Painted the bell housing before installing the engine. I couldn't stand to see the raw aluminum behind all the gold and black. Then got the engine bolted up and trans crossmember modified and bolted up. And I got some chrome bolted up for fun. I'm not sure how I feel about the air cleaner. It looked bigger when it was off the car. I know a polished carb would help. Has anyone polished one of these Edelbrocks before? It looks like it would be very time consuming to get in all the nooks and corners. Maybe buying a polished one would be better?
Build is coming out great, what kind of bike is that? I rode twice and went out and bought a niner the next day myself haha
Edelbrock makes a endurashine coated carb that would be the way to go your right it would be a pain to Polish and maintain its luster.... keep up the good work man digging the build.... I got a 54 in my shop that my cousin is building pretty cool cars
Good to know. I'll look for one of those when the budget permits it! haha. So it turns out my car has a Dana 44 axle under it. I couldn't tell earlier because of all the crust on it. But after spending a day and a half scraping and wire wheeling it, I can now read all the tags and markings. I'll be dropping it of at the rebuild shop to have it shortened and rebuilt and hopefully we'll be rolling again in a few weeks.
voodookustoms... Great build ! Lotsa work in there, my friend...and your willingness to "do it right" the first time is what makes it awesome ! When I was a kid, a friend of ours who worked with my Dad had a brand new '53 Vicky Hardtop. It was Flamingo (or, Coral), with an Ivory top, had Fordomatic with duals, white walls, skirts, and, a Continental kit. He gave me a ride in it a couple of times, I was about 10 at the time, and that car - straight from the factory - was one of the most perfect rides on the street ! Loved it ! Thought you'd like a look at this pic of a '52 I've had for a long time. Don't know who built it, or, owns it, but it's just clean, smooth, "basic cool"...like your's will be when you're finished. Best, Jonnie www.legends.thewwbc.net
A polished carb might look better but it definitely doesn't make much difference, that engine against the black looks incredible! I have to find someone to pinstripe my firewall, I didn't realize how awesome that looks.
You should! Unless its polished then keep it shiny. The raw aluminum i thought looked too "Muscle car" for this cruiser. Thank you for the kind words. That is a sweet 53 you had there. Yes, basic cool. Just clean and not overdone. Thats my style. Thanks, Im really happy with how it turned out.
Since I was able to put some miles on the car after lowering it, I realized that I mistakingly fabricated my pipe notches too far back. The axle and u bolt would come in contact with the forward part of the notch. So here is my solution. I used 1/8" plate and welded it all around. I left it a little wider than the frame so I could get a nice thick weld on there. Had my little mig turned up so high I blew my garage breaker 6 times! Haha. The welds came out pretty good though. I'll have the other one done this weekend. I'm having the Dana 44 shortened a few inches and rebuilt this weekend. Hopefully that will be ready by next week and the car can sit back on the ground after that!
I got to spend some more time under the car today. Here you can see how much I ended up taking out. I sure wish I would have made this bigger from the beginning. I think it should still be strong enough. Those side plates are 3/16" thick and welded all around with a good size weld. And finished up and painted
I got my brake and clutch pedal assembly back from the fabricator today. I wish i knew the guys name, but he is a friend of a friend so I never got to meet him. He modified the original support and installed roller bearings in it and completely fabricated a new clutch pedal to work with the mustang quadrant. It will be to the outside of the master cylinder so nice and tucked out of the way. I'll post more pics when it's installed. But his fab skills are way above mine.
Its all in the details. This pedal assembly is like a wet dream. The whole car is looking really good. I wanna ask you though, how far back did you paint the frame. and are you going to simply undercoat the bottom of the car?
My notebook it out. Im redoing basically everything I've done last year. Im gonna follow @voodookustoms foot steps
Thanks everyone! I painted back to the transmission mount. I wanted anything that I worked on to be repainted fresh. Then in the back where I notched the frame, it's painted all around that area. Any undercoating on the frame that I couldn't get off, I just painted over. As far as undercoating the rest of the body, I still have to get in there with a scraper and get off all the old loose stuff. I probably won't go crazy with it though since we don't really get rain here in California haha. But I do want to make sure it's sealed up.
Thank you. I never thought I'd have dug this deep into this project when I first stared it. I happy I did though.
I was going to say that you probably got in deeper than you thought you were going to,but I'm completely impressed with your attention to detail and your skill level.The build pics take that car to a whole new level and this ride gets more fun with every turn of the page.
Thanks guys! I got the rear end back from the machine shop today. They shortened each side just over an inch, so that should make installing my wheels possible now. Just have to get some paint on it and it will be ready to drop in.
The wheels are still impossible to install after having the rear end narrowed. That was a huge bummer to find that out. I ended up having to remove the rear shackles to drop the rear end down enough to install them. So, I'll be upgrading my AAA membership to make sure I have enough miles to get towed from anywhere. But, the good news from the weekend is that I got the rear and painted and installed.
The Jalopy Journal
