1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Hey guys, been doing a project I have picked up this last summer, came to a halt while I was in school, summer is back and back at it. First thing i did was cut the frame, shorted it like 53chopbox did. My truck had a lot more rust on it than his did so i took it a bit different direction. Tell me what you think. First attempt on going this far on a rebuild.





http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=323615

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Here is more of the work I have done.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Over the last month I put a new 235 in. Old one was frozen.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Then I redid all the breaks shoes, break lines, drums wheel cylinders, and repacked the bearings. Then in the last week i started to shorten the box down to size.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Where I am at now is finishing the box and making it completely a box, looking to find out if anyone knows a good place to find where the holes are to be drilled for the fenders on a short box, I have a rough drawing I took from a 70's short box side step but if anyone could find a place that would be sweet. Fixed the side columns on the side of the box as well where it was rusted out on the back, will get pictures of that soon. Hope you enjoy my build so far. Stay tuned the front fenders were welded to the cab! haha

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

looking good buddy! you will have to check out my build thread on here, havnt updated it in a while though.

BTW, nice looking cherry picker!

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Cool project & looks good. I just hope you did more welding & plating on that frame because it doesn't look structurally sound in that one pic at least. Always get a Certified welder to do frame work because if you ever need an safety inspection done it can fail if not done right. Good progress tho so keep moving forward ��

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Here is a bit more sorry for the delay, got a few more things done, bought a plate for the frame and boxed it in. did some Dent poping and a few more things.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Heres a bit more

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

This is some before and after pictures.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Here is what was done this weekend, Painted Box, Fenders and bolted on with temp wood just to be able to drive it around, Have Chrome strips but going to redo at a later time.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Looking good.
Kim

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Well heres an update, did a bit more this last weekend. First time using a paint gun, I don't think it turned out to badly for a temporary paint job to have some fun with. Back to the 50's here we come!

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Looks like it turned out pretty good.
Kim

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Thanks Kim, still got a lot more to do haha, but i gotta have some fun first!

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Here comes the spring. Getting ready to bolt on a new front axle from a crown vic. We will see how this goes.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

definitely document the crown vic ifs install, many of us will watch :D

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Will do, I will take a lot of pictures. Planning on starting next weekend. Wish me luck haha!

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Hey billrobbojo,
Are you interested in getting rid of that fender mounted spare hardware? If so, let me know - I'll send a PM.

Thanks, Jim

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

fyi... the long box fender and short box fender has a different shape for the spare tire
they are not interchangeable, if you cut the box down, the long bed fender will no longer work

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Over the last couple days I have been cutting and pound to get the front axle off. Here is what got done cut my steering shaft to re use. Cut out the cross member and removed the axle.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

me personally I would put a braces on the frame up front and in the area of the axle centerline to keep the frame from spreading when the front cross member is removed.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

I thought about it but if you measure the distance which is 34 inches across, as the new axle will rest between, there are little center nipples that hold it center, So i measured where the axle sat on the frame which was 27 inches from the front of the frame, Which is also center with one of the rivets from cross member and because of the nipples on the axle to line it up. As the axle rests under the frame it causes the frame to 34 inches across the front.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

I agree just by experience brace across the frame before you remove the crossmember !! I had one pull in on me on side almost an inch had to rent a porter power to get it back into alignment.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Great work! Very interested in how this turns out. I have a Camaro sub frame sitting in my back yard, to do my 58 Fleetside. I really don't want to cut the frame to add IFS. I know everyone says the track width on the Crown Vic front ends are wider which is why some guys don't use them, but you can make that up with wheel offset.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Ya I will post some pictures tomorrow for ya, the track width is only like 2 inches wider across so its like 1 inch difference on either wheel. I'm not building a 100k truck, something that will look and have fun with. for the most part I will be the only one who knows it going down the road.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Ah Rude dude, next time I will do it, never can be to careful i guess haha.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Nice looking truck keep it up I'm interested on the crown vic IFS too I already having a 74 nova sub in but it's always interesting to see what other people do plus I couldn't help but notice your just a ways down the road not to often that happens on here being from the "nearly great white north"

