Projects 1948 Chevy Gasser Pickup

Better?

 

Much better. Gassers don't run hub caps.

 

Or licence plates, or automatics or propane, or mirrors, or bench seats. The list is long. My fronts that match the rears are currently at the shop getting redrilled. Rome wasn’t built in a day.

 

I still like your truck, if you were closer I would like to see it up close.

 

Back in the 50's and Early 60's any street car that had an engine swap for an engine that wasn't originally sold in that model or year of vehicle ran in GAS class. My step father had a 52 Ford hardtop that had a 56 Thunderbird 312 in it and by weight and cubic inches it ran in C gas. It held the C Gas record at the Ellensberg Wa drag strip at that time. Slow for a gas car at 14 and something seconds but fast in 1958 and he won a lot of street races with it. That's what a gas class car originally was. Stock body and swapped engine. Then they became the high rise Willys and other rigs that we view as gassers today.
You drove out to the drags, emptied the trunk and popped the hubcaps off and went racing. When the days was done you put the caps back or maybe left them in the trunk so the guys at the burger joint in town knew that you had raced that Sunday.
Still if you are going to make it look like a race car/truck it has to look like a race car as we have been saying. No visor, no extra fru fru that doesn't go with the go fast look. Leave that stuff for guys who think Lowrider magazine is a car magazine rather than the lifestyle magazine it is.

 

My friend, a few do's and don't for you.
If you want a 60's style gasser, DO study pictures of real 60's gassers.
DON'T think all gassers were sky high on a straight axle.
DON'T listen to your young friends down at the Tastee Freeze about gassers, unless they've studied pictures of 60's race cars.
DON'T fall for modern products that are pitched as Gasser parts, like those bogus bolt on 10 spoke spindle mount wheels.
DO enjoy the HAMB. There's a lot to learn here.
DON'T mind us grumpy old farts.
DO read:
http://georgeklass.net/gassers.html

 

My friend built this one that came out pretty decent - '49 GMC, high comp solid lifter Isky 550 Super Le Gerra 327 w/ Edelbrock hi-rise cross ram, dual Holley 600's, fenderwell exit headers, Super Brute T10 4 speed, 12 bolt posi rear, stock drilled axle on blocks (I think, I don't remember exactly)......functional hood scoop, functional EELCO tank, etc... It was built to a late '60s theme, so a little outside the HAMB specs, but VERY nice. Sounds pretty mean in person.

 

MR48CHEV you mentioned driving to the track. My Dad was a drag racer through the 70s and that’s exactly what he did. There was a pretty big group from Estherville IA that would run at Humbolt IA. One or two would trailer and the rest would drive that way if someone broke, they had a trailer. He, my mom and infant me, drove the 90 mile with the slicks in the trunk of his ‘66 442. He’d bolt the slicks on uncork the headers, race, then button it all up and head home. I just wish I was old enough to remember those days.

 

Nice looking Jimmy , but needs to be 2-3 inches lower in front. It looks cartoon-ish as is.

 

I still say take off the running boards too. Look how many Willys gasser trucks still run boards...hardly any.

 

Where in SE Nebraska ya at? I’m in SE Nebraska too.


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I don't disagree with you about the boards. I didn't want to put them on in the first place but they do quite a bit for stabilizing the fenders on the street since I cut all of the inners out. I'll probably take them off the first time I go to the track. They are also a pain in the shins to get in and out over.

 

Fairbury

 

Kool. I’m up in Lincoln


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Except for a few Willys and Austin's. Pickup Trucks towed Gassers to the Drag Strips.

 

Station wagons and Rancheros were typically towing them instead of being them as well, but you see quite a few now even within the SEGA.