ICON TR 10 Old School Edition CHEVROLET 3100 PICK UP!

[Music] well hello my icon friends and family welcome back to another in-depth final test drive tour of the latest icon creation now this one's going to go into a bit of high detail and to try and keep you engaged i'm going to break up the format a little bit and get down into the weeds why am i putting you through that you may wonder well the answer is because this is the very first example of a new model that we will continue to offer so those of you that are already familiar with our antics at icon are familiar with the fact that we offer new school and old school design packages now with our br bronco and fj series so just like it sounds old school is designed to be more under the radar retro vintage funky whereas new school is basically designed to be a little more technical industrial now either design package on a platform will share the same engineering foundations and it's generally about three dozen special tactile points or elements that we will redesign to create the kind of different vibe that you'll find in an old school or a new school so this is a 1950 chevrolet 3100 half ton five window pickup which we simply call the chevy thrift master thrift master was actually the series of motors the original 216 235 straight sixes not part of the vehicular branding but it's a lot easier to say than 3100 five window half ton pickup so there you go so this is the very first one that we have built in the old school theme and i am excited to show you around so let's get right into it up here in the front other details unique to the old school edition obviously chrome and stainless and a lot of chrome and stainless so with new school you can pick from chrome and stainless or a brushed nickel finish brush nickel looks pretty damn cool it does require a little bit more maintenance nickel is not as durable of a finish but it sure as hell looks cool and when you do the igl coating the ceramic nanoparticle that helps or if you don't want to blow the money on that just keep up with it and keep it coated with just conventional wax so we did the old nipple style carriage bolts for the bumpers because it's again more of a traditional approach we did the amber lens albeit led and we did headlights that keep the classic glass lens look but are actually light emitting diodes within the reflector body so it doesn't jump the shark but gives you that functionality now again for badging we did the original chevrolet badging on the nose but the infill quality was non-existent and it was blue and the blue just didn't make any sense we kept the red because it referenced the wheels and just kind of seemed to work however we killed the blue and we hand painted that insert in the darker green now early on when we first rendered this truck we were going to do a tritone situation now we ended up geeking out on that with the client who coincidentally is a repeat offender at icon and a dear friend of mine before he became a client in fact for years so we rendered it out and we kept playing and kept playing and kept playing so we ended up deciding to do this simpler two-tone but it's really still a tritone because if you look carefully there is a very thin hand painted color break between the white cab line and the primary body green that is a darker green now that darker green is also carried up on the hand-painted infill on the dash where it says chevrolet and also on the two-tone gauges designed specifically for this truck which i'll show you in a bit for the side badges so for those we use the same design that we did on new school because they were still very retro appropriate in their font and sort of layout design the only difference is again we crumbed them and then we took the opportunity to infill these pen lines in that dark green that's also picked up on the gauges and the belt line detail rearview mirrors we stayed stocked stayed retro they're kind of weird the position of this one has absolutely no relationship with the one on the driver's side but they actually work well that way and if you try to make them visually match they just don't work with the whole tritone situation or two toner one tone that's totally up to you and in fact i think i'm going to make the configurators you can visually render it all those different ways but for example the two-tone logical thing to do is along the belt line right at that curvature bubble there up in fact that was what chevy offered back in the day now it's kind of a rabbit hole once you start thinking about it because okay that's nifty but depending on the color balance well what if you did the white cab and what if you introduced the fenders running board splash shields rear fenders in another color as well or what if for example as we had originally rendered this one you did a darker green to a lighter green to the ivory white so it's super fun there's a lot of freedom there another detail with old school chrome stainless stuff more bright work whereas new school's going to be a lot more monochromatic and under the radar and pretty much nowadays on all of the thrift masters i've pretty much given up on the early style 47-53 i think it was up until 51 i'm sure someone's going to know better in common had this swing down style handle they just suck so now we're actually modifying all of our doors and configuring them with the more robust later design latches which then also work well with the updated patch assembly which is again a bear claw because the factory ones are painted keeping with the brightwork trim around this window we wrap that completely around so we do the brightwork bulb insert for the rear three windows also for the windshield that has a proper metal insert and it just i don't know it's got again more