thing he's gonna hear before I in cork this thing and give him a really good look at my tail end as with any project like this there is always some fabricating and designing that needs to be done to make everything fit just right [Music] finally you topped everything off with a special air cleaner yeah there now you can see all that extra work it took to make this thing fit just right definitely worth it at this point it was all in but not finished so next I pulled the whole drivetrain out painted and detailed the engine while advanced plating chromed the special valve covers now while all this was going on the cab in the body rolled out of the paint shop and they were looking good because Kevin Tate's at paint ucation it's been hours smoothing it down and shooting it with a special PPG copper color then Ron Payton and I had created for this project the next stop was inside the cab to locate our new seat positioning and then fabricate some brackets so when we're ready to put them in and just bolt into place you want to make sure that the seat is sitting high enough so you're looking through the center of the windshield not through the bottom not at the top into the center [Music] make sure that you're planning ahead on your project because if not you might work yourself into a corner with the sound deadening and carpet in place on the floor it was time to modify our - so and with some performance gauges and instead of a stock - we installed this super slick matching cluster and glove box to really make the interior pop finally some custom interior panels finished it all off when we come back the body goes back together now when we left off it was time to start putting this body back together so let's get to it hold on because here we go the first step was to lower the cap back down on the chassis check all our clearance isn't fit and then bolt it down next it was time to start putting the bed together and even though every one of these parts are reproductions the bed went together really easily [Music] [Music] now if you spend a little time fine-tuning the fit this will look as good or better than any original bed now if you don't have lifting equipment like this you're gonna need at least four buddies to come in here and help you set this down on here that's it so you don't scratch the paint buddy we are on we finished off the rear with tail lights and a stock style bumper then it was time to move forward into the cab the first thing to go in was the steering column in the steering wheel and then we'll position the column in the cab where we want it now you need to take your time here because this this is where you make it fit how you want it to fit and then we not only installed power windows but we converted the doors to one-piece glass while we're at it get rid of that vent wing now with the doors all assembled and looking good it was time to install them on the cab [Music] and adjust them let's track your plate itself goes on the outside now and adjust them and adjust them until everything a bit perfect so be prepared to spend a little time here fitting checking tweaking until it's perfect and you can get it perfect even without weather stripping in there that looks nice especially with that shaved drip rail then finally it was time to move on to the front end this whole rig slowly begin to transform into a more and more recognizable truck with each piece that we put on now this is by far the most rewarding step of any build up because you can finally step back and take a look at your creation for the first time and see how it's gonna look back take a look at this thing is that sweet or why well there it is we're all up to date and once they get to this point now it's just a matter of doing your plumbing and your wiring and your detail work which we're gonna do but like I said before still have one big surprise for you on this project and that is that you're gonna have to wait till next week to see it it's what you hate that welcome to trucks I've got a great show planned for you today because I finally get a roll Copperhead back into the shop and finish up some of the details on it and I know a lot of you been waiting to see that now like I always say the final details on any project are always the most tedious always the most time-consuming and definitely the most important because this this is what decides the final fit the final finish the actual look of your project if you're getting hurry here you are gonna regret it now you need to spend time deciding what products you're gonna use how you're gonna install them so everything fits together and works right and you've got a lot of choices on a body style that's popular we're gonna show you some of them the first thing we're gonna deal with is the wiring harness and the choices that you've got here are to go with an original style harness or a custom harness now if it's an original one you're after you can get those from early classic enterprises they've got them to go under the - up under the hood and of course back to your taillights now when I say original I mean original right down to the way the fuse block is set up to your fittings and your plugins heck even the way the wires are wrapped if you are doing an original style restoration or even a modified restoration where you're using a lot of original parts this is the harness you want to go with now if you're doing a truck like this where nothing is original gauges are different this steering column is different the engines different an original style harness is not your best bet because nothing's kind of fit now you need to look at something like this this kit is from painless performance and it is made specifically for the 67 through 72 GM trucks so you've got a fuse block the bolts pretty much into the stock location and it's been upgraded with modern style blade fuses now another unique feature is that every wire is marked down its whole length exactly where it goes so it's pretty much impossible to hook these up wrong unless you're just not paying attention now another cool feature