Chris Overacker Racing J10 Jeep Truck Rebuild

It all started with “Ugly Green Gator, the Gladiator”. Yep, that’s what all my “buddies” called my 1974 J-10, that was obviously the factory green, faded and rusted. It came with a 258 six cylinder, T-18 4-speed manual, Dana 20 transfer case, and some obnoxious clearance lights on the roof (which we promptly removed).

I had bought it with anticipation of someday building a really cool J-10 like the pre-runners I’d seen hanging around the off-road races, back in the early 1980’s. It went through several changes, with the ugly green paint, including suspension up-grades, bumper changes and tires/wheels.

Finally, it was time to do some drive train up-grades. I was in the process of parting-out a 76 Jeep CJ-7 that had a AMC 304 V-8, TH400 automatic transmission and a Quadra-Track transfer case, and transplanted them into Gator’s chassis. After the bigger engine, I had a friend paint it white and stripe it. It lasted this way several years.

Then I decided it needed even more power, and we built a AMC 401 V-8, with some up-grades like a mild cam, 390 AMX heads that except 6 to 1-ratio, roller rockers arms, better oiling system, Thorley Tri-Y headers and a carter 625 4-bbl carb. The new 401 ran good enough to surprise the average Camaro owner!

After a few years of abuse, serving as a tow rig, pre-runner, shop truck, and daily driver, it was time for a major body-off, frame-up rebuild. I acquired a 1980 cab (no brow), and sandblasted the entire thing. Then did some major floor patching and built the internal cage. Custom sheetmetal plates were built with hundreds of dimpled holes, for strength and the cool look. They attached the DOM tubing to the cab interior. Each corner of the cage legs extended through the floor and would act as the new cab mounts to the frame (through polyurethane bushings). The entire cage was welded to the sheetmetal interior, forming one very solid platform.

The entire chassis would also benefit from the cage. Since the cab was now attached directly to the chassis, the rear kickers also attached to the frame in three places each, and at the upper cab/rear window area. You can see how this forms a “bridge” over the frame and adds tremendous strength to the entire chassis. It also acts as a great attachment point for suspension components (shocks) and other essentials.

On the firewall side, I extended tubing through the sheetmetal (with careful considerations for components like the heater, A/C, and fuse box). These extensions have bolt/flanges to allow easy removal of underhood tubing. The bolted on tubes go directly to the frame and also connect in three places each. The cage structure now bridges the chassis and is connected in 16 places with poly-bushings.

I’ve always been a fan of the Jeep J-10 step side trucks, so I decided to convert the style-side bed, to a “glass-fender” step side. I found some brand new fenders (long story), but beds were no longer around (very rare). So I built my own bed from square tubing and sheetmetal.

I decided to raise it about 4” above the stock step-side bed to make the truck look taller, without adding height. This allowed me to raise the step-side fenders up 4” from stock. Plus this gave me more clearance to fit the 35” tires under the fenders.