A Tornado-Damaged ’55 Chevy Finds New Life

In 1994, Denny and Dawn Johns picked up a ’55 Chevy two-door sedan. Along with Dale Johns, the couple runs Van Buren, Arkansas’ D&D Specialty Cars (479/414-2654), so it was no huge deal to think they would quickly rebuild the ’55 into something very special; after all, they had sold the car and its rebuild to Ed Johns, Denny’s father.

But about a year later, a major tornado tore through Van Buren, and along with most everything else, it left the ’55 demolished from bumper to bumper. Since the car wasn’t the only thing destroyed in the tornado’s path, it took a back seat as the Johns family rebuilt their homes and their business. Then in 2003, Ed sold the ’55 back to Denny and Dawn, and the couple decided to rebuild the car for themselves. Apparently the original plan was to build a nice driver, but once under way, Denny says, “We couldn’t find a good stopping point.” So they didn’t—stop, that is—until three years later.

A Custom Tube Frame and Suspension

Dale Johns and the D&D crew first rebuilt the original frame before all involved decided the car needed something more, something better. So they started over, creating a unique round-tube perimeter frame that’s such a work of art it’s almost a shame the car needs to have a body. To the frame mounts a Kugel independent rear suspension with a 9-inch centersection, filled with 3.70 gears and inboard disc brakes with Wilwood calipers. Air springs allow the frame to lay nearly flat on the ground, though the wheel-and-tire package does produce an attractive rake. That package includes huge 22×10-inch Boyd Coddington Quasi wheels swathed in 305/30R22 Dunlop tires.

D&D narrowed the Kugel independent front suspension, for reasons we’ll address later. Another set of air springs rests between a pair of polished A-arms, and a Wilwood caliper bolts to each polished Kugel spindle. The steering rack offers power assist to help steer the big 19×8-inch Boyds and 245/35R19 Dunlops.

Power and Precision: The Engine and Transmission

Not too far away from D&D Specialty Cars is Mark Campbell’s infamous Street & Performance shop—located about 90 minutes due south in Mena, Arkansas. So, while D&D rebuilt virtually the entire ’55, it turned to S&P for help with the engine. S&P began with a 283 bored 0.030 inch over with standard GM heads and internals, and then filed the block smooth before adding S&P’s Ram Jet fuel-injection system. Street & Performance also supplied the valve covers, the air cleaner and the serpentine accessory belt drive system. D&D’s Jim Dougan built the wild stainless steel headers, and D&D also prepped the transmission case as carefully as it did the block. D&D de-burred and painted the Turbo 350 and installed a double-pass fluid cooler to make for smoother shifting and longer transmission life.

Tornado Repairs and Body Modifications

When we asked whether the ’55 needed much bodywork, Denny Johns’ response was: “Big time!” In fact, the car looked as if it had been hit by a tornado.

Normally old cars deteriorate from the bottom up; this is one of the few ruined from the top down. A new roof and quarter panels were necessary to square up the car, but bodywork was hardly limited to fixing only the things the tornado had damaged. For the most part, the builders preserved the external sheetmetal, but they did eliminate the vent windows from the doors. When you consider just how much work has been put into this car, the body is surprisingly stock. In part, the House of Kolor Tangelo Pearl tries to trick the eye into thinking the body is more radical than it really is. In addition, since the 210 came with relatively little chrome, it appears the builders shaved off much of what was never actually there. The one-piece California bumpers, front and rear, also create a somewhat custom appearance.

Innovative Inner Fenders and Front Suspension

The real custom sheetmetal, though, is under the hood. D&D smoothed the firewall, but it’s the inner fenders that deserve special mention. The shop didn’t want to cover up all its hard work on the frame and suspension by reusing the original inner fenders, so it opted for a unique solution; D&D modified a pair of motorcycle fenders to fit over the huge tires, creating special mounts to bolt these new inner fenders to the spindles. Thus, the inner wheel covers (fenders) turn with the wheels, hovering close above them and allowing plenty of room to view the frame and all the engine details. The narrowed front suspension is a result of this need—for adequate turning clearance. Naturally, all of this metal is finished just as finely as all of the exterior panels.

Luxurious Interior Design and Entertainment

Denny’s specialty at D&D is upholstery, and he got to work covering a set of highly sculpted Chrysler 300 seats, using dark brown leather. This same leather covers the custom center console, shift boot, Budnik steering wheel, door panels and the top of the dash. The rest of the dash is painted to match the body, and the leather and paint conceal quite a number of alterations. The passenger-side dash hump is noticeably absent and is now relocated to the bottom center of the dash to house the Vintage Air A/C controls. The A/C vents and air suspension gauges are just a tad lower, while Dakota Digital gauges and the Pioneer stereo head are the only other items in the otherwise smooth dash.

That stereo system is something else, too. The head unit features DVD, navigation and voice-recognition capabilities, and the Pioneer six-disc CD/MP3 changer and TV tuner offer plenty of entertainment options. Each of the four audio channels gets its own 110-watt amp, with a 600-watt amp on each 12-inch sub. The speakers are all Clif Designs parts, and there are even dual 7-inch monitors, and one 17-inch LCD monitor in the leather-upholstered trunk.

A Showstopper That Earns Awards

That Denny and Dawn Johns’ ’55 has earned awards and honors just about everywhere the couple has taken the car comes as no surprise. The 210 has earned them Pro’s Picks, Fab Fives and many more awards, in addition to serving as a pretty good indication of the work the shop performs. A bright orange ’55 Chevy, with a one-off tube frame and 19- and 22-inch wheels…well, that alone should garner quite a bit of attention, but when packaged and finished as well as this two-door has been, be ready to be blown away.