Above 1200 Sq/FT Three Decades, Four Garages, One '77 C10

[mapesken]

My first shop. Circa 1996 and the 1977 C10 I've held onto through it all.

Let us begin a journey spanning from the origins to the present day—and looking toward what lies ahead.

Please stand by as I unpack the last 30 years.

 

[steves_001]

Love the C10!

 

[BORING HOP YARD]

Looking forward to the adventure, I have a 72 c10.

 

[rmack898]

I’m in for the ride.

 

[Chrisb62]

Following along…….

 

[Lou's Garage]

I had a '75 Suburban and a '77 Suburban. You have my interest!

Lou Manglass

 

[mapesken]

Instead of overwhelming you with a massive data dump, I thought we’d take a more interactive approach to make things interesting.

Introduction, Loss, and the 20-Year Detour​

Hey everyone,

I’m finally sitting down to start a proper build thread for my shop and the squarebody C10. This truck and I have been through hell and back over the last two-plus decades. Before I get into the current high-end suspension grafts and shop upgrades, I figure I owe a quick recap of how a truck bought in the mid 90s ended up sitting untouched for almost 25 years.

The First Shop & The Collapse​

Back when I was single, I had my first shop and my C10. Then life happened—I got married, sold that property, and shoved the truck into a standard two-car garage. Space and money evaporated. Four kids later, savings were totally drained. I was making good money, but my ex-spouse had a severe spending problem. Behind my back, the mortgage, car payments, and commercial truck payments fell three months behind.

To try and save the house, I was forced to sell the engine I had custom-built for the C10. It was too little, too late. The relationship split, I was forced out, and the house went back to the bank totally ruined. I left with nothing but my tools and my C10.



For the next eight years, I moved everything three separate times. The truck lived in dark storage units—never in a place where I could actually work on it.

A New Foundation (2008)​

In 2008, everything changed. I met my current wife—an incredible partner who actually builds with me. We bought a piece of property with an unlivable mobile home, but it had space for a shop. We dug a well, re-plumbed the trailer, and built a kitchen and two bathrooms out of salvaged and surplus materials. It wasn't fancy, but it was home.

By 2012, we scraped together enough to look at shops. I put a deposit down with ICON for a steel building online. What they didn't tell me was that they fabricated immediately. On February 7, 2013, a semi-truck dropped off a massive steel building kit on my lawn. I had no concrete poured. I wasn't ready.

 

[JuncleJohn]

Looking good. Let’s hear more.

John

 

[mattthemuppet]

Likewise!

 

[rmack898]

I always like hearing the backstory as much as the build.

 

[mapesken]

Welcome to Florida Weather​

We hurried to form up the slab, but right before the pour, the Florida skies completely opened up. That relentless rain washed our site into oblivion—shifting our forms and burying the rebar deep in the mud. If you've never had to dig 40-foot lengths of rebar out of muck, let me tell you: it is an absolute nightmare of a task.

Unfortunately, I have zero pictures of the footers, the havoc the rain caused, or the initial mess. (Honestly, I was probably too busy panicking to grab a camera!)

But we didn’t quit. We pulled out the rebar, dug out the thick mud, packed gravel into the footers, and rigged up a sump pump to fight the never-ending rain. Welcome to Florida weather.

For the technical specs, the field of the slab is 4 inches thick with a 2'x2' grid of #3 (3/8") rebar that turns down into the footers at the edges. It also features two 3-foot-square piers, 2 feet deep, engineered specifically to support the 2-post lift.

When the building inspector came by, he actually asked me why on earth I was using so much rebar. The building department even gave me a nickname because of it, but I’ll save that story for later in the thread!

When we finally got our concrete and started the pour, it was pure chaos. To make matters worse, the concrete trucks showed up way behind schedule. Between the delays and the mess, we found ourselves running the power float by the glare of truck headlights, trying to get the final finish on the slab at 2:00 AM.

During that whole late-night circus, I lost count of how many times someone accidentally stepped off the edge and fell straight into the lift piers, completely filling their boots with wet concrete.
It was a brutal, exhausting battle against the clock and the elements, but against all odds, we finally got our slab down.



While pulling 50+ hours a week at my day job, we carved out a single weekend to erect the steel frame. Of course, it turned out to be the absolute coldest weekend of the year.

Sunbelt had dropped off the forklift while I was at work, but there was a major catch: they dropped off the wrong one. I had specifically requested a 4-section mast because a standard 3-section wouldn't have the height to place the main roof beams onto the columns. After a frantic, rushed swap to get the right machine on-site, I finally had a lift that could actually do the job.

With the right equipment finally on hand, my neighbor Dan and I buckled down and knocked out the skeleton of the shop.



Once the frame was up, my wife and I spent every single evening and weekend together, working to hang the wall panels.




When it came time for the roof, I tracked down a retired friend named Chuck who used to erect metal buildings. He generously offered to help out. I had called on a bunch of other friends for backup, but when the day arrived, Chuck was the only one who actually showed up.

Getting the time off was another battle. My employer was incredibly reluctant to give me a week off for the roof install. After some serious negotiating, we struck a deal: I had to work the weekends on both sides of it, but I got my five days.

So, our skeleton crew was set: Chuck (71), myself (42), my wife (37), and my mother-in-law (61). Together, the four of us tackled the insulation and the heavy roof panels during what turned out to be the hottest week of the year. Baking in 100-plus-degree heat, we averaged about six panels a day. It was brutal, exhausting work, and I don't have a single photo of the roofing process because the Florida sun absolutely beat the life out of us.

With the roof panels officially locked down, I couldn't wait any longer. Stokes Towing delivered my C10 right then and there. As we rolled it inside, a huge realization hit me: for the first time in a decade, it was finally sitting under its very own roof.

These pics are not the day the C10 was moved to the shop. The conduit has been run and the power is on but they are the first pics I have of the C10 in the shop.



These pics are from the electrical