Projects Assembling Brookville Roadster/ 40s style Build Thread

@Nick Agius, I expect that there are lots of people watching your build here. Most of us don’t speak up unless we have something to point out or have a question. Loving your car, keep making/posting progress please.

 

Great progress, it's cool to see there's a traditional hot rod and chopper scene in Queensland as I'm moving there next year

 

Thanks Jim, It really was a beautiful setting. Something i feel like hasnt happened in a while..

 

Thanks Brad, I will do!

 

Theres a little bit happening in QLD now, And a few crew are going to the effort to put on events for everyone to enjoy

 

Love the “custom” recessed number plate. Looks so good. I arrived at the Beatup just as Matty was reversing out the driveway and you bastards had eaten all the tacos. I dragged a mate who’s into pommy cars along and he thought there was something wrong with Matty’s suspension cos the bum was on the ground. I had to hit him with an empty beer bottle.

 

Thanks! We actually used the same buck made by Matty for his 48..
They were good tacos, You missed out!

 

Hung out with John again on Monday. Made a bit of progress on getting the fuel tank in and painted,Spent the majority of the day making some straps out of some steel probably a little to thick. A few final brackets & painted majority of the timber black to hide it away a little.

Baby steps but it feels like were nearing the home stretch.

 

Looks awesome. I am just about to start on my 1930 sports coupe project, over in the south west of WA and its great seeing your work to this stage, plenty of good info. Cheers!

 

Im glad your finding it helpful!

 

Really enjoying watching your progress. The photos and info are great and helping me find the inspiration to get back into mine. Keep up the good work.
Mark from NZ.

 

thanks Sharp marky! glad your finding inspiration!

 

John and i managed to get my old chrome 32 diff back together yesterday,
The diff had spent a good few years outside. When i found it it was facing up in the rain and everything was rotten inside.
New bearings & 3.54 gears, These things quickly become more expensive than a quick change!

 

Lots of progress this week, Ill try keep it breif, But heres a few shots of what my monday entailed. John had the drive shortened mid week, You can see it here back on the diff.
Speedo Gear home installed, This took a fair bit of finessing to make work, I was happy to never have a working speedo. But john insisted i needed one, Bit of spacer work & a new circlip groove cut into the drive shaft and we were good to go. Heres the torque tube back on, I do love this all chrome diff, If anyone in australia has a chrome T spring let me know! John had a few speedo drives, Most 4:11 ratio, He managed to find x1 3:7 ratio, Which is clostest for my 3:5 gears,
Radius Rods back on, About to go back in the car Ive come to terms with the fact that building a car in this manner, (Predominately Pre 1940 parts) is far more difficult than any tardel book gives credit, Here you can see the lipped bolt required to actually be able to do the nuts up. John had these on a 32 trans mount he was more than happy to rob to get my car on the road, But it made me think how much easier itd be if you were building a car with a Chevy & a 9 inch... Diff back in, Drive shaft coupled to the transmission!
One of my Bearings in the drums were ruined so this was a good oppurtunity to clean, Re-grease & install some new seals.

Brakes going back together, Handbrake mechanisms installed. By this stage it was about 7pm, John lives 2 hrs from me so every monday i wake up super early & hit the road to go work on the car with him, Id left home @ 3.30am This day. But seeing it back on the ground made me forget that i was tired and had a decent drive ahead of me, John and i started trying on fenders & enjoyed a few quiet beers...




The Car actually sits alot lower in the rear than i remember, And we really havent put any weight in it yet, Just an empty fuel tank, I was pretty blown away right now. This car will be the nicest thing ive ever owned.

You Can see the little cut down fenders ive got here, They need a it of work but i think theyll work pretty well with that late 40s theme im trying to go for

Looks good from up here!

The underside of a hot rod is such a pretty thing, the transition between the wishbone/ radius rods with the 36 cross-member works really well in my eyes. I plan to eventually have my wishbone chromed. All in all im really happy, Need to keep the progress happening, Not long till christmas now!

 

Finished tapping threads for all the brake line stays yesterday
Also bent up the fuel line & tapped some threads for that to, All looks pretty cool We started working on the cables for the handbrake & couldn't come up with a handle that'd work.John ended up making some calls and came up with an old chrome one to match the rest of a car. All for the price of a pot of beer, Pretty good going id say!

