Hot Rods Spalding Bros Repro, for "Too Tall" Ganahl.

Pat thats going to be one tight ride

 

Finally found these pics I was sure I'd saved. They were on a hot rod CD from '04, the model mentioned earlier. I wish they were bigger. Thanks Pat and Marty. I love track roadsters and this is a favorite.

 

Sorry for the doubles, don't upload pics often

 

I to have a love for this Roadster, Pen & Ink I did back in the 80's

 

Here's one more piece of Art of the Roadster for my Nostalgia Racing T-Shirts in 1986.

 

Clean line art from Dave Wagner (top version)! Why did someone let another artist sign it on the bottom version?

 

Wow, after shutting the computer off last night, a bunch of great things show up. Thanks Lowlife, and CW for your posts, maybe we will have to talk to Pat about a commemorative shirt. I spent last evening figuring out what hardware and material to use for the front and rear radius rods. It looks like 7/8" - .095 wall DOM, would look about right, and the best I can tell, using some clevis ends, and 1/4" plate for the axle brackets, and attachment at the rear hub carrier. On the (4) pivot mountings on the frame, it looks like they welded female rod ends where the tubes merged together, I am not wild about doing that, for replacement purposes. Thanks again for all of your interest.

 

Yes, some great stuff on this thread in the last couple of days.
Some comments, questions:
Don Montgomery's '52 photo from Saugus shows how good the car still looked by then. I asked him, but haven't heard back--who were the White Bros.? Where from?
Ron, several have commented how "tight" it will be. Naw. The roadster's got plenty of room. The Iacono dragster, now THAT'S tight!
Lowlife: Where did you see these models? What scale are they? They look about 1/25. The one Bill Spalding showed me was larger.
CW40TPU: Excellent pen-and-ink work! I just missed getting one of those T-shirts, with the orange car. Maybe I'll get CRA to make them again. It is their logo.
But this is the version of the car I plan to build, since my engine has the three carbs. The shirt, taken from the HRM cover photo, shows a more rounded, nicely-shaped hood bubble than the first one they had when they ran Bonneville. Actually, it might have had the six carbs on it at this point.

Thanks all of you, very much, for your interest in this and the amazing contributions, in so many forms.

Pat Ganahl

 

Pat
I wish you had sat in my roadster Fathersday. If I knew you were building one I would have asked if you wanted to. Although mine is the front of a touring car I think the leg room is the same. It would have made a good picture. Tim with a T did sit in it. I think he said he was 6' 2" but he is also pretty young. You will be fine unless you plan to take a long trip in it. I'm good for about 100 miles or maybe two hours. Well that was maybe ten years ago the last time I drove it to Bonn. my last long trip.
Gary

 

Pat, I don't remember where I saw these pics, either scanned from a magazine or from the Internet. I do know I was tickled cause I'd never seen it in color...I love orange! Your question this morning caused me to do another search. I found mention of Merchants Of Speed, which I have, so I checked that out and found this pic of Bill with the model. It's definitely bigger than 1/25, also looks like the same display board it's on in my pics above. Chuck Meschter built it in 4 months at a cost of $3,000. Also, while searching, I kept noticing mention of Benchrace.com. Sorta rang a bell so I checked my bookmarks and sure enough there it was. Clicked on it and that cool little ezine is still there (wish he was still at it). I believe it was issue 7 I found this article about Chuck and the Spalding T. That's all I know, love ya, man!

 

Pat sent me some pictures to post. Master craftsman, Dennis Webb got the seat finished, Pat will fill in the details.

 

I am preparing to build all 4 of the radius rods, the hardware showed up today, and I picked up the 7/8" DOM round tube. The front and rear mounting brackets have been laser cut. The rear brackets have extra material, so I can bend, trim and shape the mounting ears. The hot weather, along with time spent on my Cabover truck, has slowed the progress, but it will get in high gear real soon !!!!!

