my 59 apache fleetside shorty build thread.

so last year i saw a 70% done fleetside apache project on here that made me want to add it to my collection of projects but for some reason or another i couldn't put the cash together in time (actually the day i came up with enough money it sold to someone else). so i set out to find one and do it myself . i was between places to live and moving in with my girlfriend and without a garage so a buddy of mine stepped up and said he would help me out and we could do it at his place ,which was great because he is a killer fabricator and has done several frame off restos etc etc. . my goal was to lower the truck using the straight axle and as many stock components as possible , leave the weathered paint ,maybe do some rims and tires and drive the hell out of it .

yeah right !!!

i bought it here on the hamb and it was described as a nice daily driven truck with original 283 and 3spd column shift , with surface rust and NO rot at all besides a small hole in passenger floor the size of a nickel .here is a pic from the original add.



when it showed i was immediately aware that i had spent too much on the truck and had a lot of work ahead of me . i should have just sold it and moved on , but it is a big window short box fleetside 59 and that is exactly what i was after so here we go . i get a hold of my buddy and tell him i'm on my way over , no plates ins. reg. etc.etc. i make the 6 mile drive on back roads to his place and the truck runs pretty good , a little sluggish and a bit noisy but not too bad . as i aproach his house the mech.fuel pump quits working , and i coast up his drive way . we swap the pump and pull it in the garage . when i go to turn it around to back it in i hear a couple clunks and it wont move at all in any gear ,we push it in and start tearing into it to do some of the things it was brought there for and keep finding more and more that can't be left alone . this truck went from a beater that i was just gonna lower and drive around town as is to a full frame off within a week of owning it and believe me that was not in the budget! here are some pics as we got going on it .







since i knew all along it was going to get lowered we went ahead and started the c notch in the rear , we planned on flipping the axle and maybe using lowering blocks if needed ,and i wanted to retain as near to full spring pack as possible cause i want to be able to load a bike in the back and hook a little camper or hook the car trailer with the T coupe drag car on it(once it is done) and head out to events or drags etc. etc. here is a couple pics of the notch work






you can see in these pics that we relocated the shock mounts from the crossmember that was going to be removed to the frame rails





so now out front......i wanted to keep a straight axle in this thing ,even though a clip would have been more user friendly and probably easier to do by the time we went through what we did to get it low.
i called sids to get a 4"dropped axle and he was backed up with work and couldn't get it to me right away so i ended up buying a 3" outta one of the several 55 to 59 chevy truck parts catalogs that have become my life . i want this truck low remember so it was in the plans all along to not only run a dropped axle but to flip it as well which was going to be a bit of a challenge . here are a few pics of the front end ordeal , we ended up notching the front frame rails a bit as well .



so because of the flip we obviously had to remove and flip the spring mounts.



it turns out we needed a little more room from the frame up front too



also ended up replacing the prior owners cobbled up threaded rod and fender washer motor mounts ( apparently this was not an original V8 truck) with the v8 conversion crossmembers for motor and tranny and while i was at it the tired 283 that was in there was replaced with a nice low miler out of a early 60's nova wagon that my friend jim bersani is making another drag car out of . cleaned it up and threw a few neat parts on it and it is going to be right at home in this truck , although i may need to hop it up a little to get it where i want it







while we were messing with the front end i decided to move everything ahead 1" to make the wheel sit better in the wheel opening.



of course everything changed up front in suspension and steering geometry effects everything else and one thing leads to another and then another and next thing you know you have the damn torch out again ...... it took alot of messing around and a bunch of re thinking but it is all good now , i will maybe put together a tech post later if i can get all of the pics together and a written play by play to go with it but until i actually drive this thing i only know it will work in theory i need to test it out on the roads first to be 100% sure it all worked out well .




.............here is a pic of the NO ROT cab corner that was plainly visible when the truck showed up !!



after buying inner and outer cab corners for both sides and floor pans for both sides and making several patch panels we are about to start doing all of the patch work , got one cab corner done and decided to have everything blasted first so off to the blaster it goes to get cleaned up and sprayed with DP90 epoxy primer.








continued below ......

 

sounds normal

 

cool truck justin keep us posted

 

Sounds fun, things are never as they seem, you are listen to a seller.....anyways, looks like a cool and FUN project.

 

Congratulations on staying with it. When you're finished, you may have spent a lot of money, but you'll have a one-of-a-kind truck that you put together--and you'll be driving it.

 

Nice clean work so far.

