Chevrolet had a very diverse line of vans on tap in 1963. The genuine Step-Van, the light-truck based panel van, and the Corvan. It was the Step van that was available with the Chevy II 153 four.
Vintage PR Shot: Three Very Different 1963 Chevrolet Vans/Panel Trucks – Guess Which One Came With A Four?
– Posted on March 12, 2023
Would guess that next to none were built with the 4. Same as very few Chevy 11 came with the 4.
I knew it was the walk in truck as IH also did some really small engines in their Metro lines. For in-town delivery, campus or small municipality maintenance vehicle. Likely paired with a very steep rear axle ratio so it can move the weight at a sacrifice of being capable of highway speeds.
I would have guessed the Corvan because a vehicle that cool doesn’t need a six or an eight cylinder to prove itself.
Never any kind of Corvair made with anything other than the flat six. The 80 HP version originally installed in the forward control cars isn’t particularly zippy. It would easily beat out a VW van but that’s about it. Many owners have swapped in the later 110 or 140 HP engines in.
How long did those early 80HO engines last ? .
Longer I’d think from less stress .
-Nate
Wasn’t the Step Van still called the “Dubble Duti” in 1963 ? .
IHC actually assembled come METRO vans with the tiny 1500CC BMC four banger .
Sad that good quality Step vans seem extinct ~ Boyertown among others made fantastic all aluminum bodes .
-Nate
The Rivian EV vans are pretty cool.
I wonder if the failure of the radical Corvair passenger van had anything to do with GM’s slow and conservative (followed by the Dustbusters) response to Chrysler’s minivans 20 years later.
Probably had more to do with the Corvair van’s floor being on three different levels to clear the powertrain, along with high liftover on the rear barn doors, whereas the Ford and Dodge competition had a flat floor that van buyers expect.
The Step-Van 7 was a weird little van. It had a unique 102″ wheelbase chassis with front and rear coil spring suspension borrowed from the C-10 pickup. The 230 cube in-line 6 became the standard engine later on but I think a lot of the early ones had the 153 4 cylinder.
I correctly guessed the Step-Van, which doesn’t look all that different from the Iron Duke-powered Grumman LLV postal delivery vehicles that have served since the 1980s, and that engine is sort of a descendent of the Chevy II four. Chevy didn’t bother with four-bangers in their pickup trucks or derivatives thereof at that time, and they had no 4-cyl air-cooled engine suited for Corvair duty.
International Harvester made a very similar little van called the Metro-Mite. It had the “half V8” 4 cylinder Scout engine and 3 speed transmission with a long shift lever protruding from the floor just after of the engine doghouse. The only seat was on a folding pedestal so either side of the truck could be used for egress to make deliveries. The two front doors were of the sliding type, and at the rear the truck I drove had two side hinged doors that together were about half the total width of the box. As I recall, the cargo floor was probably between six and seven feet long at most. These were tiny, tough little trucks, crude but durable, and quite squirrelly on rough pavement when unladen. About what you would expect from a farm equipment/heavy truck manufacturer.
I drove a Micro-Mite on 1960s – shifter was on column – 4 cylinder was half a V8 -power was OK – good for 50 approx. on highway – had to be careful shifting from 1 to 2, might go into reverse and damage trany – nice to stand-up inside – billchrest
Rare, but the Detroit Diesel 3-53 was optional on some Step Vans. Yes, a three cylinder, but two stroke, so 3=6?
Essentially so. 3-53 and 3-71 Detroits were amazingly useful engines, often found in loaders, backhoes, mobile cranes, etc., and, as you said, in trucks. They were durable and efficient, but worked best at the top of their RPM range, which made them sound (by virtue of their being two-strokes) as if they were running far faster than their actual redline of 2000 to 2200 RPM, as I recall. You sure could hear one comin’!
Detroit Diesel “Road Oilers” were also extremely popular in gensets, APU’s, water pumps in the middle of nowhere……
As mentioned, no matter how many cylinder it had or didn’t they make a *very* distinctive sound at full chat .
(? did I mention the endless oil weeps, leaks, seeps and exhaust spray ?) .
I _STILL_ use my Detroit Diesel Green OEM motor paint, it’s glorious in the right application .
-Nate
A big “uh huh” on that sound!
I often think about trips to a particular scrap yard in my youth, and one of the things that’s perma-etched into my brain is the sound of the Detroit (I’m going to guess that it was a 3-53) ripping away on the magnetic crane that was busily separating and loading piles of scrap into open topped box cars from open til close every day. There was a pile of automotive hulks stacked up at the other end of the property, which you were allowed to pull parts off of for 10 cents per pound, though there was a strict NO CLIMBING ON CARS policy and signs reminding you of that everywhere you looked. Of course everything we wanted to pull parts of of was higher up the stack, so we had to sneakily ascend the pile while making sure the grumpy crane operator didn’t catch a glimpse of us… You could always tell when you’d been spotted, as the frantic Green Jimmy would come down to idle just before a voice bellowed across the yard ordering us back down in-between bursts of profanity.
I always wondered how they managed to put the old vehicles we kids wanted to strip out, way up high……
I’m sure you clearly remember when you’d be up there and a car wold shift a bit, sometimes crashing into another junker .
After a few near misses I simply stopped climbing up unless they were on racks .
So many cool old cars gone to waste .
-Nate
Just a year later, the van called “Van” also received the 153 I-4. The brochure quotes it at 90hp, only 5 fewer than the base Corvan H-6
I can see a handful of places where the 153 would make sense in a vehicle such as the Step-Van. Applications that involve puttering around at low speeds with reasonable loads… Ice cream trucks are probably the first thing that comes to mind.
One of the largest of Gm’s intended markets for the 4 cylinder chassis used in the step van, was for the hundreds of small local dairies that offered home deliveries of milk and dairy products. The majority of the bodies used in milk deliveries were manufactured by various regional manufacturers. These vans rarely saw speeds above 40, and due to constant start- stop use, the smaller engines gave better MPG.
I have a 67 Chevy step van has the straight 6 with 3 on the tree
Ex police stake out van
40000 miles on odo original
I used it for greenhouse business bringing plants to the farmers market
Ed :
_GREEN_ with envy ! .
-Nate