Tech: grafting 49 Ford windscreen onto a 1952 chevy

Tech week right?

Well about 5 years ago, my wife was pregnant with our first little one and after hearing me rave about wanting to chop the top on our Chevy for the first year of our marriage she told me I better get out there and do it or I'd never get started on ti.

So I started, got the roof cut down and "back together" in a weekend, took approximately 3.75" out of the front and 5, maybe 6 out of the rear. Over the course of the next 3 years I would work on getting the door tops welded to the roof and figuring out all the fun problems I created taking a 4 door sedan and turning it into a 4 door hard top.

The one thing that always bothered me was the front glass, maybe I'm really a Ford/Mercury guy at heart or just had too many photo references from the 40's of Westergard/ Bertolucci/ Ayala cars that made me gravitate towards that style. As I understand, they started with 40's cars and updated them towards 50's styling. I had a 50's car and wanted to go backwards with 40's styling....

It took me a while to figure out the windscreen but when I decided upon grafting an earlier flat-paned windscreen into the Chevy I only had to call flat-top Bob, come up with some cash and I had another trophy to hang on the wall until I had time between working and spending time with the little ones.


...Now the Tech, in order to graft the Ford windscreen onto the chevy I cut it into 6 pieces. two cuts in the sides (one on each side), two in the top and two in the bottom. Now I had 6 braced pieces sitting on the garage floor. Not only did the Ford windscreen need to come down height-wise but also needed to come in towards the center of the car. I could have only made 4 cuts and separated it into 4 pieces but I wanted to retain the factory "v" in the top of the windscreen instead of making my own.

With the Ford windscreen braced prior to making the cuts I had it set on the opening just to visualize everywhere I needed to cut to make room for it to fit. It was evident that I needed to cut the dash and the top of the firewall away as well as cut up into the Chevy roof to allow the Ford windscreen to fit. All cuts were made with a sawzall, jigsaw and a cut off wheel. After making the cuts the lower section settled nicely into position and was tacked with a MIG (awaiting O/A hammer welkding). I then had the task of getting the upper section down where the contour of the Ford roof would mate up with the contour of the Chevy roof. A bit of finagling, measuring and cutting and the new windshield opening started to take place.

As I went, I tried to retain as much of the Chevy's internal bracing and structure and basically lay the Ford windscreen over the opening. To my amazement, after getting the openings exactly the same from side to side I cut away the top of the Chevy roof, tacked that seam for strength and stood back to look at it...

I have a lot more to do and some massaging still but the grafting of the Ford onto the Chevy gave an entirely different look and feel tothe car, more of the 40's feel I am shooting for.... I know I'll remember more pertinent information after I post and would be happy to lend the specifics if anyone is interested.

Not that anyone's going to do this but I thought I would post this just to contribute a different take on what to do with a 49-52 Chevy sedan.

Mark-Anthony

 

Man, that looks sharp. Way to stick to it.

 

I've seen this car before, but couldn't tell what was setting the chop apart from the others...cool idea, it turned out great.

Bryan

 

looks way better then it sounds grives the car a driffrent look great ideal

 

I think there is one around here with the flat glass from a chevy truck of the same era. semigloss black with red scallops. S.F. bay area. looks good, seen it a bunch of times before i even noticed.

 

That is a very strange modification.You actually pre dated the car intentionally. Like my friend Teddt says,it looks a hell of a lot better than it sounds!The car is a masterpeice.I cant wait to see it done.

 

bad-ass, love it

 

That looks great man!
But,........you forgot to tell us the best part.
no curved W/shield to cut any more! Hell of an idea there.

 

wow! makes me want a 4dr. too! keep on cutt'n! your kid will dig driving it later.

 

That was a major plus... I didn't even think of that until after ... I don't know if form followed function or function followed form on this mod perhaps there was some subconscious process going on.

Thanks for the kind words, it's kind of funny when you sit and look at something for long enough instead of just trying to get things done, how ideas spark, fizzle and then come back again. This whole idea started right after I cut the top some 5 years ago but didn't take shape until April of this last year. My taillight in the stock bumper guard idea fizzled for a while but is back after remembering what a '40 Harley tail light looked like...

As far as pre-dating it... I love the 50's, late 50's, 60's customs and hot-rods, most of my artwork is more akin to the weird Roth studios kind of work but my eye for customs and hot rods was always drawn to the early, clean not hokey or flashy cars but simply executed styling that just looked like it was meant to be there. No change for the sake of change, no lowering for the sake of seeing it on the ground just pure Re-Styling to take the lowly American family car and put it on par with the European/ high dollar cars...all out of a 1 car garage with whatever tools that were available.

