1941 Ford Truck - Stretching Out

After five years of showing my '71 Chevy pickup, it was time for a new project. I wanted to build something a little more high-end than the '71 and had always loved the '40-41 Fords. So the hunt was on.

My best friend Jim Dumler has an armory of old trucks that he found from scouring the countryside. After many trips and views through the binoculars, Jim finally sold me a solid '41 cab and doors. I finally had a starting point and now needed a good parts truck to go with it. After several months of looking, I met a guy named Don Toliman in the Kansas City area. He had a stock '41 Ford truck that was not a rust bucket and sold it to me for $1,000. Before I left, Don had given me another bed, a frame, and various small parts. There aren't too many guys like Don. I took the truck home and proceeded to dismantle it--using some parts and selling the rest.

I knew I wanted a high-end street rod pickup that would be comfortable to drive with good power and reliability, and it would have several body mods that would make it stand out from the rest. I think in the '40s, people must have been shorter because it was going to be hard to be comfortable in the stock cab. I decided to elongate the cab but didn't like the look of them stretched behind the doors. I wanted to expand mine 6 inches through the doors to keep people guessing and make the stretch less obvious. I also wanted to bring the top down some. The body was taken over to Bob Schumacher at Vintage Fabrication in Kansas City where it was lengthened the 6 inches, and the top was brought down 3 inches in the front and 2 1/2 inches out back.

When I started penciling out the modifications I needed to do with the original frame, I decided to scrap it for a new Art Morrison chassis complete with Air Ride, four-wheel disc brakes, a 9-inch Ford rearend with four-link rear suspension, and a Mustang II frontend. I wanted to keep the truck in proportion as much as possible, so I didn't want to shorten the bed to compensate for the longer cab. Morrison ended up adding 6 inches to the wheelbase so I could retain the original bed dimensions.

The running boards were custom-made by Smoothy Fabrications to allow for the 6-inch stretch. The rear fenders were in very poor shape, but it was important for me to have an all-steel truck. So after hitting several swap meets and numerous phone calls with no avail looking for a set of original fenders in decent shape, I went back to Don Toliman thinking he may have a set. I met Don at his shop, and he sent me to a shed outside his business. Jackpot! A near-perfect set of rears and fronts. I asked Don what he wanted for them, and he made me a deal I couldn't resist--selling me all four for less than dinner and a movie for a family of four. Like I said before, not too many guys like Don Toliman.

The next problem was the old bed. It was pretty beat up and not worth fixing--so new bedsides were purchased from Mac Products. The front bed panel was custom-made, as was the tailgate with a side-hinged setup to open like a door. Instead of using a wood bed floor, metal channels were bent and Pro's Pick bed strips were used for a clean look. The center section of the bed was hinged at the front bed panel and is supported by gas shocks when it's in the raised position. We finished off the bed with a custom roll pan with the license plate holder rolled and recessed into it. The front was brought together with '39 deluxe headlights from Vintique and a chrome grille using stainless bars welded horizontally from Grille Art. With the exterior metal all taking a good shape, the interior metal was next.

The original dash was cut out and a new wraparound dash was fabricated with a custom-made center console that runs through the bucket seats and wraps back around as an armrest. The interior's stitch work was done by Chuck Rowland of C.A.R.S. in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I wanted the interior kept simple and clean, and Chuck pulled it off exceptionally well. A custom overhead console and nice underdash panels tie everything together.

The final bodywork and paint was left up to Bob Launders and his sons, Jeff and Eddie at Carefree Body and Paint. I knew the colors I wanted to use even before any work had started on the truck, and Jeff was able to make my vision come alive. A House of Kolors Tangelo was used on the lower body and topped with House of Kolors Pearl White. The challenging part was breaking the two-tone scheme with flames. The chicken-scratch pinstriping adds a unique touch, is carried throughout the interior of the truck, and breaks the two-tone nicely around the back of the cab.

After a lot of late nights, we got the truck done just in time to get it to the Goodguys Lone Star Nationals in Fort Worth, Texas. Our efforts were rewarded with a Top Five finish in their Truck of the Year competition and a CLASSIC TRUCKS Top Ten pick. We can't wait to take it to some more shows and enjoy it more this year.