Posted by Don in Missouri [108.162.219.175] on Tuesday, April 19, 2016 at 01:11:35 :
In Reply to: Re: Only 19,900! posted by Don in Missouri [108.162.221.88] on Thursday, April 14, 2016 at 12:16:09 :
After looking my new, old truck over, it is not the cross member that indicates mine is factory built, it is the bracket for the transfercase shifter. That bracket is riveted to the top frame rail. In a way that would be pretty hard to do after the cab was installed. It is bolted on the side. I'm guessing that is because the riveter was set up to rivet from the top down, so somebody had to put that one bolt in by hand.
The crossmember where the T-case bolts looks like it could be the same for 2WD trucks, so no mod was needed there. EXCEPT, for the Swivel frame, they had to move that crossmember forward in order to make room for the swivel frame. The NAPCO t-case sits really far back on my '59. I'm guessing they shortened the front driveshafts and moved the transfercase forward. Again, making it unlikely that it was done in the factory.