1954 Studebaker 3R5 Pickup Build

A few months ago Hot40Rod (a member on here) listed this pick up for sale for a friend of his. Me being a Studebaker fan, I couldn't pass it up. I had an idea what I wanted to do with it especially after seeing a build thread by 62ChevyII (another member here). He was really detailed on how he mounted a 48 Chevy AD on an S-10 chassis, and I want to thank him for being so meticulous with his photos and descriptions.

Anyway, that's going to be my plan here. Mount this on an S-10 chassis and I already have a tuned port 350, 700R4, and a posi rear out of an 87 Trans Am GTA, that I'm going to use for the drive train.

I have been working mostly 7 days a week since the beginning of the year at my real job, and on the rare days I do have off I've been doing some fab work on a Henry J for a friend. Since I haven't been working 10-12 hours during the week lately, I decided to take a few hours at night for the Studebaker, but I know this build is going to be slower then I want, mostly because of the lack of hours in a day and trying to get the Henry J back to my friend.

Alright, I'll shut up and get on with the important stuff...at least what I have so far.

This is where I started....









Like the Bondo work????





This is the rust on the drivers side floor. Both cab corners need to be rebuilt, but this is the extent of rust on the floor on the drivers side. even the step well is solid on the drivers side

The passengers side floor and step well is another deal...









For north east PA this isn't to bad, but I'll still have some fab work to do making patches. Like I said, this is what I'm starting with.

Anyway, disassembly started by unbolting everything on the front and getting that out of the way.





This must have been a race truck from the factory...check out the castle nut and cotter pin on the engine mount

Once the cab was unbolted we pulled the S-10 frame next to the Studebaker and made some initial measurements



All that looking good, I lifted up on the cab and my buddy slid some 1x(something) tubing underneath the cab and put it on top of the Stude frame.






After some more lifting and a little cussing (very little) we were able to slide the cab onto the S-10 chassis











And my buddy had to pretend he was on the other side of the pond and make vroom vroom sounds



All this was done in a couple hours over two nights this past week. The cab is sitting close to where it needs to go, but I want to throw the front end on to make sure the front wheels are centered properly in the wheel wells before starting to fab up the cab mounts.





I know that some of this is going to take a little longer, because as of yesterday, my buddy was victim of an impatient driver who had to make a left turn...right in front of my buddy who, along with his wife were taking their German Sheppard to the groomers. He is having surgery tomorrow (Monday 3/26) to put his hip back together and he expects to be out of circulation for a few months. His wife had to get stiches and is being kept in the hospital for another day for obsevation. The puppy also had to have a surgery, to repair some internal bleeding. The good news, after talking to my buddy today, everyone will be fine. His wife and the puppy will be back back to normal alot quicker then he will, but the important part is they all will be fine in time.

Updates will be coming as time permits....and I already decided to draft my buddys step son to help with some of the stuff on the truck....and my buddy (when he's back home) can supervise

Cool truck! Hope your buddy has a speedy and full recovery.

That frame looks like it's a perfect fit. Might do that with my 54 3R5. When I rebuilt my 50 Stude engine I was really suprised how well it was put together all the rods and main caps were safety wire along with a lot of other internal stuff. Studebakers were well built cars.

Hope your buddy, wife and puppy heal up fast.

That a sweet foundation to start with, same body as my 48 2r5-12, i gots a split windsheild, i just cut out the hole floor an started over

There are just so many good lines on the Studebaker trucks... nice truck

dmw56 said:

That frame looks like it's a perfect fit. Might do that with my 54 3R5. When I rebuilt my 50 Stude engine I was really suprised how well it was put together all the rods and main caps were safety wire along with a lot of other internal stuff. Studebakers were well built cars.

Hope your buddy, wife and puppy heal up fast.

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As it sits right now the wheel base is 4 " short, but thanks to 62ChevyII that's an easy fix. I'll be posting pics of that operation when I get there. I was surprised too to see how many bolts were safety wired, and your right about how well they were built. The 59 Lark I had with the 259 was a work horse engine

Studebaker said:

That a sweet foundation to start with, same body as my 48 2r5-12, i gots a split windsheild, i just cut out the hole floor an started over

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The split windshield and the grill treatment is the biggest difference between the years of this body style. If I'm not mistaken, I believe 53 was the first year of the one piece windshield. Also, my front fenders are the same as yours...if wanted I could bolt a grill in like yours. they just drilled a bunch of mounting holes in the fenders to bolt on the full size grill. For what it's worth, they do make replacement floor panels for these trucks if you wanted to replace with the factory style floor, and from what I remember they aren't real expensive either

Dirtyrat said:

There are just so many good lines on the Studebaker trucks... nice truck

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Thank you...I love the lines on a lot of the Studebaker models, and always liked these years of the trucks


Also, when my buddy gets out of the hospital, he'll be reading this thread, and I'm sure he'll appreciate all the well wishes...on his behalf...thank you

I like this look. Best wishes for your friends too.

Got a little update on the Studebaker. First things first...My buddy, his wife and pup are doing fine. My buddy is going stir crazy from being stuck in the house as much as he is, but he still has a few months to go (he'll probably be a real basket case till he gets the clearance to start driving again...yes I harass him as much as I can when I'm there but...what are friends for?)

This is from before the accident, but I think the pup is ready to go again, because the first thing he did today when he saw me was check out my truck for an open door. I thought he was going to try for the open window, but he didn't




Ok...the truck...............

I cut up the radiator support so that I could get the frontend sitting on the S-10 frame and get some idea where I'd need to make mounts and modify the frame as needed.




I guess you can see that I'll be trimming the frame horns right at the steering box on the drivers side...




and I'll trim the passengers side the same distance back





All that said...I think I like where the frontend is sitting in relation to the wheel in the wheel well.

Very good

box

are you going to box/cap the ends of the frame where you trim it back?

it's looking good

Later

I've always loved that Stude body style, and looks like you have a nice one! Should be a great truck when you get it finished. Nice dog, too! I'd bet when he wants to go for a ride, nobody tells him no!

skull said:

are you going to box/cap the ends of the frame where you trim it back?

it's looking good

Later

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Yes, on this one I'm going to cap the ends of the frame. On my 39 Plymouth and the 40 Studebaker Commander I didn't bother, but I have a sneaking suspicion that you'll be able to see the frame ends on this one through the grill.

Bamamav said:

I've always loved that Stude body style, and looks like you have a nice one! Should be a great truck when you get it finished. Nice dog, too! I'd bet when he wants to go for a ride, nobody tells him no!

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Thanks. As far as the pup (I keep calling him a puppy, but he is 4 years old)...that day it took my buddy and me to get him out of the truck. Guess he didn't want to get out until he went "somewhere", but that wasn't in the cards that day

Ron

glad to see that you been working on it. Looks good. Am i going to see it this year at the show?

HOT40ROD said:

Am i going to see it this year at the show?

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I'm hoping to have it together for the show, but a lot depends on my real job. We've been working basically every weekend since the begining of the year. What I've gotten done so far has been a few nights after work....when I didn't work late. Like I said earlier, I'm trying to get some fab work done on a friends Henry J when I do have some time on the weekends. Once I get that finished up and back to him, then I'll get serious about this one. I have basically everything I need mechanically and I have a new wiring kit, so when I do get to work on it, it should go "pretty" quick (I hope!)

Looks like it fits that frame nicely.

Nice

Any updates? I really like where this build is going! [P

what year s-10 are you using?