The first time Trent Greenwald’s 1966 Chevy C10 really drove down Powell’s roads was last spring to transport the ashes of his grandfather to Crown Hill Cemetery for one final ride. 

While Greenwald’s grandfather had not worked on the truck, his grandson and great-grandson Aiden had spent nearly eight years on, he was kept in the loop throughout the project that began around the time Aiden turned 11. Trent decided to sideline working on a 1966 Chevelle (a project he’s had since he was 18) to find Aiden a pickup. 

The truck was originally meant to go to Aiden in high school — he’ll get it eventually — and his younger sister Kaylen has been promised the Chevelle when it’s completed.

“[The C10] was going to be [Aiden’s] high school truck, his daily driver, and we started tearing into it, and it was a little [more rough] than I had thought it was going to be,” Trent said. “So we dove pretty deep into it, and decided to do kind of a full restoration on it.”

Trent had grown up working on cars with his father Gary and “I would always go find old, raggedy trucks and beg my dad to buy them, and we would fix them up. But that really never happened,” he said with a laugh.

He landed on the mid 60s C10 for Aiden after he had seen a similar one at a Billings car show and fell in love with the design, including the unique cab, Gary pointed out. The truck’s cab has a front that comes out and a ‘fin’ coming off the back end. 

Trent and Aiden didn’t hesitate to make the truck their own — the truck sports a two toned paint job, large chrome rims and an updated black leather interior with stitching. 

While the grill does belong to a Chevy it’s actually not from a C10 but a harvested and modified grill from a beet truck. The engine, a small block 350, was machined at a shop and then put together by Aiden. The transmission was also upgraded with a Muncie 4 Speed transmission and the truck’s bed, Trent’s favorite part of the build, was stained dark with white streaks using ink and a white stain that was then clear coated over. 

To get to its final form, the truck was stripped and quite a few panels had to be ordered for it. When it came time to paint the vehicle Trent actually did so himself, getting some pointers from a friend and building a paint stall in his shop (you can still see the outline on the floor).

“It was a lot of trial and error, and just a lot of time getting it to where it is today,” Trent said. 

But, the goal of the project was to get Aiden involved and teach him how things worked, and so the younger Greenwald also got his hands dirty on the project.

“I think he was probably 16 or 17 when we built the engine,” Trent said.

While Aiden was pretty young when the project started and he admits he doesn’t remember all of it, working on the C10 was new for him. He said working on the differentials and the transmission stand out as memorable due to the many parts and pieces involved.

Trent has let Aiden drive the truck a few times since it’s been completed. “It’s pretty scary when he does,” Aiden said with a chuckle.

“He hasn’t figured out the old style of clutch quite yet, it’s a lot different than the newer vehicles, so it’s a little tougher to drive, but he’s getting it, he’s figuring it out,” Trent said.