 

Great build, great writing, great car! Thanks, made me go back and look at my own roadster build.

 

Glad your enjoying it, I always wonder if what im saying makes any sense!

 

It's refreshing to read threads that are interesting, by people who can think and write, and do stuff. Plus, I'm thinking of doing one of these, so it's a nice primer on what all needs to be done.

 

What do you have to do in AU to get an assembled car like this registered? I recall Flathead Pete's build, seem to remember had to have everything certified and approved. We are fortunate here to have pretty lenient registration (for the most part) rules.

 

Looking good man!

 

Aha, im just a passenger on this. John has the experience, Im just lucky he wants to teach me.
He told me the other day he and his uncle put a Y-Block in his 34 roadster when he was 14 years old. Thats a crazy amount of experience

 

Thanks Josh!
Hopefully wont be to long before we can go for a drive.. Perfect roadster weather!

 

Theres a few ways to go about it, Probably easier if i dont go into it on here. Really depends on what car your building

 

Yesterday felt like we took 10 steps backward and 1 forward, I guess thats just the way it goes sometimes i guess, Theres been a few things about this body that John pointed out that i really hadn't noticed that needed to be addressed.
The body was sloping to the rear aprox 1" and was the cowl was practically sitting on the motor/ manifold no matter what we did.
You can see here how much the rear had to be lifted.
New timber body mounts made
Inserted back in the subframe

the spacing required went up as we got to the rear.
We also got the brakes finished up, Then realised we didn't have any brake fluid & all the stores were shut by this stage Here's John machining the head back on the brake bolt.
All bolted up & in place back on the chassis.
Final seal arrived for the wheel bearings, As it turned out i had odd drums so one ran a larger seal than the other
Going back on, New key ways & axle nuts installed.
Handbrake is done, adjusted & on the car. This next weekend should be a good one for the car, Were hoping to have the car fired up for the first time. But we will see.. Still alot of work to be done.

 

John was nice enough to spend the day with a friend getting my boot floor finished up whilst I was at work yesterday,
Here’s some pics he sent me..





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looks top of the range from here

 

Thank you, Its all pretty honest!

 

So good nick! Loving this thing!


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Saturday saw me finish work at 4pm and make the 2hr trip north to Johns to work on the roadster for the weekend , John was kind enough to setup an old caravan in his backyard for me to stay in whilst i was there. It was a good time. Heres how it went...
Saturday night saw a few too many beers, Saturday night jukebox and fitting up the radiator hoses to the rad for the first time, I bought this kit from macs originally, Fit pretty great.
We sat it back on its wheels and sat the grille on, Its crooked in this photo but it looks pretty good. The car is alot lower in the rear than we originally anticipated, But i dig it... John taking it all in... I woke up pretty early sunday morning and got setup, Messed with the grille shell &^ hood for a bit before John showed up with the coffees I had a hood and sides made a while ago before i figured out where i was going to mount the generator. At this stage I wont be running them, But i dig that its hanging out the side like it is.


Hangs out there a bit...
Since the car got to johns about 6 months ago, We've ran this book since we started work on the car. It'll have the parts we needed that day or whatever we wanted to achieve, The book will stay with the car, Id like to think that someday someone would be interested in what we were doing.
Fuel block & regulator mounted up on the firewall

Next we got the throttle pedal happening. For this we started with a RHD 32 pedal John had, I traded him a LHD pedal and we made it work, Not really sure why we went that way but we did and im happy with how it turned out

Oxy welding the pedal back together after some shortening.
Monday morning i started going through the carbs and rebuilding those, I had two rebuild kits but there were some smaller bits missing. John whipped out the stash, Yet again.... Putting the fuel pumps together
They came up really nice, A friend sold me these a year or so ago. Thanks Des,
We have really had a lot of issues with firewall clearances on this car, You can see here my terrible cutting to get the breather in, The car is running a mechanical fuel pump with a long rod and cylinder that runs into the motor so getting it in was a bitch. This wouldn't be a problem if you were running an electric fuel pump.
Back to the throttle, Cutting the holes in the firewall for the throttle shaft. All hooked up, Ready to be cleaned up and re installed
Rebuilt starter motor in