Jordan Kudsk's '77 Cheyenne
In today’s world, the LS motor has become ubiquitous, so it’s a breath of fresh air to lift the hood and find an honest-to-goodness small block Chevy motor fed by a good old fashioned carburetor. Jordan turned to Davidson Racing Engines of Puyallup, Washington to build the engine. Davidson started with a 400 cubic inch Dart block and worked their magic on it. Without revealing all of the secret recipe, we can say it was bored and stroked out to 424 cubes and puts out over 600 horsepower and 585 lb ft of torque on the dyno. More than enough to vaporize tires and the occasional transmission, which brings us to Jordan’s biggest regret of the build; not starting with a strong transmission. Since the truck’s completion, the engine has already eaten up a helpless 700r4. Jordan replaced it with a stronger unit and things have been ok since then.
Jordan’s Stepside is one cool truck, made even better by the fact that he drives it often. Not many of us can say we still have our first vehicle, or that we’ve been able to take it to such heights. When it debuted in its current form at Good Guys in Puyallup, WA, back when we still went to shows, it won a “Chevy Truck Pick” award. This all goes to show that, there’s hope for our hobby in the future, we just need to start them off right and help along the way.