Featured is a fine looking 1952 Chevy 3100 Half Ton. Chevy’s Advance Design light trucks are head turners and our featured Chevy 3100 is no exception.
Chevy’s All New Advance Design Light Trucks
The 1948-1953 Chevrolet Series 3100 half-ton pickups ( half-tons were known as 3100, 3/4-tons 3600 and one-ton trucks 3800 ) were totally redesigned a few years after the end of the war. This redesign took Chevrolet light trucks into a new era of comfort, more convenience, and passenger car type style. Chevy’s restyled “Advance-Design” trucks were introduced in 1947 which was ahead of its first new postwar passenger automobiles.. This restyling was essentially unchanged in appearance through the 1953 model year. The first Advance Design Chevy trucks displayed grilles very similar in style to Chevrolet passenger cars.
The Chevy 3100 Offered the Best Comfort For Driver and Passengers
The Advance Design Chevy trucks offered the operator much better comfort. The truck cab itself was wider, with both more head and more leg room. It could seat three people. For 1952 the outer door handles were made push button as opposed to the previous turn down style.The trucks cab was Unisteel. This meant that the top, the side panels, the back, windshield frame, the cowl and floor were all welded together to make it one single unit.
Visibility from the cab was improved. The windshield was larger, and corner panel windows helped reduce blind spots adding to safety. The corner windows were an option but were standard with the Deluxe Cab. Advance Design trucks offered a thicker dashboard, floor mats and better insulation than prior Chevy models which allowed the cab to be quieter. The dashboard had a push-button truck radio and speaker and an ashtray plus a large glove compartment box.. As far as the hauling capability of these Chevy 3100’s, the bed was 50 inches wide with stronger front panels and tailgates than before. Chevy designation 3100 means a one-half ton short bed pickup
1952 Chevrolet 3100 Half Ton Specifications
The 1952 Chevy 3100 came with a 216 cubic inch Thriftmaster or with a 235 cubic inch Loadmaster inline six engine. Horsepower was 90 and 105 respectively.
Transmission was either a three or four speed column mounted manual.
Brakes were four wheel mechanical drum.
Suspension were semi-elliptic leaf springs The 1952 Chevys had front and rear semi-elliptic leaf-front and rear.
The Chevy 3100 had a 116.0 inch wheelbase with an overall length of 196.6 inches.
Serial numbers for the Advanced Design pickups are found on the left front body hinge pillar, except on models with a cowl less windshield. With those models the serail numbers are located on the left hand cowl side inner panel.
Related Auto Museum Online articles are found on the links below..
Reference material for this article includes..Chevy Trucks: 100 Years of Building the Future by authors Larry Edsall and Alan Batey..Collectors’ Cars: A Generation of Post-War Classics by Julian Brown..National Chevrolet Assoc.
The 1952 Chevrolet 3100 Collector Truck
Currently, light trucks from the 1950’s and 1960’s are very popular with collectors. They are realizing values not seen before. Light trucks such as the first Ford F Series and the Chevy 3100 Advance Design are two good examples of classic trucks that should hold their value well.
The Chevrolet 3100 Short Bed Half Ton’s are the gold standard of classic light pickups and the most popular style of these is the Five Window cab.
The Chevy Advance Design was the first restyle after World War Two and they caught on with buyers from the start. Those 3100’s from the first few years of the 1950’s would have cost buyers just a few thousand dollars at that time. Currently the average asking prices for these same model range from about $35,000 to $60,000 and some even higher.
(Article and photos copyright Auto Museum Online)