is how long the wires are this gives you the option of running the wiring up out of the way however you want to do it now obviously hooking this up is a little more time-consuming than just plugging in an original harness but this is the best for our application [Music] [Music] now don't worry this is not as tough as it looks [Music] okay now that we've got this painless wiring harness all laid out and we know where everything's gonna go it's time to do something about our heating air conditioning because you definitely want to lay that out before you go any further and before you get your interior in now of course you've got a couple choices on that they're both over here on the table okay for the 67 through 72 GM trucks both of your choices come from vintage air and the first one from here over is made specifically for these models of trucks now it takes your whole heater blower evaporator assembly and moves it from under the hood to under the dash now of course when you put all of this under your dash you're gonna lose a little bit if your glovebox so the kit also comes with this little glovebox insert so you at least have something now of course you get all the bracketry the hoses the hardware that condenser the compressor everything you're gonna need to put air in your truck but one of the most unique features is this little panel this is a firewall cover slides down over the firewall covers these stock ugly holes just screws in place and allows all your fittings to come out here as you can see this is considerably cleaner than the original setup which came up to about here and took up a half your engine bay this will be the setup that most of you guys want to use now let's say you want to smooth the firewall down even more you don't even want this sticking out well you need a different system that is the Gentoo system now this system is a very compact universal fit heating air system you have your heater and your blower and your evaporator all wrapped into one tight little package much smaller than this now you also have a flat area here this is what goes up against your firewall and then with this kit you also get the condenser and the compressor all your lines all your hoses wiring controls everything to make this a complete system now you're probably wondering well if the lines come out here where do they go through the firewall the answer is wherever you want them that is what this fancy little bulkhead is for lines go in there through the firewall and out here this is a very clean very very low-profile look now as you've probably guessed this system is a little tougher to put in than that one because this is universal fit that means you get to make it fit but this is the one we're going to use because we're going to smooth that firewall down so the first thing we need to do is Mach this evaporator into place hey welcome back to trucks where I'm finishing up some of the final details on project Copperhead and showing you some choices you have when you lay out your own project now I've already got the wiring and the air conditioning all laid out now it's time to deal with a very common problem area on an old truck the firewall it is ugly now hold on we got some choices for you to fix that first of course you can weld in some panels then you can smooth it down and paint it of course that looks awesome problem is that takes a lot of work you basically need to disassemble the whole truck to do it or you've got another option it looks just as good or better it's a lot easier something most people can do and that is to make a custom panel to cover the firewall first make a pattern of the shape you want on a cardboard template then transfer the shape to the material that you want to use in this case I'm using polished stainless steel then cut it out now dress the edges drill your holes and finally mount it on now is that slick or what now the best part about doing it this way is you can use stainless steel you can use aluminum you can use regular steel and paint everything you can roll beads in it this is where your imagination comes in you can make this look exactly how you want and if you don't like it just build another one to change it look how a different style panel completely changes - look at this firewall now the most important thing here though is to spend the time to make it fit right all your edges need to be straight bolts need to be evenly spaced so when somebody walks up and looks at it they go man where'd you buy that is that Factory that's what you want okay anytime you start talking about final details plumbing always comes up and if you want something special you need to go to pure choice motorsports because when it comes to plumbing they've got at all take a look at this we've got complete systems for your breaks hard lines hoses got power steering setups heater hoses transmission cooler kits fuel system air conditioning heck you name it matter of fact pure choice is the only place I know of where you can't completely plumb your vehicle with one phone call all right let's take a look at the brake system we're gonna use for a hard lines pure choice has got this high-quality seamless stainless steel line then of course you've got all kinds of a.n fittings to go with them and then they've got these really slick little banjo fittings to go on your master cylinder these aren't cool then four hoses we've got braided stainless steel hoses then to hold everything in place got some polished stainless steel clamps now to adjust the system got a proportioning valve and to help us build the system got this little bending tool now this will allow you to make some of the tightest bends that you can imagine now one thing that is very important when you are working on stainless steel lines you have got to do a 37 degree single flare with an aien on the ends if you try to do a 45-degree double flare like you would on a normal system you are going to get leaks this is probably one of the biggest mistakes that people make when they do stainless-steel lines all right speaking of leaks it's time