OK... here we go. I'll start by saying I'm a little embarrassed by what I'm about to do. I normally consider myself a wannabe-photographer. I carry my camera everywhere and capture pics of almost everything... to a fault. However, looking back thru the archives of my RPU building adventure, I've been woefully remiss in documenting the build via quality images. So... what you guys will see of progress to date will contain lots of phone images and the like. Please bear with me, and I'll promise to do better going forward. The 1930-31 RPU build started in 2006-7. We still lived in Houston, but I bought all the basics from/thru my good buddy Jason Kidd as he was starting FlyRite Hot Rods in Austin. These 'basics' consisted of Brookville steel body and fenders, Pete & Jake roller chassis, hot crate 350/350 combo, and lots of incidentals... all delivered to FlyRite and pseudo-mocked up in the corner. A short while later, we moved from Houston to Austin, and the RPU joined our '62 Buick, '29 coupe, and other toys in the new garage space behind the house. At that point, the project remained basically a raw roller with the body panels stored away while we remodeled the house and otherwise got settled... so when you came over to drink beer, this is what you'd see... for a while. I did manage to complete all the brake lines and such, but that was about it at this point.
Fast forward a little bit, and a cancer diagnosis and 7 weeks of daily radiation treatments made me realize that life is too short to have a cool project gathering dust. I start fitting all the Brookville fenders, aprons, and brackets to the Pete & Jake chassis. As you can imagine, this took some doing... especially for a first-timer like me... but it was EXACTLY the distraction I needed at that time. With the panels all fit together and to the chassis, I could set the bed on and make plans for a steel subframe to support it.
With the steel subframe in place, I could set the bed on and finalize the fender alignment. I could also really bolt everything together for the first time. I could also start thinking about incidentals like fuel tank placement... which turned out to be a custom-built aluminum jobber that will show up later in this thread.
The bummer about reaching the 'sorta assembled' stage is that the RPU looked like a mostly-complete hot rod sitting in the garage. Man, what a drag to blow that thing back apart and put fenders and shit back on the shelves so I could make more progress on it! So... the RPU sat at this stage while I bought a '32 sedan to occupy my time. Then, a year or so later, I was motivated again. I started pulling the assembled RPU apart so that I could build it for real. My plan was to paint and finish the chassis, then paint and finish the fenders, mount the fenders to the chassis, and then move on to painting the cab and bed. So, I blew it all apart, moved the trans x-member to accommodate the 700R4, and got it ready to paint.
Awesome build, keep at it. I also had 7 weeks rad & chemo, 3 years in remission now from stage 4! Your 100% right on the distraction method!
It was around this time that John Joyo, Keith Tardel, and I started talking about the motor. The original hot SBC had long since been swapped into Joyce's '31 pickup, so I had that stocker and a 4-71 setup sitting in the corner on an engine stand. Left to my own devices, I woulda just freshened up the stocker a bit and run the 4-71 on that. Tardel set me straight. Before too long, the new motor was ready to pick up from Austin Speed Shop and set between the frame rails!
I LOVE the narrow whitewalls. When I was a kid in the 70's, my dad had w/w's with cragars on the family Nova, thought they were ugly then. Looking back, I really dig them now.
While the motor was getting ready, I got busy painting the perimeter frame and chassis incidentals. Again, I'm doing all this by myself in the garage, so I got a little creative with a sawhorse rotisserie and such. The chassis is all Eastwood Chassis Black. I also removed a couple of front leaves to hopefully improve the stance.
With the chassis all ready, I was good to drop the motor and trans in... which inevitably led to mocking the front fenders on to check stance. I liked it.
Paint. The colors were always gonna be 2-tone... dark green with black fenders... but I had a certain green in mind. Too many greens have too much blue in them... I wanted more gold or olive tones. I finally found one I thought would be perfect and sprayed the dash as a test panel. I liked it, so proceeded to assemble the gauge panel to see that part come together. I like where this is going!!
It was also around this time that I started looking at the Brookville-assembled cab. The passenger door had fitment issues, as did the cast brass windshield posts. I annealed the brass posts until the windshield fit like it should, then I attempted to lead the door until the fit was worth a damn.
complete details are needed about wheel and tire brands and sizes. what wheels are they?...used, new, backspacing? also, this would be a good time to think about selling me the sedan...you're obviously not going to have enough room to store all these cars...hint, hint.
Wow very cool so far. I can't wait to see more. Some cool pick up builds going on on the HAMB right now.
Good to see. Your frame/chassis is a good example of what I suggest here to first timers when they ask about frame and suspension. If you don't know any better, look at what P&J (and a couple of others) do and buy or copy that. Can't go wrong. Nice progress at last. I know about life -gets-in-the-way projects.
Wow! What a cool build! I like to know more about tires/wheels, too ! I bet the motor will scream , if Keith build it!!!
You've got a great story with this one and have got me hooked. This is going to be an amazing build when you're done. I love that motor. Keep up the great work and stay distracted!
Great work so far man! Keepin' it clean. That's really gonna be a fun RPU with that motor. Keep postin' up man, diggin' it. Ride over an' give them Rex Rod boys some pointers, they seem to be strugglin' over there. Another fine build on the HAMB!
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