1948 Inline 6

[GothicWombat]

Ok a quick overview about my situation; I'm an 18 year old male in love with classic cars, muscle cars particularly. I'm looking for a car and have narrowed down my search criteria to; a vehicle made before 1972 with a manual transmission and a V8 engine under $8,000. Unfortunately it has been hard to find such a vehicle. With that being said I found a 1948 Chevy pickup with a manual transmission for only $2,600. The only problem is that it has an I6 and not a V8. Here is what the ad for the truck:

"1948 Pickup truck 5 window straight six. Excelent conditon for a hotrod or resoration project. Very little rust, frame and pannels very straight. Matching vins on engine and truck. Original wood bed, interior in good shape but seats needs to be reapulstered. All windows except the rear and pasenger intact. Would make an excelent resotration or hotrod project. stored indoors. If you have any more question do not hesitate to ask. Thankyou $2,600 Two thousand six hundred"

From pictures he sent me the truck seems to be very complete and although it doesn't run he claims that it "could be made to very easily" and I couldn't see what kind of condition the bed was in as it was filled with boxes and stuff and there is more rust than the ad leads you to believe (isn’t there always) but it seems to be only surface rust that could be sanded off.
Because of my limited cash flow I was wondering how much power I could get out of the 6 cylinder engine as opposed to getting a V8 to put in and how much each of these options might cost, because if I can get enough power to substantially school any ricer I may come across then keeping the inline 6 would be a lot cheaper I'm guessing.

[MagicRat]

Forget about this truck. It is not what you want at all.
Unless you have driven a pre-1960's truck before, you will be amazed at how slow, harsh and foul handling these trucks are, when stock.

Most light trucks we are familiar with, from the late 60's to today are not much worse handling or slower than a full size car of the same year.
But trucks back then were different. It was very rare for anyone to use a truck for personal use; it was always for commercial / farm use. They tend to have slow revving high torque motors. Often the transmissions do not have synchronised gears. Do you want to double clutch every shift?
Also the rear end gears tended to be very short. 50 mph is about top speed for a truck.
The saying is that the trucks were too slow for the road and too fast for the farmer's field.

The interiors are cramped, noisy and very primitive. Handling is heavy and vague. Also given the age of this truck likely every component is worn out. Trust me, driving on worn king pins and a loose steering box is frightening. It would likely cost you thousands just to get this thing running and safe for the road.

There is a reason why every rodded old truck has a modern driveline, custom interior and front clip. It's because the stock stuff is absolutely hopeless for anyone other than the die-hard restoration fanatic.

[GothicWombat]

ok wow thanks for the info, guess I gotta keep looking then