When you live in the areas of the continental United States that regularly see snow, ice, and other forms of absolutely crap weather, a four-wheel-drive vehicle is almost the only option. It’s why pickup trucks have been a staple of the country’s vehicle sales, but a big truck isn’t the only game in town. Sure, you could pick up an all-wheel-drive rally rocket or maybe a crossover that does a great impression of an off-roader. But what kind of person looks at a full-size American van, the kind that is all but extinct at this point, and convinces themselves that what they need is a Chevy G-series van on a four-wheel-drive chassis powered by a big-block Chevy.<\/p>\n
Dalton has been working on the world’s largest model kit-bash project in his shops for a bit now. He’s got an original GMC van that came with four-wheel drive, but unfortunately the body is little more than a pasta colander now. When he went out to Arizona with Kevin from Junkyard Digs last year, he found a neat little rust-free Chevy Van that would work. But then there is the issue of a big-block…and that’s been answered by an old church van that was rocking 7.4 liters of motivation. So we have an engine, a chassis, and a body…on three different vehicles. The end goal is a shorty 4×4 van with a big block, right? That’s a pretty tall order in your backyard shop that doesn’t have a lift…<\/p>\n