The truck was -so- clean when I bought it. Which is a good enough lead-in to the convoluted back story part of the thread.
I bought this truck in the spring of 2002 from a sketchy little dealership in Garden City, Kansas. It had 112k on the clock and I was the third owner and was clean, clean, clean with the exception of off-colored paint on the passenger front fender from a previous repair.
Much later in a wintry mountian road gaurd rail incident we learned that bondo can be applied by monkeys and will apparently attach itself to unpreped paint and can be put on an inch thick. . . but that is another tale for another time.
The first summer I owned the truck it became the official road trip vehicle for my siblings and I. We took it to concerts in KCMO, Colorado, Wichita, etc. al..
This truck is also the reason I became a CK5 member. We wanted to take the top off and it just wouldn't come free. CK5 to the rescue and I learned about the under rail bolts.
The only modifications were 33 inch tires; a CD player, amp and 6x9s, and a hydrogen reformer experiment that resulted in a reliable 19MPG and a ton of odd electrical problems.
I put 68K miles on it over six-ish years. It moved me or my brothers from various colleges and cities, took us about Colorado and Kansas on many adventures and was just the best thing ever.
Then in a dark time of life drinking became a bit of a problem and that problem culminated in destroying the front clip with a pair of trees. Thank God that wake up call only cost me truck and pride injuries and no one's life.
After that I continued to drive it for another six or so months until the engine let go.
Great plans for fixing it were launched, stalled and after nine years untouched here we are.
