Very nice work! your pictures are great , your modifications look well thought out. You're gonna have a nice car!
Thanks fellas, appreciate it. I picked up a insert and shell. the insert had a bunch of bars missing but i had a handfull of bent and twisted bars, to straighten them i put a saw in a vice and hammered them back to straight over the blade.
Steering wheel work - got a little ahead of myself on this but wanted to restore my banjo steering wheel, lot of cracks and chips and dryed out. first I wanted to make it fit my steering, so I milled out the keyed center then machined out the center with the right spline from a junk wheel, then pressed it in. Then I made a plate to weld the bushing too - the center of the wheel is aluminium. then made a cap I then wanted to restore the wheel so I first fixed the wheel rim with bondo and sanded it all smooth. then I made a mold from it using silicone. the mold is in two halves - first using a clay type putty you build it up around half the wheel. cover it in mold release spray and pour in the silicone, after it drys you pull off all the clay then spray mold release again anmd pour the second half. You end up with a void that you fill with a two part resin that when cures, is super strong but flexible. I have made a bunch of wheels as practice - its really hard to get it to vent right and you only have about 30 seconds of work time after you have dyed and mixed the resin. I have not removed all the old wheel down to the steel insert as im a little scared and wanna get it right first time! this was a lot of effort and maybe should of just bought a good wheel! but at least if I get this down I can buy the cheaper bad wheels and fix them. fingers crossed! A
Oh and I made this buffing wheel from an old motor I acquired. gonna need this as the steering wheels come out a little dull
Thanks for sharing all the details of your project. I really liked seeing the pictures of your banjo wheel reconstruction.
Nice job on the steering wheel, please keep the details of your effort comming, will follow with grate interest. Thanks for sharing.
I made up a banjo wheel 20 years ago... I cut off the spokes, built a fire in an old steel tub.. I melted the rubber off a small ford sportie car [EXP. ?] … the inner steel wheel was made of an extruded X, bent round... the spokes fit into the angle in the x, tacked them in, wrapped the wheel in duct tape as the tape gets sticky on both sides with time... electrical taped around 1/2" of the spoke's outer ends with the tape ends ending on the wheel not spokes... then added [2] steering wheel wraps... cut, ground the banjo's under side hub till the base fit my speedway removable hub... now the steering wheel can be stowed / locked in the trunk as a little theft protection... after pix if it matters... had the boys in the tool room turn down the outer edge of a '35 closed car horn button so it fit in the banjo's hub... my $0.02.
Looking really good mate. Love the details on the chassis. Nice work. Have to have a visit soon. Cheers!
Golly gosh @Willows and you say this is your first time in the hot rod saddle. Man this is one smooth build. The kind of build that will surely inspire others to get out in the shed a do it. As said your skills are awesome even though you say you are a machinist ,you have bumped it to the next level.
AMAZING!! Not only do you have the ability to conjure up the designs, you possess the mad skills to execute them. I've wasted a lifetime!
Thank you for the compliments guys, really helps keeping me motivated. Which it feels like as though lately i have been lacking. its been very cold here in denver for the last few weeks and i have no heating in my shop so its almost unbearable. So not much progress to report: I started to box the frame. Then plasma cutter crapped out, it apparently doesnt like the cold either. Luckily it was still under warranty and is being repaired. The good news is that i picked up a cheap banjo (deluxe too!) at the tri state swop meet a few weekends ago. The start of the steering wheel empire has begun!
Hi. To say that I am embarrassed about it now being almost two years since last post is a understatement. I don’t understand why it is taking me so long to do this, I have all this energy to work on the car when I am not around it then I get home from work and not much happens. I feel overwhelmed sometimes maybe. I hope that I am not alone feeling like this. Needless to say we didn’t drive hotrods to Bonneville 2019, we were there and had a fantastic time per usual. 2020 did not happen for us. 2020 what a year… I have made some progress. Not as much as I hoped. But some. Chip chip away, right? I have managed to make some improvements to my shop also which has been great. Also some new tools. Ill follow this post with a download of latest trials and tribulations. Thank you. A
I finished boxing the frame. i had screwed up on the center X section was interfering with sub frame. Trimmed the top and added some gussets .