retro kind of fun charm going on to it so let's move on to the interior where there's all sorts of cool stuff going down there is so much going on on the interior frankly i hardly know where to start but since my arm is upon it let's start with the door so again same as old school and new school but chrome instead of satin nickel so this is a power window actuator and it has my nifty little gizmo box so from the driver's side if you double actuate down all windows down double actuate all windows up these as well as the seat recline hardware the exterior badging the armrest pretty much all of it i try to put myself in the theoretical shoes of one of my hero industrial designers raymond loewy and sort of ask myself okay if louie had designed those details originally what would he have done which was kind of a fun brain game to play in kind of confining my design direction on the choices i made there so again these are the same ones that we run in new school but the chrome finish just sets them up a little more retro the door panel is unique to old school i did this vertical sort of implied tuck and roll design to give it that vintage vibe and to kind of reference the original pattern of the stock ones but these are applied with a magnet system onto laser-cut marine board and that we don't have the ugly screws everywhere which just kind of bugged me pinstripe just being geeks we carried that pinstripe all the way through the door jambs so they wrap full dimensions all the way around which is kind of nifty these lower access panels on the doors are factory so those are always there and they just help you deal with the window regulator or whatever service needs you might have with glass new school or old school we don't segregate it's just about the style of the truck in your personal opinion so sometimes we do full clear laminated glass sometimes as in the case with this green truck we just couldn't pass on the opportunity to do like that old vintage coke bottle green laminated glass which is it's subtle but it's got a nice mild tint going on we also do the smoke gray or full blackout totally up to you now the dash there's a lot of changes going on there so steering column same one that we use in the new school ergonomically works out killer so you've got the tilt functionality which is super welcome the original columns kind of suck we have the tri-five chevy reproduction steering wheel reduced diameter we leather wrapped it in this case because it just feels a lot better than the plastic ring and in keeping with the design language established by the window regulators you'll notice that the turn signal stock ends as well as tilt hazard and transmission shifter control all have that same language those are all cnc'd by icon and chrome plated gauges really fun opportunity our friends at dakota digital came up with this new retro tech series which expands upon their already really cool functionality married to a vintage analog look now those guys understand me so they let me geek out and redesign the typeface and the layout and the graphic and then we machine the icon lizard in the center and also due to the layered sandwich dial design of these gauges that allowed us to again play with multiple tonal languages so you'll notice two different greens that are on the body are applied to different elements of the gauge design then the illumination is all led and backlit and it's there's so much new functionality with this new one the led screen is way cleaner and crisper and has more of a 3d effect than the early ones plus there's all sorts of enhanced functionality like 0 to 60 top speed recorded quarter mile you can get pretty nitty gritty and detailed on your psi and your amps and your volts and whatever the heck you want or if you just don't care leave it on odor or trip meter and rely on your more traditional gauge aesthetic so the illumination on these is just so cool and they did a really clever job of integrating the tachometer so you can buy this basic system direct from dakota but not with the art and layout or lizard that we designed for our trucks but check this out the tac uses the same indicators for speed but with this inner ring so the orange indicates the red line which is obviously programmable and then check it out i love it that's good stuff old school we took a completely different approach to the dash so gone is our beloved tap drop to reveal the modern double den audio system because well it just didn't seem to match so instead we kept basically the factory layout we deleted the radio hole that went up here we also deleted where the original wiper switch was up top center because no one ever knew where the heck it was and then down below here we created this bank of switches so you have audio base wipers fan vent temp parking brake headlights over here on the far left now the shape of these i didn't really invent anything i took the original one that was plastic and reinterpreted it in metal and then cnc the letters so they're debossed and they are in filled in fact when we just finished doing that dark green infill like you know the on the exterior badges and the pinstripe and across here in the center of the dash then last night driving home i find myself looking at my oddly generic infill in black on these switches i just can't stand for it so we're going to back up take those off and infill those in the same green so the audio system is bluetooth dependent running through a digital sound processor we're running focal audio speakers oddly enough just two in the front and bass in the rear but it's such a small cab and the digital sound processor gives us such great control of the audio this sound system just kills it without having to have a bunch of speakers cut into panels everywhere so