64 Econoline WIP (Work In PAST)

Well since I have posted the finished product here is the build. Sorry to all the guys that have come from other forums and are probably sick of seeing this build by now! I started it back in early January '23 so some of my tenses during the narration may be a bit odd.





While shopping the Jimmie Flintstone site for a 58 Chevy body I stumbled across the '61-'65 Econoline panel body. I was over joyed to find it as it is a major vehicle in the Cars I used to Own series of builds.







The Flintstone site does not ship to Canada and anybody that sells the body here charges WAY more I had a buddy in Vancouver Washington order it and he then shipped it to me. It has traveled so much it probably has more miles on it than the real thing did.


Since the first generation Econoline's have never been kitted the body is designed to go with he chassis and interior from the Lindberg Lil Red Wagon/Dodge fever Dodge A100 pickup kit. As these have not been released for several years I was beginning to think I would have to sell a kidney to complete this project! After a long search for one of these available for a price that did not require a second mortgage on the house I managed to score one from a reasonably close toy store/hobby shop at a normal retail price.



Although it is a Dodge interior the basics are close enough for anybody but the most diehard early sixties van fanatic. In fact Dodge it looks like didn't even try to hide that they were copying the Econoline.



The knowledgeable amongst you are probably saying "But Tcoat the Econoline only came with a six cylinder engine and that is clearly a V8". Well that is actually convenient for me as my '64 had a 351W and C6 tranny from a 67 Fairlane crammed into that doghouse between the seats. So with some blue paint and a bit of squinting the kit318(?) now becomes a 351. It isn't like you are going to see much beyond the very bottom anyway.



I bought the van already built in late 78 and it had already been done up in pretty much standard early trend vantasic style. There was a bench in the rear that folded down to a bed, a cabinet from an early sixties RV with an 8 track player in it, an ugly (by todays standards) carpet and some early '70s house speakers mounted up in the rear corners The two pieces of foam for the bench/bed were hard to "sleep" on as they always pulled apart so I screwed the base down and threw a cheap RV sized mattress on it. I also wanted a chair so borrowed (forever) an old mid sixties bar stool from my parents and screwed it to the plywood floor. It of course would have meant instant death for anybody riding on it in the event of a crash by those were the invincible days.



So I had to scratch build a bunch of stuff up





How many scratch built bar stools do you see?



Paint starts to bring things to life. The top of the cabinet was that sort of psychedelic woodgrain pattern that anybody over about 55 years of age will recognize.





The carpet, although not shag, was a heavier pile than you get using embossing powder so it is short turf fibers used in model railroads. I think I missed a narrow black line between the bigger sections of the carpet pattern but once body is on won't see much of it anyway.










And all painted up. The dash is coming with the Flintstone body and will have white panels like the doors, seats and doghouse have. The blanket will be familiar to pretty much anybody with military, police or firefighting experience anyplace in the world. You can probably feel the itching kicking in already. Still need to make an 8 track player for the cabinet but have to did up a chrome radio I know I have someplace for that. Nothing but the front seat are glued on yet since I need to have the body to ensure spacing is correct.



As far as I know there are no existing pictures of the real thing but most of the details are etched in my brain even after all this time so it is very accurate at least in my head.

At this point I still didn't have the body so had to settle for a quick mockup using the Dodge body. Looks like I am going to need to trim a hair off the barstool height but the cabinet is bang on. There is no way the front seats will fit in using the locators. They don't even clear the kit body so need to move closer together. I raised the rear about 3 scale inches when I built the suspension so the rake looks about right.




More to come!