1950 GMC COE - The DinerLiner

[macksimus]

I originally wrote this build thread on the HAMB forum but have since found this place and I figure I'll be asking plenty of questions of you guys, so I'll duplicate my thread here.


I'd never even heard the term COE until about 4 or 5 years ago. To be fair, pretty much ALL of our medium to large trucks here in the UK are cabovers.
Then I saw this article

about this truck:


and after that I was smitten.

I started collecting pictures of COE trucks from the web and had a pipe-dream of one day owning one.

My girlfriend and I have a small part-time catering business that we're looking to expand, mainly selling food at music festivals over the summer in the UK. It can easily take us a day to get our kitchen/marquee set up and ready, so when this converted fire truck rocked up next to us one year



and was selling food within 45 minutes, I was envious enough to start looking into food trucks.

Fast forward a couple of years to Oct '11 and my girlfriend and I are working in Florida. I start looking at my wish list of american cars and searching for something I can buy over here and ship home to the UK. I started looking at cabovers again and a plan was hatched to look for something we could convert into a food truck.

Well there wasn't much that was suitable in stock form, I was already leaning towards a 47-54 GMC/Chevy. I was also considering importing an Airstream trailer and converting that into a kitchen. Hang on - what would the bastard offspring of a COE and airstream look like..?
That thought kept me awake all night as I scoured the internets to see if someone had done anything similar. In about 6 hours I only found these two:

and


I thought both looked awesome and so when my gf eventually woke up I started the pitch. Luckily, it took all of 30 seconds for her to get on board (she's a keeper!). She's since confessed that she thought it'd never get off the ground - ha! that'll teach her...

So I then started looking for a builder who could make this project a reality. I had a couple of places in mind whose work I really admired (my background is in aircooled VWs), so I emailed one of them - Wayne at the Intergalactic Custom Shop in the UK.
I'd been a fan of Wayne's work for years after seeing his V8 bug - The Phunky Phantom:



And later, his insane 1700bhp 7 sec 1/4 mile splitscreen dragster, Mental Breakdown:



I was stoked when Wayne emailed back to say he'd love to build it!

Originally I'd thought about using a Isuzu NPR chassis and engine, but Wayne had a mate who just happened to be selling Wayne's old '82 Chevy G30 based RV. It used to be Wayne's tow vehicle when he went drag racing, so he was confident the 350 chevy v8 and turbo 400 box would be ample for our needs. Plus it was already converted to run on LPG (pretty much essential given UK 'gas' prices).



So the search was on for a cab. After months of looking, emailing potential leads and more looking, I eventually found this 1950 GMC which seemed to fit the trifecta of condition, price and location:



and contacted the seller Steve at desertclassics.com, who was really helpful in separating the cab from the chassis and sorting out transport to the port in LA.

Almost 18 months to the day after that sleepless night, the cab arrived at Intergalactic:



(this photo always reminds me of the bit in King Kong, where our captured hero gets put aboard the boat bound for New York)

If you got this far, thanks for reading. Comments and feedback always welcome!

Take it easy
Mack

[macksimus]

So with both the donor vehicles at Intergalactic, Wayne let rip with his plasma cutter and reduced the RV to this:



then this:



and fabbing up some brackets to see how things would fit, he got the cab offered up into place to make this:



The bonnet was catching on the brake servo, the steering wheel hit the inside of the door and the front fenders a very close, but it gave us a good idea of how it'll sit, and I was stoked!
(eagle eyed readers will notice that it's a sunny day in England in this photo - that's not photoshop, we actually had some clear skies last year!)

Eventually we'll be using a different column and hopefully using the original GMC wheel rather than the plastic fantastic chevy thing. A couple of UJs should put the steering wheel in a more sensible spot, so I don't have to drive with the door open

[macksimus]

With most of the RV cut away, there was still the wooden floor, waste tanks and LPG (cooking) tank to jettison. They ended up on the scrap pile, as we'll be needing bigger tanks than the RV had, and the floor had seen better days.

