Projects '23 Model T Gow Job - AKA: Sand Creek Special

All you need is a seat and a gas tank. Mine started the same way. Driving around the yard was great motivation.

 

I'm a long ways from that. The engine/trans in there are unusable, and I still haven't cut the driveshaft down to fit the cut down torque tube. Would be great if I could find an engine that wouldn't take much to get running. The wheels are probably decent enough for yard travels. I really need to finish up the good set.

 

Yeah, I should have remembered that. I've been following along pretty faithfully. Just got carried away, I guess. Hahahaaa

 

Today I set the lump of iron (Frontenac Head) on the mock up engine. I wanted to get some exhaust going for it. Up first, made a set of loud and proud hater pipes. @pops29 had laser cut some flanges for me, well worth the price for the time savings in hacking them out myself. Thank You again!









Although I didn't complete it, I started looking at making a lakester style pipe. This is probably what I'll run most of the time. I'll make a cap and a bottom outlet to go to a regular exhaust system. It's so easy to switch out the exhaust I thought why not build two systems.





I should back up a little. Mounting the head confirmed my fears of firewall clearance issues. If I was to run no valve cover, it would just barley clear. But with a cover, forget it. Now I know why the Aldrich car had a big box recess on it. I just made a quickie notch in the firewall..this one is junk anyhow and just for mock up. I'll need to make a recess in the good firewall.

 

When I started this project, I did some putting the cart before the horse stuff. Of course I'm trying to fix some of that after the fact. One of those things was my steering box mount. It worked, but in the end, I realized it wasn't really period enough looking. So here is how it sits currently.




So with that, I had to find a better solution. @David Mazza is a great friend and us building cars together has led to correct some things that neither of us had thought of initially. He is an invaluable source for me to bounce ideas off of and visa versa. So I had an idea. I measured the sector shaft housing of the A steering box. Found some 3/16" wall DOM tubing (my god is that crap expensive), and was going to set forth on my project. But then as luck has it, someone on Instagram posted a pic of a bunch of stuff they cut off an Model A frame and I spotted another 30-31 steering box in the pile. I bought it cheap and received it last night.




My main interest was the sector shaft housing. An extra I could play with. So I extracted it, stuck shaft and all and cut the mounting ears off and cleaned it up a little bit.




After talking to my good friend, I mentioned it'd be nice if I could find a way to turn it down to a consistent size....I know, a little fancy for a Gow Job. And then the light bulb went on and out came the calipers. What do you know, the shaft is larger than 1"....which means I'd press my brake lathe into business again....I really starting to think I need to buy a real lathe though...damn if they aren't so expensive. And as it turns out, the casting is off set to the center of the bushing. So I centered the outside of casting up on the shaft of the lathe, and went at it. I not only was hoping to trim up the outside, but get it just a little smaller to fit inside the DOM tubing. Mission accomplished.






Got up this morning and decided to make my new mount. I sliced off a section of tubing, split it down the middle, welded on a nut and a flange so it could hold and pinch the sector shaft housing.




A few more hours of work netted me this. I am much happier with this design.




And with the sector housing slid in place. I just have to drill the holes for mounting on the frame. This one will be bolted in, vs. welded on. Much more correct I think. I was trying to make it look like a 1 piece casting, although it doesn't have the cast texture to it, I think I did OK...what do you think?

 

Whats the plan for the levers on the column? Stock?

I have a T column, A column amd box, and a Willys jeep column and box.

I dont know what to do linkage wise yet... then again i still dont know what carb setup or anything else I'll be running yet...

 

Plan is to make them work somehow. I am hell bent on using a timer and coils on the engine.

 

Round all the edges a just a little more then then go to town on it with a air hammer/chisel using those wire scale removing thingamajigs.





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This is going to look much better :




@Runnin shine , Everytime a decent used scaler comes up for sale i either miss it or don't have the funds. However, caught a little tip searching online. Let a carbide burr bit skip around on the surface...Not bad at all!




A little paint on it, looks fairly convincing I think.

