Great! Good to hear. Probably will be the first thing done while working oh the bugs. Thanks! More body work. Doors next! Thanks! Pete
Sorry for the delays. A lot of personal stuff going on right now. Anyhow, I was able to get down to the shop for a day full of spreading bondo and sanding it off. I've been thinking about the motor idling high the last few days, and was poking around the motor when I found that one of the studs for the heat riser on the bottom of the intake was missing. Vaccum leak!!! Plugged it up, and it is now idling at 900rpm. Good deal! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Skg61qk6qik Thanks! Pete
Hi BlackJackPG, your car looks great, exiting to follow your build! I think your definately going the right path with the different rear and newer trans, i have a 38' coupe with a gmc 270 and the stock torquetube and non synchro 3 speed, engine revvs about 3.3k at 50 mph.. not fun at all. I myself are doing the conversion come this fall, but i'm gonna do it alittle different due to parts availability and cost here in europe: 2wd S10 rear with wheel adapters 5->6 Lugs.. T5 or volvo M40 gearbox. I would also like to say hello to Mr. Six Ball! thank you for your advice a while back with my 270, everything is great and the engine is running fine. A question to all: has anybody ever used the Weber 34 ICH 1 bbl carb on a straight six? they are about 150$ brand new and one could maybe jetting them down (170cfm stock) alittle and use two or three... ?
When you get rid of the torque tube rear and bolt your new rear in place the wheels won't be centered in the fender opening, some people just turn the leaf springs around to get the rear end located instead of making a plate to move the locating bolt.
Hello Wolfman glad to help. Us 270 guys have to stick together. @2racer,That is interesting. I never heard of turning the springs around. How easy!
Great Advice guys! ^^ Thanks! Just about everything is bondo-ed up! I started taping off all the holes for the first few coats of blocking primer! It's starting to get exciting! We also sandblasted and painted a bunch more parts. I'm just glad to be back in the shop. I almost shriveled up and died from withdrawl the last few days, so it's nice to be back. I was having trouble with the video, so it was reposted, new link here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DJOJct5aAQ One more thing. We started to get into the dash board today. Tore it all apart, fixed the clock and started looking at the speedometer. We have heard of speedometers that operate by sticking a magnetic transponder on the wheel or through GPS. The freese plug in the speedo outlet of the Saginaw transmission is going to be really tough to get out, so we wanted to weigh our options before going to far. Has anyone tried this or have any advice/ reccomendations pertaining to electronic aftermarket speedometer setups? Anything is appreciated. Thanks! Pete
The car's getting so nervous it might start changing colors here pretty quick! The first few coats of blocking primer are going on in the morning. Thanks! Pete
I was starting to get tired of flat black anyway. This is getting exciting! Sawhorses where harmed in the making of this production. Thanks! Pete
I spent most of the day sanding the body. I've got most of the bumps worked out with 150 grit sandpaper. We're going to go down to 600 grit, so there's plenty left to do, although it should get easier as the sandpaper gets finer. Boy it's tedious stuff! Not sure if I've already said this, but my hat goes off to you full time body workers. It's brutal. Anyhow, I'm going to spend the next few days up in Indiana doing college stuff, so it should get pretty dull on this thread at least until about mid-week. Hopefully grandpa might get a bug in his butt and go sanding some more, but I don't want him to work too hard. Also, we looked around at some local hardware stores and found a good color for the dash. It's pretty close to original, so that's good. We'll put it all together, then decide if we want to go the extra mile with the wood graining. I think it looks okay. Thanks! Pete
Whew! Finally back to work! Body is sanded down to 500 grit paper and at the painters! The final color we chose was a dark blue found on a 1974 Mac Commercial Truck. Should be painted by Monday. I hope it turns out good. We also pulled the tires off the rims and will be sandblasting them tomorrow. Rims will be painted the same color as the body. Firewall and inner fenders will be a glossy black. Thanks! Pete
Beautiful car and I really like the direction this is going. What a cool deal working with your Gramps on a hot rod. Best o luck guys. ~sololobo~
Hey Thanks! I am blessed to have this time. Love every second of it. Progress from today: Rims and dashboard are sandblasted. The dashboard components (glove box lid, instrument panel etc.) are painted. I think they turned out well. Also, gramps spent the day polishing chrome and putting in the new glass. It really looks great! Thanks! Pete
Pete, As you know you've got an 8 slot wheel down there on the far right bottom row, that's a more valuable wheel as it's only a one or two year make for the Chevies. I have one, if you find someone putting together a set. Cosmo49
Wow! No, I didn't know that! I did noticed one was different, but not desirable! We were just going to use it as a spare, but I might consider selling it now. Cool, thanks Cosmo! Progress from today was minimal once again. Gramps took a personal day, so naturally things were going to be slow. Rims are primed. I ran out of primer, so the dash didn't get primed. With all the body parts at the painters, the shop was fairly empty, so that gave me the chance to do the first real clean up for a while. We can walk around in there now which is nice. Anyhow, more to come tomorrow. Side note: Does anyone have any ideas about 1940 steering boxes. Nobody is remanufacturing 1940 Steering boxes, nobody wants to rebuild them and I can't find any NOS boxes. I might start hitting up the junk yards, but before I do that I thought I'd make a shout out to you guys. Anyone have any ideas of interchangeable boxes or ways to rebuild them etc.? Thank you! Thanks! Pete
Rims are scuffed up and ready for paint. The steering box is back together and surprisingly tight. (whew!) Also, Grandpa got back to polishing the trim. Unfortunately, while he was doing that a piece caught an edge in the buffer, jerked up and ripped open his hand pretty bad. I pulled him inside, wrapped him up, set him in his chair in front of the coverage of the races at our local Sonoma Raceway and he was napping before I got out of the door. Kinda funny about the napping part but jeez, I really hate to see him hurt himself like that. He cant just jump back up like he used to. Luckily, he was back out later that day to help with the steering box, but boy that shook me up seeing him like that. Getting old ain't fun. Thanks! Pete
Getting old is not for sissies but a lot of young guys get hurt too. Making it to the end of the road with all your body parts is a rare thing. If you do the stuff we do it is highly unlikely. I hope your granddad is OK.
