The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area General Truck Talk 1955 first series advance design

Anyone know why the 55 first series truck was made? Was it to use up old 54 parts, or was the new design not ready to go into production? Recently took the 55 AD to a car show, most thought it was a 54, had several questions on why the new design wasn't started at the first of the year , my only guess was GM had to use up existing parts, heard somewhere the same thing happened in 47 but the trucks were all titled as 46 even though they may have been made in 47. Thanks for any input

The way it has been told to me was that some GM factory's started on the new design halfway though 46 when the design was ready while the others continued to produce the old art deco for the whole year for some reason. I can only assume this is what happened with the '55 trucks. But by all means, I'm no expert. Just what I've been told.

there's quite a few good books on the history of GM trucks .... the 47 1st and 55 1st trucks were simply because GM wasn't ready with new models, for a variety of reasons including putting scarce resources into new car models first - after the war there were problems with retooling, material shortages and particularly labor strikes, closing GM plants from late '45 until mid '46 .... note that new models back then were introduced after Oct each year and production needed to be set up mid year .... in 54/5 the Korean war contributed to some of the same problems, and the 55 2nd wasn't ready to roll until early 55, so something had to be sold after Oct 54 as a "55"

nothing to do with using up leftovers, GM has always been king of using parts designed in the past for it's current vehicles, back then there wasn't totally new designs every year

Bill

thanks for the info