to take a break we'll be right back hey welcome back today we are doing some plumbing on Project Copperhead and it's time to do some air conditioning lines power steering lines and of course heater hoses now in the past you haven't had a lot of really good choices here you could use original style lines that were kind of ugly and never quite the right length and you had to cut them down or you could have somebody custom make them for you but wouldn't it be nice if you could just make them yourself well now you can with these kits from pure choice motorsports now this is a setup for power steering notice to have the different size hoses and all the fittings that you need this is for air conditioning once again different sized hoses compressor fittings bulkhead fittings and of course this is for the heater now the best part about this pure choice stuff is all you have to do is cut the hose to the length you need put the fittings on and boom you have a custom hose exactly the length you want it all the fittings are right no leaks no hassles and the best part is all your hoses match that is the way it should be look at this the last piece of plumbing that we got from pure choice is this fluid cooler now I know this looks a little different but check this out your fluid runs in here it goes through a series of internal baffles and fins all that heat dissipates out through the aluminum body and these big exterior fins something like this will actually cool better while you're sitting in traffic no air flow then a conventional style cooler now I add to that it's low-profile it'll mount right on your frame rail if you want it to and you've got a pretty slick set up now that takes care of all of our plumbing I've got a little surprise for you come on over here come on come on it's back here in my stash stop you stay now obviously thank you Copperhead is gonna paint really fast as any hot runner knows you can't be too fast or have too much power so I thought it was only fitting I put one more surprise under the hood of Copperhead and that surprise comes from bottle blown racing now bottle blowing racing specializes in custom nitrous systems yeah nitrous which means they'll be custom build you any system from the most exotic to the most simple here is what they did there it is now starting with a bunch of hardware from nos they plumbed my intake for a 250 shot of nitrous and it's blowing right into the intake runners now notice all the solenoids are all set up you'll get your gauges your feeds for your fuel and your nitrous this is a nice setup now some of you might be thinking man that is a lot of nitrous no not yet hmm what are these little extra solenoids back here well to be a little extra sneaky they also put in a 150 shot of nitrous underneath the intake you won't ever see this you won't ever know it's there until I trigger those buttons and hope the heck we're all holding on to something Wow you can see by the workmanship here bottle blow and racing really does a nice job like I said before do you want a quality nitrous system you need to call them now if my math serves me correctly that puts copper headed over a thousand horsepower is that what are you nuts yeah I guess we are now to go with that system we got a couple of blue anodized bottles from nos these will go behind the seats then of course we got all the hoses and all the hardware to make this a nice easy installation now anytime you start pumping in this much nitrous you need more fuel so we got an auxilary fuel system to go with our normal fuel system to take care of that it's a Mallory series 140 Comp pump the filter and of course the regulator now hopefully this gives you an idea of the planning that goes into this stage you can't do your electrical until you do your accessories you can't do your plumbing until you know what and where to plumb so make sure you're taking your time so you don't end up having to do something over okay obviously I still have a few things to hook up here but once I get them done it will finally be time to take this thing down the road now I know I've made a big deal about this being the very first production 572 crate engine it's because that is a big deal but now that they become available well a lot of guys are using these on their projects now one guy in particular is none other than Jay Leno now Leno took one of those huge engines and put it in a 55 Buick and it's a cool car and it's really fast but come here take a good look at that picture it looks a little smug doesn't he kind of like he's calling you out so Jay what do you say we take that whole fancy Buick run it against my old truck now it's just an old truck and you know it's got some nice paint on it and you know not much more let's drag that Buick out see what it'll really do you know that is unless of course you know you're scared what do you guys think you think Jay scared if they have to be scared of yes we'll just have to find out hey welcome to trucks got a question for you what do you think is the most tedious and time-consuming part to a full-on project like Copperhead here putting in the engine and laying out the suspension doing the interior these are all good guesses but the truth is it's in the final assembly that's when you need to make all this aftermarket stuff work together and trust me sometimes they don't want to work together but if you take your time take each step as it comes before you know it you'll be done now obviously I am down to those final steps on Copperhead here but remember almost nothing on this truck is original which brings up some interesting questions what am I gonna do about the radiator and the fans and how about the linkage and the wiring and how am I gonna get gas in the tank that is what I'm gonna show you today how to solve some of these problems the first thing we're gonna deal with is the radiator now what we're using is this big aluminum radiator that we got from be cool now this not only has the capacity to cool an air-conditioned big-block which obviously we have but it also has all the fittings for the