What y'all been up to, fellas? Garage time has been a little bit limited for me this month. Mrs Artiki and I were expecting a visit from the stork on the 1st Feb...today, in fact....but the little so & so couldn't wait to meet us and popped out three weeks early, on the 12th. So here's the latest banger-fanatic to enter the world, Henry Arthur Hart, born 12th January. Still managed to get a few odds and sods done on the coupe though, in between changing nappies (diapers!) and washing clothes. Made a pedal mount - now using a '66 Volvo trans remember - and also finished porting out the block after having the larger inlets fitted. Also made a start on strengthening the rear 'bones as I'll be running a prop instead of the torque tube, as well as a torque arm. Still loads to do, but certainly made some progress.
congratualtions man! nothing really new on my coupe, besides driving it and putting it up for sale. Need to find a loving home that won't go and chop her up! Bought a new grill shell from a HAMBer, got my Model a buckets and 7" conversion kit installed, fiddled with fixing my gas tank leak, that's about it. Dang weather's been so cold, we had a few weeks there where it was below 10 degrees (that's in farenheit for those in the civilized world using celsius!) every day, that really sapped my will to work. Now it's up in the 20's though!
Whats the significance of a AA bellhousing, I have one bolted up to my supercharged A motor, was wondering if some later tranny "justs bolts up" anything?
Finally got my block back from the machinest a couple of days ago. Its only been 2 months! I've had billet steel (4340) main caps fitted. I've had these in storage for years. They were a lucky find on British Ebay of all places with a total price of £8 ($16)! I've had Bronze cam bearings fitted. These came from Jay Steel at Taylor Engine. They are specially made for the fours. You can fit 1600 Pinto cam bearings, but it ends up as a really horrible looking conversion. Bigger valve seats on the inlets have been fitted. Heres a close up of the seats. This wasn't a straight forward valve job. Still need to blend the ports into the seats. Pretty much all the valve train here. I've added large footed single lockers and yet more flatty V8 parts with the addition of Isky valve springs. Back of the valve. Again the photo doesn't do justice to the work thats gone into these. Crank assembly. Still a little undecided how far I want to take this at the moment. Thats as it sits at the moment. I'm now stuck again as I have no pistons, rods or a solution to someone who meets my requests with the re-bore. Oh and I'm waiting on a load of small piece's to be finished like the timing cover that are being 'tweaked'. I'm thoughly fed up with the whole exercise at the moment as its been a battle with parts suppliers and machine shops for nearly 3 months now and it shows no signs of improving in the near future. I JUST WANT IT BACK TOGETHER!
The AA bellhousing is 2" shorter than the normal 'housing, making it easier to adapt a later trans to a banger. I'm in the process of adapting the 4-speed trans from a '66 Volvo Amazon to my four-pot, using the AA bellhousing and it fits really well.
Found these videos on Youtube that some of you banger nuts may find interesting.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2Ch9QhwyBY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7aMfDha-bc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Eagp_rAy_U http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eeAw3-4HK_U
Well - not much but repair work to the Fordor. Drastic cut in wages means I'll probably be out on the streets busking this summer... Mark however is making plans for a performance boost later in the year in his A powered Standard. First port of call - new front brakes. With the stock tired, four banger A engine easily pulling the THREE:1 final drive (!) the limitations of the standard, err Standard, brakes have quickly been found, and a couple of fading brake slides onto roundabouts prompted having these beauties made. New Ferodo linings on the existing aluminium shoes, finned aluminium drums with a steel liner. Lovely. As for how much? He wouldn't say. Suffice to say he only had them made for the front... Comparison between the original pressed drum and the new one.
Blimey Phil, they are gorgeous. I bet they weren't cheap. Be interesting to see whether they are much more efficient than the new cast drums that are available.
Not available for a Standard Nine though... Won't spill the beans on how "not cheap" they weren't! Don't know where they were from - but that logo looks familiar, seem to remember it was stamped on there.
Nice one, Clark. Who did the work? Do you think your cam would still walk with the straight cut gears?
