Im about to look at a 56 nomad project thats for sale. Im wondering what are the parts availability and interchangeabilty for them, like door skins and quarters, floors and stuff. any links would be great. thanks
I think my Father used Danchuck? Is that the right name? As far as original parts, my Pops always said the tailgate bars, especially; the center bar was the hardest parts to chase down. He's been chasing on a Gold V for his steering wheel lately. His '56 had a chrome one I think, maybe the gold V's were 55 or 57 only. Good luck, man. Carl Hagan
I have a 55 I'll be starting on also. heres a good starthttp://www.trifive.com/forums/sponsors.htm and here http://www.eastcoastchevy.com/
You can get most any and everything from Danchuk or one of the other places. You could build a 2 door sedan complete from repopped pieces.
I agree with Voodoo - you can get just about anything. I think it used to be tough to get the curved glass for the rear quarter, but I just checked Danchuck and they seem to sell it, too. Look at the post behind the front windows - they tend to crack there because the rear shocks originally were attached to the floorboards. I think Danchuck sells a bar that can be bolted in to re-fit them and alleviate that problem.
Unless they repro it now, it used to be hard to get a upper quarter mldg. , the diagonal piece with the little fake vents.
Who cares how hard it is to get a trim part or two, man, if this is a decent car for a decent price jump on it. I would love to have '56 Nomad. As an old junkyard own is fond of saying, "They don't make 'em anymore". Good luck.
Of course just about anything can be fixed but be sure and check the area(s) around the hinges on the rear upper and lower 'hatch'.
most of the floor in front of the shocks to the firewall is the same as sedan /hard top. on a 56 the replacement 1/4 from a hard top should be enough to get you by. the upper section of the 1/4 where it molds to the roof and windows will be different. the nomad tailgate leans in at a steeper angle than the wagon, so the area from the center of each taillight in across the back is nomad only. the door skins are the same from the door handle down, but nomad has a special stamping on the door, about a 1 inch high bead that runs from the vent window to the back of the door under the chrome. You can get stuff to fix, but be ready to do fabrication, and use creative solutions to get the patch panels to work. I think all the tailgate chrome , and the back glass is being reproduced now.
I am near the end of doing a 56 nomad, there are a lot of pieces that are hard if not impossible to find. The interchangeable stuff with the sedans are plentiful (as somebody said; danchuck, american autowire, and the chevy chat sites etcetc). The pieces you do not loose are the rear bumper, upper garnish for the tailgate hinge, stainless trim for the plywood on the floor, rear seat hardware, tailgate hardware incl the cable/strap mechanicals. Check to make sure you have those items as they may have been pilfered for somebody elses' project. Give me a shout if you need advice on how to go about it, i'm full of advice. Good luck, oj btw, be prepared to spend a lot, the one i'm doing is 150K and climbing.
What he said. I spent several weekends pulling my hair out trying to get my floors and the braces to line up. The patch panels that EMI makes are outstanding. The quarters and the doors are like NOS stuff. I don't know how rusty your car is, but mine was pretty complete and a lot of shit was hidden. I ended up doing the whole floor, all but 2 braces, toe boards, trunk floor and some of the side, under tail lights, splash pan and brace, wheel wells, inner/outer rockers, B pillar jambs, new quarters, and new doors. Sounds fairly simple until you cut it all out.
Since you are in Jersey,try to do business with Ol55-east coast chevy in Doylestown Pa. buy the complete floor that they assemble,I have done 4 of them, sedan door skins can be modified on the top under the stainless,(has to be narrowed) I leave the nomad top part and seam it under the stainless. Use the hardtop quarters . Good luck!
Two Tens and One Fifty V8's had the chrome V, 6 cyl's had the regular emblem with no V. Belair V8's had the gold V and 6 cyl Belairs had the gold emblem with no V.
id look at the roof for rot. tops do pop up for sale now & then usually around a grand or higher. its the little things on a nomad that'll get ya! good cars but not cheap to put together but THEY ARE WORTH IT!
floors on sedans and 2 door wagons are the same.Hardtops are different.Quarter wheel well openings are also different.OL 55 everything you need
The cabels fpr the tailgate are also Danchuck. Some guy in Ca. rebuilds the tailgates and the lift gates. Friend sent his out there for repair.
Like Bruce said, check out the forums at chevytalk, there is one strictly for Nomads, wealth of information there. I'm building a '55. Good thing about the '56 is you don't have to worry about headlight eyebrows, door mldgs & fender spears like on the '55.
There's a nomad/safari group here on the HAMB, would be a good place to network. I've had my '56 for 18 years this month, and have not had trouble finding parts when I need 'em. Two places I've ordered parts from are www.carsinc.com and www.hhclassic.com hhclassic overnighted windshield rubber to me 3 years ago when I needed it the next day, at no extra charge. There's also lots of Nomad stuff on eBay, like cargo floor trim, etc 2 dr sedan door skins work for Nomads (No dip like a 2 dr hardtop). Complete floors are available, all glass, tailgate parts, etc. It's amazing what is available now compared to when I first bought my Nomad in '91.
A 31 Mo-Fo, I finally get to see the Nomad, Nice score, I need to get over and see it live and in person. I like the photo of Alex checking it out...
Here's mine when I brought it in 1986, started on the gasser think but I am over it, its going back on a standard chassis soon for some street duty. (first pic thanks to assie steve) Good luck with it. Cheers Dago.
For '56, the only red available on a Nomad was Matador Red, in combination with Dune Beige...the interiors were red and beige. If you see red and ivory instead of red and beige on a '56 Nomad, it's not original paint. (Source: Chevrolet 1955-1957, by the editors of Consumer Guide)
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