heater and the transmission and the housing is completely polished so this thing is gonna look awesome in that engine bay the radiator just slides into place and sits right on the factory rubber mounts on the bottom now this is where you can run into a little bit of a problem because notice that the stock rubber mount for the top is nowhere near fitting this radiator is a lot taller but if you pick up one of these Universal pieces from trans DAP that can be made to fit real easily with just a little bit of tweaking first set it in place and mark and drill your holes then modify the factory rubber mounts finally bolt it in okay for fans I've got something that you're really gonna like this is a dual electric fan system from old air products made specifically for the 67 through 72 GM trucks now obviously it's got dual electric fans main fan runs all the time auxiliary fan comes on only when you need it and everything is all wired up you got your thermostat and your wiring and your relays basically all you do is plug in a couple of wires now the best part is this whole assembly slides right in place if you're ugly stock fan shroud now that's really cool down here on the bottom but since this radiator may just change these upper mounts we're gonna have to make this work [Music] [Music] okay here's what I did I fabricated a bracket the bolts to the top of the fans here runs over and utilizes two existing holes here in this upper bracket simple clean and very strong as you can see it is not hard to fabricate pieces and make things work it just takes a little time to decide where you want to go with it all right now radiator hoses now obviously we are not going to use stock rubber hoses on an engine like this first of all we'd never find anything that would fit properly second of all it would look really bad on an engine that's nice no this is more what we're looking for yeah unfortunately you are not gonna find something like this in a box and then just bolt it on now you need to make this here's how to do it this is flexible stainless steel tubing that we got from Earl's performance plumbing and it is specifically designed for custom making radiator hoses now all you do is cut it to the length that you need and then just bend it into whatever shape that you want then once that's done all you do is put on the hose in the best fit your application [Music] [Music] once you're done just polish it and clamp it in place then we are ready to move on to the interior now obviously this interior is almost finished but now is a good time to talk about door handles this is what I'm gonna be using I got these from Billet Specialties and they'll slide right on to the factory stub then we'll just cover it with the armrests now that is a nice look looks really good with the door panel and those window switches now how about the gas pedal made it called a little car got this big chrome one that's for those of us with a really heavy foot and then to go with that also got one of their braided stainless steel throttle cables now these will not only look a lot better than what was in here originally it'll make it a lot easier to hook it up to that new engine now what about this nitrous bottle we're not just gonna leave it out there in the open for everybody to see are we ah I saved the best for last this is a custom console built to my special specifications by Kevin Linda mood and heavies customs and as you can see he did an awesome job you've got matching leather and matching design matching upholstery even a functional armrest but it gets really fun underneath that armrest yeah there's my nitrous bottle and you only think that this is an ashtray that's actually my weapon system yeah just like James Bond got the nitrous purge and the nitrous arming system and switches to open up my dual exhaust cutouts all kinds of cool stuff take a look at this that holds my gauges for my nitrous system and my auxiliary fuel system of course up here on the shifter there's the controller for the gear vendor's overdrive everything's all hidden up here nice making this the ultimate sleeper is this cool or what now I'm gonna take a break hook up the nitrous we'll see you when I get back hey welcome back to trucks we are in the middle of one of the final shows of the build up of project Copperhead a 67 Chevy truck that started out as a frame and a cab here in the shop now I'm dealing with a lot of the questions that you guys have asked about the final details on this project how am I going to hook it all up and make it work right and one of the biggest things that people ask about is the fuel tank of course that's because one of the first modifications that people want to do to an old truck is get that gas tank out of the cab and relocate it under the bed of the truck now finding a gas tank to go into the bed well that's the easy part getting gas down to it that doesn't come with any kit you are on your own for that but this is a slick way to do it now this polished stainless steel tank that we got from early classic Enterprises fits up nicely between the frame rails and the crossmembers in the rear the filler neck is centered right beneath one of the bed planks so first we'll just mark the location of the filler neck on the bottom of the plank then remove the plank next drill a small hole in the center of your mark this is for the center of the filler neck now to get to that filler neck down on the tank we're going to go through this polished aluminum cap that we got from styling concepts now this is actually made for a PT Cruiser because it's the only one that's small enough to fit into the wooden plank between the metal strips now the trick here is to recess this down into the wood so it's all flush for a nice smooth clean look so don't even expect to be able to use this factory mounting hardware uh-huh you're gonna need to make this fit yourself so first thing we're gonna do is Center it over the hole we drilled and then make a mark here for the big cut then cut out the center hole next using a router cut the groove for the outer ring now