Thank you. It’s kind of how we felt it should be. I recently restored the chassis on a 1960's brabham for its original driver. There was a dent in the chassis on one of the rear structures that can be seen when the car is all together. I was under strict instructions not to repair the dent. The story was the car in question was an F2 car competing in an F1 race to make up the numbers. The dent was from Jacky Stewart getting frustrated in his F1 car not being able to get passed the F2 car and ended up clashing with it. The story is Stewart never got passed hence why the dent had to stay.
With the body back and the under fully welded, with captive nuts welded on where needed I could carry on and finish up the floors. the trans tunnel needed to be tight to the bell housing and tunnel to give as much room as possible for feet. hurst shifter Cutouts for the exhausts. Fuel tank filler. And very large ally fuel tank.
We’re now up to date. There’s still a bit to do over the next few weeks before it goes back to its owner to have the motor built and finish the car. Rik will do most of it himself, he’s a capable car guy and will finish it properly. I’ll leave you with a bunch of random photos for now and I’ll update as progress is made. Thanks for looking. Pete.
Dayuum...What a lucky Hotrod... @nutrocker what's the story on the brushed lettering on the tranny? Asian American Heritage? Just curious...
Very cool car and excellent work!!! Can’t wait to see it finished up. It has definitely come a long ways already!
C874DF1C-E733-4378-BA83-A5418F02071C by KFC posted Dec 4, 2018 at 4:05 AM its as it came with the car, trans has been rebuilt but had to leave the “pin striping” on
517A0A96-D8BB-4647-B097-5DD43A6A3585 by KFC posted Aug 30, 2020 at 3:51 PM 2A3BB295-0BBE-432B-ABFA-5613875E246F by KFC posted Aug 30, 2020 at 3:50 PM
A bit about the motor, It’s a 51 long bell housing 331 Chrysler hemi, when I stripped it, it had Jahns hi compression pistons and isky “hi rev” cam with double valve springs and adjustable pushrods. The heads where the stock round port 51 heads. It had a period aluminium flywheel and long clutch with a speed gems adapter for the Cadillac lasalle. The Bottom end had major work meaning the crank had been ground .100” under the con rod eye had been opened out and it had been fitted with 37 Ford floating bearings. Unfortunately that meant the crank and rods where scrap the pistons had been run in worn bores and the cam had worn .014” down on some lobes. so, fortunately a stock size crank came with the car, new forged rods where sourced, it was bored .060” though over and Ross forged pistons where ordered to give a 10:1 compression. I bought an isky B777 cam to replace the hi rev. I sourced some ‘54 354 heads (no front water outlets) they where heavily ported and fitted with 2.02” inlets and 1.75” exhaust valves. It was all balanced. The lasalle trans was rebuilt with all new bearings It will be topped with a Weiand dragster with 6 strombergs with Scott tops. I do have a period Hilborn set up that might make an appearance if I ever feel wealthy enough.
Wouldn't that be something if it had a connection to Larry Shinoda back in the day... @KFC these are the details and soul that makes the story and journey that much more interesting and restoration a balancing act...so awesome you chose to leave something that could easily have been scraped off... The tailight holes are another bit of that soul...48 Chev perhaps?... You certainly have a builder extraordinaire performing the magic... You must be pretty excited and I'm sure you are helping Nut with the vision moving forward... Perhaps one of our Japanese Hambers can chime in with a translation...that is if it is in fact of that language...
7B9365E4-15EC-471D-A7B2-6DE3E8B083EC by KFC posted Jan 31, 2021 at 3:30 PM 371F1BA9-80D0-4388-A30F-C5F6B1CACC1B by KFC posted Jan 31, 2021 at 3:30 PM 068A7859-6828-4A01-8AF3-8794A8FACC68 by KFC posted Jan 31, 2021 at 3:30 PM B47F4B6E-E5EF-4CCD-A988-85875C85EF4F by KFC posted Jan 31, 2021 at 3:30 PM
We are trying to keep the spirit of the car alive while making it 1. Usable in the modern day and 2. My own. It’s pretty obviously not a masterpiece of period Hotrodding but I want to keep the good bits. The rear lights are 48 Chevy and I have the original and they’ll be going back on. I’ve also collected pretty much every Stewart Warner block gauge they ever made for the dash.
A great percentage of the movement was rough around the edges and they many times stole the show...you are fortunate to have acquired it...
Very true, a chopped and channelled 34 with a hemi and history is about as good as it gets for me. A bit more history would be even better
...this has to be one of my all-time favorite threads on the HAMB,..I like everything you've done to this project, and your work is outstanding....thanks for saving this old hot rod,...keep us posted on progress with those great photos. Awesome! (ps...reminds me of a donation "board" I did for the Retro Rewind art auction in Dubuque, Iowa in 2017_)
The "as found" workmanship reminds me of a lot of stuff I saw when working at a wrecking yard in L.A. in the '50's. Not at all uncommon.
Awsome job saving a cool old drag car that has lots of battle scars. This is the stuff many of us dream about finding. Just curious, what became of the Jahns pistons?
This is a great build thread! Awesome work, can't wait to see the finished product! I Love how you kept the little touches from it's original build, but made it safer!
Man I’m loving all those under the dash detail shots! few questions. I’m curious if you plan To make a bead or anything around the exhaust cut outs in the rockers? How do you get the drivers side header on and off? The bends around the steering are fantastic but it’s got to be a tight fit dropping them down and it doesn’t seem like there’s space to remove the steering box to make room to wiggle them out. do you just fish the long end down and threw? Really curious how you thread the needle on that install! And my last thought, the vertical face of the trans cover in the front. It’s got that fantastic dish shape after the flange. How did you form it? I’ve gone back and looked at it half a dozen times. Just something about it. Really dig that shape. thanx for posting all this. That’s a rad hot rod
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