Mental Chevy A modifi ed pick-up but not the kind you’re expecting

Most of the modded trucks you see in this magazine have been built for off-roading. Like most of them, James Evans’ Chevy S10 SS is a family car – but its spiritual home is the kind of track you’re not thinking of when you fi t a suspension lift…

Modifi ed pick-ups take many forms. Here at 4x4, we tend to concentrate on the lifted, lockered, winched-up sort… they might be built for work, play, travel or some combination of the three, but no man with a good car needs to be justifi ed so it’s all good.

What they tend not to be built for is drag racing. But any modifi ed pick-up is still a modifi ed pick-up, right? And as we were saying, no man with a good car needs to be justifi ed. Ten points if you know where that quote comes from.

You defi nitely know where James Dean Evans’ name comes from. And by extension you know that his parents must have been cool to name him after the original rebel without a cause. Sure enough, he says his family have lived and breathed petrol since way back. ’As far back as I can remember,’ he tells us, ‘cars were the main priority in our lives. My grandad, the great Alan Evans, was the founder of Bamby Cars (a Hull-based company which, for a spell in the mid-1980s, manufactured single-seat city cars under its own brand name). Then my parents, uncle, aunty and family friends used to run the original Bomber County Cruises in Manby back in the 1990s and early 2000s.

‘So it was pretty much set that cars was the life I was going to take. I know, ruined from such a young age! But hey, it was the way of life – and not a bad one at that.’

As he was growing up, the variety of cars in his life was startling. Everything from his stepdad’s custom Model T to an array of ex-Army trucks which the family used to tool around in. And through it all, he developed a taste for the most obscure vehicles he could fi nd.

Which brings us to his pick-up truck. You may well recognise it as a Chevy S10 from the mid-90s, but a further ten points are on offer if you can tell which model it is.

Back then, the S10 sold in absolutely monumental volumes. But between 1994 and 1998, the high-performance SS model shifted less than 12,000 units. And that’s what this is.

By high-performance, we mean a 4.3-litre V6 (the one that came to the UK aboard the Blazer of that era) putting out about 180bhp. It went out via a limited-slip rear diff, but that wasn’t even going to be much help off-road, except possibly when giving it death on gravel trails, because this here pick-up is two-wheel drive.

What, in 4x4 magazine? Yes. We wouldn’t normally entertain such a thing but what the hell, this is the pick-up issue after all. And besides, remember, it’s a modifi ed pick-up, and we love those…

So anyway, as well as not having four-wheel drive, the S10 SS had lowered suspension. But it’s all been modifi ed anyway, so you can forget about that. Not that it’s been lifted, of course.

So, fi rst things fi rst. That 4.3-litre six-pot has long since been fetched out for a proper engine. Several proper engines, in fact. Just one at a time, don’t worry, but they’ve culminated in a 6.0-litre LS2 chucking about 600bhp through a built 4L80E auto into a narrowed 9-inch Ford rear axle with 3.30:1 gears.

The engine was installed by the truck’s previous owner, but it’s been under James’ ownership that it has started to close in on its full potential. It runs a smoothed inlet manifold and 1 7/8” Stainless Works long-tube headers, the latter going twin 3” stainless exhausts, as well as DSS Racing FX forged pistons and rods, a BTR Stage 3 racing cam and a Canems programmable ECU. The fuel system runs a custom tank, braided lines and twin aero-spec Bosch 44 pumps, Spal fans pull air through an oversize custom radiator and to help keep it cool (in every sense of the word), James tends to view a bonnet as an item that belongs on other people’s cars.

Matey also fi tted the 4L80E, again with uprated cooling and with a performance TCI to get it shifting as fast as it was going to need to. The narrowed Ford 9-incher contains Moser shafts and an uprated LSD, and very wisely it’s been con-

verted to disc brakes. Caltrac links and single split leaves hold it in place, the latter also keeping the vehicle up with the aid of adjustable shocks.

Result? ‘Some may call it a sleeper,’ says James, ‘being as it looks like a stock S10 minus the 3-inch exhaust exists and the 275 radials in the back. But it was what I wanted – a truck that I can use regularly to pick the kids up from school but then run serious times down the strip.’

Which it does – high 11s and low 12s so far, but by the time next season comes around James’ plan is to have given it a lot more than just that.

‘Hopefully through the winter we are aiming to have a strip down and rebuild,’ he says, ‘as well as heading over to forced induction. I’m hoping to run a large twin-turbo set up.’ The price of the supercharging options has a lot to do with that; anyway, his aim with this part of the project is simple: ‘the magic 1000bhp mark.’

That ought to get him down the strip a good bit faster, all the while without making the truck any less of a tool for kid-shifting and general daily duties. ‘What more could you need?’ he asks. ‘The truck turns heads everywhere it goes. Kids smile at it, blokes take pictures and love it. You can’t drive anywhere in it and not be noticed.’ He’d certainly be noticed if he took it green laning…

No, this is not your typical 4x4 feature truck. But even if the purpose is different, the intent is just the same. And that intent is to put a big grin on the face of anyone who comes close.

Oh yes, and it’s also to be James’ family car, and a jolly good one it is too. And lest we forget, no man with a good car needs to be justifi ed.