 

while the parts were at the blaster we banged out some chassis work and cleaned it all up and painted it in a semi gloss that looks pretty good with contrasting flat and gloss parts here and there !!! threw a disc brake kit on the front and some new shocks and were getting closer to finishing this thing up. turns out the 6 lug rear i got for it was too wide so i am in the process of cleaning up the new narrower rear end i got and it will now be 5 lug on all 4 corners plus the new rear is also a disc brake rear so it ends up 4 wheel discs too (not seen in these pics)









here is the pic of when we discovered the rear end was too wide ....i'm still not sure how that happened , i knew what i needed for a width and asked my buddy who owns a scrap yard to get me a rear end . he called and told me what he had and i said ok , never really double checking it, we went ahead and cut all the mounts off welded spring perches to it and cleaned it all up and painted it before ever realizing it was no good , worked out better anyway cause i wanted a 5 lug rear but settled for the 6 lug cause thats what he had at the time . new 5 lug rear also has disc brakes so that is a bonus , i hope , although i may not like em , my avalanche daily driver has 4 wheel discs and i hate it!!



i haven't really been able to decide on a wheel tire combo , i originally wanted chrome smoothies and skinny whites so i mounted a set up and they are seen in the pic above ,then i decided i didn't really like skinny whites on chrome smoothies but i love skinnys on astros so i grabbed these



still not sure what to do i may get a set of WWW i have mounted on a pair of smoothies and see how i like that , as for right now the project is on hold for a month or two while my buddy gets things in order for winter and i collect some more parts i will update and i have hundreds of pics if any one is interested in more details of any of the stuff we did . i was going to wait till the truck was done to post the build thread but i had some time today and decided to go for it!!

i think the 59 apache will make a nice match in the driveway for my 59 biscayne Kustom ....... unless it sells!

 

lotsa work, typical for these trucks though.

Did you get the steering drag link to sit level?

 

no it ended up with a slight angle but it rolls lock to lock with no bind or any risk of hitting anything and should end up fine as far as any kind of bump steer , we rolled the wheel lock to lock with the front suspension in every different stage of compression and never felt any variation in resistance . like i said in the post the true test will be out on the road but i have built a hot rod or two and my buddy has built several drag cars etc.etc. and we both feel very confident that it will be fine!!

i will post updates as soon as i know !!!

jp

 

Looks great

 

Looks Great

 

Hey that truck will be right when you're done, to bad it was listed wrong but it looks like it's headed in the right direction.

 

Gotta love those Fleesides....Good job on the truck.

 

Wow,looks great.Gotta love it when something snowballs on ya

 

Nice work, I love these old trucks.
You will be happier after all the hard work is done.

 

Hey JP, it's lookin gooood!

 

looking good so far

 

Looks really nice. Good work.

 

that's too bad the truck wasn't what you were told it was......Did the seller offer any money back?

 

looks killer so far nice work bro

 

Absolutely love it! Kinda scarry...I'm building a 59 Apache to haul my custom Harley that's also in the works. Mine will be long box and stepside with the small rear window, but astro supremes had crossed my mind haha. Interested to see what you do with the bed floor, my frame is z'd in the back and I'm going to have to raise the floor substantially. Keep the pics coming and keep up the good work!

 

Very kool! You goin to lower the bed to match the cab?

 

Yeah, the top rails of the box will sit at stock height to match the cab lines, but the whole bed floor will have to be raised on my project to hide the framework. The neat thing about it will be the space created under the bed floor where I plan on relocating the tank and battery and whatever else I can cram under there!

 

nice work man, cant wait to see the final product

 

Very kool truck so far. So the tubing you welded to the rear frame where you notched it..does that mean you'll have to cut the bed floor? -Jon

 

Would love to see the tech thread (step by step) as i am in the process of laying out my 59. Especially the flipping of the dropped axle.

 

of course the bed will drop about 4.5" to line up the body lines , it is also going to be moved forward 1/2 to 3/4 " to eliminate some of the out of place look that the fleetsides have on these cabs from a 3/4 angle front view the box looks too wide on these trucks , i'm hoping by moving it ahead it will eliminate some of that with very little effort!!!

jp

 

yes the bed floor will have to be cut , no biggie on this truck cause someone went ahead and "upgraded" it to a piece of 3/16" steel plate somewhere in it's past , i would have considered cutting all of that out and going with a traditional wood slats bed floor and just raising the whole floor 4" but i am just going to step the floor up over the c notched area and make a removeable cover for it, cause i am planning on rhino lining the inside and running a bed cover anyway!!!

 

keep us posted.

 

just a few teaser pics of some parts going on this build to give ya an idea of the direction it's going .
i was looking for an extra boxside to use the spear as a raised feature in the middle of the hood but not only are they fairly rare , i couldn't bring myself to ruin one ,while i was looking i decided since i have always like the side trim on 58 buick specials i would see if i could score some of that and run it on the hood instead. i ended up with some so that is whats going to happen there .

here is a pic of the trim in it's natural habitat



and here is the piece i scored , i will post pics as soon as i get it all drilled
and mounted on the apache hood l



another idea that i have seen here and really liked was the 58 impala bumper mounted on these 58-59 apaches here is a pic of one of these on a HAMBERS truck!



and the one i scored for mine is a 1 piece california bumper in really nice runnable shape.



i'm pretty sure i'm gonna run a set of duals out the back just behind the tires with some smithy's or bombs under the bed but i am definitely gonna have these sneaky little bastards dumping just behind the front tire ready to be uncapped for a little fun!



and i had originally bought a 67 biscayne steering wheel for it but when i saw this early 50's chevy dealer accessory wheel in the exact same color i am doing the interior i had to have it , plus i think the lack of any dish will make it roomier in the cab for me . my damn belly touches the wheel in my 59 biscayne if i don't suck it in!!



that's it for now , i will post pics as these items make there way onto the build so stay tuned if you dig it !!

jp