you have individual control for primary system volume and separate control for the base tone volume we kept the somewhat useless original ashtray because well it was part of the design so this was another neat opportunity for the two-tone or tritone situation that i think i'm for now just going to work out with each and every client individually so in this case we thought it was cool to reintroduce the green to reference the main body and the gauges we also did that on the brightwork around the inside of the doors and the windshield frame the original am radio speaker now facilitates your primary ac vents they blow super strong i also put two more of those that are hiding on the outboard lower edges of the dash so with this small cab the ac really cools it off in a hurry it works out great of course our beloved foot possible actuated basketball hoop mercedes g-wagon stolen cup holders work quite nice down here low in these kick panels so as with all the thrift masters of course we're running power door locks which you can actuate of course from the door or from the key fob with the carpets we're doing our usual situations so of course my bodies get stripped their original bodies stripped to raw metal ills of time are addressed any welding patching done finish re-silica blasted powder coated in a suspended zinc epoxy based powder coated then block it fill it line sand it seal it and paint it after the paint cures then it goes back into a different oven at another facility when we apply the heat cured polyurea coating now that gets applied to the underside of the fenders front and rear as well as to the underside of the complete cabin as well as the inside floors of the cabin so that provides not only an insulation and sound deadening barrier but a significant rust barrier as well for carpet both new school and old school are running my beloved hargarden square weave from germany so super nice high quality vintage carpet it works well with either design language it's available in a wide range of colors in this case we did this nice warm brown and then we lined it in dynamat and then rubber backed it and then hemmed it in scrap leather from the seating and then there's one large one-piece floor mat on top of the removable fixed carpet on top of the dynamette and the linex polyurea so really nice controlled sound and heat environment in the cabin now for the seat as most of you know i'm quite the leather geek my nights and weekends pretty much are ocd time for me to geek out with my leathercraft hobby so i make all sorts of stuff uh belts wallets bags jackets you name it but that rich world of contacts in the leather world opens up a whole wide library of opportunities now when it comes to upholstery new school and old school i really wanted to differentiate you guys remember the gmc derelict that we built that truck was so cool it came out great now in the case of that truck i used the original bench seat frame and we spent countless hours trying to improve the ergonomics and functionality of it didn't work out so good in my opinion client digs it so fine with me but when it came time to really start thinking about a production intended model with this new old school nothing beats the seat that we use in the new school so i simply used it and all the bright work cnc details we created for it now what i did do though is change the layout of the upholstery and the foam sculpting details to be more retro so i introduced this sort of horseshoe pattern situation with a little vintage tuck and roll and then this green leather actually all of the leather with the exception of the headliner in this truck came from our friends at moore and giles back in virginia so incredible resources they know all the top tanneries big ones small ones you name it so we picked this cognac leather for the primary seating which by design it's a waxy chrome tan leather so it will scratch but it welcomes patina so even if you surface scratch it you can kind of lick your finger and rub it down and it kind of becomes one with the general vibe and character of the surface of the leather and over time it'll shine and fade and crinkle and it'll just get warmer and cooler as time goes by so the piping this leather i really wanted to introduce the contrast of the exterior paint so we had that leather created that's kind of a nubuck leather so it has a really nice tactile vibe to it french stitch details memory foam on the inside the articulating armrest that we do in all of them and then of course the ever so popular pocket for your phone on this front plane now other weird leather details the headliner so this headliner is a really unique leather that comes out of chicago from one of the oldest american tanneries called horween horween's super famous in the leather world i'll forgive you if you haven't heard of them and because i love tony the guy i made the truck for we went to japan together last year and i took inspiration from a cool little japanese mail pouch that i saw at an antique store there and i hand made and hand stitched this for tony so inside's all is typical you know the appraisal the owner's manual which no one ever reads and whatever all that sort of mundane stuff but i thought it would be fun to utilize the scrap leather and make this cool handmade bag that i know tony will really appreciate and keep but this leather is super nifty it has super funky surface grain and character to it it's highly irregular but that's kind of the point in the beauty of it and by doing this and deleting the cardboard insert headliner we create about three inches more headroom dome light stock other than an led insert three point seat belts for everybody oh one more cool detail i did for tony so in automotive history saint christopher even if