Street Feature: Cross-Pollination – A 1955 Chevrolet With Hemi Power

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It’s not every day that you come across a classic Chevy with a non-GM engine between its fenders. We’ve seen a Ford powered Tri-Five in a project built by G3 Rods, but we’d never seen one with a Hemi! That is, until we saw this one owned by Bob Cook of Fresno, California. It’s cool because of more than just its Mopar powerplant, though. Take one look and you’ll see why we love it so much.

The story of Bob’s car starts with the engine, rather than the car itself. He had a friend that owned a Chrysler-Jeep dealership and when his friend sold the dealership, he offered the motor to Bob. “He said he had a few crate motors and asked if I wanted to buy them,” Bob explained. “This was right when Fiat was taking over Chrysler, so my friend had to get permission and I didn’t hear back from him for about a month, so I figured I wasn’t going to be able to get one.” All of a sudden, out of the blue, his friend called and said he could come get one.

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That’s right, a Hemi in a 1955 Chevy!

Bob had the engine for about two years on a stand and knew he needed to find something to put it in. “I didn’t really want to put it in a Mopar because there are too many of them,” he explained. “I thought about a Tri-Five since they always just have a small-block, big-block, or an LS.” He wanted to do something different, and it’s clear that he succeeded.

You'll see the blackout paint at the bottom of the core support, that is there so that when the hood is closed, you can't see anything through the grill. Not even a speck of orange. He wanted you to be surprised when he lifted that hood!

Bob found a 1955 Chevy 210 out in the desert and brought it back to Fresno. When he got into it, he found that the side cowl had been damaged and had a crinkle to it He looked into it and decided that it was going to be more work than it was worth to fix.

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He ended up buying a frame from Art Morrison. “It was a beautiful Chassis,” Bob detailed. Bob put some old wheels and tires on the frame so he could wheel it around and set the engine and transmission in so that he could make sure things fit and lined up. “Things seemed to line up really nicely,” Bob told us.

Bob located a Bel Air that had been started as a project and had the body off the frame. He looked at it and thought it would be great for what he was doing, so he bought it and brought it home. He recessed the firewall to fit the engine and slightly offset the engine so that there was more room on the driver side. Even with the offset, the Hemi was too big in the engine bay for all of the brake equipment to fit, so Bob setup a right-angle brake system tucked under the dash. “With the Morrison chassis, there isn’t really room to put stuff under the car,” Bob said.

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Notice there is no break reservoir on the firewall?

The Bel Air body was really solid, except a few pinholes in the floor and a crease that Bob found along the passenger door and rear passenger quarter panel. The rear quarter panel was also two panels spliced together so he ended up replacing the panels and re-skinning the door.

When everything was said and done, bob had his car painted the same orange as his 2007 Corvette with a Chrysler cream color for the upper rear. He dressed up the motor with a single carburetor to get exactly the look and sound he wanted, and he used a corvette air cleaner that would sit low on the carburetor to fit snug under the hood.

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The interior was a custom job done by a friend of Bob’s that usually does boat upholstery. “He has the vision to do something different,” Bob explained. And that is what he wanted. The front seats are from a 2008 Saturn and the back seat is out of a ’64-’68 Impala with the center speaker grill. The interior is also lined with a material called Luxury Liner to dampen the noise. “You drive that car and it feels like a Cadillac,” Bob told us. “It’s soft and it’s quiet.”

SFHemiTri5-08The final build features the 472 cubic-inch Mopar Hemi, a Tremec TKO 600 transmission, and Wilwood disc brakes all the way around. Bob knew what he wanted and he built a car around the motor. The vision came together in the form of the car you see here and it’s something that is sure to be rarely seen at any car show whether you are judging it by it’s exterior, interior, or by what’s under the hood. This is one swap that turned out pretty amazing.

About the author

Kyler Lacey

A 2015 Graduate from Whitworth University, Kyler has always loved cars. He grew up with his dad's '67 Camaro in the garage and started turning wrenches at a young age. At seventeen, he bought his first classic, a '57 Chevy Bel Air four-door, and has since added a '66 Plymouth Valiant and '97 Cadillac Deville to his collection. When he isn't writing for Power Automedia, he's out shooting pictures at car shows, hiking in the forests of the beautiful Pacific Northwest, or working on something in the garage.
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