Projects 1928 Model A 2 dr Phaeton Build

Right there with you

 

Cool change of direction! I dig it. A friend of mine built his 29 Tudor into a tub. It got a lot of attention while we were travelling. He had a full top and side curtains, and 4 bucket seats.

The chop of yours looked great to me before cutting the roof off but if you weren't happy, now's the time to change it!

I always thought the attached one had such a cool roof line for a Phaeton (ignore the street roddy bits). Saw it for sale in Puyallup in 2015.

I'm going a different direction building the front half of a Phaeton into a RPU.

 

but it still has Tu Dors! Yeah, thread title might get changed as this moves along.

~Peter

 

TUBOR?? HAHAHAHA

 

I put a panel on the back and access the gas tank by flipping the rear seat forward, I forgot what I got the rear seats out of GEO Metro and Don't remember weather the fronts came out of it also or a Ford Van

 

Lee Osborn's bitchin' tub started out as a Tudor sedan.
https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/lee-osborne-tub.1230048/#post-14062850

 

Thanks for the link! That one still looks good even decades after it was built. Just about as "timeless" as a 90's build can get! I like the idea of the roll over upholstery, which was fairly common among 20's touring cars. I got a pretty solid plan for the beltline and doors that I'm excited to implement here in the next week or so, should solve a bunch of issues all at once.

 

Lee and the Greek are good friends of mine, Lee is also a USAC Sprint Champion several times. Lee and the Greek built many fine race cars and hot rods together.Here is a picture of Lee in the earlier days. I watched him race against Jan Opperman [the original Outlaw] at Terra Haute at a WORLD OF OUTLAW race Jan won. Now you know how my car came to be. Frank

 

So here's step one in getting the new body line capped off. Since the original lock assembly is rather wide, it's impossible to keep the factory latch mechanism and also slim up the door thickness to fill in the gap where the window used to be.

But then I realized I could just lower the latch mechanism down closer to the door dovetail snubber, and this would not only move that thick mechanism down and out of sight, but would also allow for a more centralized latch location, since the door is now much shorter.

So I moved the entire inner door structure down 5"


And then moved the catch assembly on the B pillar down as well:





Door gap didn't change at all, so still pretty happy with that at the moment.


So the plan is to do a 1.75" wide upper rail, instead of the 2.375" that it would've been otherwise. Then have the inner door panel taper in to the original Model A structure that I moved down. Maybe it's hard to imagine, but I got it all up in my head.



So the exterior door handle holes will be filled in and I'll just run the Original Ford inside door pulls. Since this is a roadster, the security literally went out the window, and a battery isolator and kill switches will be more than enough anti-theft prevention.

So that's one door modified, I'm gonna be on the road for the rest of the week, but I'll get the driver's side matching and then I'll start on that new upper body rail.

 

Everybody I know that has had an old car stolen it was hauled away, not driven, and always at a hotel while attending an event. Add a hidden GPS locator for peace of mind.

 

Here’s a pic for inspiration!

 

Finally back from my trip and got in some more time on the Tub.

I got 1.5" square tubing with .120 wall to use for the upper body edge all the way around. Obviously, these bodies aren't straight anywhere, so there will be a lot of pie cuts and tweaking as it wraps it's way around, but that's why I chose the thicker wall.


You can see in that pic especially^ that the upper door is beginning to look more similar to a Roadster:


Thicker, but not as thick and unsightly as the original door uppers.

I'm still workshopping a few ideas for an arc to transition to the dash:


I'll tidy up the A pillar areas once I have that transition worked out. In the meantime, moving on to the passenger rear upper body piece. I decided to do all my R&D on the passenger side, and then apply what I learned to the driver's side where I'll be spending more of my ownership.


More to come, just wanted to throw an update on here.

 

Looking good mate!

 

Looks great, what are you planning on doing for the inside of the door?

 

Gonna be a door panel transition from the new upper rail down to the wider existing inner door structure. Still a few details to decide. Then the plan is either upholstered door panels or just paint the completed structure.

