OT: OMG! People used to work really hard at things we take for granted.

beautiful indeed! As you know, your efforts paid off bigtime!

 

hard work, determination, working with your hands, imagination, budgeting money, start early-work late, hand-eye coordination, PRIDE, self-worth...
It illustrates the same moxie and character that has everything to do with someone who builds a car.

Few people will wake up one morning and say, "Ya know what? I'm going to build a house"

Or, "Ya know what?" I'm going to build a hot rod".

If you don't understand, then it can't be explained to you.

 

Can't see the forest because of all the trees??
Open your eyes and mind a smidgen, this thread is about early craftsmanship and quality and most of all the men and their mindset and sense of pride involved.
In fact, different analogies were offered up using these early men's almost extinct mindset and the early rodding pioneers.

I see your fairly new here, I offer up some friendly advice:
If you allow yourself, you can/will learn a wealth of information on this forum, It is FULL of masters and craftsmen of ALL types and trades with the above afore mentioned mindset.

 

My daughter bought a circa 1880 victorian. It is cross gabled and the gables are at different levels and offset. The framing in the attic is a piece of art. it is all notched and fitted and is basically self supporting. It looks like the square cut nails are there just to keep it in place while assembling. Then I realised that all the angles and notches are had cut in rough sawn lumber, three stories up. The framers must have been some hard working very smart guys, I doubt i could figure it out myself and make those precise cuts with power tools much less a hand saw. Nothing wrong with setting trusses, but the "art" has gone out of it. Actually this is exactly the same with cars nowadays, very good and functional, but the "art" of the automobile is missing.

 

Mmmmm, that was probably a wonderful smell to wake up to!

 

Obviously you don't spend enough time trying to decipher some of the posts on this site!

 

I once made myself a sandwich ,I thought I was never going to get done !!

 

What does "laying frame" have to do with traditional hot rods and customs?
Not a damn thing, but punch that phrase into search and see how many hits you get!

 

My dad told me about when he lived in Montana that they had to do that with the diesel in the winter time. Use a soup ladle to put the gel into buckets, take it in the house to turn it liquid again, and then go out and put it in the tractors.

 

Exactly. Back in the day, there were no power tools or air tools to work on anything. Nothing but a workbench with lots of hand tools on it.

Changed alot during the years before the war, when the industrial revolution came.

Anything built before 1940 was all manual labor.

 

Those that can do... those that can't buy.

I can't afford to buy anything to build my car... that's why it's taking so long. I just purchased a book to build my own charcoal foundry, and I'll be working on learning how to cast metal so I can make some parts. I'll also be using my small foundry to make my own metal lathe so I can make some machined parts too. In a year or two I'll have a complete small machine shop so that I can make any tool I need... just like was done in the past.

I suppose I could get a credit card and go in debt and get everything right now, but I've had enough of "modern convenience". All it has done for us is create a nation of "do-nothing" slackers. I don't need the instant gratification of getting it done now, I'd rather take pride in making it all myself, so that when I'm done I can truly say that this is MY car.

 

I heard talk of an old guy in our area that actually built his hot rod without using E-Pay or the Internet

 

It's about preserving what made this country what it "was" before it's gone forever. For me at least it's why we're all here at this site, it's the same ethics just with wood instead of metal.

I built my own house a few years ago and drove every nail by hand. I did cheat and use power saws and drills but no power nailer just a 28 Oz. waffle face framng hammer and a whole bunch of 10 and 12 penny nails with 3 to a stud at each end. My friend who was a framing carpenter for a big name local contractor couldn't believe it. He told me I was nuts but that my house would be standing 200 years after the crap they were building was long gone. Nearly destroyed my elbow though, it hurt to even shake hands for a good 6 mos. My Great Grandfather and Grandfather were both carpenters and built many of the homes and barns around here in the late 1800's through mid 1900's all by hand. I like to think I did them proud.

 

i built a loft in my barn last week, i hand nailed it all, damn, my arm was tired

 

1880's?? Thats, like, brand new!! The house I live in was built in the early to mid 1700's. It could even be earlier than that but the deeds got a little screwed up way back when. This is my barn that had seen better days as a blacksmith and farrier shop in the late 1800's. It was believed to have been built in the early 1700's with even older wood from previous barns and buildings. Over the past few years I, along with my brother, took it upon ourselves to rebuild the entire place. The craftsmanship that took place back then was amazing, mortisse and tendon joints on 24' long hardwood beams hung 16' up off the ground and over a 8' pit!! We used a backhoe and a chainfall to put the new posts and beams in place and it was still backbreaking! Its still not ready for all out hoedowns yet but hopefully will be this spring. Oh and what does this have to do with hotrods? My roadster loves to sleep in its 300 year old New england barn!

 

This is our house. To keep the thread "hotrod" related, my Essex is in the pic.


