Ha ha. What i mean was that i start to see the end of the construction part of the build. Then come the next part to finnish the car with a new endless list of things to do.
A small update on what i have done the last days. I pulled out the engine in order to do some things where it is in the way. The first thing i did was to put a pipe in the frame for the electric cabels to the front.
Now it was time for the firewall. Started to put in the edge where the floor will atatch against. The steeringshaft complicated things alot on the driver side. Used a bit of exhaustpipe that fit around the hardydisc. Then i centered it with help of metalstrips. Then i took a bit of sheetmetal and cut out the first pice of the firewall and tacked it. Before i fully welded things up i hang in the gearbox with the bellhousing to make sure it fits. The other side was a rather straight forward job. The inside of the driverside.
I have done more the last 6-7 weeks then manage to do during the whole winter. And i am tired to look at it in my garage so its time to make a car of it.
With the firewall in place it was time to make the toeboards and the front part of the transmissiontunnel. To get my sheetmetal close to what i needed i used some maskingtape around the edges. Then laid it on a bit of sheetmetal and scribed. I added about 3/4 around the edges to get some margin. Then it was alot of bending and trimming till it fit. I plan to run the maincable from the battery to the starter in the right side subframe. Made a hole just before the kick up to route the cable over the frame to the starter. Left some extra space under the floor for that. Could then make the toeboard and finnish the transtunnel. Made a hole in the toeboard to access the wiring there thats will get a lid. So now is the front part done on the floor.
No big update this time. Have doing some odds and ends that needed some attention. I mounted my not so traditional hydraulic clutch on the gearbox. Will be alot easyer to route the lines than make a functioning linkage. Next was a link for the accelerator to mount at the back of the cylinderhead. Not sure if i need it or not but it was easy to make when the engine was out. Made the upper holes in the crossmember to route gas and brakelines. Could not longer use the lower ones after i lowered the engine in the frame. Made a bracket for the brake distributorblock. Drilled and bolted some sheetmetal i did not finnished when i made them. Drilled and tapped the front legs to clamp brake and fuel lines. Made a resess in the frame for better access to oilplug on the gearbox. Then i put the engine back.
Next up is my cooler and grilleshell. I dont know how its suposed to be done but this is how i did. I use the 32 grilleshell so i can hide a electric fan in the grille. And i wanted to avoid to have bars over the engine as support. Early in the build i welded in some stout brackets and bolted two bars upwards to mount the cooler. I decide to make a coolerframe where i could bolt both the cooler and the grilleshell. Then i bolted some sheetmetal stripes around the edges on the grilleshell that i welded to the coolerframe. Did slots on the sides to get in with spanners to the bolts that holds the cooler when the grilleshell is out. Allso made two tabs in the bottom to rest the cooler against during the mounting. I am pleased to see that i got the height of the grilleshell where i wanted it. The cooler sticking out about a inch behind the grilleshell. But thats was a trade off i made early on when i planned my grille and cooler. Since i allready was messing around in the frontend the headlight stands went in to. Just drilling some holes in the stands and frame and some tapping to bolt them down.
Since you have the grille shell positioned good, are you going to run a hood ? Sent from my SM-T350 using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
I was planning in the beginning to have that option. But in the reality it would need alots of speedblisters or holes to make it happend. The Dodge engine dont fit very well in the T. It will most likely not be in the first version to save some time. But it would look good with a full hood with speedblisters and cyclestyle fenders. And the hoodsides going over the frame and curving down to the bottom of the body like the 55 version of Andereggs car. But it still does good for the aperence of the car to have top of the grille down there.
Now i got all three pedals in place. I can operate them with my workingshoes on so i am pleased with that.
Its cutting edge technologi. A lots of time and thoughts to get it there. But a must o pass the tech inspection.
Next part of the build was a bit more rewarding. I put in a floor in the coupe. No buildpics on that. It was just to cut out some pices and weld into place. I made some beads to prevent oilcanning. Did not made the pice over the gearbox. It have to wait until the seat is made.
Well done Anders, you are really making good progress these days. My progress feels like some kind of dance steps, with two steps forward and then one step back... hahahahaha!!!
I am pleased myself with the pace of progress lateley. Its a combination of motvation to get it done and some extra sparetime becouse of covid. But now the progress problaby going to slow down a little bit couse i got some other stuff that want my attention. I have my share of dancing to. It tok just over a week to sort out the gas peddle so it works without bindings and got a good placement. I made the floor in 2 days. I dont cover the problemsolving that much becouse its difficult for me to do in english.
Have done some major work on the house during the summer and early autumn. But now i hope to be back on hotrod building again. I have ben working on my seat in some sparetimes. Wanted it to be lower and further back to gain some space. The height for the chop and the length for better legroom. It was alot more work to modify the frame for the seatbottom than it looks. But i got it where i wanted. For the backrest i just cut a bit of board that i will bolt right to the rearwall. And i have no longer use for a folding back couse i cant even get a roadmap in there anymore.
Have now spent a mounth to do a 3 day work. I wanted to convert my gearbox with a top mounted shifter. It feels like everything that could couse trouble did that. In reality its problaby the combination of a rather unclear shopmanual and my inexperience with boxes that made it timeconsuming and difficult. So first i had to lift out the engine to get access to the transmission. Then it was many days with broken tools, clips from hell and all sorts of things that falling down in the housing. I read the manual, google it and looking at several videos on youtube. And it still not want to give after and come apart even if i did everything that i have to. But after i going through all bad words and curses i can i finally got it apart. Now i could use my new toy i had bought earlyer this atumn. Tok a pice of pipe to make a tool that would help me to keep the needels in place when i put in the shaft trough the bottom gears. It worked like a champ so it was a easy install. It took a while to figure how the rest should go together but it worked out rather easy. The new shifter fitted without problem and work nice. But on the positive side the gears all looked to be in good condition. But the bearings for the input and output shaft will need to be replaced. Then i lifted in the engine again and could see it in place. I will need to rebend the shifter to clear the dash. The main reason to do all this work was pure estetic. I wanted the shifter on top of the box like most of the rods in the era. But the bonus is that i now got 1,5 inch extra room for my feets when the shifterbars on the side is gone.
I used a Jeep shifter top on mine also. I'm curious about the bolts sticking out at the original shifter shaft holes. I just tapped in frost plugs there.
Its the shifter shafts that still sticking out. Just bolted them tight with some spacers for now. I have to reassemble it before i use it anyway and then i make something nicer.
The Jalopy Journal
