Van based chassis cab?

Commercially available cab and chasses are called cutaways.

Custom home made versions are called "Vrucks", and there are a ton of them out there- some are gorgeous, some are hacks.

Google "Vruck"- you will find plenty of eye candy.

I have a cutaway with a 14' utility body on it- my favorite work truck ever.

mazdeuce wrote: For the second time in the last six months I've seen a pretty epic work truck bassed on a single van cab. These aren't cut up vans, but factory cabs with proper rounded corners, I checked. I've seen a few of the cabs on U-Haul trucks of various vintages but I can't seem to figure out how to search for them. I'm pretty sure I need one for a build in my head. Help me out?

Very common. Chevy and Ford both made them. Heck, I was working on one today. Much preferable to pickup cab based box trucks IMO.

I'll see if I can get pictures of the Chevy I was working on today. It has a Roots blower mounted behind the doghouse, driven by a jackshaft and clutched Mad Max style.

In reply to Knurled:

In the cab?!

We kind of NEED to see a picture of that.

Trust me, it sucks!

How about one of these?

There is a shop local to me that builds 4x4 vans and the owner dailies this.

build thread here http://www.ujointoffroad.com/ujorv4.html

MrChaos wrote: There is a shop local to me that builds 4x4 vans and the owner dailies this. build thread here http://www.ujointoffroad.com/ujorv4.html

Beat me to it, U joint builds some pretty impressive stuff. I wish I could afford even the parts to build one.

Knurled wrote:

mazdeuce wrote: For the second time in the last six months I've seen a pretty epic work truck bassed on a single van cab. These aren't cut up vans, but factory cabs with proper rounded corners, I checked. I've seen a few of the cabs on U-Haul trucks of various vintages but I can't seem to figure out how to search for them. I'm pretty sure I need one for a build in my head. Help me out?

Very common. Chevy and Ford both made them. Heck, I was working on one today. Much preferable to pickup cab based box trucks IMO. I'll see if I can get pictures of the Chevy I was working on today. It has a Roots blower mounted behind the doghouse, driven by a jackshaft and clutched Mad Max style.

I need more information, man. I have evil thoughts now.

mazdeuce wrote: We kind of NEED to see a picture of that.

Dusterbd13 wrote: I need more information, man. I have evil thoughts now.

It's a vacuum cleaner/carpet shampooer, in the same sense than an A10 is a rifle.

There's a fiberglass cover that goes on top. But the thing is basically a SBC-engined vacuum cleaner with license plates...

Hey, I told you it sucked!

mazdeuce wrote: For me, I'm looking at getting a really useful (8 foot plus) bed on a short wheelbase.

This is exactly why I love vans. For the same wheelbase and overall length as a single cab 8' bed truck, I got 12+ feet without the penalty of a super long truck.

A nice short cutaway like that one would be the best of both worlds.

In reply to curtis73:

And then there are the Isuzu trucks. The people that love 'em REALLY love 'em. They freak me out to drive, but there are certain advantages to being so cab over engine that you sit in front of the front axle, and you don't raise a hood to get to the engine you raise the entire cab.

I'll admit that there's something neat to having hydraulic-over-air brakes and a 500ci 6-cylinder diesel motivator. Expensive to maintain, but neat.

Knurled wrote:

mazdeuce wrote: We kind of NEED to see a picture of that.

Dusterbd13 wrote: I need more information, man. I have evil thoughts now.

It's a vacuum cleaner/carpet shampooer, in the same sense than an A10 is a rifle. There's a fiberglass cover that goes on top. But the thing is basically a SBC-engined vacuum cleaner with license plates... Hey, I told you it sucked!

That's amazing.

curtis73 wrote:

mazdeuce wrote: For me, I'm looking at getting a really useful (8 foot plus) bed on a short wheelbase.

This is exactly why I love vans. For the same wheelbase and overall length as a single cab 8' bed truck, I got 12+ feet without the penalty of a super long truck. A nice short cutaway like that one would be the best of both worlds.

I do miss that part of my old E-150: 10' clear from the back of the front seats to the rear doors. 12' from the dog-house to the doors. It was nice when I needed to haul stuff.

Found this on craigslist:

https://southjersey.craigslist.org/cto/5248228593.html

In reply to rdmx:

That's pretty cool. A bit crack-pipe on the asking price IMHO, but maybe he'll get lucky.