89 MJ

This is a very sentimental truck to my family and I. There are a variety of places that I can start the story about this truck, but I think I'll go all the way back to the beginning, before this truck was even in the picture. Back in the late 80s, my father and grandfather restored and made a street rod out of a 1934 Chevrolet Master Town Sedan. This car hit the road in 1987. It got painted in the early 90s. It was a fairly mild street rod that had some revisions made over the years, but it always had a small block Chevy with a tripower. It was my grandpa's daily driver for decades. More on that to come though. My grandma used to do daycare, so that was where my cousins, brother and I all went. Naturally, we all liked to spend time with grandpa out in the garage. He was usually either working on some little project on the 34 or working on his prostreet 40 Chevy pickup. It had a big block chevy in it and was chopped and the cab was stretched. One day, my dad had somehow come across the current 40. He was going to buy it, but didn't have enough cash and the sellers wouldn't take a check, so my grandpa ended up buying the truck. It got all of the metal work done, a Heidt's Mustang II front suspension, fiberglass fenders and running boards, a Vortec SBC and 700R4, and (I believe) a 3rd gen Camaro rear end. The prostreet 40 got sold and traded for some parts for this truck because this truck was going to be a lot more drivable. This truck is yet to see the road, but it has done driveway burnouts in town with open headers. And this is where the story takes a turn. June 1st, 2016 was an absolutely gorgeous day. Perfect weather. My grandpa cut the grass at his house and used his Chevy Avalanche to haul grass clippings to the dump. He then came back and got his 34 and was driving on the freeway. Another car hit him, he went into the cable guardrail, it tore the car up (wooden structure of the body) and he passed. The car that hit him was never found. To this day, we do not know why he was on that road. The media said it was street racing, but the police report concluded that was not the case. I think he probably was just out enjoying the beautiful weather in his car. Understandably, my grandmother could not stand to look at the 40, so we put it in her storage unit. This is where the story gets less sad again. When we were loading the 40 on the trailer, we were driving it because it was easier. Now, the truck had a slight fuel leak and had open headers. Well, the truck just happened to backfire and it became a fireball. No damage was done though, which was lucky. This was just grandpa having some fun with us. Fast forward 6 years and my grandma wanted to get rid of her storage unit, as it was an expense she really did not need. I was allowed to take over on the 40, so I jumped at the opportunity. I'm hoping to get the truck drivable next summer. My parents had to go get the truck for me because I am in AZ and the truck is in WI. Here is the only picture I have of it at this time. It is loaded in my parents' enclosed trailer. I do have the bed for it. Those of you eagle-eyed people or people with a really good memory will notice the plate number on my grandpa's 34 is the same plate number I have on my MJ and Eagle. This is because I took over on his collector plate. Plans for the truck: It's going to be a tribute to my grandfather with my own twist. It is going to be a combination of the 34, what he wanted out of the prostreet 40, and what this 40 was going to be. Aspects it will share with the 34: Multiple carbs (dual quads on this one, more than likely) Ford rear end (I'm thinking I want a 3.73 8.8 with an LSD to hold the power better than the Camaro rear end. The 34 had an 8") Possibly the trunk (I'm not sure yet. We have an extra 34 Chevy trunk that I might want to use as a tool box, but I also know my dad has a plan for it to be an entertainment center too) Trailer hitch (We use our old cars! That 34 towed quite a bit) Aspects it will share with the prostreet 40: Its a 40 Chevy pickup... BIG BLOCK POWER, BABY!!! (Yup, this is getting my 348 with dual quads) Aspects that will be unchanged from the way my grandpa had it: Overdrive transmission (700R4) Mustang II front suspension Good, daily drivable truck Color (He wanted GM Arrival Blue from the early-mid 2000s. I like that color too) Possibly lettering on the door Where is my twist coming in? I want to give it a 60s-70s hot rod shop truck kind of look. This upcoming summer, I want to try to build my 348 for it and get the truck in black primer so I can go out and drive it some. Because you read all of that, here are some of my inspiration photos. I dig the no bumper look. That's the way my grandpa was going to run it too.

That’s going to be a gorgeous truck. Can’t beat the Chief stripes, IMHO

Funny you post this, we are actually working on a Comanche Club Google Drive right now to save a bunch of PDFs. I was actually going to post a bunch of them today. If you want, could you send them to comancheclub.com@gmail.com and I’ll post them with the others I will be posting?

Very nice, Jake!

The truck is finally road legal! He drove it to a car show last Sunday. I'll try to grab some pictures of it at the show next to my cousin's 72 Lemans GT (with the GTO Endura front bumper).

Glad to see this thread is back!

Awesome combo!

Thank you!

@AZJeff, can you please post the PDF in here or email it to comancheclub.com@gmail.com so we can keep a copy of it in the club's Google Drive?

Thanks, Pete!

Looks like an 87. Could you please merge these?

Great, Carter. Thanks for sharing. Why did you do this and why are you telling us? And that is a terrific question! Basically, it is so all of our Comanche related PDF files will be in the same place (crash manuals, parts manuals, etc.). This club account is also going to be shared with a few of the site admins, plus myself that way someone will always have access to it in case something happens to someone else. With that being said, if you have any PDFs of really anything Comanche related, please email or share them via Google Drive to comancheclub.com@gmail.com in the highest resolution possible. Thank you!

I would love to have those, and they're not too far away from me right now. I wish I had a huge stack of cash. They'd be complete overkill for my blue truck, but it would be sooooo cool.

I’m I saw that. Never got MTOD, but wanted it. That, Roadkill, and RKG would’ve been the only shows that I would’ve watched though.

This information is scanned from a crash estimation guide that I was given. It does a good job of showing how things come apart. It can also give a ballpark of how long a certain project *should* take, but we all know how that goes. I did include the XJ pages as well. Link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1iDlo3d5I8pOwgGLHDpTRzn-OLSTZaGz3/view?usp=sharing

No help, here. I tagged two admins that can hopefully move this to get some more eyes on it for you. @Pete M or @eaglescout526, could this get moved to tech?

I’ve seen that he’s down this way. I’ll have to try to catch up with him at some point. Ratchet straps on the axles to the tie downs in the floor

Thank you!

Well, I am down in Arizona for college now. My Comanche and Eagle are both tucked away in my container. The Eagle may come out to put the latest addition to the collection in there, but the Comanche will stay there until I am back in May. I'm not going to lie, I do miss driving it. If anyone has an MJ near Tucson that they want to sell, I may be interested. I have no clue why the photo rotated the way it did, but you get the drift.

No real progress lately. I pulled the valve train out, but that's all. I also acquired another pair of heads, a crank, and a set of pistons. Oh, and I acquired the vehicle that this will be going in. Stay tuned!!!

We ended up building a roughly 8' by 89'' loft inside to house my parts. I have the Bolens G14XL and H14XL under that and my Eagle and Comanche behind those. Something is getting moved out for a cool and upcoming announcement.

And the Eagle is tucked away into my container while I am away to college. It may get moved out soon though for an exciting upcoming announcement. Don't worry, its not getting sold.

Well, this one got sold this week. The buyer plans on bringing it out to CO for his son. I'm going to miss it, it was a terrific rig, but it didn't get used much anymore because I have the two of my vehicles and my mother's JKU gives a similar open top feeling, but fits all of us better and drives a little nicer.

@cquinnball, any updates or still just waiting to try to track down the missing pieces?