what you want is for the cap to fit flush with the wood so be careful that you don't go too deep once you're happy with the fit treat the wood with the sealer where you made your cuts then mount the cap and replace the plank and there you have it a slick little fuel door mounted down into the bed and the polished aluminum matches the polished aluminum strips and the bed wood and they're stainless hardware now the best part is because this is flush mounted well you can still use this bed to carry stuff if you want to right now that takes care of the bed of copperhead let's take one last look inside this interior now you can see how well this all came together we started with a two-tone look in the door panels carried it through into the seats and into the center console of course all that sneaky performance stuff is well hidden in the console waiting it's turn of course in the - we got performance gauges everything is accented with polished aluminum definitely a nice place to spend some seat time now I've got one more thing to show you out front you know there comes a time in every project when that last piece has been put on and you can finally step back and take a look at what you've created and for Copperhead that time is now this cowl induction hood was the last piece to put on to finish off the look of this truck and Mahan want a truck remember though this thing started out is just a frame a cab and a title and the whole idea here was to show you what is involved in this kind of build up and if you take your time don't get discouraged well even the roughest project will eventually turn into something that you can be proud of now the big question how does it run I'm not gonna tell ya I'm gonna show you but not today oh we're out of time you have to wait just a little bit longer but me I don't have to hey welcome to trucks you know the purpose of this show has always been to show you how to do stuff you know the tools and techniques it takes to hand build something of your very own but every once in a while the time comes to put the tools down and see just exactly what it is that you've created and today on trucks is one of those days you know without a doubt one of the most popular trucks I've ever built is this little 67 Chevy called Copperhead but why well the reasons are pretty obvious the 67 through 72 GM trucks are without a doubt one of the best looking trucks ever built and there are so many parts available for them that you can literally start with a frame and a cab and you can build this truck I've been telling you that from the very beginning but telling you that and proven it to you that's two different things this is the proof now I know a lot of you been following this project from the very beginning and you're just dying to see it all come together and hear that big 572 finally kicked alive well guys and girls this is copper [Music] starting at the very bottom the frame and the chassis were the first two things to be brought back to life with all new components what I'm starting with is literally a 67 cab a frame and of course a title you got to have a title you don't have a truck without that remember by breaking your big project into smaller sub projects you not only keep everything more organized but you're also able to keep the project moving along and give you a sense of accomplishment [Music] the drivetrain was next and with that came the introduction of Chevy's new 572 crate engine this sucker not only kicks out a massive 620 horsepower on pump gas but this is also the very first production engine which makes this truck definitely one of a kind we backed up all that power with a built turbo 400 transcend our Road as well as get off the line and at this point people were beginning to understand why I had named this truck Copperhead it's a very potent Street machine disguised in the unlikely body of a pickup truck [Music] the pain and body were the next stage and to go with the name Copperhead and to add to the illusion that this is just a fancy show truck that you only drive once in a while we created a special EPG color called Copperhead metallic and it looks good even on a cloudy day and then we started putting it all back together using a combination of reproduction nos and original parts proving once again that you got a lot of options when it comes to building one of these trucks [Music] the interior that is a whole step in itself and once again with these body style trucks you have a tremendous from bone-stock to full-on custom and the only limit is your imagination and of course your budget yeah easier said than done don't underestimate this step this is where most people get discouraged and give up usually because of bad planning or unforeseen problems that they weren't prepared for and then all of a sudden it's done now did I hit my goal do I have something that can be a full-on show rig when it needs to be but something that's reliable and functional enough to give a driver but at the same time can transform itself into the fastest fattest nastiest thing on the screen is that even possible oh sure it is check it out [Music] the first stop for Copperhead upon completion was not just any old car show it went to one of the biggest the SEMA Show in Las Vegas where it sat on display in the Chevrolet booth to represent the crate motor program with the very first production 572 crate engine bulging out from under the hood this was a tremendous honor for an old truck that was just a derelict frame and cab just a few years ago the response to the truck was overwhelming people swarmed around it looking any point in asking questions it was great I even had some time to spend with Jay Leno who had his awesome 67 Toronado on display websiteís you may notice it shave the drip rails because it always looked like a big eyebrow on this thing oh that's Joe yeah yeah well it's all subtle it's one of his own beautiful yeah anyway the SEMA show was great truck was a huge hit but that's only a small part of what this truck is the biggest part we're gonna cover them to come back because