Introduction

Welcome to the blog.

This blog is to document my restoration of a 1961 Chevrolet Corvair 95 Loadside pickup.  The Corvair pickup has always been an interest of mine but I was never able to purchase one.

A month or two ago the wife and I picked up a 1963 Corvair coupe for her, this began the adventure that is the 61 loadside.  We noticed that the 63 needed a front hood and a driver side door and began looking for replacements.  We posted on Corvair pages on social media looking for parts.  The advise we got was to go to Corvair Ranch in Gettysburg Pa.  We emailed Jeff, the owner of Corvair Ranch, we went on a Saturday and were impressed with Jeff's customer service, prices, and collection of parts.  After we picked out a nice hood matching the color of the 63 and a door from another early model coupe, I casually asked Jeff if he sold entire cars and give him a little background on what I was looking for.  He immediately said he has a 61 loadside that was in need of love and he didn't think he would be able to have the time to get to it.  He also explained that the truck was number 36 off the production line, I was immediately interested.  

I went over to where it was sitting and took a look at it.  I knew I had to have it.  The next week I came back with my trailer and took ownership of the 1961 Loadside. After i got it home and took a closer look I knew that it would be a good amount of work but would be worth the time, money, sweat, and blood.

I wanted to chronicle the restoration of this piece of Chevrolet history and decided a blog would be the easiest was to keep from losing all of the pictures and notes from this build. This will be a long term restoration and I may not be able to update on a regular basis, so please bare with me.

So welcome to the Rusty Crusty Loadside, I hope you enjoy it as much as I plan too.