The tell-tale that this GMC pickup hasn’t moved in a while is all-too obvious. Not only is it growing moss, but so is the street under it.
And it’s not just moss; there’s lichens and this very lovely black scum or whatever it is, which seems to be thriving in the area around the fuel tank fillers, no less.
Of which there seem to be three, no less.
Even the Brahma bull is growing green fur.
Presumably, the Jimmy used to tow the boat in the side yard, once upon a time. Wonder how long it’s been? Actually, probably not all that long, since it’s only moss on the street. I’ve seen tall grass growing where the moss has been there long enough to create enough “soil” for grass to grow.
In Eugene, street parking is technically limited to 48 hours, but is only enforced in response to a complaint. And no good neighbor will do that, as long as the offending vehicle is on front of the owner’s house.
It’s a bull chia pet!
Interesting how in some places its possible to abandon your car on the street long enough to grow moss. In New York, this truck would have received at least two tickets in as many weeks, and got towed away shortly afterwards.
In West or North Philadelphia it would have been torched.
We don’t have moss out here, but I have seen vehicles that have been parked on the street for 5-6 years. But, there are only 10,000 people in our “city”, and these vehicles are well off the beaten path.
From what can be seen under the moss a really nice,straight and loaded GMC hides under it’s moss (almost) matching green paint. Probably a big block, judging by the 3 gas tanks. Once the bio-hazard is cleaned up, it has the potential of being a really great truck.
I have a neighbor like this, who has an ’86 GMC Jimmy K5 parked in the same spot since 2007. Leaks oil everywhere & is completely rusted beyond reasonable repair. Neighbor refuses to do anything to it because he’s “gonna fix it someday”
I really like the ’67-’72 GMC pickups. For the most part, this was the last generation that was truly different than a Chevy, but towards the end of the model run many of the formerly GMC only features became optional on Chevy. And vice-versa. For instance, a typical ’67 GMC would have the big V-6 with a New Process 4 speed, a Dana Spicer rear axle and leaf spring rear suspension. The corresponding Chevy would have either a Small Block or Chevy in-line 6, a Muncie transmission, an Eaton rear axle and coil spring rear suspension.
You just made all of that up. GMC / Chev the same in and out.
Sorry, no. This was in the years before GMC became just a rebadged Chevy. Look it up.
Yep, there really was once a difference. My oldest brother had an early-to-mid-60s GMC with the V6.
Respectfully, after 1967 – when the V6 was discontinued, GMC and Chevrolet were IDENTICAL. Only the grille, SOME trim, and the front bumper on some of the models differs.
Otherwise from 1968-1998, you can make a GMC out of a Chevy and vice versa without changing any appreciable sheet metal. The only way to tell would be the VIN.
IMO the ONLY reason GMC exists today is to give Buick and Cadillac dealers a truck to sell. At least today’s GMCs have a fair amount of unique sheet metal, especially in the crossovers.
As per Wikipedia and other sources, the 305 and 351 V6s were offered on GMCs until 1970. But otherwise you’re completely correct, AFAICT.
I always thought that the consumer-oriented 67-72 Chevy pickups all had rear coil springs, while the “professional grade” GMCs had leaf springs.
The 351 was available through the 1968 model year, when it was replaced by the 396 in both lines. The 305 continued in GMC’s only through the 1969 model year. I agree about why GMC is still around, it was a way for non-Chevrolet GM franchisees to sell trucks. Looks like in the future, GMC will become a premium line of pickups and CUV/SUV’s, and Chevrolet will become more commercial orientated.
Wow, that is pretty cool, very Pacific NW.
