Despite what you might think, classic American cars are more popular overseas than they've ever been in the past. Whether because of the internet or some other factor, it seems national boundaries aren't the hurdles toward enthusiasm they once were. This is doubly true when it comes to custom cars and trucks. Want proof positive? Look no further than what Luke Dale and his shop, Diesel Pump UK out of Riccal, North Yorkshire, is getting up to lately. It may look like a typical 1952 GMC truck, but it's anything but ordinary, trust us.
With not all that much different from the Chevrolet Advance Design line of light and medium-duty trucks made from just after World War II until around 1955, what Luke and his team have done to this particular model differentiates Chevy from GMC much better than how General Motors did it back in the day. In its era, these trucks left the factory with one of three anemic straight six engines that, while acceptable for the time, had a shelf life like an apple in your fridge that you forgot to throw out for months. So to say, some much better engines were launched in the immediate aftermath of this truck's production.
With that in mind, what better way to solve things than swapping the old six-pot for a Mercedes OM606 three-liter diesel straight six engine famous for its use in the W124 E-Class and the W140 S-Class? It's not exactly a modern powertrain anymore; we'll grant you that. But come on, compared to what this truck started with, it's like you swapped this truck's old engine for whatever they used to power the Starship Enterprise or the Millenium Falcon. That's especially true when you consider the new motor is in the process of being twin-charged, meaning it uses both an exhaust gas-driven turbo and a mechanical supercharger to force as much air and fuel into the engine as possible for peak performance.
Using a Borg Aarner 66 mm turbo and a Kenne Bell 2.8-liter supercharger nearly as large as the engine itself, we get the sense this truck's going to be rolling coal better than any other truck in Great Britain pretty soon. The upgraded connecting rods and valve springs will do wonders for making this motor not spontaneously disassemble itself with every motorway pull. With a beefy GM 4L80-E four-speed automatic gearbox behind the engine, we have every reason to believe the killer combo of an American body and a German engine built by a Brit has what it takes to turn heads wherever it looks. One thing's for sure, we can't wait to see what this beast looks like when it's all buttoned up and finished.
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