Here's another shot of the truck minus the wooden floor and all the other gubbins; you can see the LPG tank slung under the side.

[macksimus]

With most of the RV cut away, there was still the wooden floor, waste tanks and LPG (cooking) tank to jettison. They ended up on the scrap pile, as we'll be needing bigger tanks than the RV had, and the floor had seen better days.

Here's another shot of the truck minus the wooden floor and all the other gubbins; you can see the LPG tank slung under the side.

[macksimus]

With the blasted cab reunited with the chassis the new firewall could be fabricated:


You can see how big and how offset the lump is in the cab. Not a huge amount of legroom for the passenger but you have to make some sacrifices in the name of looking cool

The bonnet (hood) still wouldn't close fully as the master cylinder was touching it, so that was recessed into the firewall and hey presto - closure.

[ghettoluxury]

Very cool project!

[MARTINSR]

Hot damn that thing is cool!

Brian

[macksimus]

Not sure if I'm being daft but I can't find an edit button to delete that double post...

[MARTINSR]

Usually after a certain period of time (30 minutes or so) that option is taken away from you.

Brian

[xpickup]

macksimus, very cool. I built (started) a 1948 ford COE for a buddy a few years ago. If you have problems with the steering column placement with the steering box those clear steer boxes are great. I am using one on the 1947 box truck I am working on now. Looks like a great project.


Shannon

[youngrodder]

I like the looks of this...Following along.

Good luck
Marc

[Red Foreman]

I'm in on this!

[Bishops Trucks]

Welcome to the site. This should be a fun build.

[macksimus]

Thanks folks. I think Wayne has sorted the steering with a couple of UJs. I'll get some pics so you can see the set up.
More on the story this eve...

[Kim57]

Looks like another great COE build.
Kim

[_Ogre]

very cool build. welcome to the forum.
looks like you found an able builder too.
saw this pic in the unique thread and come and see...

[Bomp]

I saw the pic above on that thread and now you have another follower.

[macksimus]

just found out i have a job for 3 months in Thailand - leaving tomorrow! So I've been a bit rushed to update the thread but we'll get to that pic shortly...

[macksimus]

With the RV floor out of the way, Wayne started to fab up the framework for the catering pod. He has a chassis table so everything is nice and square:




Testing the frame floor on the truck:



Wayne got the bit between his teeth then and the next thing I knew, he'd fabbed up most of the frame:


All the curved sections were hand rolled using this tool:
http://www.stakesys.co.uk/product/sta163_tube_roller/
He's got arms like popeye now...




Originally I felt that the pod should be a separate entity like the green F6 above (albeit with a walkthrough from the cab area), but Wayne thought it would flow better with the roof starting to rise from the top of the windscreen.

Having seen the pod on the back of the truck, and the height difference in the roof lines, my gf Anna and I both agreed that Wayne had the right idea from the start.

[OrrieG]

What a great idea, following for sure...

[Russell Ashley]

Looks like your fab guy has some skills. I'm in.

[whiskymaker]

Wayne is a legend....and yup im another that is/was into vee dubs

Ive no doubting Wayne will pull this off after seeing and hearing about Mental Breakdown (some of my mates know Wayne)


Looks like its gonna be a cool truck..

out of interest how are you gonna register this on the road?...PM me if you prefer......reason im asking(apart from the rules we have in the UK) is im maybe looking at a COE in the future....

good luck with the project

Mario

[macksimus]

Thanks for the kind comments guys - yep Wayne definitely has skills!

Mario - no need for reregistration, it's just a rebodied '82 chevy motorhome

[Trekster]

Cool build, I'm in.

[Dan in Pasadena]

[URL="http://www.customclassictrucks.com/featuredvehicles/0601cct_1940_chevy_coe/"[/URL]

I have been IN LOVE with this truck since it was featured in Custom Classic Trucks. I especially lovea the color and really wish knew what the name of it was. I had decided I would paint my '46 half ton this color when I had it. I'm not so sure it'd look right on my '55.2 but man, I just love this color.

What color scheme have you decided on? Apologies if you've mentioned it already and I missed it.