My 1955 Chevy 3100 build

[RockinKees]

Truck is coming along great!
Sidewalk is a great upgrade to the garage ( sounds like I'm a bit jealous....)

[bowt1ed]

Looking good Dave. Hey, where did you get your column drop? I like the way is blends in with the column and dash. Jim

[Dads Burb]

Just spent the last hour going thru your build. Flat out incredible!! Really like what you did with the doors. I also removed my parking lights. Your fabrication skills are way above mine. Keep up the good work.

[55 Chevy Dave]

Originally Posted by murd969

Your build is looking great.

Originally Posted by Advanced Design

Wow, really nice work on the concrete! It would be nice to be able to heat and melt the snow / ice.
Looking forward to the truck updates!

Originally Posted by oldman3

Nice job on the concrete, and yard...Jim

Originally Posted by RockinKees

Truck is coming along great!
Sidewalk is a great upgrade to the garage ( sounds like I'm a bit jealous....)

Originally Posted by Dads Burb

Just spent the last hour going thru your build. Flat out incredible!! Really like what you did with the doors. I also removed my parking lights. Your fabrication skills are way above mine. Keep up the good work.

Thank you for your compliments on the build and on my concrete!

[55 Chevy Dave]

Originally Posted by bowt1ed

Looking good Dave. Hey, where did you get your column drop? I like the way is blends in with the column and dash. Jim

Jim,
I bought the column drop from Summit Racing at www.summitracing.com. They are a great seller, ship lightening quick and have never let me down. Part #BRG-911202.

[55 Chevy Dave]

I repeated the door modification on the passenger side door. This time, I am showing a few more pics of the process.

When I cut the sheet metal corner of the door off, I lost the sheet metal where the door skin wrapped over the sheet metal in the back. To correct this, I added a strip of 18-gauge sheet metal on the back side of the door. I punched some holes in the center of the strip and plug welded them. I didn't weld the edge of this strip to the back side of the door. I think this gives the back side of the door more of a "from-the-factory" appearance.

I then welded the edge. The extra layer of sheet metal in the rear added to the overall thickness of the door.

[55 Chevy Dave]

As with the driver's side, I then welded a strip of metal to form the new back of the cowl where the cowl meets the door. After spraying the inside with weld-thru primer to avoid future rust inside the cavity, I cut and welded a piece of 18-gauge sheet metal over the new "cowl extension". I grinded everything down smooth.

I think it ended up looking just as good as the driver's side!

[55 Chevy Dave]

I enlisted the help of a local speed shop to weld some of the joints of my polished stainless steel exhaust.

Their TIG welds came out much nicer than my MIG welds would have come out.

The shop belongs to a friend of a friend. I dropped it off and they had it done in two days.

I connected the mufflers and side-exhaust extensions back onto the x-pipe with stainless steel band clamps and reinstalled the whole assembly back under the truck.

[55 Chevy Dave]

My radiator came from US Radiator designed to sit between plates mounted to the top and bottom of the radiator core support with the expensive, fragile aluminum radiator and electric dual fans sandwiched in between the two plates. I prefer more secure nut-and bolt fasteners, so I had the same local speed shop TIG-weld aluminum angles to my aluminum radiator so that I could bolt through them into the radiator core support.

[55 Chevy Dave]

When I made the aluminum angles for the radiator, I also made matching steel mounting plates with receiving nuts welded into each of the plates that I could later weld to the radiator core support.

[55 Chevy Dave]

I then welded the mounting plates to my radiator core support. I plug-welded the plates from the front side and only welded the inside and bottom of each of the plates on the engine bay side.

I then bolted the radiator into it's new home.

There are no bolts or nuts exposed through the grill on the front side of the core support and the welds are all hidden behind the radiator on the back side of the core support. Best of all, I know the radiator isn't moving from it's new home.

[Advanced Design]

Nice work! Really like the radiator mount fabrication. Good ideas.

[oldman3]

Nice work...Jim

[RockinKees]

Nice work!!

[Kim57]

Real nice fab work.
Kim

[bowt1ed]

Originally Posted by 55 Chevy Dave

Jim,
I bought the column drop from Summit Racing at www.summitracing.com. They are a great seller, ship lightening quick and have never let me down. Part #BRG-911202.

Thanks!

[1955chevy]

Originally Posted by 55 Chevy Dave

UPS delivered my new LED headlights from my recent EBay purchase and I, of course, had to install them right away complete with my new LMC headlight bezels (even though I am nowhere near ready for them). I can wire them so the white halo rings around each headlight turn amber and blink when I hit the turn signal lever. That should solve the problem I created when I smoothed out the factory front turn signal lights.

