Was wondering what the production was on the '58 Chevrolet Delray Sedan Delivery. They lump these in with the trucks in the Pontiac and Ford books so I assume if it's available you can find it in the Krause Standard Catalog of Trucks...
Reason being I found one, but the frame is lousy in it as are the pans and fenders. Debating picking it up and seeing if I can turn it over to someone who needs one since if I don't nab it it will get crushed -
In 1958, Chevrolet did not break out the production figures for the Sedan Delivery, as while it was cataloged with pickups and light commercial trucks, its production seems to have been added to the Delray Yeoman 2-door station wagon production figures--making it pretty hard to guesstimate.
I owned one from 1993 to 1999, and when I tried to track down the production figures, it became apparent, from what I was learning from members of a sedan delivery club that the last year of verifiable sedan delivery production at Chevy was 1957, when they produced more than 7,000 of them, a good portion of which went to the US General Services Administration. However, I was told in the midst of that research, that for 1958, the USGSA (buying back then for all US government departments, including USPOD, that Ford won the government contract for sedan deliveries (for use in Special Delivery and Parcel Post--both of which were delivered by specialized letter carriers back then, separate from one's regular carrier). This was apparently due to a GSA specification, beginning for 1958, that sedan deliveries were to be equipped with quarter windows, rather than the blanked off sign panels one usually associates with this body style. For whatever reason, Chevy came in higher in bidding, and Ford won the contract, delivering approximately 3000 sedan deliveries to GSA, their courier being easily fitted with a window frame upper rear quarter, and a single pane of glass installed, based on the 2dr Ranch Wagon. Ford apparently was able to spread the cost across most of the rest of the Courier production, by the simple expedient of fitting many civilian Couriers with a recessed steel sign panel, simply by spotwelding in a sheet metal panel in place of the glass in the government-contracted cars, and running a quick bead of lead around that--joining the two types in the same production runs (there were still 58 Ford Couriers built with the more traditional flush sign panel, the same as used in 1957). I have seen all three variants of the 58 Courier. Based on this, plus the general decline in Chevrolet sales for '58, and the entire auto industry as well in that recession-plagued year, it seems reasonable that somewhere between 2000 and 2500 Chevy Delray Sedan Deliveries left the assembly halls.
Now for the car you are looking at: Does it still have the one-piece rear liftgate? I've seen several (including mine when I bought it) that have had the one piece lift gate replaced with the conventional station wagon clamshell tailgate--if so, you may have some trouble locating the correct gate, and likely will have to do some welding and filling in the rear door sill as well (mine came with the original gate as part of the package--had to install it myself, a [censored] of a job!).
You say the frame is bad on it? Not a major problem, as solid 58 Chevy frames are out there, and for station wagon bodies, any sedan or hardtop chassis will fit, they are all the same. If the frame and floor pans are infested with tinworm, likely the rockers and rear quarters are as well--unless you are prepared to do the work of welding in new pieces (depending on the level of rust, you may be faced with making most of the new floor pan, as I believe the only patches available are for the rear foot wells. In any event, the floor pan is the same for all '58 Chevy bodies, only the rear section (a separate part) is different on the wagon bodies). Otherwise, you could easily have far more money in the restoration than the car would ever be worth. The same thing will be true of the interior parts--there is a sheet metal box spot welded to the floor, behind the front seats that, if the foot wells are gone, likely the bottom edge of that panel is gone as well--a new one will have to be made, but a competent sheet metal fabrication shop should be able to do that for you. The interior side panels from the B-post all the way back to the rear corners is done in tempered masonite, and was painted silver when new. The cargo floor panels were plywood, all the way to the back, covered in grey battleship linoleum--which is still available. The correct seats may be a bit of work to find, but I believe the driver's seat and the optional folding right side jump seat are pretty much the same as '55-57. Exterior trim is another matter, the side spears can come from any Delray 2dr, but the rear quarter panel upper trim (which wraps around the end of the quarter, and down and around the taillight cove) is unique to the Delray wagon line, being the only trim level for which 2dr wagons were available.
When last I looked, the upper level of value for a top notch 58 Sedan Delivery was in the $13-$14 thousand range, so you might do well to keep searching for a good, solid one--they do still exist out there.
Art
April 20th, 2005
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