you're not a religious guy is considered the patron saint of travelers so all the way back to horse carriages you would carry that or apply that medallion to your mode of transport so when tony and i were on a trip where were we i think we were in france we saw one at retromobile and i told tony the backstory and he dug it so when i stumbled across another one in england that matched the sort of tone of the interior leather it had to happen so my friends have this really cool antique store that's just off the hook called the piccadilly vaults in london they found this for me and we bought it and brought it over and i subtly applied it dead center in the back of the cab for tony it's so here in the back there's a whole bunch of things going on and most of them are hidden which is kind of fun so we did the traditional stainless steel bars in the bed which you've seen us do again and again and actually that's consistent with the new school version but it's just cool we changed the species of wood pretty much every single time this time for frankly no great deep story for reason other than we thought it looked cool we used african teak and the staining on this wood is a marine based satin stain and we kind of picked it because of its neutrality and because it created a really cool rich relationship with the cognac leather tones it just kind of brought everything together i think with the old schools especially there's a lot of responsibility to create like clear cohesive design flow with all the little bits and pieces for the tailgate it has a lot of the modern features that you'll find in our new school tailgate but with a more retro look we also have the hidden latch so what's cool about it is just shut it and it's shut no chains so no rattle no nonsense and then here on the inside you push and drop from this single actuator that actuates both of the bear claw latches on each side these are stainless steel they're safer and more definitive yes i have sat on tailgates on early chevy pickups more than once and have the chains break or the last not be connected correctly just to screw up my tailgate my bumper and my butt for the tail lights we use the same ones we use on the new school which are cnc machined aluminum led prismatic cool like patterns so the optics are really interesting but in the case of old school we chrome plated them for more old-school look reverse lights we hide in this otherwise completely useless rolled cavity in the bed rail ends and then the license plates you'll notice on this one the shapes a little funky that's because this truck's gonna live in texas and we found some really cool vintage restored texas license plates from 1950 so we custom-made the frame to match that for lighting we have the same light that we use in the fj's and the brs which is a cast stainless steel marine application waterproof sealed led it just gives you a nice warm bleed for the reverse camera in this case since we don't have the modern double den in dash unit we actually hit it underneath the rear bumper so it's super super subtle and it's bluetooth controlled direct to your phone so while i admittedly removed it for the photo shoot because it was kind of modern and ugly we have a somewhat generic adjustable magnetic iphone mount that is under dash client mounts his phone there manages his audio preferences or audio books music whatever he's pumping through a digital sound processor and then when you put the vehicle in reverse it automatically switches to that app and gives you the reverse camera view uh what else can i tell you fuel system we're running our usual stainless steel tank with uh baffles sump tank and in tank pump and filter system so you don't have one of those uh ever so unreliable frame rail mounted external pumps that just hum and make too much noise and the functionality of it it comes with a key which i think is kind of silly so i don't know if anyone's ever going to bother using it but it has this cool little lid with the swivel cap so you can lift it off with ease we did a little stay chain on this one so the client can't lose it because apparently that seems to be happening again and again but if it bugs you can remove it and leave it alone and that's cast stainless steel too which is quite nice another cool detail that we've been doing on these lately we machine these super groovy little anchor pins so the idea is there are four positions in the bed where we do not install the usual carriage bolts that affix the rails and wood so instead we have these trick little buggers which have a push release so you can keep your bed super sanitary until you need hold downs and you're hauling cargo then you can clip these little guys in they don't rattle they've got a nice little delrin seal and an anchor point so you can run like a spiderweb or tie-downs or i don't care run whatever the heck you want to run but we wanted to think that through for you you'll notice mini tubs as on all of the icon thrift masters because the big meets that we like to run for wheel tire or such that they come inboard just a little bit too much to leave that stock so we form those mini tubs bringing the wheel wells inboard a little bit to give us full travel room to drop low and allow the big fat sticky tires to do their thing so also on the new schools we do the super smooth tailgate and then we acid etch the icon branding but one of the neat things about old school is to be more under the radar less obvious that it's an icon more of a like if you know you know but if you don't what a pretty little truck smiles and no judgments of money or any of that fun stuff so with that in mind we decided to not do any blatant exterior branding so we did the traditional licensed chevrolet stamped tailgate for old school so as