While looking into chassis and suspension upgrades for our ’49 Chevy 3100 Advance Design pickup, we came across Robert Hertz from ADEngineering. There are several options out there for these trucks, from brand-new chassis to weld-in Mustang-II-style front cross members, and some people have even cut the front frame off and clipped them with Camaro or other Chevy-car-style front suspensions. Robert actually approached us to inform us of a chassis swap kit he produces for the 1947-55 first series pickups and Suburbans. We were definitely intrigued and started talking about using the kit for project Cindy.
After exchanging a few emails with Robert, we were sold on the chassis swap kit. The complete kit comes with everything we would need to swap the chassis, engine, transmission and steering. AD-Engineering has spent a lot of time perfecting the kit, both on the computer-generated plans as well as on vehicles. We selected the options we would need for our project and the parts were soon headed our way.
The kit from ADEngineering is designed to work with a standard cab long bed S-10 chassis. The 1982-93 model years are a bit easier to perform the swap with, but the 1994- 2005 will work just fine as well. The difference between the two model years is that the earlier versions are not boxed in as far back, making it easier to get to the new bolt locations. If we were to get a hold of a second-generation model we would have to drill access holes, but it’s still very doable. Luckily for us, we were able to track down a retired airport service truck. The truck had seen a lot of use, but it was never involved in an accident because it was always used inside the airport. This, combined with a visual inspection, assured us we would have a straight chassis with which to work.
SOURCES
LMC Truck
800.562.8782
LMCTruck.com
AD-Engineering
Ad-engineering.com