we're gonna put you the passenger seat we're gonna drive this up about to swing you but all over that seat welcome back to trucks and the Copperhead payoff now we already know the truck looks good but how does it perform on the road well that is what we are going to find out all right we're rolling down the interstate here right at 80 miles an hour everything is just smooth as glass this thing feels like a new truck which I guess all the gauges are lined up everything's functional get 60 pounds of oil pressure water temperatures 180 degrees tachometers working old fuel it seems feeling good now one thing that's really cool that I want to show you is this airbenders overdrive now we're running down the road here 70 miles an hour 3000 rpms I hit the overdrive drops it down to 2500 just like that if I want to go back hit the button back to three it's like a whole nother gear but that's that's sweet [Music] first thing we'll want to take a look at is the handling of road manners remember I didn't get overly exotic with the suspension because you don't need to new urethane bushings ball joints bigger sway bars quick ratio steering drop strengthen spindles all this adds up to make this thing handle surprisingly well on the street especially for a truck with a big heavy engine in the front all right big ol heavy truck let's see what you can do however if you start to push this thing on a road course you'll get the typical understeer entering a curve but a quick blip of the throttle bring that rear-end right now for money with oversteer which would make this truck a handful on a slick or gravel road this thing is a lot of fun on a road course okay what this clique racial steering is nice even if you're building a truck just to be a street driver you need to have preparation steering the harder I push on the gas the board against pitch goes down why is that of course if you want to play you gotta pay yeah Scott lost the toss on this one how's it going Scott I gotta watch you man now rolling down the road this thing is surprisingly quiet due largely to all that soundproofing I put on the carpet in the upholstery now the gauges are big and easy to read the mirrors are small but they're functional driving position is nice and comfortable shifters within easy reach this is definitely a vehicle if you'd want to that takes care of two criteria for Copperhead one nice cool show truck - nice reliable daily driver if you want it to be now when we come back I'm gonna put some switches we're gonna see jazz town nasty this [Music] welcome back to the Copperhead payoff we've taken a look at the show ability it got cut out and the street ability of this rig now it's time to get back to the Nashville Superspeedway and put the pedal down [Music] in the quest to see just how sharp this thing will turn I found it'll actually turn in its own radius but not using steering will adjust the throttle which leads us to the conclusion and you're into drifting you need to build a truck because nothing will hang the rear out like a truck [Music] [Music] of course right about now it's time to take our increasingly familiar position at the back of the truck and this is 112 so nobody's gonna miss these few gallons are they you want to just like pull that tank behind me the way this stuff's going through they were probably gonna need to do that [Music] all right tank is full it's time to find out what kind of top speed this thing's capable of and with its 60s aerodynamics and its modern power and drivetrain trust me this trucks going to be airborne long before it stops accelerating making 140 miles an hour a nice round number to stop pushing it out well at this point it's time to stop fooling around see what this thing will do off the line with or without slips [Music] so after warming up the unfortunate Toyo tires to get as much trash as possible Aylin course the headers and turn this sucker loose here we go [Music] now hold on wait a minute quick a minute I'm not really sure you understand what you just saw those black marks are over 300 feet long and it was still spinning I hadn't hooked up yet finally at about 70 miles an hour with the rear end whipping back and forth I finally lifted the throttle enough to let her hook up and guys that was without the nitrous amazing hair watch it again [Music] [Music] well there it is Copperhead now this is the best part about this whole deal we put 250 miles on this thing in two days drove it to the track flogged the we out of it and then drove it back in the dark no breakdowns no leaks no problems everything worked exactly like it should and that is what you want that's where all the time that you've spent working on the details making sure they were right really pays off because you don't want breakdowns and problems when it's time to go have fun now a lot of you may be thinking well that's great for you I can't build a truck like this yes you can that's the whole point here you can build your own version of this truck to your skill level and your budget man put a small-block in it or keep the stock interior or the stock brakes just build something and make it yours that brings up one final point I want to make you're not gonna build a truck like this in six weeks you're not gonna build it in six months heck you're not gonna build it in a year the average gearhead spends four years working on this project so don't get discouraged because one day it will be time to turn the key and drive out of the garage and at that point I have got two requests of you number one that you drive it like you stole it and number two if you ever pull it beside me you better be ready to run it

Channel: Gunpowder & Gasoline

Views: 3,243,795

Keywords: trucks, truck, chevy c10, c10, stacey david, chevrolet, truck rebuild, truck rebuild project, show truck, project copperhead, chevy c10 build, c10 build, restoration, rebuild, chevrolet c10 build, copperhead, chevy ck, street truck, how to, do it yourself, full build

Id: lFbmYJE8NL8

Length: 145min 58sec (8758 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 28 2020