Bill's '89 OBS Project

Bill is our resident photographer and pizza provider, and all around good guy. He already has a handful of cool vehicles including his imported Honda Beat & RD1 CRV's, but after lots of nights drinking pizza & eating beer down at CWHQ, he was sure to catch the truck bug eventually. With the push of some peer pressure and late nights chatting trucks, Bill & Jay set off on a painstaking search for a decent shorty short OBS at a fair price within Bill's budget.

Only a few months later, the three of us ended up driving down to fetch this 89' Silverado from South Carolina. It was a running & driving factory 350 truck with AC (still blows cold!), and had been fairly well taken care of by the second owner that we met up with. It had a few signs of cab corner work and paint touch up as these trucks often do, but Bill was super excited to find a factory two-tone truck that matched all the specs he was looking for within his budget. We also scored a few factory OBS parts off another long bed truck the guy had beached at the back of his property, which would help bring this one back to factory looks including a factory chrome rear bumper.

There were a few things we knew would immediately need to be addressed. The truck had a really awful pair of aftermarket tail lights, along with a bulky diamond plate rear bumper, bed side top plates, and matching toolbox in the bed. The interior was far from clean (although mostly intact), and one of the rear sliding glass panes had been broken at some point, replaced with a slice of plexiglass that promptly fell out after about 20 minutes of driving. Nothing some Scotch green tape couldn't fix. We also knew that it was certain the truck was going to need new tires before making the haul back up North, so our first stop was the local tire shop for a fresh pair of Radial T/A's, and a quick bite from Sonic while we waited.

With the tires fitted, we promptly hit the road with Ohio as our destination for the day. Bill piloted the OBS while Jay & I following behind in the Sierra. We made a quick stop at Waffle House (for good measure) before making it to our Air BnB for the night in Ohio.

First thing in the morning we were up and off to pick up the U-Haul trailer in prep to tow the truck across the border and deal with registering the truck to Canada. With some handy prep work in advance by Jay & Bill, this was a smooth process and we were on our way within about an hour.

To be continued...