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Canadian Chevy: 1957 Chevrolet 3100 Pickup

While it has been advertised as a Chevrolet 3100 Pickup, the “1300” badges on either side of the hood indicate that this Pickup hails from Canada. It looks to be a really solid old vehicle, and would potentially make a great restoration project. You will find it located in Sweet Grass, Montana, and listed for sale here on eBay. Bidding has reached $4,550 in what is a No Reserve auction.

The Pickup started life finished in Omaha Orange, but as so often happens with these old workhorses, it has received a repaint at some point. It features the 7½’ bed, which looks to be solid and clean. That’s a theme that continues right across the old Chevy, with precious little rust anywhere on the vehicle. There is the usual rust in the bottoms of the fenders and across the top of the windshield, but as the owner rightly points out, patches for these areas are now readily available and relatively inexpensive. Prone areas such as the floors and cab corners have avoided any rust problems, and while there are a some minor marks and dings around the body, there are surprisingly few for a vehicle of this type.

The surprising condition of the 1300 continues when you move inside the vehicle. It has obviously been treated to a clean and a dose of detailing spray, but below that, it looks to be quite promising. The seat will definitely either require a blanket or a new cover, but the rest of it is definitely quite presentable. There are a few cracks in the wheel, but I suspect that this could be restored quite easily. It looks like the lighter and radio blanking plate are both missing, but the rest of the dash would seem to be nicely preserved. Really, if the wheel was restored, a new cover fitted to the seat, and a rubber mat was laid down on the floor, the interior would look really nice.

It probably isn’t any great surprise to learn that the Pickup hasn’t run for quite a while. The engine is a 235ci straight-six, while the transmission is a 3-speed manual. The engine is said to turn freely, and given how robust these actually are, it might be surprisingly easy to get it up and running again. That six produced 123hp when new, which provided reasonable levels of performance. If that doesn’t sound like enough power for you, then the owner does offer the buyer an option to consider. He also has a good, used 350ci crate motor and TH350 automatic transmission that could be purchased separately. That engine only has around 30,000 miles on it, and the owner is happy to supply a video of it running. For a potential owner who is not tied to a faithful restoration, this should provide a bit of extra performance, and is definitely an option worth considering.

This 1957 Chevrolet 1300 Pickup looks like it is a great project vehicle, and it offers the next owner a world of options when it comes to which direction to take the project. Certainly, the crate motor and transmission would provide a good starting point for a custom or rat rod project. Alternatively, it would also be a standout if it was completely restored. The fourth option would be to get it running, throw a blanket over the seat, and then drive it as it is. Which way would you go?

Comments

  1. HoA Howard A. Member

    Folks who regularly visit this site, I bet just had a feeling this is Sweetgrass, Montana, home of the classic pickup, apparently, at sane prices, I might add. I think the increased price ( seems most their trucks go for $2g’s) is justified, these Task Force GM’s have a bigger following, due to the more modern styling than the AD’s. One could go either way here. It’s nice enough to keep original, but will most assuredly become a resto-mod, like all the others and that’s ok too.

    Like 7
    • Avatar geomechs Member

      Yep! Sweetgrass; you don’t have to be crazy to live there but it helps. With as many as six bars in a population of less than 200, plus being a major border crossing anything went. I bumped into an old (I’ll go lightly on the old as she is my age) acquaintance at the NW MT State Fair last August. Her dad was a mechanic and ran a gas station/garage in Sweetgrass. She said that more often than not they would encounter drunks sleeping it off in customers’ cars. Of course the bar owners often found overnight ‘guests’ under the benches in the booths. The old saying: You know you’re wasted when they wake you up and tell that the bar is now open for the day…

      Like 6
  2. Avatar Bear

    Very Nice!
    I hope someone gets it running/driving, has the seat recovered, fix (or treat?) any serious rust, & just enjoys it mostly as-is for a few years.
    (drive it now, & restore it at some point down the road.) (y) (y)

    Like 6
  3. Avatar geomechs Member

    ‘It said: Take immediate delivery of this 1957 Chevrolet 1/2 ton pickup truck; will sell or swap for a hide-a-bed and 35 bucks. Call 1-4-0, ring 2 and ask for Bob.’
    These trucks continue to come out of the woodwork. Lots of Tri-Five pickups out west but I really think that the bulk of these in Chinook Country were the’59 models. Lots of potential in this project. As usual if this came my direction it would most likely get the stock treatment. I love 6 cylinders and leaf-sprung straight axle front suspensions although I have to admit that I was impressed with a bolt-on IFS for these…

    Like 4
  4. Avatar Paolo

    I like that rear bumper and hitch!

    Like 3
    • Avatar Bear

      yeah, I’ll BET that hitch has DESTROYED a shin bone or 2!! :-p

      Like 4
      • Avatar geomechs Member

        My wife smashed her shin bone twice within an hour on our own truck. She couldn’t blame me because she was the one who installed the receiver. But she was some hurt…

        Like 2
    • HoA Howard A. Member

      A hitch like that, this truck pulled a lot of hay wagons, I bet. They didn’t call them “knee-knockers” for nothing.

      Like 0
  5. Avatar Glenn Schwass Member

    I want this but have to wait until I retire. I hope they are still around in 8 years when I can…hopefully
    This one is perfect with the orange coming through like flames….I’d get trim rings and chrome hib caps on clean rims, and hot the road. And a new seat..

    Like 2
  6. Avatar TimM

    Really cool one of my favorite years for Chevy truck!! I know it’s original but I bet I could horse shoe the 396 in there that’s been sitting on my engine stand!!!

    Like 1
  7. Avatar Del

    Our old Border Crossing Buddies.

    This is one of their nicest ones so far

    Like 2
  8. Avatar Stephen Brodie

    Sweetgrass Mt. is beautiful all of the way south to Great falls. Bought an old oilfield engine at Four Corners just south of there near Keavin. It had run continuously pumping nine shallow oilwells from 1923 to 1979, about 400,000 hours at 125 rpm. Dad bought a ’59 Apache 32 new, wore it out in the oilfields working, then sold it to me for $125. Cab was internally rusted from him smoking so much so I sanded it down and painted it Lilac pink,(Gawd). Rusted and busted but still would do 68mph flat out with the 235 and 4 speed I know cause I got 2 speeding tickets at that speed. Those were the days. Cab was so rusted that when you drove down gravel roads small rocks would catch in the back of the cab and come screaming up past the gastank. Had to run alchohol in the tank all winter otherwise the gaslines would freeze because of the location inside cab. I’ve had 3 of these fine old Chevs since that one. All had bad steering boxes, got pulled over by a cop, thought I was drunk, but I explained to him that driving it was like herding a group of pigs down a road, they continually wanted to go in the ditch. He laughed and away I went.

    Like 2
    • Avatar geomechs Member

      A lot of people can’t appreciate the country that spans I-15. From Sweetgrass down to Great Falls. When I was a kid the countryside was dotted with those shallow-well, cable-operated pump jacks. Those old Climax (is yours a Climax?) engines ran forever. I especially remember watching the puffs of exhaust during cold weather. You could sure tell when they were lifting oil. Not much left of the refinery at Kevin. I well remember back in the 60s when it was going 24/7/365. Kevin and Oilmont, two communities that most people wouldn’t know anything about, unless you ventured off the highway. It seems to me that the field truck of choice was GMC. Used to see a lot of them on the road or later languishing in the numerous boneyards.

      Like 0

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