with all of the thrift masters we run smog pumps and egrs and there's a mile of vacuum tubes and nonsense it's pre-cat post cat wideband sensors catalytic converters evaporative emissions system they're not stinky they're refined they're as efficient as any ls3 is ever going to be 430 horse 425 torque and they're just a such a bulletproof motor we love them it's the same basic architecture we apply in our fj series as well and there's a reason this engine is so popular amongst custom builders it's reliable it's light it's fast it's easy to service it's a no-brainer [Applause] other fun details in the engine bay radiator old school opportunity we thought it would be kind of groovy to do these indents which are reminiscent of the original radiator what a geek no one will ever notice but we thought it was fun that is made by our buddies at griffin who handle that as a complete module for us including the dual electric high output fans along with the condenser for the ac system for power steering we're running the factory gm fiat front engine accessory drive configuration but we are adding a psc remote canister to enhance the capacity of fluid for the power steering system because we also utilize that system to create the assist for the brakes via our hydrotech hydro boost brake system the exhaust system is all tig welded stainless steel it is a dual exit it drops out just forward of the rear axle pretty mellow pretty quiet unless you put your foot into it and then the gates of hell do open up [Music] down low you'll notice a couple more details such as that stainless steel exhaust system the headers they are ceramic coated we do that for thermal management so control the heat adjacent to a lot of the plastics and electronics from the gm systems you'll also notice we did a k n filter onto a long carb certified air intake plenum that's running the factory mass airflow because we run the factory gm operating system i am not a fan of those wide open throttle start stop simplified operating system nothing beats the refinement you're gonna get from the more complicated gm one you'll notice all systems and plumbing is tethered and out of the way there are specialty thermal wraps on ac plumbing to maximize efficiency of the ac system those hoses go to a nifty little machine the bulkhead on the firewall thousands of dollars of a am fittings that's something i think a lot of people even when they're building at home fail to anticipate in their budget it is shocking so do that math early on if you're doing your own build but super high quality none of that nonsense crimp oem fitting junk that falls apart in a hurry you'll also notice we have tethered all systems plumbing as far away from the engine as possible using uh really nice double-sided tie downs to anchor everything nice and secure always a sucker for sexy connectors especially from the marine rail car and aerospace world so when we engineered our proprietary harness for the thrift masters same company that makes them for my broncos and fj's they predominantly do aircraft so they get it everything down to the crosslink wire the triple seal connectors and some of these super sexy like shrouded multi-pin bulkheads on the firewall yummy yum yum so as always brembo breaks all the way around that's six piston oversized calipers in the front four pot in the rear with a dedicated parking brake caliper that is actuated with an e-stop electric actuator for the parking brake which compounds the pulling force to give you a much more definitive stop you actuate that with the simple dash switch and if you screw up and leave it on we provide you with a ding ding ding and a warning light so that you can't fry that caliper rotors are two-piece hats t-4041 hardware brakes on these trucks are just phenomenal people often ask why aren't you running a brembo master that's easy to answer brembo don't make masters so wilwood great company made here in southern california good friends of ours and we run their great dual reservoir master in conjunction with the hydra tech feeding the brembos and combined epic brakes [Music] the four-wheel independent suspension is phenomenal while it's still an option if you are to order a thrift master from icon count on the fact that i'm likely to try and bully you into this four-wheel independent version super robust nodular dana 60 third member current camaro suspension architecture premise in the rear so you even get about three degrees of rear steer if you're really pushing the performance beautiful weight distribution and layout independent front it's just i mean any of the icon thrift masters are wolfson sheep's clothing in that they're really kind of modern sports cars masquerading as vintage pickups but the four wheel independent is just phenomenal they stick stick stick they're super comfy crappy roads railroad crossings dirt roads anything you throw at it's super stable just love this chassis so there you go that's pretty much it in the coming months hopefully by the end of 2020 we will have launched the configurator for the tr series and it will join the already existing and pretty damn good if i might say so myself vr and fj series configurators and until i geek out and created another new production line will actually be fully represented in configurations so there you go any questions reach out to us old school eight one eight two eight zero three three three three instagram's where all the fun is and that's icon 4x4 website icon 4x4 same with facebook be well be happy be kind be patient and i'll see you guys soon

Channel: Jonathan Ward

Views: 83,912

Rating: 4.9102135 out of 5

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Id: syAfFDUxOcA

Length: 34min 5sec (2045 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 06 2020