NAPCO C-50 Chevy restoration

[Dannny B]

If you search 15961 highway 42, Myrtle Point, Or..... google maps, you will see that my 10 acres is in the hills with MILES of logging roads, etc. The hills are full of the usual, deer, elk, bear, cougar and LOTS of mean feral cattle.
I built a 6' X 6' X 3' underground pit BBQ. I also have a "venison" tree. It looks like an apple tree but, the deer think it is deer cocaine.
I'm on the banks of the Coquille river and it runs salmon and steelhead.
The truck is mostly a big toy but, I will use it for logs and firewood.
I also have a Dodge Dakota, wood-gas truck that will need firewood.
In case of hard times, I have a wood cook stove and a wood-fired water heater. And a couple of wood stoves for heat.
I see a lot of muddy roads in the future for this truck.

[3757chevy]

Looking Good,rear flares to imitate the fronts would look good. I tried to freehand something like what I had in mind. Of coarse drawing something and actually building is not something I can do. I was not able to draw any depth as to how wide they are.

[Dannny B]

Thanks for the illustration. The Chevy bed has kinda straight lines at the rear wheel opening. The Ford flares have a rounded opening.
https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/06...g?v=1513325976
I need flares that have some roll inwards in the lower part of the bed.
The Jeep Gladiator seems to have the right shape but, they are all steel.
https://di-uploads-pod4.dealerinspir...p_lft_frnt.jpg
I can't get excited about using strong flares for a truck that will see the bush. Remember when the dually chevys came out? Everybody ripped off the rear fenders.

[350TacoZilla]

The other c50's you showed are using standard bushwacker 67-72 cut out fenders which are no longer made I believe (maybe custom order?). The 60-66 trucks have a odd shape to fender opening, that why I had said about trying to cut down or mold the stock front ones. I also thought about the rear flares from a wrangler but havent gotten to measure a set of TJ or JK ones yet which I think would be best bet. Early broncos also have nice fender opening shape when cut for flares but non of them around my parts to look at.


If you are worried about steel fenders I wouldn't think about using something like the bushwackers, they are $$ per pair and break when smacked off trees pretty quickly.

I used boat trailer fenders on my samurai build and while its true a good smack will bend them they can be bent back unlike the stock abs style ones that crack into pieces. The chevy next to it has bushwacker cut outs for the rear of a 73-87 chevy all around. Oh and a better pic of just samurai flares.

[rkn463]

Looking great!

[sweepleader]

Love your truck, very nice.

I have a 1962 K10 that I put power steering on. I used a later pickup steering box and had to cut and weld the pitman arm and the steering arm on the Spicer 44 front axle. I know there is a lot of difference between mine and yours but it might still work. Its been about 30 years since I did it so I don't remember all the details right off. Mine has a V8 to so I cannot help with the 6 cyl pump.

[Dannny B]

Thanks, Swepleader.
I have a 1970 D***e Power Wagon that I changed to power steering. I used a Saginaw box from a P.U. truck. It was too fast of a ratio and it turned to quickly. The power wagon has a cummins and a 9.5 ft. utility bed. On top of that, it has a cabover camper. It weighs 10,000 and I had to get a slower box to get good control. While creeping out of the mountains on a deeply rutted dirt track pulling a trailer, the forces on the box were so high that it broke the aluminum cap on the box. Fortunately, it didn't completely brake off. I get nervous when I lose my steering.

My current project is a F-900 Marmon Herrrington with air brakes. There are 2 basic types of power steering. Standard box with an assist ram,,,, and a P.S. box.
The F-900 has the assist ram. The best brand seems to be Garrison. I had thought of using the Garrison but, would rather ave the P.S. box.
The c-50 has a box that is twice as big as the P.U. box.

[sweepleader]

With the talk of steering boxes, I forgot that my fire truck has factory linkage type PS on it, its a 1969 T50 Tilt Cab Chevrolet chassis. Somewhere around here I have some original sales literature with actual glossy original photos of the Chevrolet promotion of the Napco conversions. The Napco parts were made just a few miles from here, in Hopkins MN. The factory building has since been used by other companies but Napco is just down the street from there. I don't know what they do these days. I will look around and see if I can find that stuff, it has pictures of a Chevrolet "Mountain Goat" climbing hills with sales people looking on and details of the equipment specs. Good stuff.

[sakohntr]

What a rare beast. Nice to see you doing it right and driving it. Did you get your death wobble sorted out? I appreciate the part #'s you listed as I will also utilize them. Keep up the progress.

[sakohntr]

Slightly older.