 

Well, Marty's thrown the ball to my side of the court. If you look at the photo of Dennis Webb holding the seat I picked up this morning, you can see several track noses and wooden bucks hanging on the walls behind him. He works out of the same one-car shop where his dad, Marvin, built hot rods for Dick Kraft and many others, often with the help of his good friend Art Ingles. That's where Dennis learned to be a meticulous metalman. Midgets and things with track noses are his favorites. Dennis is the guy Arlen Kurtis uses to build noses, tails, and tanks for the midgets he builds today.
You might not have seen The Rodder's Journal No. 56. In the RJ Times I talked about Dennis, his shop, and how Don Borth bequeathed the original Ingles Nose wooden buck to Dennis, the one Art used to make the distinctive noses for the Spalding Bros., Barney Navarro, Wes Cooper, and blue Dick Kraft roadsters. When I asked Dennis if he would make the nose for my Spalding duplicate, he said he didn't think the old buck would hold up. So I borrowed it, took it apart, and exactly copied each piece to make a new one, so he can.
More recently I showed Dennis photos of the Spalding car and asked if he could make a seat like the one in it. He said, "Sure, I know exactly what that is, a B-25 bomber seat. I've made lots of them." He made patterns from an original B-25 seat long ago, and has made a couple hundred by now. I'm amazed that people can make things like this out of flat pieces of aluminum. Anna and I will deliver it to Marty as we head up to the smokey Northwest in about three weeks for our annual vacation trek. This will be my first chance to see the car in person. We hope it's not so smokey by then...

Pat Ganahl

 

I've only seen that particular style of seat in B-17's. They used a short-back one like you have shown that was the radio operators seat, mounted on a pedestal ...and taller-back versions that were pilot/copilot seats. Could they have used them as radio operator seats in B-25's?...who knows, but I do know that this type seat was not a pilot/copilot seat in B-25's...they were much bigger and were mounted on their own frame.
here's a pic of a B-17 radio operator seat...

 

I'd like to know more about that Harbor Freight English wheel. Is that BIG ASS BOLT on top the tension adjustment? That thing probably scares the metal into shape. "One bomber seat, coming right up!"

 

That English wheel looks homemade to me. It looks like the bolt draws the two wheels together by the sheer force of drawing the frame members together through deflection. I think its biggest limitation aside from the small throat is I do not see any quick-release mechanism on it for releasing the work piece.

 

Thank you, all. I tuned in yesterday and was early for the update. Enjoying following along. -Dave

 

It appears to me that the front column upper tube slides over the front lower tube. The rear of the lower tube being hidden by the seat is where the pivot would have to take place when the large bolt is adjusted. Would be nice to see that area,,

 

ken mccandless old

157656_Front_3-4_Web by billmac posted Mar 9, 2015 at 2:52 PM

uncle bill is also in for the ride

 

I don't want to hijack or sidetrack this thread but I really liked the E wheel. The pillow blocks as bearings and the robustness of the whole thing. On the "Homemade Tools" thread a lot of time has been spent on modifying a HF unit. I'd rather fab up one like this.

FF, I didn't see a quick release either.

 

OK, OK. I can see that nothing gets by HAMBERS. The thing you have to understand about me is that if it's not going into print that'll end up in the library of Congress, I'm not always so precise about fact checking. I don't lie. My wife calls it exaggeration. But I didn't take notes on this one. I thought Dennis had said B-25 or B-29, so I guessed B-25. But you're absolutely right, it's from a B-17. And Dennis says he's "only" made about 50 of 'em.
As for the English Wheel: Dennis has a nice big one on the other side of the shop that someone in Anaheim made years ago with a big, cast "C" type frame. But Dennis found he needed to wheel certain parts in a tighter radius, that would hit the legs of the big machine. So he designed and made this one, that can actually wheel parts in a 360-degree circle. It stands on a pedestal that can be moved out into the room, away from the table.
That's all I can tell you about that stuff. I was figuring someone would comment on how niece the seat was.

Pat G.

 

The seat is NICE.

 

you have a very nice seat Pat.....wait

 

wow nice work on that seat, following this build for sure !

 

Oh that seat is "niece". It's simple and purposeful, instead of some of the recreations you see with a million belled holes and rivets covering every inch.

 

Pat that is the best looking hand made seat I've seen in a long time. Can't wait to see what Mr. Webb does for your track nose! -Dave

 

I'd like to see a step by step of Dennis forming the track nose.

 

For sure!

 

I think you speak for all of us when you say that...

 

Marty you know ,Six cylinder guys are little soft in the head .