Hot Rods Have you personally ever built a T-Bucket

I have a lot of friends that have in the past but I have never built one, but I remember a time when most young guys in the 60's and 70's that's all they wanted.

I still know a guy that built one back in the 70's and he still has it but now that he is in his late 70's he is not agile enough to get in the car but he still loves it.
HRP

 

I had a friend who built one back in the seventies with a super charged big block chevy and no brakes on the front axle.
Not my kind of krazy….

 

Built a roadster in the late 60's and sold it before completion. my friend finished it and drove it to the nats in Detroit .
I built the touring and drove it to Minneapolis nats in 74, Menphis 75, and Timonium in 76.

 

I never built one but was ruined by one when I was 14. A friend of a friend gave me a ride in his with a blown small block Chevy. After launching with the left front wheel in the air about a foot, I was hooked on horsepower...

 

My old Touring would certainly qualify, just with two extra doors like @jim32 in post #3

 

Yes, I have built two. I have had hot rods for 40 years and my t-bucket was the most fun car I have ever had. They are great cars, not practical yes.

 

Yes

 

You know I have, I built it in 1963 and owned it until 2018.

 

nope, never wanted to build one, rode in a few, they are fun

 

If I did not have my drag coupe, I would love to build a wicked T bucket. Maybe someday, I have always liked them, ever since I was a child.

 

I've been in the hot rod building business for 50 years, doing mostly '32's.
Now I find myself building my first T Bucket !

 

I love your T build Mr. Eastwood. Fantastic look sir.

 

My first Hot Rod was a T Bucket because that's all I could afford to buy as far as a body. It was kind of rough but I based it off of Sam strubes T Roadster in rod and custom I believe in the early 2000s. I probably had about $3,000 invested in the whole thing. It was a great fun car but I wrecked it drinking and driving at el mirage. Lesson learned.

 

I have always wanted to. It's never too late'

Go Kart

 

I love that! Any more pictures john?

 

Pete, perfect proportions, have you thought about using cowl steering ?

 

Well, I got hooked watching 77 Sunset Strip. Built, should say tried to build, a T-Bucket at 12 years old. Worked on it in our basement. Got it as far as a roller, did have an engine and trans. Flathead with a 39 trans, never got it in the car. Turned 16 got a 55 Chevy and sold the uncompleted T-Bucket in parts and never looked back Still like T's to this day.

 

Almost 20 years ago I guess. The one that's my avitar. Just don't really have any good photos of it.
Built it with my son and he's now 31. If he wants it he can have it when I'm gone.

Lynn

 

"T"s are small,oddly enough too me,those I have helped to build there "T"s, have to be told that simple fact, combind with"You should make at least one of the doors open!!! And you should use a low bench seat/for both room an so your not sitting on top vs sitting in,the bucket body. The last one I loved working on,,was helping my Son do what he wanted.
He got a pile parts{ someones failed project an other used parts,too make a T-bucket with. Not a kit,and we made our own frame.like most of the other stuff..
All though now days,there are real nice "T-bucket Kits",< You don't need to build exactly as the plans call for,but be way ahead engineering wise by using the kit,in time an $$$$ for most want to be hot rodders that have not done it before!.
Ya,I know, werid way too talk about it !
Yes,I have worked on 5 T-buckets that belong to others,plus a number of redo on some that needed help.
I built my own first "A"-bucket{ even as a teen,I know I wanted working doors.,an got that running in 1959.
You can make one or both doors open,long after the rod was built. It's just a bit harder to do later,yet if it needs to be repainted anyway=that's a great time for the mod. Jumping over the side=gets old faster then you think,when your young!!! So dose building the car too low{ getting in an out of a cartoon,is not EZ,except if you are a cartoon.
I could not talk my Son into doing openning door ether.
The blue one is my Son's"Pandora",the red one on the far right,is Rosh's,I helped with.

 

Most Ive seen for sale are half built.

 

Have always loved your T. Basic and simple............. spot on.

 

60’s T’s can be awesome. I sold my stash of steel Model T parts in the last year, and regret that every day. Might be time to buy all new Should probably hire somebody to bolt the stuff together. Nothing wrong with that.

 

I've always wanted to. I really like the turtle deck way more than the truck box. To me, the turtle deck makes it look like a race car. One thing I don't like is a lot of Ts are built so the top of your thigh is even with the top of the door. I see guys diving them and it looks like the bear at the circus on a tricycle. I raced a T but I want to do a street car one day.

 

If I could find a body tomorrow I'd start on it this weekend. Always wanted one.

.

 

yep, 7 of them todate. Just finished another Kookie T "look a like"

 

Started mine in 1968 , finally on the road in 2002 , life seemed to keep getting in the way !
Its probably as far from a kit as possible , fabricated most everything.

 

Built a few t roadsters, but never a classic bucket. I have parts lined up and want to build a classic bucket from the yellow car pictured in the near future.

 

Country Joe....do my eyes and the camera angle deceive me or is the front axle in slightly askew with the LF wheel ahead of the RF wheel? If that is the case, I guess it would be an advantage against red-lighting?

 

I built one on '64-'65. I built a frame out of 2" square tube, a Model "A" front axle, and a '50 Plymouth station wagon rear axle. The body was the front half of a early '20's touring mated to a shortened "A" pickup bed. It had a junkyard 241" early Dodge hemi coupled to a mid fifties Dodge three- speed. I got the car running and driving, and found a chromed "T" windshield someplace. Surprisingly it drove OK after changing the steering box from a Model "A" to an unknown box out of a pickup. The engine was a real turd though, and made more smoke than power. At the time, I had a '55 Dodge that I was driving back and forth to college. I knew the car, as it had been bought new by the parents of a high school classmate. After passing through the hands of a couple of local idiots (where I grew up, being the town drunk was a team sport), I was able to buy it for $10 when the latest owner abandoned it one cold night in the Legion Club parking lot when it wouldn't start. The engine turned out to be in surprisingly good shape, and with a tune-up and the addition of a stock 4BBL carb and manifold, it was a little powerhouse. When the Dodge went "tits up", the engine found it's way into the bucket.

With that engine, the stock Dodge "plowbox", and 4.30 gears, the car was block to block terror, and I had a lot of fun the next couple of years. After a while, the 2X2 1/8" wall frame proved not to be up to the purpose and the car went into retirement. The next winter, someone broke intp my winter storage, and stole all of the good parts off the car (the chrome windshield, the chromed valve covers and the chrome wheels among this), and I was left with a bent up frame and a few other parts. I have dragged this around for the last 55+ years and am currently in the process of building a new frame and putting it back on the road. The one thing I kept up all of this time is the valid Minnesota title (1966 "Homebuilt") and hope to have it on the road in the next year or two.

After many moves and two divorces, I have lost all of my pictures of the original car. Here is where it is now. I went with a new, longer frame and a touring body since the original car was very cramped.

 

Yes. Many. Beds, decks, or tanks at the rear. SBC, BBC, tunnel rammed, blown, 2,3,4,6 carbs. Even wasted my time doing one with a 53 flathead with a Grancor dual carb intake and matching heads. Common thread through all the builds were they had to be fiberglass bodies, and be low (3" pan clearance) with the seat bottom 2" off the floor. All were tube framed with center steering, quick change rears, and front axles dropped 4 or 6 inchs (even had one with the tube axle dropped 10") with full torsion bar suspension and spindle mount fronts with no brakes. Purposely kept it simple so they were easy to blow apart when I got bored with them or changed my mind.