Yeah, after all the stories I've heard from him, it's amazing he still has all of his fingers/ limbs. Heck, it's amazing he is still alive. More of a blessing than luck I guess. He's fine, it shook me up more than anyone else. Progress from yesterday: The dashboard is painted. It looks pretty nice, then I was struck by the obvious. Why not just paint it the color of the car? Haha, again we'll see how it turns out, but if worst comes to worst we can always use the left over paint from the car. We also built the linkage for the clutch pedal to the lever on the bell housing. Then we drove to our closest paint store to pick up the paint for the car (about an hour drive.) On the way back, my '01 Jeep Cherokee stuck an exhaust valve and that took a good portion of time to diagnose and fix. These last couple of days have been pretty slow. I hate not getting a lot done, but what are you going to do. Thanks! Pete
I always wear heavy welders gloves when polishing or buffing. Occasionally, a piece will get ripped from my grasp and twist my fingers. Hint, if a piece is really small, screw it to a piece of wood and polish against it. Trim can easily tear a finger off before you know it! Be safe!
Good idea! At least there is a good chance that if you can find the glove your fingers will still be in it.
Hahaha! My thought exactly about the welding/ heavy duty gloves. I looked around for a while, then finally gave up and asked him. He said he didn't have any, "Never have, never will!" His hand are just about as tough as cow hide anyway. Heck, there isn't a pair of safety glases in the place either. (Not such a problem for him wearing regular eye glasses, but mom tends to get kinda hot when I come home with metal shavings sticking out of my eyeballs.) Like I said, it's amazing he's still alive. There is no such thing as safety equipment with Grandpa Jim. Although, we are pretty good about preventative safety measures so usually things run pretty smoothly, but accidents do happen. Could've been worse. Progress from today: More trim polishing, more sandblasting and more painting of miscellaneous stuff. We also set up a bench and laid all the junk we've got out on it. We took stock of what's ready and what's not. I hope it's all there. Really, we're just preparing for the body to roll in and then start slapping stuff back on it. Word from the painters is that they are done with the final body work (they found a few spots that needed touching up) and would be painting tomorrow or the next day. I would've liked to paint it ourselves, but having a climate controlled paint booth is probably more safe with paint being so expensive now-a-days. I'm starting to get really excited about seeing the body all spiffed up. I just hope we chose the right color. Not really too much to see from today... Sorry. Thanks! Pete
I'm big on eye safety. One eye quit on me a few years ago and I got a good scolding from the doctor when he was pulling a piece of wire from a wheel out of my good eye. I don't play the guitar well enough to make a living on a street corner. I have used up my visual spare and although one eye is not half blind it is damn inconvenient. Being unnecessarily blind from carelessness would be extra bad. The wire was from one of those "It'll just take a sec to knock the rust off this bolt." things. Dumb!
Wow, I'm sorry to hear that. It must be the pits having bad eyes. I hope it doesn't slow you down too much. I buggered up my left eye a little bit a few weeks ago, so I invested in a 2 dollar pair of glasses from a gas station. Same situation, I was on the wire wheel and had something fly into it. It's like a paper cut, you can hardly see it but man does it sting! I'll be more careful. Progress from today: More trim work done. Polishing chrome and stainless steel and painting the window sills (if that's what they're called?) we chose a metallic paint which is similar to what the original was. It concerns me a little bit because its different than the tan/ cream color, but it blended nicely in the original car. Also, we bolted on more odds and ends on the frame. It's coming along! Thanks! Pete
I don't go any slower I just bump into more stuff. It takes twice as long to look at a pretty girl but only half as long to look at an ugly one. I can't see all of a fat girl at once. If I need a cornea transplant I can be my own donor. My world is smaller but it's full of surprises. It only takes half as much beer to get blind drunk. I don't squint when I shoot.
Hahaha! Man, your're on a roll! Those are hysterical! And on that note, lay your beat up eyes on this! Hopefully it takes you twice as long to look this pretty girl! Thanks! Pete
Need to ask a question to the experts I also Have a $0 Chevy coupe and want to keep stock as possible while updating to a 235 from a 55 Chevy, I have been told I will need to change to a 42-48 Flywheel, Question is why can't the forty flywheel starter be used on the 235. Is there a difference in the crank flange that was made after 1940. Also there a alumnium flywheels adverstisted to fit 1940 t0 62 don't know the Dia of the 40 or the 55 flywheel please help me to understand
The Jalopy Journal
