Junkyard Find: 1970 Chevrolet C10

Murilee Martin
by Murilee Martin

There’s really no reason for an old Detroit pickup to die, but The Crusher’s blind hunger for steel makes no distinction between a Mercury Tracer with fire damage and a solid ’70 Chevy with small-block and manual transmission.

Here we see Brandon, captain of the Dr. Strangelove-themed Mercedes-Benz W110 LeMons car and in Denver for the B.F.E. GP, contemplating the possibility of bringing this truck back to Texas.

Nothing on this truck should cost much to fix, but its last owner may have racked up endless parking tickets and been a tow-away victim. Or perhaps the lure of $250/ton steel proved too much.







Murilee Martin
Murilee Martin

Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.

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  • Moparman426W Moparman426W on Apr 13, 2012

    You're right, I was thinking of the GM cars when I made that comment. Sorry about that, Murilee :)

  • Moparman426W Moparman426W on Apr 13, 2012

    Budda, notice on my avatar there is such a truck behind the 5th ave. Both vehicles belong to my wife's co workers. The truck is a 69 307 3 on the tree, low miles all original. It has manual steering but power brakes, no radio. It even still has the blockoff plate in the dash.

  • Formula m How many Hyundai and Kia’s do not have the original engine block it left the factory with 10yrs prior?
  • 1995 SC I will say that year 29 has been a little spendy on my car (Motor Mounts, Injectors and a Supercharger Service since it had to come off for the injectors, ABS Pump and the tool to cycle the valves to bleed the system, Front Calipers, rear pinion seal, transmission service with a new pan that has a drain, a gaggle of capacitors to fix the ride control module and a replacement amplifier for the stereo. Still needs an exhaust manifold gasket. The front end got serviced in year 28. On the plus side blank cassettes are increasingly easy to find so I have a solid collection of 90 minute playlists.
  • MaintenanceCosts My own experiences with, well, maintenance costs:Chevy Bolt, ownership from new to 4.5 years, ~$400*Toyota Highlander Hybrid, ownership from 3.5 to 8 years, ~$2400BMW 335i Convertible, ownership from 11.5 to 13 years, ~$1200Acura Legend, ownership from 20 to 29 years, ~$11,500***Includes a new 12V battery and a set of wiper blades. In fairness, bigger bills for coolant and tire replacement are coming in year 5.**Includes replacement of all rubber parts, rebuild of entire suspension and steering system, and conversion of car to OEM 16" wheel set, among other things
  • Jeff Tesla should not be allowed to call its system Full Self-Driving. Very dangerous and misleading.
  • Slavuta America, the evil totalitarian police state
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