I was browsing the Reader's Rides section of www.sporttruck.com, when i saw an '00 Silverado truck with an Hd hood and a '68 grille grafted to the front. After looking at the picture and trying to figure out just how the owner did the work, i decided to contact the guy and get the information straight from the horse's mouth. I fired off an e-mail, hoping to just get some details and was happily surprised when the owner told me he had taken a bunch of photos along the way. As soon as i heard there was documentation of the work, the story changed from a single image and a few words to this technical article. Yes, folks, you read that right; this story was found on our website, so make sure to get your cool stuff up. You never know who might contact you.
The gentleman in question is Chris Redmond from Marshall, Texas. He is a painter by trade and has been working on this truck for a while. He had the truck in a mild custom state when he backed into a small pole hidden in his blind spot. That little mishap to the back of the truck was the spark that lit the fire on the front-end conversion.
Like most of us in the world, Chris doesn't have a shop of his own, so he asked Eric Nichols, owner of Certified Collision in his home town, for a little shop space. Being an ultra-nice guy and a good friend of Chris, Eric gave up some space in his shop. After getting the tailgate and roll pan straight again, with the help of friend Rob Robinson, Chris went on the hunt for the sheetmetal. Chris scored the whole frontal area of a '68 Chevy truck from his local wrecking yard and brought it back to Certified Collision to start the grafting process.
Now there is no manual on how to do something like this, so Chris and crew just went for it. They started by stripping off the grille, bumper, and anything else in the front of the truck, so they could see just how much it was going to take to blend lines that are more than 30 years apart. After everyone agreed it would work, the cutting, welding, and smoothing began. Chris ended up sacrificing two bed sides, a roll pan, and the '68 clip to complete this swap, and it was well worth it in the end-or should we say front end?