The oil pump/dizzy drive is still helical gears so I quess there most still be some sort of movement there?
Hmm...dunno. They are driven as opposed to doing the driving, so I don't know whether the cam would walk or not. Just gotta make sure the dizzy/mag is held firmly, I guess.
Well, whatever the case its got to be better to have a positve anti-walk raather than the sprung plunger!
It's good to see others have been busy. Me I haven't done a stroke on mine, fired it up a coupe of time and that's about it. Maybe I'll get round to doing all the little jobs I keep threatening to do this month..............
Got lots of parts in - cam, head, intake, header. Also cut the flywheel by 23 pounds - now you can pick it up without a hernia! Planning on taking the aluminum bits out for polishing, installing a big valve kit, buying some 94's and having the whole mess balanced this month. Plus getting a distributor. Maybe it will run by the end of March. The chassis is coming along nicely - the T-5 needs a rear crossmember (in the works). The 46 rear end is almost installed, all this should be complete by the end of next week. Waiting to get with Brent and build the axle drop jig, then the front end can go back together. Maybe I should quit talking and go build something?
Wildfire, I'm glad you brough up '46 rear ends. Postwar axles (front and rear) are littering the junkyards around here and can probably be gotten for cheap. Is the width okay? I know they're wider than A bits and I want to run fenders on my T but I don't want the wheels sticking out. -Dave P.S. Congratulations Artiki. My wife and I just found out we're expecting our first this week.
Outmost to outmost, it is about 2.5" wider. Although I haven't put the body back on yet, I "think" it will be OK. From what I have heard, you can piece the 36-48 axles together to get the width you want. I do have the Hot Rod Works open drive conversion on this one. It is a fenderless tudor though, so it really doesn't matter. From what I have seen, the tudors get a bit wider as they go up, coupes and roadsters look like they don't. Worst case, I can have some wheels modified to get the perfect backspacing.
Hey! Congratulations!!! I've only been a dad for three weeks but they've been the best of my life. You'll love it. Tell Mrs Bigcheese to take it easy. Plenty of feet-up time in front of the TV
A friend of mine is buiding a model T speedster. He's trying to get the motor running, looking for info on how to set the timing. Thanks, Rob
Not too much too it. Are you running on timer and coils or a distributor conversion? Well, first of all, you need to find TDC on No. 1. There's no pin on the cam gear - have a peer down the plug hole, watch the valves, remember your Otto cycle - or whatever your chosen method. Be careful - there pretty much zero overlap on the cam, TDC before the "bang" stroke looks very similar to TDC before "suck"... Now, if you're on coils, you just need to turn the timer so that No. 1 coil just starts to buzz. Adjust (bend...) the timer rod until it does. Your mileage may vary... I've been cooking, cleaning, washing, bathing kids, keping fires in, and working on the Sedan. Anything I may have said may not be relevant in this reality.
Yup - round about there is a good starting point. Especially if you're hand cranking... keep your thumbs clear! You'll know if it's too retarded when the manifold glows red...
Ah - no problem, let us know how you get on. Once it's running, add a few degrees of advance with the hand lever, maybe up to 10 or so. Could need as much as 20 degrees if she's a high revving beast - like about 2000rpm - mine's all out around 1500! If you have the distributor conversion with the helical gear that's wound on in place of the timer (Texas T Parts?) it's a good idea to use some threadlock or similar, and don't add too much advance until it's warm. I've had a couple of backfires that'll loosen that drive gear right up and put your timing out by enough to break your wrist...
Hi Guys. My Neal Jern conversion is in the machine shop getting the new valves installed etc. For now I am playing with this winfield carb and intake. The intake is for a C carb or larger so I had to make an adapter to run the BB. Pay no attention to the fuel line it's temporary. I had to make my own gaskets for the carb and lots of other tinkering to get her running. The take off is much improved over stock. There is a big lean spot in the end of second gear though. I can't figure it out. In the process the old anchor developed a knock I think. I have a new short block in the works anyhow as I never expected the stocker to last with my abuse.
The Jalopy Journal
