1935 Chevy Panel Truck

	Owned by Ray Travis "AllDrivers" Bolter # 15627 Annapolis, Maryland Talking about this truck in the DITY Gallery

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From Ray :

I have a 1935 Chevy Panel truck that I will be building into a Suburban. I plan to do '96 Corvette rear suspension, rear axle and drivetrain. The front suspension will be Mustang. The body will be RestoRod with full trim as original as possible. Outside will be full chrome and wide whitewall radials, dual side mounted spares for the look. I'll probably build a small trailer out of an old Kelvinator frig to carry our junk and luggage.

This Suburban build is planned to be a distance driver for traveling to shows and for vacations.

Here it is in he beginning stages. Here is the truck as it came out of the barn (steel building in upper Minnesota) and my brother loaded it and transported it to Maryland for me.

My wife drives a 1934 Plymouth sedan hotrod and I drive a 1939 Chevy. Both are good drivers but not alot of room in either for long distance comfort. I've always liked the Suburbans and after months of searching, I decided that an old one is a rare find.

I do alot of hotrod fabrication in my one-man shop, "Built2Drive Rods and Rides" and adding windows to an old panel would not be that much of a challenge.

I found this Panel on the Minnesota Craigslist. It was very solid for a vintage piece. Its previous life was a school bus for a Wisconsin school system in River Falls, WI. The bus company used it for the rural kids and had benches in the back and loaded the kids in from the back.

The rear doors still say "school bus" and "slow" in a faded patina paint (very cool).

My wife is very excited about her new ride being as stock as possible on the outside but very comfortable in the inside. The fact that there is alot more room inside will allow us to venture further in a nice ride. The trailer will keep the inside much cleaner and comfortable for the ride.

We drive to about six car shows a year now in her Plymouth and just love participating as a family.

We are planning a coast to coast trip in for the summer of 2011 in this new Suburban. It will just be my wife and my seven year old daughter. My daughter is excited because she wants to pick out the DVD system and stereo system that will entertain her in the back seat on this journey. She has even done Crayola drawings of the rear seating area and has planned in storage for all her coloring stuff, movies, cds, and a cooler.

Needless to say we are excited, too.

We'll continue to post to the web site as we make progress.

Thanks,

Ray

Ray has another old vehicle in the Gallery that he restored some time ago. It's a 1936 Chevy 1/2-ton that he had for 19 years. ~ Editor

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