The headlights are made for a Jeep, but seem to fit just fine by deleting the rear headlight mounts and connecting them directly to the factory buckets. I don't think this will be a problem since the back of the headlights are cast aluminum.

What's the brand and part number for these? Do you have a link to the eBay seller you purchased them from?

[Pooseys]

Originally Posted by 55 Chevy Dave

The truck's original 235 cubic inch inline six cylinder was running at the time. There was no wood in the bed which made it easy to see how clean the frame was. The interior had been redone at some point.

Hi I see you took photos of motor, I dont spose you got any close ups of either side ? The reason I ask is I had someone take the 235 out of my dads 1957 chev due to blown piston and rings so we decided to give the motor a full rebuild, now I have no one clued up enough to put the motor back in and attach all thats required. My dad died, which is why I now have it. Or are you able to advise me on which wires go to where ? Thanks in advance

[lv2tri2]

Originally Posted by 55 Chevy Dave

I then welded the mounting plates to my radiator core support. I plug-welded the plates from the front side and only welded the inside and bottom of each of the plates on the engine bay side.

I then bolted the radiator into it's new home.

There are no bolts or nuts exposed through the grill on the front side of the core support and the welds are all hidden behind the radiator on the back side of the core support. Best of all, I know the radiator isn't moving from it's new home.

Very nice work and well shared, thanks. Your project is a lot of help for me.

[55 Chevy Dave]

Originally Posted by 1955chevy

What's the brand and part number for these? Do you have a link to the eBay seller you purchased them from?

Here's all the information I could find on the headlights I purchased:

BRAND:
Sunpie

ITEM DESCRIPTION:
2X Chrome 7" Round LED Headlight with White Amber Halo 1997~2015 Jeep Wrangler

EBAY SELLER:
auto-sports (all lower case letters)

Keep in mind, I haven't wired these up yet and cannot confirm if they work properly. That's probably not too smart on my part!

[55 Chevy Dave]

Originally Posted by Pooseys

Hi I see you took photos of motor, I dont spose you got any close ups of either side ? The reason I ask is I had someone take the 235 out of my dads 1957 chev due to blown piston and rings so we decided to give the motor a full rebuild, now I have no one clued up enough to put the motor back in and attach all thats required. My dad died, which is why I now have it. Or are you able to advise me on which wires go to where ? Thanks in advance

The wiring on the truck was a mess when I got it. I knew that I was going to replace everything (including the engine) so when I removed the engine, I promptly ripped out all of the wiring and threw it away. I never kept any record of where anything went. The best picture I have of the engine wiring can be found on my second post of this thread.

They do sell reprints of the original wiring diagram for the truck. That may be your best bet.

Sorry I couldn't be more help! Best of luck to you on your project.

[ChuckDriver]

Very cool!

[55 Chevy Dave]

Now that the holidays are over, it's definitely time to get back to work on the project.

After hunting high and low on the internet and looking through all of my catalogs, I was not able to find pedal plates for my truck, so I decided to make some.

I bought some Lokar billet aluminum pedal pads from Summit Racing. I made the pedal plates to fit inside these pedal pads. It wasn't too difficult as they only have a slight bend to them. I drilled the mounting holes and then made mounting brackets and welded them to the back side of the plates.

The pedal pads now screw to the plates.

I still need to take the die grinder to those ugly welds!

[55 Chevy Dave]

I drilled mounting holes in the clutch and brake pedal arms and mounted the two pedal pad assemblies.

I was concerned that the pedals were going to be too close together, so I purposely offset the mounting brackets on the clutch pedal as far off center as I could without blocking any of the mounting holes. The brake pedal needs to be centered under the steering column, so I can't do anything with it. I am also concerned about how much room is leftover for the throttle pedal already.

The clutch and brake pedals still aren't far apart enough for my taste. I plan to relocate the mounting brackets on the clutch pedal as far to the side and block one of the 4 mounting holes. The pedal pad instructions indicate that you don't need to use all 4 bolts anyway.

[55 Chevy Dave]

I want the front bumper much higher and tighter to the body than how it originally came from the factory.

I positioned the bumper in its new location and welded some scraps from the bumper to the body. I also added another temporary steel strap from the bottom of the bumper to the frame.

I then took measurements from the mounting bolts of the bumper to the mounting bolts of the frame and fabricated new mounts from some scrap pieces of angle and plate welded together. I think they look better than the original bumper mounts!

You can never have too much scrap metal laying around and it seems like no piece of scrap is too small to save!