This is the 1 1/2" Maple floor. The main floor has been refinished, the upstairs hasn't been refinished yet, but it's on our "to-do" list. The house also retains its 4 original stained-glass windows which make for interesting patterns when the sun hits them.

 

This place is about tradition isn't it? That's what it has to do with hot rods. Everytime I go into a really old building it's like talking to an old person - they all have interesting stories to tell and memories to share. I still have lots of old hand saws and planes and to think that's all they used back in the day is very sobering. Because of this, I try to use hand tools as much as I can just to get a feel for how much we've lost to our "modern" ways. Ity's humbling to realize just how much the old guys could get done in a day, regardless of the weather or lack of electricity. Think about that the next time your power drill acts up or you MIG jams.

 

I do find it funny that, for the most part, when I build something by hand it costs me more in time and money than if I just bought it ready made. I make stuff by hand when I want it "my" way.

I built 350 ft of fence. Post hole digger in hard pack dirt, digging pole, hand mixed concrete, pressure treated uprights, cedar beams (3 horizontal instead of two) all cedar pickets. I spent about 2X the money on materials and all that "free" time on labor. It's beautiful, mortise and tenon jointed the uprights to the beams and screwed in all the pickets by hand. All in all, I could have spent almost half as much to pay someone to do it and had all my summer back to do fun stuff.

I still prefer that I did it my way.

Most of the stuff on my 52 is the same way, would have been way cheaper to buy a wiring harness, new off the shelf brakes, etc. I still will eventually, but I will when I know everything I want to keep still works like it should.

 

The stories are interesting I guess, But I've never used a post hole digger,nail hammer or wood floor in any of my hot rod builds...Maybe some of you are on the wrong site!!! Maybe "This Old House" would be more fitting...........

 

My dad's uncle used to do that until he got sidetracked one morning and forgot about the oil on the stove ... managed to burn the house down.

 

what you fail to see is this,,these things involve problem solving,,building ,,etc,,the more knowledge you have the more ways you can approach things.

Like 20-30's cars ?? Wood working skills come in a bit handy there,,and overall problem solving

Plumbing ,,can come in very useful when working on cars..sorry your scope is so narrow.

 

Yeah, but did they use air drills/tools to build your car when it was built and brand new?

There is a lot to be looked back in awe at what they accomplished without modern conveniences.

 

If you want to talk about how old cars were built, that's find; I just don't think old houses are appropriate on this site. You can rationalize and compare all you want but houses and cars are, I'm sorry to say, not alike....

 

I appreciate this thread a lot.My 1942 era house is framed in all hardwood,not a pine board anywhere.If I nail anything,I have to predrill it.Almost bought a house built in 1892 last year with the then g/f..It was originally built by the owner of a furniture and mantle company.The construction details and woodwork were amazing.I really wanted to live out my life in that house,but as it turned out,the ex g/f wasn't in it for the long haul.
And my respect for this type of work is directly related to my respect for traditional cars.

 

My grandfather had to walk to school uphill both ways barefoot in 3 feet of snow..
not quite true lol but things were much tougher than than now
love the thread ...own a old plaster walled centery home
built garage off the back trying to stay with the theme of home an wow back breaking work even with the help of many an new styled tools ..

 

Don't be sorry bubba, just ignore the thread if you don't like it. Have a good one.

 

You guys with your no power tools craftsmanship can give me a bad time because we hired a crane to do the lifting. The logs were hand peeled and notched in Canada. trucked down & re-stacked in 3 days. Then the work began. For you "What's this got to do with hot rods?" guys I included a pic of my '57 Ford Grumman Kurbsider. It's available, & then I can get some handrail.

 

And many old houses were poorly built.Framing lumber not cut straight,nothing nailed on centers and all that.Yeah the crooked floors and door openings,some call it settling,but not always.If you check closely you'll see the way it's put together a level was never used during the construction.Even the Romans and Egyptians used levels.
This is the reason for all the building codes we have now,because of past fuck sticks.
Just cause something is 120 years old doesn't automatically mean quality.
Some old buildings were the rat rods of their day...........

 

"Some old buildings were the rat rods of their day...."
True. My house was built in 1908. Did you know that you don't need a saw to install floor joists? Its true. As long as they're close to the right length you can just kick one end of the joist to one side or the other to fit the width. Angle them, right? That's why joist spacing ranges from 22" to 38" and never the same from one side of the room to the other. LOL. Definitely the carpenter's equivalent of chicken wire patch panels.
A weird old tech way to build is putting up green (fresh cut) sweet gum lumber as fast as possible before it dries and warps. Only works if you have real wood interior and exterior wall sheathing. Did any of you Southern people know that sweet gum could be used in building a house?

 

You make a very good point. However, just because a house is built today doesn't mean it can't be crappy too. Our current 100-y/o house is far better built than the one we had before, and that one was built only 30 years ago. Nothing was straight, corners weren't square, the builder used crap windows that leaked, insulation was poor, etc. While I agree that not all old houses were well built, the one we're in now is far superior to our last place.