Television has created an unusual interest in all things high-performance, both cars and trucks. On any night you can watch some creation of modified vehicles, and even though there’s not much reality to the builds, you can get a good idea of what’s going on. But don’t get your hopes up: Unlike the team of experts that supposedly does this in a week, your build will probably take six months or more, and longer at some shops. While you can witness a number of world-class cars rolling across the auction block, commanding huge prices from over-enthusiastic bidders, you will find that this, too, is not the reality that most of us live in each day, as many auction samples are some of the more rare in existence. The one thing each of these shows has in common is that typically the owner rarely gets his hands dirty and if there is any owner involvement, it is often limited to writing a check.

This no doubt is a great way for some to enjoy the hobby, but it’s not the approach that most enthusiasts take, and that includes Rick Finzer. As a way of introduction, Finzer is the event coordinator for a much respected Florida car show and swap meet known as the Turkey Run. The legendary Turkey Run is celebrating its 33rd anniversary and is well known by most enthusiasts, and Finzer has been involved since its inception.

Finzer is a longtimer, because even before that he and his favorite truck this 1945 Chevy were together. He took the truck in trade after rebuilding a friend’s ’57 Pontiac. That was back in 1972. The Chevy was a former military vehicle. In fact, it was never titled until the late ’60s. When Rick bought it, the vintage workhorse was still decked out in military trim, complete with olive drab paint. Although he liked almost everything about it, Finzer just couldn’t warm to the color. He decided to sell the truck but realized that potential new owners would probably feel the same way, so with the help of some friends he applied a quick paint job to ready the Chevy for the civilian world.

As Finzer drove the now apple green truck with shiny black fenders to the car corral of a local show in Daytona, he realized that he was starting to feel different about it. He stowed the For Sale sign underneath the seat, and instead of selling the truck he displayed it at the show. From that moment on, the truck was a member of the family.

As the years rolled by, a lot of changes occurred. There were no highly paid teams of experts or sponsors to help with the upgrades on Finzer’s Chevy. Rather, all of the changes were made one by one, as the need arose. Typically, these changes occurred in the driveway, and over the weekend, since the truck had to be ready for work by Monday morning. Throughout the years, a collection of friends would lend a hand, improving the truck with each new adventure.

One of the biggest of those adventures was the new powertrain. The engine, transmission, driveshaft and rearend came from a wrecked ’69 Camaro. A Corvair frontend was a popular solution back then, but after breaking two sets of ball joints, Finzer solved the problem with a Trans-Am front clip, complete with disc brakes and power steering. He drove the truck that way for several years. Currently, the truck is on its third engine, a 350 Chevy with an Edelbrock 600 carburetor, HEI ignition, factory exhaust and a ’55 Chevy radiator. The best thing to do is to make them as simple as possible, Finzer told us. If it breaks down, it’s easy to get parts.

As much fun as the truck has been, there were a few times in its history when it sat idle for a couple of years. The last time Finzer took it out of storage, he realized it was in bad need of both mechanical and cosmetic upgrades. After renewing the brakes and tuning the engine, he decided to truly make the truck his own. At 6 feet, 4 inches tall, Finzer decided that he really needed some additional legroom. A lot of options were considered, including installing a bed-mounted Oldsmobile Toronado powerplant and moving the firewall forward, although that one was a bit of an extreme solution. Almost as extreme was the final solution of cutting the truck entirely in half, right through the middle of the cab, and extending the doors, roof, floor and frame rails. A second pair of doors simplified lengthening the originals, but lots of innovation was required to find the compound curves necessary for the roof. Armed with a template in a salvage yard, Finzer discovered that the roof of a ’55 Pontiac worked perfectly. The original running boards were replaced with flat sheetmetal and extended to fill the gap. The hardest part was cutting the frame in half, but with the help of heavy steel sleeves prepared by a local welding shop, Finzer was able to join both halves together with a heavy-duty, overlapping joint. A new driveshaft finished the process.

Interestingly, Finzer never considered making the truck into an extended cab or some other variant, adding only what he needed to make the truck comfortable and retaining most of the original profile. Even after a close inspection, few will ever spot the 6-inch extension.

The last of the cosmetic upgrades was paint, and Finzer jokes that this is the third, and hopefully the final, paint job. This color combination does more for the truck than any other combination I’ve tried, said Finzer. The truck was expertly sprayed PPG silver and blue by Terry and Brian Schaack in Holly Hill, Florida.

The truck has traveled an unknown number of miles in the last 30-plus years, attending shows around the country. Finzer estimates that he puts about 1,000 miles on the truck every year. How does he feel about his favorite automotive member of the family? I wouldn’t enjoy this truck nearly as much if I couldn’t do all the work myself. When we started this in the late 70’s, there weren’t a lot of street rod shops, so you did it the old-fashioned way you went to the junkyard, found your parts and made them work. We have the feeling that Finzer will be making parts work on this truck for another couple of decades.