I agree,But its just so much easier to set the car up right the first time while its all blown apart now. Cutting and welding is easy now with the bare frame. Without a lift and when the body is on. Its a real pain in the ass to be cutting and welding on your back on a garage floor. Thats just how I would do it. I only like to set up suspensions once.
You static drop that car pretty low. I am thinkin the rear. Then throw in your wife,kids,cooler,chairs a couple of buddys. Its going to drag ass,exhaust,bumpers,ect. Not to mention get High Centered like one of our guys did at the Style Kings Show right in the drive to get into the show. It took 5 guys at the gate to pull it off so he cold get in. Its just not worth the aggrivation to me. Set it up right the first time and enjoy it for many years to come.
Real cool fleetline. I have a 51 pontiac fastback, id love to chop it but i dont have the funds or resources right now. (still in school). Cant wait to see more prgress on it!
That was my plan... smooth and floats down the road like a cadillac Cool man, hopefully I can bump the quality up from "2 stars" haha Air shocks? First goal is to get it on the road... then the kustom work and chop will happen soon after!
Looking good! I'm also building a 52 Fleetline with truck arm rear. I've gone with coilovers, though. My arms were take-offs from a NASCAR racer, but pretty much the same deal. There are some pics of my project on my Photobucket: http://bit.ly/miGTM6
Im going to be putting a trailing arm suspension under my fleetline this weekend. I want to use the factory truck crossmember and lenghten it like you did. Will it hit the floor board?
That's cool man I bet it will ride nice with the coilovers. A bit too much technology for me though! Suprisingly it did not hit my floorboard. I mounted the crossmember just in front of a body mount and the floor just happens to be raised up there from an under floor crossmember on the body. Couldn't have asked it to fit better... now I didn't bolt my body back down, so it could've been interfering a little bit you know?
i was excited about your truck you were building, but this is a great thread. you do great work, keep it up.
I miss my truck, but I'm glad I'm building something on it's original frame. I never really liked the idea of the s10 frame under the '54 p/u, but it's what I had so I tried to make the best of it. This car will teach me a lot about body work. The rocker panels are horrible... they are going to need some serious work.
Sweet this is an awesome thred. I love those Fleetlines. Looks great with the trailing arms! Did I understand it correct, are they from a 1960 - whatever Chevy truck? Is the crossmember from the same truck... I really like it! Klaus
Yes they are from a 60's chevy truck. I think they're the same from '60-72 on those trucks. And yes the crossmember is from the same truck. It was a little narrow so I extended it to fit and it actually doesn't interfere with the floor boards! Anyways got started boxing in the notches:
It's only 6 inches... I think the gambino notch is like 10 inches for these cars. Besides ride height with those 6.70 tires was with the axle sitting on the frame, so I wanted to make sure I had plenty of room so I wouldn't be on the bump stops every little bump.
I want to lower my car more in the rear but I already have that problem. It makes me jump out of my skin everytime that axle smacks the frame. Its like if you have a baby with a REALLY bad cough.
Yeah you really have to notch these frames if you want the back end low. They were 4x4 from the factory ha
From a few crude measurements it looks like they will clear. If not it will be minimal trimming. Now upper spring mounts will probably be a different story...
My grandpa owns a fab shop and they've been pretty slow so I drew up what I wanted and one of his guys cut them out with a torch and cleaned them up. I cut out the plate for the top caps and bent it as I welded it on. Still gotta get some plate for the bottom pieces and bend that up
Hey...It's finally in the garage, maybe now you can get three stars! I will show you some love! haha! C-notch looks good! See it worked! Your at 3 stars now!
Got my leBlond tonight! Turns out it's a 14 inch which is smaller than I thought but still plenty. But it's set up with a 3 phase motor right now so I'll have to explore options to convert to single phase or just put a single phase motor on it. Garage is so full now...
The Jalopy Journal
