1951

This month’s feature is the earliest NAPCO accessory equipped truck in existence! So far no one has been able to prove otherwise. That is quite a compliment due to the large following of these aftermarket 4x4 trucks. As the author of this article, Jim Carter of Jim Carter Truck Parts, I became telephone friends of the owner of this 1951...

Featured Truck of the Month 2019 starts off with a bang! We are offering a different way of showing this special truck. We hope you enjoy the video, background music and the detailed description as much as we did putting it all together. This Advanced Designed Suburban was rebuilt by Mike and Tyler Chance a father/ son team devoted to...

It is rare that we see a transformation that has occurred like this 1951 Chevrolet ¾ ton pickup. It was changed from being a parts truck to a national show winner among some very stiff competition.  It has become a step above the quality on the day it left the dealership 65 years ago.  The owner, Dr. Fred Young of...

What a unique 1951 Chevrolet Suburban for our Feature Truck Series! It is certainly a one of a kind. The owners are Jeff & Brenda Kuhn of Plainfield, Illinois. Their dream is now complete after 4 years in the making. The goal was to restore or find a totally original Suburban and then add special performance features that were usually...

This month’s feature truck may be the only COE (cab over engine) short wheel base Advance Design Tow truck in existence! Most trucks that are tow vehicles are doomed to extinction once they begin their job of car and truck moving duties. They are worked everyday sun, rain, or snow to justify their expense of huge insurance, a driver, maintenance...

One of the lowest mile over 50 year old trucks in existence! A great example of what an older truck was like when it first came off the assembly line. It is owned by Gerald Cooper of Manassas, Virginia. He has almost 50 early vehicles in his collection but this ½ ton is a special vehicle to him. It is...

Owner: Butch Voigt This month’s Feature Truck certainly follows our trend of finding the more unusual among early Chevrolet and GMC vehicles.  This may be the only survivor of a 1951 Chevrolet 1 ton with a 16 passenger body. Chevrolet provided the 131” wheel base chassis with fenders, hood, grille, etc. See photo. The passenger part was made by the Carpenter Body...

The full rear quarter panels for the 1947-55 Chevy/GMC Suburban were made all the same at the metal stamping manufacturer.  To save money these panels were not made different if the Suburban was to have the double doors or the tailgate style opening in the rear. Thus, when the Suburban was provided with a lift and tailgate combination the 4...

What a unique invention. When you have a 1947 through 1959 single rear wheel 3/4 or 1 ton GM truck and need more pulling power, this is the answer. American ingenuity at its best! This new steel center hub extension includes eight long bolts to reach the original wheel studs. This holds the factory wheel in place and then provides...

This is a very unique one of a kind 1951 Chevrolet Tilt A Whirl style Carnival Amusement ride. This vehicle was used back in the day to go around the streets of New York to give rides for 5 cents to the kids who could not afford to go to a regular carnival or amusement park. Unbelievable history for what this truck represents. Basically it rode around and stopped for kids just like the ice cream trucks of today do.

Life for this 1951 Chevrolet Model 5100 began at the GM assembly plant in Kansas City . Soon after, it was delivered to its new home at a small Chevrolet dealer in Lydon , Kansas . About this time it was also equipped with a new wrecker body (manufactured by W.T. Stringfellow and Co., Nashville , Tennessee ) and made ready for duties as a GM dealership tow truck.

Here is a great example of a ground up restoration of a 1951 Chevrolet 3/4 ton. The project is being done by Line Creek Restorations in Northmoor, Missouri near Kansas City, 1-816-946-6000. When the project is finished, it will be a new truck!

  Beginning in 1951, the rear bumper became an option on both Chevrolet and GMC pickups. This required a change in the standard left tail light bracket. The tail light assembly was now unprotected without the bumper. GM created a new bracket design that brought the tail light slightly ahead of the rear edge of the stake pocket. In this...

  During the Advance Design years no less than four different Chevrolet hood side emblems were used on 1/2 tons. Each of their two mounting pins are in the same place so the punched hood holes were unchanged during these years. All were chromed die cast even during the 1952-1953 Korean war chrome shortage. The following pictures show the correct...

On first glance, most people assume that both Chevy and GMC gauge clusters are fully interchangeable and are the same except for perhaps the minor difference with Chevy oil gauges topping out at 30 psi versus GMC gauges maxing out at 60 psi. But that's quite a bit short of what the actual differences were originally! There are actually no...

I was volunteering for my church, working the graveyard security shift, at a fireworks tent. The 11pm-7am shift was an opportunity to visit with a couple of men from our church, share a few stories etc. We got to talking and I told my new friend I had been searching a long time for a specific, Chevy, truck...

This 1951 GMC advance design half ton is owned by Tom Pryor of Kansas City, Missouri. Found four years ago in Clinton Missouri it was originally an Iowa farm truck. The previous owners had started a very poor attempt at restoration, sanding the old paint with little body repair then applying primer, the truck then sat in the outside elements were surface rust took over on every panel of the truck. The wood bed was rotten, electrical non-existent and field mice had taken over the interior.

This 1951 GMC is a family original. My father bought it new from the local GMC dealer in Fort Benton, Montana and has stayed with us ever since. For years this pickup was used to drive from town, to our farm and back daily.

This 1951 Chevrolet 3100 has been in our family since my dad bought it new in 1951 in Wooster, Ohio. It has a 216 cu. in. motor, four speed transmission, original radio, that still plays, the original bill of sale and spec. sheet.

Hello Jim: My name is Paul McGarr and I bought my "1951 GMC" in 1994. I always wanted one because my dad had a 50 Chevy 5 window when I was a youngster. Originally I wanted to buy a Chevy 5 window but could not find one in half decent shape.

I bought my '1951 GMC in '1991 and like many people, eventually I found my way to Jim Carter's shop door...or more correctly his catalog and mail order business. At that time, his catalog was just being updated which is still the case! It's constantly being updated. I wish that I had all my old Jim Carter catalogs to go back and look at them because of what is now available versus what was not available from the catalog then. Trust me, the catalog is a LOT thicker now. He used to go from '1934-'1959 in one catalog! Actually I think his first catalog was from '1934-'1972.