Driven: To Make an Old '72 Chevy C20 New, Icon Made a New Truck Old

Motor Trend

5 days ago

For many of us, making an old car or truck run like new again is to restore its magic. Sometimes when we do, though, we're reminded how much better new cars are engineered than their progenitors. With enough time and money, we can re-engineer the past, but at some point, it risks becoming a modern Ship of Theseus. That's where Icon usually stops, but for its 1972 Chevrolet C20 reimagination, the company decided to start in an entirely different place.
Icon transformed a 1972 Chevy C20 by fitting it onto a modern 2019 Silverado chassis, combining vintage looks with new performance. The project took four years and around $600,000 to build, offering modern features in an old shell, appealing to those desiring classic aesthetics with updated mechanics.
This summary was generated by AI using content from this MotorTrend article Read Next Out With Some of the Old
When Icon 'normally' builds a vehicle, particularly one of its one-off Derelict or Reformer creations, it usually replaces the original chassis, suspension, and drivetrain with modern aftermarket components customized to the build. It's expensive and time-consuming, but it has the effect of maintaining the old car's charm with modernized power, handling, and braking.
The result is generally magnificent, if you want it to drive like an old car but better. Icon does brisk business with those folks. Some, though, really just want a new vehicle that looks old. Something that rides, handles, stops, and goes like the other cars in the garage but looks like it could be their figurative grandparents. In With the Somewhat New
As with most Icon vehicles, the original chassis and mechanical bits of the old '72 Chevy donor farm truck are still tossed. But rather than adding a custom Art Morrison frame, Currie Axles, GM crate engine, and so on and massaging it all until everything meshes, for this build Icon decided to try starting with parts designed to play nicely together. Specifically, the bottom half of a 2019 Chevrolet Silverado.
Barely six years old, the lightly used Silverado work truck was half the age of the average vehicle in America today rather than nearly five times as old, as the C20 is. As you've no doubt noticed, new trucks have gotten considerably larger than old pickups, so some modification was necessary. Surprisingly, shortening the Silverado's ladder frame by 8 inches just ahead of the rear axle was all that was needed to make a half-century-old single-cab, long-bed fit on a modern crew-cab, short-bed frame. Add in some new mounts for the cab and bed, and it was mostly good to go.
Of course, shortening the wheelbase meant the rear driveshaft wouldn't fit, either, so it had to be chopped, as well. Otherwise, the powertrain from the Silverado is entirely stock, save a modified engine air intake and cone filter. Modern 5.3-liter V-8 engine, modern transmission, modern suspension, modern brakes, all designed by the enormous GM engineering department to work together with a considerably heavier truck. Keeping everything as it was on the new truck means this 'old' Chevy C20 gains traction control, stability control, an electric parking brake, and the factory trailer brake controller. You can use it to haul and tow roughly the same way as you would any newer Silverado 1500. Respect Your Elders
Making the Silverado fit the C20 as opposed to the other way around meant minimal modification to the old truck's bodywork. It originally came with a V-8, so it had little trouble accepting a new one, though a bit of firewall work was needed to fit it with a Vintage Air HVAC system.
Aside from that, the team fixed some rust in the door frames and on the doors themselves just below the windows and matched the paint and patina so well you can't tell. Not content with stopping there, the bumpers and even the modern, Icon-designed wheels were painted to match the surface rust spotting on the roof.
Equally subtle concessions to modernity can be found if you poke around. The lighting is all LED now, including strips hidden under the bed rails activated either by opening the tailgate or an old-looking toggle switch under the dash. The tailgate has a gas strut fitted to it, making opening and closing easier, and modular tie-down rails on the bed floor have been added to better secure cargo. Icon badges on the rockers behind the front wheels and the cast metal Icon lizard between the hood and windshield on the passenger side are more easily spotted.
So, too, is the independent front suspension, if you know enough about old trucks to know it doesn't belong. Otherwise, the exposed suspension and frame rails just look unusually big and clean for a truck whose body has clearly seen more than five decades of farm labor. Preserving that character was paramount, so the original gas filler on the cab was retained, along with the actually functional locking fuel door and filler on the bedside. Even the screws in the doors and trim from long removed towing mirrors were left where they were. Newer On the Inside