 

If you need, send me your coils and I'll rebuild and time them for you. Your steering box mount turned out real nice.

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Mucho appreciate it, I actually have a fresh set of Brent Mize coils and also a couple sets done by Ron Patterson. I was buying them and getting them done when I could afford to over the years just to have in stock. Now I'm on the list of employees being cut a little so things are going to get tight. Luckily I have been collecting parts.

 

I had to laugh as I too have been putting the cart before the horse. My build has taken so long that I have redone a lot of early mistakes. I made this nightmare of a steering box mount which I am now replacing along with the model A box.

 

Putting my furlough day to good use...still wish I was at work getting full pay though. Anyhow. Tackled a long overdue project, the split wish bones.

Started by laying out my string to represent the draglink line so I knew where the wish bone connection needed to be.



Measured down from the bottom of the rail, in my case, the bracket is short at only 1" from the bottom of the rail to the center of the mount hole. Way shorter than I initially thought it wold be, but as I learned from others at the beginning of this thread, this is why this must be done.





Then I put my plate in place, I had the wish bone mount hole drilled first, then I marked and drilled the other holes, and then transfer punched the marks into the frame and drilled.





Next, I welded the ball in and finished off the plate. I have bolts in now, but will probably rivet it in for the finished product. At least that's what I want to do, but I never have done that before.





And just about done. I drilled the end of the bone for the repo Model A tie rod to slip in, (3" into the tube), drilled holes to plug weld, and welded it up. I made a slit cut near the axle end so I could tweak the wishbone up just slightly to be inline with the ball and welded it back together. Then I did the other side. Looks easy, but I worked on all this for 7 hours for both sides. Lots of planning that will hopefully net a smooth bump-steer free ride.





Then I tackled the steer box mount. Made some sparks and whacked that off.




Cleaned up, and I set the new one on to mark and drill the new mount holes.





Put on some paint, true to form of the backyard build, I just blasted in some spray bomb black.

 

Front suspension / steering almost done. I just need two more Model A tie rods ends to make a drag link...if anyone has any hint hint. Spent sometime this morning getting the split wishbones adjusted and installed after finishing the welding and painting this past weekend.





Been pondering about the mounting of the coil box being I have to make a recess in the firewall for clearance on the head. In my reference book, Model T Speed Secrets, they suggest using 2x4 wood to space the box back. I then remembered I had this nifty first generation Fordson tractor coil box. the basic box and lid are the same as a '26-27 coil box, just the logo stamping and the mounting brackets are different. But it should work perfect and actually be easier to mount under the cowl still compared to the '25 and earlier box...plus it's different, something you don't see often. It'll need a full rehab of course, but I'll work out the mounting first.

 

Sometimes you have to fail before you'll succeed. I needed to make a firewall recess. But it needed to be raw, and like someone might have done it in the 30's......besides I don't own a sheet metal brake, so it seems all appropriate. well, I got my practice run in...I mean really, did you think I could pull it off the first time correctly? I made it too deep, the side mounting flanges are not big enough, and I accidentally cut off the top mount flange. OK, well, like I said, practice. Hopefully I can nail it the second time, I'll try again tomorrow....

Follow along as I fail though.......

 

Hahahaaa. If I posted every try I've made, I'd have 5 times as many posts. Keep on.

 

Nailed it pretty good today. Not sure how, but I'm just off a little on the depth still.....it should have been just a little bit more shallow. But none the less perfectly usable and it fits the build of building it raw, and backyard garage. One thing that immensely helped was using some angle steel in the jaws of the vise. Other than that, I just bent and hammered it out. I just need to do some more trimming on the flange and to fit the bottom, and add some paint and bolt it up.

 

Just right.

 

Picked up some carbs. 1962-64 Austin Healey 3000 SU HS6 carbs. It was a fair deal, but they are in really good shape. I like the fact the cosmetics of them are pretty good and I probably won't have to touch them. I really only need 1, but mocking up I have already discovered the benefit of having a front and rear carb to choose from. I can tell you the one I thought I was going to use is not it. Hopefully will have the intake done tomorrow. The benefit of the SU is they are a pretty simple carb, and they actually date back to the mid 20's and have virtually unchanged since (Thank You @David Mazza ). So this is one of those deals where its close enough, and if I don't tell you, you probably won't know it's newer than the 30's.

