9 hours ago
Building This Flatbed Oldsmobile Bravada Work Truck Took 500 Hours. It Shows
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The second-gen Oldsmobile Bravada was built on the Chevy S10 platform, but it was never a pickup truck. Instead, it was a badge-engineered Blazer with a slightly fancier interior. You wouldn't know that by looking at this work rig built by First Choice Fabrication in Colorado, though. Every detail on it is so well-crafted that you'd think it was a factory job, from the chopped single cab to the beautiful flat bed and steel front bumper.
Of course, that's what you get when you invest roughly 500 hours in a build. First Choice Fabrication owner Loren Byers explains that it was a 'personal shop project' with no budget, and the skirted flatbed alone starts at $10,000. It's hard to even guess what the rest of the work would cost because there are so many intentional touches. My personal favorite is the big Oldsmobile logo that's worked into the headache rack, but I'm also big into the branded mud flaps. Heck, I even like the teeth on the front brush guard. First Choice Fabrication
Given the extensive amount of work it took to convert the SUV to a pickup, you might wonder why he didn't start with a regular S10 pickup. 'I wasn't even planning on building it when I bought it,' Byers told me over the phone. 'Essentially, I bought it as a paperweight to park in front of my garage door at night for safety. I drove it all the way home at 80 mph, the thing had 105,000 miles on it, and it was absolutely perfectly clean except for a smashed back end.'
The gap between the rear door and the roof was apparently big enough to fit your hand in.
'Water was just going to dump in there, so it started as, 'Let's just seal it up so it's not getting water in the cab. We're still going to use it as a door blocker.' Then it became a single cab, and then I said, 'I might as well build a bed for it and use it.' And then it just spiraled way out of control,' Byers added. First Choice Fabrication
I love how almost every upgrade here has made the Bravada a better workhorse. The flat bed is awesome to look at, obviously, but check out the storage boxes on the sides, not to mention all the tie downs on the deck of the bed itself. Auxiliary LEDs make late-night repairs out in the field a whole lot easier, and those tow hooks would surely come in handy for pulling out stuck equipment.
The truck still has a stock 4.3-liter V6 for now, but it's on its last leg. 'Unfortunately, 800 miles after I finished the project—I mean, absolutely done—the motor decided to take a crap,' Byers said. 'It was knocking and ticking and not running anymore.' The fix he has planned is simple: swap in a 5.3-liter V8 next month. That ought to really put those new BFGoodrich all-terrains to use.
While you could use a small, maneuverable truck like this in lots of applications, Byers says its main job is running to the steel yard and powder-coat shop. He has a drop-in metal rack that runs from the front bumper to the back of the bed, so he can carry long materials without a trailer. Like I said before, everything here was done on purpose and for a purpose.
If only every other truck were built like that.
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