But it makes me glad my city has a 24 hour street parking rule. I don’t care if my neighbors want to fill their driveway with brokedown cars, but as soon as you start storing them in the public’s space, I have a problem with that. I manage to keep 5 cars at my house with none in the street, and I only have a 2 car garage. The key seems to be not having a garage full of junk, and a driveway/street full of cars. Old man rant over…
Cars are not allowed to park on the street overnight (unless special permission is obtained from the city) in my small, suburban municipality. If a car is parked on the street between 2 and 5 am it will get a ticket. The fine is fairly low – just a gentle reminder really – but there have been a few nights when I woke up in a cold sweat wondering if I had moved a certain vehicle onto the driveway. This was especially true when we had four cars at the house; two for each of my children, my wife’s, and my own. More than once in the past 15 years I’ve had to dash out in the wee hours in my shorts and t-shirt to move a car. I’m cheap you see. I wonder what the fine is for “public display of inappropriate attire.” 🙂
That said, several years ago I observed an early 80’s model El Camino parked on a side street, but a public street none-the-less, so long that the bed filled up with leaves. At first there was a stack of tickets under the windshield wiper but the stack stopped growing at some point. I finally made a call to the police department to get the scoop – more out of curiosity than anything else. It turns out the owner was in Italy and had the only set of keys to the car/truck with him. I guess the authorities decided it wasn’t worth the trouble to themselves or the owner to have the Elky towed. About a week later the vehicle did disappear but I do not know under what circumstance.
It amused me though. Our city is a bit like the fictional Mayberry, North Carolina and the static El Camino is good evidence of that.
There is a truck like this nearby and I am going to take some pictures in the next few hours and both look nice despite the ecosystem taking over. There is a dead Hyundai Sonata in/near Forest Park that has been sitting about 5 years and the ecosystem sure has done an surprisingly more impressive job in taking over. I did not know Eugene had a 48 hour parking rule, but hey, the tabs on this truck look to be good until 2016 unless those are 2010’s red tabs. On a side note I would totally buy this truck just so I could transfer the valid license plates to my own vehicle then sell it off.
Sadly these trucks are real rust buckets than to GM not dipping them in a phosphorus bath after they were jig welded ~ ever in the Desert they rust and fall apart .
I have a ’69 Chevy C/10 I’m replacing the cab on , due to rust out .
Good trucks these are , you can get them with coil springs for Light Duty or leaf springs for serious work / play , easy to convert either way .
-Nate
I had a 70 C10 (California model) that I bought in 76 and sold in 06, truck was only in California and Washington state. Other than surface rust due to poor paint in the later years, and always being parked outside, rust was not a problem on this truck. Maybe your truck spent a few years in salted road country, or possibly by the beach? Or maybe inconsistent rust proofing from the assembly plant?
There was _ZERO_ rust proofing of any sort on those rigs .
My truck was a Texas truck from new and still had very nice original paint… even the body man asked me why the hell I wanted to scrap the cab until I raised up the floor mat .
Most of them rust out in the root and windshield pinchwelds .
-Nate
Bet he used to use it to tow that boat next to the house. Has anyone checked to see if the home owner is still alive? 😉
For some reason as much as I like the 1967/72 GM pickups I prefer the GMC headlights over the Chevy’s, probably because I don’t come across the GMC trucks as I do with the Chevy trucks, I wish they’ve kept on making the headlights look different on the GMC trucks as opposed to the Chevy’s.
Don’t forget when a GMC truck in the 50s had a pontiac V8 and the Chevys had Chevy engines
does the moss corrode metal like Pine needles do? I’ve seen cars left under pine trees here and inside everywhere the needles get, it may have been stored in salt water…
How do you get moss/lichen off a car, anyway?
ha ha, and if it sits too long, do they get barnacles, too?
The owner has never heard of soap and water, or Turtle Wax, apparently. Sad.
Seriously: The lichen that’s favoring the gasoline vapor would be worth gathering and investigating as a living pollution absorber.
The detail that jumped out at me was the faded amber lenses. Sidemarkers not so much (they were still around on new vans) but in the early ’80s as a kid seeing those ’67-72 GMC trucks I thought the turn signals were supposed to be only sort-of amber.