So i had a complete disaster with the engine. This is hard to believe. I had sent a crud filled, grime covered 59a block to the machine shop for cleaning and magniflux. Got the all clear. Great! So it was then bored to finish, honed, milled. cam bearings installed. Got it back in a bag, i took a quick look and sprayed it down with WD40 and sealed the bag back up. This all happened sometime mid 2018. In early 2019 i unbagged it to start building and discovered these holes in the side. the next day i took it back to the shop that did the work. and they couldnt believe it either. They were really good and apologetic and just asked for another block and repeated all the work, no further charge. Which i think was the right thing of them to do, but it had been almost a year., plus i was embarrassed for not looking at it more closer. Anyway i had to find a engine quick. a 51 Merc came up (stuck of course) i bought it (for too much of course). I dont have any pics of the disassembly, but the one good thing that came out of it was that i came up with the best tool ever! I dread taking the horseshoe clips out no longer.
Another mistake i made was not copying the angle and length of the x-member from stock. What i should of done is what my idol and man crush Bass does which is just remove one from a 35-40 and weld it in. What i did is got some bent channel drilled a load of holes etc. So when it came to the pedals i was forced into making my own, which ended up being ALOT of work. I can only find a few photos but i can take some new ones if anyone is interested.
Built the floor. i used parts of a cut up subframe to make pockets. the front floor is all removable for access to MC and battery which will be under passenger. I had won a big box of large hinges at an auction, used some to make a metal brake so i could bend the rear section .
Deck lid was badly rotted so needed to fix that. I used a piece of hardwood to fold patch piece on itsself and had a very damaged deck lid that i cut some parts off
I was so lucky with this car that all the wood and garnish molding was in it and in great condition (other than the roof, headliner etc) but after the chop i needed to shorten, heres the pictures showing that. i dowled and glued and added oak then sanded for the rear window. These next pictures are how i tackled the front which some may be interested in. i made a little transfer punch to locate the holes. then made a really simple cup to do the new counter sink. sorry that the pics are not that clear
dash work First there was some holes that i needed to fix. i am using the stock tank and wanted to be able to see the tank level dial, so a made a little fixture to make a trumpet shape. Using a harbor freight hyd press it made easy job of it. you can see the two pieces of the tool
english wheel. first i needed to make one, then i need to learn how to use it. I had bought from harbor frieght years ago some lower anvils. i dont think that you can get them anymore so it was lucky i did. i knew that i wanted to use the frame of a antique bandsaw. i just had to wait for one to come up. after a few years one did. it is insanely heavy, 1930's Tannewitz. the guy didnt want to put it in my truck. he was probably right. Hope this doesnt break the rules i know its not car stuff but i thought you guys would be interested. I plan on making the roof section .
Sorry for massive dump of stuff. i have a bit more to add till we are up to date. Ill do that later. Thank you for looking. \\A
Engine! So after the first core with cracks, the second with holes that was fully finished. the third block came back. it is a 8BA this time, specs: 3-5/16 Ross pistons, Merc 4" crank, 8BA rods, Harmon Collins 6372 (grind by Pete D&L absolutely incredible work!), old adjustable lifters (redone by Pete also), Fidenza flywheel (beautiful), edelbrock manifold and heads. I will build it like a earlier motor with crab dist. and earlier heads and manifold. All rotating parts have been balanced. First i built the gearbox i didnt get to many photos of this. I did machine o-ring grooves onto the main shaft and reverse idler shaft. That first picture i just included for fun, it went straight on the scrap pile. I used this Hall to regrind the valve seats - this thing is amazing! Assembled the valves for each seat Then the pistons, rods and rings after gapping the rings. Heres the Cam. I ended up making a cam bearing tool to install the bearings. After grinding all the cast flashing and polishing the intake and exhaust ports. then thoroughly cleaning i painted it and assembled it, i used Tardel/Bishop & Abbin books to get correct clearances and torque specs etc. I found that you really need both books for the job unless you know it all inside out which i dont. The new gasket sets come with a lip seal for around the crank snout. i made a new spacer out of ferralium which is pretty hard, you need a hard smooth surface for lipseal. the engine in car for first time. I have not run it yet, pineapple has run stand which we will do. I took many hours doing this, i was so nervous for this job and i am so glad that its done. i have so much into this engine i dont even want to think about it.
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