Chevy Tracker (in the beginning)

 The biggest personal project that I've been working on over the last year has been my little Chevy Tracker.  There is an old saying "The last vehicle an mechanic wants to work on is his own".  That's not always true, but it is often hard to find the time.  I would suspect that many of you  will look at the pictures of what I started with and say why bother!  Well, several reasons come to mind: because it was all that was available in my small community, because the 4x4 ability of these little vehicles is amazing with just a little work, JUST SO I COULD SAY I DID!

 As you can see the condition of the exterior of the truck wasn't in very good condition.  There where some major dents and dings but there was almost no rust, so everything was solid.

The driver's door wouldn't open all the way because there was a huge dent in the fender blocking the door.

 The interior was trashed (literally).  I took a whole bag of trash out of the truck.  The seat were worn substantially.  The front seat doesn't match the backseat.  Even the drivers door panel was broken and the handle was gone and had been replaced by a vise grip.

The engine was a story in itself.  When my father and I first looked at this rig we brought a battery to start it.  Added some oil and turned it over.  It started!!!!!!!!  Ran a little rough, but I figured it just needed a tuneup after sitting a couple years.  One of us joking said "wouldn't that be funny if all the oil had just run out on the ground".  About that moment is when we noticed the oil running across the ground.  After closer inspection we found the hole in the block.  Number 3 cylinder had a broken push rod that had come through the block.  Amazing it still ran on 3 cylinders.  So the engine was the first thing to be done I new that it would take a while to rebuild an engine to put in.  At the time I didn't know just how bad it would be, but that is another story!!!!