Twenty-two years ago when it was light blue, I saw this truck roll into the used car lot next door to my friend Stephon’s auto repair shop. The Blazer’s owner traded it in on another car, so I ran over and asked if I could buy it.

The 1974 K5 Blazer has had three engines in it in the time I’ve owned it. The last, a small block 400 that I built especially for the 4×4 application. The chassis has been completely refurbished, the new parts are too numerous to list. I wasn’t happy with those generic “wagon wheel” rims, so I hunted down a set of original factory 10″ wide rally wheels that would have come on the Blazer.

Over the years I slowly accumulated a pile of parts that I would need when I finally started the restoration. One day I got lucky and found a complete tan interior in a body shop that was no longer in business. The original was dark blue and thoroughly worn out. You folks at LMC provided the “pretties” for the interior like the door handles and window crank handles, gauge cluster and dash pad, to mention a few. I changed out the entire front end sheet metal with LMC’s front fenders, inner fender wells, radiator support, and that gorgeous 2″ cowl induction hood!

Any other rust that was on the main body was cut out and I welded in the front floor pans, rocker panels and door bottoms. I covered all the sheet metal with a beautiful dark green with gold metallic paint, both inside and out. Then ordered new parking lights and marker light lenses from LMC to give it that “new truck look.”

Every piece of weather stripping on the Blazer was replaced, and with that removable top there was a lot! That top is painted tan to match the interior. The exhaust is the last thing I do on a build, and hasn’t been done yet. When it is, it’ll have the exhaust tips come out in front of the back tires.

There have been so many parts that I have not mentioned that were necessary to complete this build, and I have to express my appreciation for what you folks at LMC do, helping me keep a piece of American automotive history on the road.