Now If I could only find some 49-54 chevy truck fenders somewhere in So-Cal, I could finish up the rear......

 

Hey Mark Anthony,

Killer job on this bow tie!
Are you plannin on doing anyting with the deck lid to take the
"Aunt Bea Butt" outta it? I'm thinkin the sedans had a taller
deck lid than the coupes, no? Maybe a pie section of 3-4"
may help with the flow of the roof chop with the deck lid,
maybe not.

Swankey Devils C.C.

 

Nice idea on the windshield and all, but I like your grille opening. I know it's a Plymouth grille. Is the opening just a '49 or '50 Mercury grill shell welded in? Did you have to alter the lip on the front of the hood? Do me a huge favor and post a couple in-progress photos of that, too, will you?

 

Its all in the details. Lookin sharp.

 

Atomic kustom
Nice idea on the windshield and all, but I like your grille opening. I know it's a Plymouth grille. Is the opening just a '49 or '50 Mercury grill shell welded in? Did you have to alter the lip on the front of the hood? Do me a huge favor and post a couple in-progress photos of that, too, will you?

The recipe for the grille shell is:
½ 3’ long x4” o.d. exhaust tubing
1-90 degree bend 4” o.d. exhaust tubing
1- piece of angle stock to locate the hood latch mechanism
1-piece ’54 door as the door rolls up to the belt line

I’ll get some pictures tonight but:
1- took ¼” rod and bent it to the contour of the hood and tacked it to the lower edge leaving an 1/8” gap between the rod and my hood, tacked that rod also to the drivers and passenger side fenders.
2- then took a piece of 1/4” rod and created the contour of what I wanted the grille opening to look like using the 90 degree bends as my pattern for the down-turn and tacked that right to the splash pan on both the drivers and passengers side.
3-I then fooled around with how I wanted the grille opening to roll under the hood. Did I want it to come out and then roll under or just roll under right away from the edge of the hood. I decided on the latter and it was time to use the rod patterns to make the exhaust tubing grille shell.
4-using the now three pieces of exhaust tubing, It was then a matter of splitting the long section of exhaust tubing in half (actually ended up being a quarter) and doing the same with the 90 degree bends .A pie-section was cut in the center of the horizontal bar to get it to conform to the leading edge of the hood. If you look down on your hood you’ll see that it comes out about 3-4” forward in the center from where it meets the fenders on the side.
5-Fenders were cut using my rod “opening” pattern as a pattern to allow the 90 degree bends to mate up flush with the fender and roll back into the radiator opening.
6-With the relief cut in the center of the horizontal piece of pipe now allowing it to conforming to the forward edge of the hood and situated vertically to look right around the grill I tacked everything together.
7- the rolled stock or the top portions of the ’54 doors made up the difference between the leading edge of the hood and the tubing that now made up the opening.


The sketch shows what I did to make the pattern of the grille opening and you can see in the “finished” picture most of the cuts and things I still need to finagle, I hope you can see where I had to cut

pimpin paint:

as far as the deck lid, it is from a coupe, is 8” longer than the one that was on there and is oriented 6” further down at the rear than stock. As far as what will happen, it really depends on how I sort out the rear quarters and what will look good between them and the slope of the roof, My first thought is to totally change the opening making it more akin to a late 40’s Cadillac coupe but when I decide on that we’ll see if I need to section height out of it.

Now if I could just find a set of un wanted 49-54 Chevy Truck fenders in Southern California maybe some 46-48 chevy sedan fenders or maybe even some 39-40 Ford fenders… almost anything tear-drop like I’m open to considering.. 

 

I'm impressed.
I did something similar on my '53, but I used sheetmetal and did a lot of bending and hammering to make the curves. I like your method better. I'm going to copy your technique on the '51 I'm about to start.

 

atomickustom,

here's a few more pics if they help as far as the grille surround

 

Looks greeat.If you intend to round the hood corners and start the radius at the right spot,the hood line will then appear to be more parallel with the grille shell opening which will make it look even better if thats even possible!

 

great to see some of my parts back on the road!



thanks

 

THERE IS ALWAYS SOME BOOB ASKING A DUMB QUESTION.....
Like.....
Would a 47 48 Chevy car W/S opening work at all in a later Chevy like this?? anyone tried that?

 

A cat in Austria has that's where I got the idea....

http://www.thecheatersgang.com/lead_works.htm