00:04Number one, it's attention getter. Number two, it's definitely a fan favorite. Number
00:11three, it was a lot of work.
00:15Former car race driver Davey Hamilton has swapped the fast lane to build a one-of-a-kind 1952
00:21Ford backwards pickup truck.
00:23I'm Davey Hamilton and this is my 1952.
00:30Ford backwards truck.
00:32Wait! It's going backwards! What the heck?
00:37So a friend of mine up in Maine, who is a former racer, I went to his place and he
00:43actually
00:43had a truck that was somewhat like this, but I took it another step farther.
00:54So a lot of the trucks, older trucks have really small back windows. They don't have the wide ones.
00:59They're still little and I'm from Indianapolis. So I looked all around the Indy area, couldn't
01:03find a truck with a big back window. I happened to find this truck like three miles from my
01:07father's house. He sent me some pictures, I go, perfect, get it.
01:11As far as the body, it's all the original body. The frame's original. The steering column and the
01:16pedals, it's all still original. And then we had to put the lights on, obviously, going the wrong
01:21direction. I didn't know what to do for a bed cover, so we figured to keep it rustic looking.
01:27We just use this piece of plywood. But then you can see inside, it's just a 350 Chevy engine with
01:37a
01:37turbo 350 transmission. One key thing was a big radiator because the air going through the tailgate
01:45wasn't that good. So you can see we had to cut a hole for your feet to go inside the
01:50bed. So we
01:50had to seal all this up, make sure no water and stuff came in inside the truck. We actually took
01:56seats out of a Clarisse Razor. We just had them, right? But the dash, we built it. My dad actually
02:00built and broke this dash out of aluminum, got all the gauges in it. I always get mixed up on
02:06which
02:07door to get in. But obviously, this is the door, the right door is the one you're supposed to get
02:13in
02:13all the time. So I just took a racing fuel cell and put it in for a gas tank.
02:23Fenders, brake lights, tail lights, blinkers. It has to have windshield wipers. It passed,
02:28it has everything that's required to have in a car. All the body mounts had to be turned around
02:33and switched. So getting it to where it looked proper and like it was a regular truck, per se,
02:40like it looks pretty good. It looks like it's supposed to go forward. And so it took some time
02:43and to get everything leveled out and make sure that it was mounted properly so it didn't bounce
02:48around. This backwards vehicle is also easy to maneuver once you get the hang of it. It's easy to
02:56drive. It's got, like I said, good brakes and all that that goes with it. But it's still in the
03:01day,
03:01it's still a 1952 Ford truck, right? So, but it's fun. It's not too aerodynamic with the cab backwards.
03:09I'll tell you that. The front end is so long. It's the bed and you're looking over the bed. So
03:14it takes a
03:14little bit to learn where you're at. And as you can tell, it's a little tighter, right? The cockpit's
03:19not quite as much room as if you turned around. Had it up to 85. I really don't want to
03:24go any faster.
03:24It goes pretty good at that speed. It doesn't handle great. I definitely don't want to put it on a
03:29racetrack. It's really a 52 Ford truck.
03:35I don't even know how to value that thing, right? I don't have any idea what it's worth to somebody,
03:40but it's unique. I've been offered some money for it, but I wasn't ready to sell.
03:45Unsurprisingly, this unique vehicle gets a lot of attention out on the road.
03:50You know, the guys at the bar over there. People get a kick out of it. That's always fun,
03:58right? When somebody, when it makes somebody's day, it's probably cool. People have told me that.
04:02I go, you know what? I haven't, I haven't smiled like this for a long time. So that's pretty cool,
04:06right?
04:17That's the kind of reaction you get, right? People just like this gentleman. They want to stop you.
04:25They want to talk to you. They want to look it over and ask questions. So you definitely don't
04:30want to be in a hurry. The town I'm from, everybody talks about it, but it still gets reactions.
04:35There's new people that see it every time we take it out. It's definitely a crowd getter.
04:40I haven't been pulled over yet. I've kind of been waiting. I actually passed a cop once. He waved,
04:45and off he went, like most people. You know where in the rules it says where the body's supposed to
04:50go?
04:50Yeah, it doesn't matter.
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