Sierra Stepside Pickup1989
Sierra Stepside Pickup
This is the "Bad Dawg", my daily driver. (You didn't think I drove that 1987 Olds 442 back and forth to work, did you? ;-) I ordered this truck in April of 1989 as a college graduation gift to myself. I took delivery on May 5th, 1989. It was built in Fort Wayne, Indiana.
I've been a Mississippi State Bulldog fan since I was old enough to walk, and their school colors are Maroon and White. I proceeded to customize it a little after I took delivery. The wheels and tires, the bed cover, tailgate art, exhaust system, plus the custom seat and stereo are all I did to it. It's been the most reliable daily driver I've ever owned, and I'll never part with it. It only had 87,240 miles on it as of October 8, 2014. I was able to put an antique license plate on it in May of 2014 since it was 25 years old.
I purchased the seat from a business named Venturi Coach Works in Dallas, TX in May of ’89. I don’t know if they’re still in business or not - if so, they may have changed names. They used factory-style material on their truck seats, and it matched perfectly. I had both bucket seats re-covered by the same shop that customized the trunk in my ’87 442 a few years ago. I also got the wood console refinished by a local furniture restorer.
The new bed cover was installed on August 19, 2008. It's an Extang Tuff Tonno III designed for 1989 - 1998 Chevy/GMC Stepside models. It has three factory metal bows to keep it from filling up with rain.
The engine is the 5.7L V8, ordering code “L05”. According to the factory literature, it’s rated at 210 Net horsepower at 4,000 RPM. After driving that ’82 Cutlass for seven years with the 231 Buick V6 in it, I wanted a 350. ;-)
The wheels measure 15” x 8½” and they currently have a set of 275/70/R15 Cooper Cobra Radial GT’s on them.
I built the custom console to mount my CD player and EQ in, to keep from having to modify the dashboard. The “Kenwood” emblem on the front carpet came from an old speaker grille.
I still have a stock radio in the instrument panel, but it only has power going to it to run the digital clock - no speakers are connected to it. When I ordered the truck, part of the Sierra SLE option package was the factory cassette deck with the built-in EQ. (The cassette deck was factory-mounted in the middle of the dash, slightly to the right in the above photo, under the center A/C vents.) I took the factory deck out, and later, I met a gentleman with a 1988 Chevy Silverado with the same gray interior as mine who had the AM/FM radio in his truck, and wanted the factory cassette deck I had. He knew a guy that worked at a Chevy dealership that could do the installation. The technician explained to the buyer that he’d need to get my factory AM/FM radio in order for the swap to be made, since mine had the proper connections for the cassette deck. (The components in ’88 were black; in ’89 they were gray. This explains why I have a black-faced radio above the gray-faced climate control panel.) The technician removed my gray-faced radio and installed it into the buyer’s truck, and I got his black-faced radio installed in mine. He had the factory “pocket” piece in the hole in his dash where the cassette deck was located in mine, so he gave me the matching dash piece to go in my truck, and he got my stereo-surround panel. It was a lucky break for a perfect match.
The Good Stuff:
350 cid V8 with Electronic Fuel Injection
4-speed Automatic Transmission with Overdrive
3.08 Rear End (Open)
Custom Seat, Stereo, and Exhaust (Single Cat to Dual Outlet)
E-mail me at
