55 wagon turned camino, was there ever one that looked good?

lookin for pics of 55 chevy wagon, turned into a camino. i have seen some, but they never look that good. does anybody have pics of any that do? thanks.

 

I'm with you...seen some tri-five wagon efforts, but all looked at the best homemade and at the worst - cobbled together with plywood, plexiglass windows and lots of putty. Not to get too O/T, but there is an excellent conversion of a 66 Nova wagon into an El Camino currently for sale on Ebay...I've never seen a more factory-looking job than that red beauty.

dj

 

this 57 came out ok.

I have tried thinking of all sorts of 567 elco ideas, and I just think the body style is a tough one to get the roof to look good.

somewhere in all my magazines I have a pic of a gm artist rendering elco concept for a 55.
It also did not look too good. basically imagine the shape of a wagon roof vertical behind straight 2 door sedan posts, with a small back window.

It just looked real boxy.

 

Joe Bailon built a nice '55 years ago. Candy red, chopped, Nomad wheel openings, with exhaust stacks behind the cab. Was on the cover of Custom Cars Magazine. I'll scan and post later...on the way to a show today. Hooray for Texas weather!

Edit: Here it is...



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Saw a 57 Nomad in South Dakota one time, they had done a nice job. But couldn't they just have bought a pick up? Freaked me out, not my idea of how to treat a Nomad. ~Sololobo~

 

Not a fan..but I remember in the late sixties it wasn't that un-common to turn the 2 door wagons (Chev and Ford) into El Camino/Ranchero type vehicles, so I know there are some out there. That black '57 in the above post is a good example, if there is such a thing.

 

Sorts looks like a 50-60's era boat with 57 rear wings. I car/truck is a hard thing to pull off.

 

Google image, ''1950's cadillac flower car'', [for the funerals], those things look like pickups. Are you thinkin about cuttin up the ''crawler''?

 

There was a 56 Nomad in my home town that had been wrecked(rear of the roof damaged)that a local body shop converted into an el Camino.Used a section of roof and rear window from a 59 Thunderbird.The B pillars were curled in a bit and welded to the T-Bird roof and a steel piece welded in under the backlite.Top edge of the body finished off and smoothed.Nice conversion and it had plenty of headroom.The 57 pictured with the 59-60 roof section probably does not have a lot of headroom;especially if you are about 6 ft tall.
The 56 was pictured in a group shot on a R&C cover sometime in the 1980's.Wish I had a picture of it(hell I wish it was sitting in my garage!).

 

I like the look of that 57 myself. JC

 

i cant find the pics, but there is a orange 57 in sweden or norway that was posted on here not to long ago.

nomads seem to work out the best, but pretty big waste of a nomad.

 

I bought a 55 for parts years ago that was exactly as you described. The old guy used plywood for the rear panel, plexiglass for the rear window, a ton of bondo and silicon sealer, and hand painted it Salmon pink with a white top. It had been a 150, 2 dr wagon; six cylinder with a 3-speed. The engine had broken the nylon cam gear right after the engine had been rebuilt, and the guy parked it. It was beyond ugly. Butch/56sedandelivery.

 

NO WAY! found another wagon, its missin all the glass. i figured it might be worth tryin to do a camino. i saw one for sale years ago, and it really had a cool look to it. that was the only one i ever saw that looked good. just cant find the pics. it was just a wagon, NOT a nomad. i wouldn't even think about cuttin a nomad.

 

check out this thread with my friends 56

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=399170



.

 

This was my friend's project that he drug out of a ditch and fixed. He chopped the top and worked in the back glass/surround from a late fifties Ranchero. Somebody had welded it some sort of full size chevy pickup back glass frame and it looked horrible.

He did all the body work, subframed the car, and swapped in a 400 Pontiac. He used it to tow his boat/trailer to and from the lake every weekend--about a 120 mile round trip.

He called it an "El Safino"... I think it's pretty cool...

 

I was going to mention this one myself. Very smooth Five Five.

 

Seems like there was a black, flamed '55 Nomad conversion on the cover of Hot Rod in the mid -70's. Of course, my memory may be a bit hazy due to growing up in the mid 70's.

 

That is my buddy Tommy's car. He still has it. It was converted in the very early 60s using a 59 Ford wagon upper tailgate glass assembly. Still looks the same today. I may have pictures of it if I can find them.

 

Here is the magazine cover

 

That's the one. That was one of my favorite issues. Practically fell apart from being looked at for many years. That is one sweet ride.

 

The ''Nomad'' doors and roof section, are what make that one work, in my opinion.

 

It's a really cool car to see in person. If I was a millionare I would throw money at him until he sold it to me. He said he went to the national nomad convention many years ago and they got so pissed at him for cutting up a nomad they gave him his entry fee back and asked him to leave. He said it was built originally by a wrecking yard as a delivery truck before he got it.

 

Some folks have no sense of adventure.

 

That looks really cool ! I would love to see some more pics of it if you have any.

 

not what it looks like now paint wise but this is from the earlier days ..

 

looks pretty much the same last time I saw it.

 

I would rather have the wagon than the elcamino conversion, and besides putting glass back in it would be easier and cheaper than what it would cost to build a elk that probably wouldnt look as good as the wagon in the first place.
Just my .02

 

The 57 in post three has my vote.

 

I always thought cutting the roof off a Nomad would look good but that 55 in post twenty five is not how I imagined it. It needs that full width pillar behind the door like a Nomad to be balanced.

 

Love the car, hate the paint, and am not so taken with the chop, but I could live with it. This could be cleaned up to look great. I don't understand why so many people start out so well and then end up doing some, quite frankly, tasteless things.