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Well its coming along, here is kinda what I did next, I decided to try to save as much of the frame as I could to give it the most support when it lays ontop of the CV front axle, by the way i'm already a lot farther than what i'm posting. Just makes it easier to say well its done cant change it now than trying to change to everyones liking, haha. Let me know what ya think though.Its spring break and gotta get it done in a week, Steering, full axle, breaks. The part I'm stuck at right now is does anyone know a good way to put a pulley from the CV and convert it to V drive belt, I was looking at pulley's but I don't think any V pulley will work because most will be unbalanced, so I might try to spin it on a lathe to make the V grove, just pulled the part to day so we will see what I can think of tomorrow. These pictures are after I heated the frame with a torch to bring the frame up from where it dropped into the cross member from before.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

I also flattened the curve for the steering box on that last post.
In these pictures I took a 1/2 by 3 inch thickest tubing I could get. I drilled holes in the bottom as close to the size of the round tubing I got to run the bolts through which the inside was the size of the bolt, be careful to make sure if its a seemed welded tube you can still get the bolt through. I also then went forward to drill a hole the size of the bolt on the top. I found it really hard to get it all to line up because the tolerances. If I were to do it again I would just drill larger holes, but with larger holes there is more to weld and I would believe less strength. So I thought having the pipe run all the way from the frame to the top would give the most support though the frame to prevent it from collapsing. I think the tubing was 1 1/8 inch on the outside or so, and I think the bolts are a 5/8, or maybe 3/4 I forget. But once I lined it all up I tacked it and checked to make sure the bolt would drop all the way though with the axle on.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

From these pictures you can see the frame gets smaller as you go towards the front, It goes from like 5 1/2 inches to about 4 and 1/2. I welded a lot to try to prevent if anything were to break it wouldn't slip so from the bottom of the frame to the top bar the tube cannot go though cause the holes are to small. I then continued by adjusting it to fit the bolts in the last picture you can see the top tube is not quite straight but the wholes are straight in the frame. Today I fixed this problem by grinding it down and putting plates on both sides of the frame, inside and out.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

That bottom picture is wet paint, which looks like a second hole. My bad

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Looks like that should work pretty good.
Kim

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Been awhile, here an update of what I did last week. This is what the outer tube of the steering column is going to fit into with a bearing at the end to keep the steering column centered. I used a 3/4 inch bearing from Northern tool which is a trailer axle bearing it fits the steering shaft perfectly. Then I also cut the back mounting brackets for the support arms that hang under the frame, I just cut them to the shapes that fit the plates that came from the crown vic and welded them in after I bolted and measured where they naturally sit.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Why do you have plates on the bottom now too? In the other pics you had the box on top and the IFS was flush with the bottom of the frame.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

I did this because as you can see in these pictures, On the top as the axle sits under the frame, the frame gets closer together making gap bigger between the top of the frame and the axle bolts farther apart. So I needed to fill the gap on the top or I suppose you could choose to do the bottom if you wanted the car to ride higher. On the crown vic the gap of the frame is 6.5 inches and the 57 frame rails where the axle needed to placed to match the old placement of the axle is about 5.25 inches in the back and about 5 inches in the front. The pipes I welded into the frame are all the same size to fill the gap from the bottom of the frame to top of the rectangle plate i welded on top to make the frame the required 6.5 inches, this includes the width of the frame with the steel on the top. When holding the truck up from the crown vic axle to make sure the frame is flat on the top of the new axle I had to extend rear of the frame downward to meet the support arms, or what ever you wanna call them, because if you look at the crown vic the frame it bends upwards over the axle. The bottom of the axle isn't the same height of the arms that go back when laying it flat on your square frame you can see this in the 3rd picture on someone else doing it too. If I had the truck with me I would take you more pictures. Let me know if you got any more questions. I will try to explain them.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

I see now. Didn't realize the bottom control arm extended backwards like that & required a second frame mount. Makes sense in those pics you just posted.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Once I had it all welded how I wanted it, I continued to plate the frame up just to make everything look a lot nicer and reinforce it.

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

Looks very stout.
Kim

Re: 1957 chevy longbox to shortbox
 

When I started to work on my steering column, I had to extend the steering shaft by about 2 inches to make it long enough to reach the old crown vic steering linkage. I welded the old ford steering linkage arm and made it fit my DD 3/4 joint. Both sides are DD 3/4 fittings it costed me about 40 bucks for a Stainless steel one.