strelok

I've been working long enough on this truck that I believe its earned its own thread, mainly doing this to keep a better log of the progress I've made with this fantastic vehicle. Picked it up in West Virginia from another 1st Gen enthusiast. PO said that they used it as a daily driver and would commute about an hour with it, I intended to use it for this purpose as well however my commute is only 25 minutes. It had a minor amount of front end damage on the passenger side, and upon a CarFax I learned that it also had a rear end collision at some point in its long life. The frame is in good shape with the exception of the floor pan which was in terrible shape, I could almost stick both of my feet through it when I pulled the metal panel that the PO had screwed over the hole. The drivers side body mount had disappeared, such is the way in the rust belt, and the rear crossmember that holds the tire was in poor shape. The quarter panels were rusted out quite a lot, along with the rocker panels. The engine also sounded a bit rough and the parts of the plastic timing guides were resting in the oil pan. The nearly two hour drive home went very well. The truck performed excellent at higher speeds albeit with a slight vibration. I've had it since September of last year and at this point and I figured I'd share the experience so more posts are on their way. Thank you to everyone on this forum without y'all I could've never got this far with her. Photo is of day one.


Day one, after the trip home.