Projects Project Mattitude: the Beginning

A couple questions..

The lean-back on the crossmember at the top should be about 8 degrees. Right?

How many leaves should there be in a stock rear A spring? Mine only has 4 but it has a regular bolt and nut through the middle which makes me think the PO before my brother-in-law took a couple out.

Is the angle of the driveshaft to the rear of the transmission important for the U-joint?

I would like to know the second one so I can keep it in mind when I tackle the angle of the rear axle in regards to the motor/transmission.

 

Lookin' good Matt, its somethin' to be said trying to be period correct. Are you using "Ford script tools" Ha Ha

 

Ahh.. I plead the fifth.

 

Took some time to cut off the subrails in the back and trim some stuff here and there..



Mocked the quarters on it..



And centered the banjo axle to the body. Looks like I did my math right on where the crossmember would end up if aligned with the spring perches on the banjo axle. I don't know if I'm in love with the appearances of the perches protruding from the axle like that outside of the body. It may have to do with it being an obnoxious shade of orange. Maybe I'll clean it up some later on and see how I feel about it. All the suspension parts and the frame will be black anyways so that should help me out some.



I'm still getting used to taking pictures after dark with this camera. They all came out blurry (like in the second picture) but I'll mess around with the shooting modes on it and see if any of the others are better.

 

I just noticed the five star rating. Thanks guys!

 

Well deserved! Looking great...

 

Thanks, man! I didn't expect that at all. It surprised me to say the least.

 

Just had a chance to go through the last few pages of your thread here. Lookin' really, really sweet! I can't wait to see it setting on the rubber. That's the point where it takes a week to wipe the smile off your face.

Keep bangin'!

 

Love what you're doing with the car Matt.....will you be installing the air ride suspension soon?

 

I keep telling myself that. I can't wait to get it on its tires although it's still a good ways from getting there.

Air ride!? This is all buggy springs, buddy.

Thanks for the kind words, guys.

 

Man, I can't even believe that I have never run across this build before. This thing is awesome, and you're doing amazing work. I'll be keeping tabs for sure!

 

Awesome build Dude...Keep it up Man!

I bet mine is on the road before yours! Ha! (that should light a fire under your ass)

 

Not cool!! I'm in school full time!

Yours may get on the road before mine but mine will be faster!

8 more weeks until summer.. 8 more weeks until summer..

 

Just kiddin dude...cant wait to see yours on the road!

 

8 more weeks til summer. The only draw back is I only get a week off between semesters. You are lucky to have the time to work on it. BTW I may steal a couple of minute details from you on a future project that is simmering out back til the 37 is done. Can't wait to see yours done.

 

Ha! I expect that from you, Forty!

I'll be volunteering a lot of time to the studio but I'll have much more time to work on the A than if it was during the school year. But, yeah.. I'm a pretty lucky kid. what subject do you teach in school?

By all means, use anything from this thread that you want! Imitation is the most sincere form of flattery. I can't wait to see it done either.. It's robbing me of my youth and money.


iPhone - TJJ app

 

Cool thread. I just picked up a 28/29 sport coupe body the other day, I'm a long way from starting on it but this thread is a good motivator. Some people shake thier heads at coupsters but I think its a perfect way into early ford hot rods.

 

Thanks! I agree.. I'm glad I started with an A sports coupe as opposed to say, a deuce 3-window coupe. I've made a lot of mistakes but learned from them on this build and in the end, if I've made too many mistakes then it was only a sports coupe. No big deal..

Mini-update: I haven't been working on this much with school taking up the majority of my time. However, I managed to find a Hurst motor mount for my 283. I've been slowly chipping away at getting the rear crossmember in. It's just about ready to be tacked in.

Since I'm bumping this back up, I'll go ahead and throw this out there. What should the angle of the rear crossmember be? At first I thought it should be a couple degrees leaning back but then realized it wouldn't work well with a closed driveshaft so I'm assuming the crossmember needs to be at zero degrees flat to work in harmony with the torque tube. From what I see in the Model A handbook, zero degrees flat is about right.

... Right?


iPhone - TJJ app

 

cars looking good! hopefully the round up lit a fire under you for the summer

 

You have no idea. Haha. The LSRU was everything I expected and more. I'm anxiously waiting for school to be out..

Three more weeks..


iPhone - TJJ app

 

awesome, i just realized that my original goal date for the car to be driving is this saturday :S i bumped it up a month. may is going to be a month of thrashing it looks like haha

 

Wow what a project! love the flames in the drawing! The proportions are right on and the fact that their is a small budget is awesome too keep plugging away cause it rocks!!!

 

This is a great thread and a great build you have going on. I am doing the same thing right now; a coupster build. You, however, are paying a lot more attention to the details than what I have been doing. I could learn a lot from your craftsmanship. I am anxious to see what you do with the windshield as that is my next hurdle. Keep up the awesome work.

Subscribed!!

 

Funny how things like that can be so motivating...the past 3 weeks or so I've seen more & more rods out and about, really pushing me to be more efficient with getting the 'Bird back together...

 

That's a pretty neat little coupster you've got there. I don't know about windshields yet.. Been tossing around some ideas. The original plan was to run without one, salt lake flats style. Did you always plan on having a windshield or did driving around without one annoy you to the point that you decided you wanted one?

 

Oh yeah.. Especially seeing Bobby Bleed pull up in his roadster made me think "I'd like to be able to do that soon."

 

Just came accross this build. TOO COOL. You got a bigger pair than me, I'll tell you that! Keep up the great work, you'll be on the road before you know it! Todd

 

I don't have much of a choice; the Iowa DOT says they won't give me a license plate till I have one. It's all part of the safety inspection. Also, I find comfort in knowing there is a piece of safety glass between stuff flying at my face and my face. I would like to have a removable one, though. I also like the idea of a "salt flats" style. All this hot rod stuff seems to have taken a back seat to a house remodel job I have going on right now. Funny how priorities seem to sort themselves out.

 

I don't know about having a bigger pair. I can tell you I'm more stupid than you are however.

Ah.. That's true. I've been doing some heavy thinking on the windshield aspect. All right, since this thread has been seeing some responses lately, I suppose I could go ahead and do a super small update.

I haven't done anything in the garage lately. There's still two and a half more weeks of school to finish then it's garage time!

However, as always, I've been obsessing over paint, interior, wheels, and so on.. And I decided that since I plan to do a metallic green for the main body, with cream white flames and gold parts throughout the car including the motor and trans. Oh, and being mentally harassed by DirtyDan's '36 coupe with the gold wheels/WWW's.

I made the decision to go ahead and go with painting the '40 wheels gold to match the motor along with WWW as opposed to chroming the '40 wheels and getting blackwalls. I think it'll match the paint scheme and overall style of the car much better in the long run. I plan to order the tires soon so I've been thinking about getting the traditional 5.50's and 7.50's.

Oh, and the windshield. I've been up in the air about whether I should have one or not. Perhaps a homemade DuVall-style windshield or cut up a stock roadster windshield to fit, etc.. I made a drawing a while ago playing around with the idea of a DuVall style windshield after seeing exStreamliner make his own with some friends and seeing Jesse James' roadster in person last weekend.



^^ Disclaimer: Proportions not exact! ^^

I know you guys would rather see REAL progress on the roadster as opposed to me changing my mind every week. Sorry guys! Hahaha.

Two and a half more weeks!!

 

This build just keeps getting better --- Cool drawing, Matt!!