 

Run both! And build a kngarley enough engine to need them!

 

That's the interesting part.... a Model T engine is also 3 liter....so it almost seems weird to run one....but the T engine runs a much lower powerband than a Healey could run. The intake port in the Frontenac is 1.5", this carb is at 1.75". I have no clue what the CFM rating of one of these is, but it's probably sufficient for the under 4000 expected RPM limit. Probably under 3500 really. I am ultimately building two engines, one a stock bottom end and one as a high performer with an A crank.

 

Yep one would be more than enough. Two smaller su's would look better though. Guess they are not that common in US but a couple of 1 1/8 or 1 1/4 would work. I am running two 1 1/8 which is about right i reckon.

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I'd have to build a Y shaped intake for two, but as I found out yesterday, the steering column is really in the way, so I doubt that would happen. It was kind of a bummer to find out how much the column hindered the fit, but the solution helped solve a couple issues (both fitting and personal preferences). I'll post up as soon as I finish the intake. I could make some off the wall looking fabricated intake, with bends to clear everything, but remember, it's supposed to have a simple mid 30's build vibe, and that just wouldn't fit for correctness.

@Kume , are the smaller sized carbs physically smaller on the outside dimensions? These things are way bigger than I was anticipating, which was part of the fitting issue.

 

The smaller bore SU's are indeed smaller but you may still have room issues. You could try a log manifold. Or you could go right hand drive

 

Or find some downdraft ones...

 

Made the intake manifold for the SU carb. Not shown is the finish welded product, it's only tacked in the pics. While it's not at all how I assumed I was going to run it, I am happy with the end result, and I think I can actually hook the linkage up easier. One more piece of the puzzle done.

 

I like it! It has a purpose built race car look.

 

That’s ingenious.

 

If anyone trying this wants to know for the future, the CFM ratings on a couple of the more popular HS carbs is as follows:

HS4 (1.5" throttle bore) 133 CFM
HS6 (1.75" throttle bore) 210 CFM

as @Kume mentioned, for a Model T hot engine, a single HS6 is more than enough.

 

WOW, it's been a while. So what have I been up too? Well, a little of this and that. The Fronty is fixed and ready to be built. What got done. First a thorough cleaning and inspection. All the guides had to be replaced which I figured anyhow. Some how, my machinist miraculously saved the valve seats (there is no room to put a replacement seat in this head) and some 1.88" stainless valves were installed...of which a little reduction in the OD had to occur so they didn't hit each other, so they are approximately at 1.84" now. Then all 4 rocker stand bolt holes and the two water neck bolt holes needed to be repaired, and put back to their original sizes. Finally, there was a dip in the middle of the deck that had to be removed, so a pretty light .018" cut was taken to straighten it back out.

After I paid the savior of speed equipment, I brought it home. Then I decided, I wonder what color these things were painted originally. After some pretty extensive searching, the conclusion was that it appears they were painted a machine grey--or very light mossy color...basically alot of grey tone with a smidge of green. So a friend whipped up something we both felt was fairly correct.








Finally, some of you may or may not have noticed the slight title change in the year of the car. That is because I finally was able to find a roadster body. It just kind of fell into my lap, I was being shown some other parts and i saw it on the floor and started asking...figuring I had no business doing so because I could never afford it....turns out I could that day. I don't know how, and I am still unsure why it happened, but I really have a roadster now. I almost need to pinch myself a little. Yup, its a little rough and needs lots of love, but its real Henry steel. Same as the other body, the wood is shot (although this initially appears way easier to re-wood). This one is going to need some patches and sheet metal work, I probably could have skated by on sheet metal repairs on the other cut off touring body. I actually believe the car is a 1920-1922, but I was able to find and purchase (if the post office ever delivers it) a rarer late 1923 only metal firewall. So in the name of accuracy, it will be labeled as a '23.