Not sure about GMC, but my 70 C10 had white (clear) turn signal/parking lamp lenses, but had an amber bulb so they light up orange. The orange bulb would give it a faded orange look in the sunlight.
Yup, I remember those too;the fading problem was specific to the GMCs with the signals just below quad headlights.
This reminds me of a big 1960’s Cadillac that was parked in a back street in an inner suburb of Melbourne. There was/is no parking restriction for residents displaying a permit, and although the car had not run for years or maybe even decades so long as it was registered it could be parked on the street (there are no periodic inspections here just when a vehicle is sold).
The only reason why the owner was paying what is now $700 a year for registration (including compulsory 3rd party injury insurance) is that they did not want anybody else to park in front of their house! The length of the car was about the same as the width of the terrace house (attached on both sides). Don will probably know of it, but I don’t think it is there any longer.
A lot of points here:
I wonder “what’s the deal with 2 fuel filler necks so close to each other?”
I live in what is billed as THE largest city in the US, in an older section with narrowish streets. The section I live on has no STOP signs for nearly half a mile so it has become a high speed “freeway” of sorts. In the last 2 years, 5 or 6 parked vehicles (that I know of) were HEAVILY damaged by folks speeding down my street late at night. I tried getting a new car from my insurance company by parking it on the street….no takers (er, hitters).
Just yesterday I passed a farm with 3 older GMC trucks sitting in a row next to a barn and considered stopping and taking a photo….but since I was “behind schedule” and these weren’t technically curbside I didn’t think it was going to be worth it.
Couldn’t something like this be cleaned up using something suitable for boats? Or would it take too much paint with it?
As Bob.B pointed out the 67-72 model years were the last years where there was a difference between GMC and Chevrolets, albeit a minor difference. The GMC had quad headlights and rear leaf springs (standard) and availability of V-6, Inline 6 and V-8 engines whereas the Chevrolets had only Inline 6 and V-8 engines, two headlights, rear coil springs on the C10 and C20 models, although I believe leaf springs were an option. The C30 had rear leaf springs.
My father used to own a light yellow 1968 GMC CS-1500 base model with the full gauges, 292 inline 6, 4sp manual, 8 ft wideside bed with wood floor as the only options. Wish I still had the truck. I still have the owner’s manual and brochure and it does list the 305 and 351 V-6 engines available as well as the 230, 250, 292 inline 6 and 307, 327 and 396 V-8 engines. I thought it was interesting that the max torque rating on the V-6s were higher than the V-8 with exception of the 396.
Another thing: the 1968 model year was the last year with manual choke and hand operated emergency brake. In 1969 the manual choke was replaced with a automatic choke and emergency hand brake replaced by foot operated emergency brake, which made the trucks more like cars, in my opinion.
I see Eugene only enforces certain laws on a “complaint basis.” Same in my town, and I’m not a fan, as residents have to be the “bad guys,” rather than city/police impartially doing their job (I figure they’d issue a warning, then cite a day or two later). My barometer is: “what if everyone on the street did this?”–meaning that Eugene street would look like a boneyard. (That said, I’m a Eugene fan, overall.)
I like the looks of these quad-lamp GMCs. This one is picturesque in its own way, though all that vegetation can’t be good for it–wonder how long since it’s moved?
Where I live, parking laws vary by neighborhood, there’s not one overall city code that I know of. Parking on the street in my neighborhood overnight is allowed–thank goodness as many of the apartments and some of the houses have no off-street parking! Mine is, sadly, one of those. 3 cars and I have to find parallel spaces for all of them. There is a law saying you cannot leave a car in the same spot for more than a week–though there isn’t any immediate action other than they come slap a warning sticker on the car proclaiming that if it isn’t moved within 7 days it will be towed. It’s only selectively enforced though, as its main use is to keep inoperative vehicles from being left on the street and to be able to tow away ones that have been abandoned.
Here is a truck I’d like to have… I’d clean her up.