 

Here is a couple shots of one Tudor for Inspiration

 

Wound up getting called to do another 1500miles roadtrip this week. So just now getting back on this. Getting the 1.5" tubing pie cut and bent to match the new body-lines.

In that pic^ you can see how the body actually wants to spread out and away from the tubing in the corner, that's because the roof on a Tudor is wider than the beltline. I'll be reversing that and the body will actually transition inward to the new tubing.


There will be some creativity involved to bridge the gap between the two pieces of tubing and also tie in that factory body welting between the two panels.


The rear piece is pie cut both up and down but also fore-aft to get the Phaeton style arching rear.


Got my cut area marked, now time to slice it out and start metal shaping a new piece.





^There you can get an idea of how the body lines are going to flow. The lower is the stock Ford and the upper will follow it back and then flow up into the upper corner area.

 

Borrowed a buddy's bead roller to get the majority of the new panel worked out.


Not my first rodeo, but definitely learning everyday! The upper portion is 85% there, still some low spots to cleanup, but I was able to do it all in one patch panel.



You can see here ^ how the new panel sticks out further from the old metal, I'm going to do some relief cuts to shrink the upper piece in and transition smoothly into the old metal.

Like this:



Overall I'm very happy with how it's flowing and the body is starting to really get rigid with that .120 wall tubing around the perimeter. I still need to tie it into the B pillar and there's an old brace in the C pillar area that I'm going to tie into as well. Curious if I can get away without a brace behind the front seats....

 

It will be interesting to see how you go with the B pillars. What did the factory 2 door touring/phaenton's use there? I have seen a cast angle bracket on the B pillars of a 4 door touring out here once...

 

Well, on the 1931 Model A 2dr Phaetons, they had no visible braces that I can see. But that body is much stiffer and more complex than the 1928. So that's my rational behind the thicker tubing, trying to do something like this:

 

You can see the cast B braces (grey primered) in this fuzzy photo of a 29 tourer I picked up, I can get some better pics if you'd like. I don't think you'll need something so substantial as you're not swinging rear doors of it.

 

That's the ones I was thinking of. The 'Clunk' of the front door closing on the pillar would be substantial though, depending on how the door shuts, (very well in this case I expect ) & how heavy handed the passenger's are...

 

Finished up the majority of the passenger side metalwork. Epoxy primed in the meantime, until I get to overall bodywork and paint prep.

Here's how those relief cuts worked:


And outside for primer, 70°+ today here in Lubbock.

Now to make the driver's side match...

 

It's looking good, That line flows so much better!

 

Looking good you are getting there.

 

Was recently linked to this threat by friend 40ply who's morphing a 4 door into a 2 door tub. At times I've imagined turning my 31 Tudor into a tub because of the daunting prospect of recovering a hacked chop job. However, that decision is a long way off as I'm challenged to make progress on my most ambitious build to date.
Thanks for sharing, I'll continue to watch and learn.

 

Thanks for the works of encouragement; very little progress over the last few weeks as other jobs got priority, but I should be getting the driver's side done here as soon as next week. Then on to interior & floor panels.

 

Looks Great and Love the Project! But get you some Roadster Cowl pieces to get rid of that C'Dan transition and then narrow the Doors to fit, Jambs too. This will be a step above just whacking off the roof of a Tudor C'Dan.

OR if you like the look currently then tell me to go pound sand. Either way It's going to be one fun hair mess 'er upper. I'm following the build and encourage you to keep up the good stuff.

- Tim

 

Great build so far!

 

It's been a tough few months. Pulled in all directions on many projects, trips, crisis, etc... All the while this car is just eating away at my mind. Finally got time last week to get some more work done.

Despite the stainless Windshield Posts being made with 2" chopped out already, I found that I needed another 2" removed.




Of course I also realized that my initial work on the windshield frame was flawed, so then I had to start re-doing that:


This is a widened but stock height 28-29 frame, and the arc of the cowl is different as well, which required multiple tweaks.



Got a much better windshield height and angle now. Really loving the profile view!

I'm scrambling trying to find time to keep chipping away at the Phaeton, but after putting in a 8-12hr day on other cars and projects, it's hard to find the energy. Hoping to have more routine updates here in the coming weeks.