Far greater concessions were necessary in the cab. In a modern truck like the Silverado, everything electric is connected, and severing or messing too much with those connections will cause enormous software problems. The gauges aren't just gauges, the radio isn't just a radio, and so on. That means the stock 2019 Silverado gauges, infotainment screen, and most of the buttons and switches had to be retained.
Icon being Icon, the utmost was done to design custom bezels that reflected the 1972 truck's original setup as much as possible and paint them to match the original metal dash. We aren't gonna lie, it's jarring at first, but after a few hours with the truck you kind of stop noticing the incongruity (or at least stop being bothered by it). The Silverado's analog gauges help some.
As is the case with the powertrain, there are benefits to retaining the Silverado's modern electronics. This means Apple CarPlay and Android Auto are available, while the computer retains features such as cruise control and automatic high-beams.
Elsewhere, things are a bit more integrated. Manually activating the high-beams is still done via the old-school foot switch. A new Ididit steering column with shifter and topped by the original steering wheel (albeit wrapped in leather) feels appropriately vintage, as does the Glide Engineering bench seat finished in vintage-looking materials and decorated with custom end caps that match the exterior chrome and faux-wood trim. Icon's typical machined metal climate control knobs look the part, and although the new, circular air vents under either corner of the dash don't look original, they do look appropriately vintage. Everything New is Old Again
Unlocking the doors with a remote feels odd, but not nearly as odd as the old truck's driving position. The C20's massive steering wheel is nearly in your lap, and your feet sit more on top of the pedals than in front of them. Three-point seat belts feel familiar if not period appropriate.
Drop it into drive, and the 5.3-liter V-8 leaps ahead with unexpected authority. The stock transmission and rear-end gearing were retained, but each was designed for a much heavier truck and have the effect of making this one feel far quicker than it is or than its 355 hp and 383 lb-ft would suggest. A light touch on the throttle goes a long way, especially in a parking lot.
The big wheel also requires some acclimating. There's a little play on-center like an old truck, but the ratio is very much that of a new truck, and a little bit of steering returns big results. You end up having so much leverage you can drive with your pinkies.
Once you've adapted to those eccentricities, though, it feels exactly like driving a last-gen Silverado. The ride is the same, the braking is the same, and the handling is the same. You can therefore drive it just like a newer truck, which is to say much quicker and with more fluidity than any truck made last century. The goal of making an old truck drive like a new one was unequivocally achieved.
So familiar is the drive you start to wonder why the cabin isn't quieter. There's just no getting around 1970s aerodynamics, so you get wind noise around the A-pillars. The sensation of driving a modern truck is so strong, though, you forget how much of it isn't. Things like the crank windows (the customer's preference) and the still-functional triangular vent windows bring you back to the reality of the situation.
Likewise, the exhaust note. Old trucks are plain louder, with a distinct lope in their firing order. Other than shortening things up, Icon didn't mess with the modern exhaust system, either. Naturally, then, it sounds like your average V-8 work truck or moving van. Something with a little more grumble wouldn't have hurt, but it's not what the customer wanted.
We didn't test its off-road capabilities, but you can imagine they're slightly better than the donor truck thanks to the improved breakover angle, a side effect of the shortened wheelbase. The electronically engaged four-wheel drive system is entirely stock, but the more aggressive all-terrain tires should work better than whatever came from the factory in 2019 or 1972. Quicker and Easier If No Less Expensive
Not having to engineer anything new below the bodywork paid big dividends in the build time. While this pilot project took about four years to sort out, the next three already ordered should take about a year each now that the R&D is done. Then again, if you'd like a newer donor truck—something Icon is looking into—there will be some additional R&D time and expense to consider. Providing your own, clean C20 helps, as finding good-condition donors at a reasonable price is getting harder as the model gets more popular, both with the general public and Icon customers alike. (It's become the second-most popular order behind the company's restomod Ford Broncos.)
Don't make the mistake of assuming the modern drivetrain significantly reduces the price tag, however. This first-of-its-kind truck rang up to the tune of about $600,000, and subsequent models will still run in the neighborhood of $500,000 to $550,000 before you start customizing things. No one said grafting an old truck onto a new one would be cheap or easy, but the result is worth it—that is if you can afford it, of course.