Projects Koz is building a modified, (my next build)

Looking great

 

A little progress tonight after working 12 hrs. I finished up the motor and trans mounts and popped them in. The trans mounts are removable to get the trans out without tearing everything up.



They bolt to the K member and hold a pair of Chassis Engineering donuts. The front works in a similar manner to fit the Ford truck pumps.



Likewise these are made of some 3/16" stock and welded/riveted to the chassis. Heres a detail of what they looked like before they went on.







Everything fits super nice with the flatty and '36 trans in place. I also fit up and shotened my driveshaft. I had the coupler turned to remove the splines halfway and a resistance fit of a half thou. I then had my sweety bake the coupler for a half hour at 375 deg. in her pride and joy big bucks Thermadore commercial oven. It fit on with just a light brass hammer tap and while hot I welded it solid. The driveshaft is now 39 1/4" long overall qand fits like a glove. For you non Ford guys, that's short!

 

The frame's turning out nicely, Koz.

 

Hey Koz,
Thanks again for the help on my build. I'm watching this one and I'm gonna steal those mounts and the frame mounts for the rod ends.

 

Excellent! The alternative on the frame mounts is detailed a little more in my Sport coupe build thread, http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=641469&highlight=sport+coupe+sort+of+koz It's in there somewhere. Just remember the wishbone mounts are different between the first frame and the one I'm using now.

As a quick update while I'm on here. I've started slinging sheetmetal while I wait for some things to arrive. I'll post up later tonight or tomorrow with pics of the subrails and cowl panels.

 

Until my missing suspension parts arrive I've started pounding some sheet metal into submission in the shape of an old Ford. I had the '28 AR cowl narrowed a while back and proceeded to fab a lower firewall of some 16ga. to support the cowl. The inside is reinforced with some 3/4" sq. tube to build an inner structure to support my pedals and steering box. There is a 1x2" steel frame in the cowl "hoop" that will hold most of the steering gear and the door hinges for the '27 doors. I'm trying to hold as close as possible to Mr. Proulx car although I am taking a bit of artistic licence with the rear of the tub.



First I made up some front side panls for the cowltop. On the muse car there is no rolled body joint so I removed the flange from the bottom of the "A" tank and hammer welded the 18ga side panels to the cowl, trimmed to fit the door opening and braced from the inside.

As you can see from the pic I made some crude cardboard templates to fab some sills and rails for the floor structure.



I used a 4' stainless straight edge and some scrap steel to get the profile to my liking.



Most of my sheetmetal stuff is in flux at the moment while I look for a bigger shop so I'm building this body with the simplist of hand tools including my Dads old hand shear.



When I was a kid I used to be in my Dads shop watching him making panels that rivaled factory parts with this old beast! It feels a little like he's with me here while I use his stuff to build one more. I'm sure he's looking down o me thinking, "dumb ass why doesn't he just set the jump shear up". It feels good though.



Here's my bead making fixture for the side panels.



A shot inside showing how the firewall is coming together and how it's braced.



Side panels coming together along with my homemade subsills.



The sides coming together. The car looks a bit deceptivly long here. when the roll goes into the back of the seat it will visually bring the car back into proportion. You know I can't leave anything alone. If you remember the rear body panel on Grabowskis' "Lightning Bug", the look was perfect!



I'm grabbing at bits and pieces of all kinds of cars I love in this build. Like I mentioned early in this thread, I'm not really trying to capture the Proulx car, but more capture the flavor of the era. I might note that the panels in the pics just look like flat stock but in fact they all have a compound curve to them as '27 sides ave a pronounced crown to them, just enough to keep them rigid and take the oil can out. I have been laying the crowns into the panel on a shot bag with some leather slappers. it's amazing how sweet you can get the panels this way with such simple tools. The finish is very much like a nice power hammer panel, not the bag of walnuts.

Back to work with me. I'll post up progress soon.

 

Damn Koz, looks great!

 

Need Louvers, You know my brother? He lives in Phoenix and has a shop that builds mostly bikes but a few rods as well, TMK Metalworks. Terry is his name.

 

No I sure don't. But I'll take some time to look him up this fall when things get a bit better outside. I'm between putting the Plymouth in my avatar back together, working on customer projects and putting together my '61 Triumph chopper. When it's constantly 105 out side, you kinda just deal with it while working and limit trips around when your not...

 

'Leather slapper', Koz? My friend Ron Covell used to have a set of those, from small to large. (never saw them used, could you show a pic of which size you used for crowning this size panel?)
Project is coming along nicely, good idea with the invisible floor-dropping Z. My '27 on '32 rails was 'way shallow until I dropped the flooring down between the rails...

 

Nice build.. I'll follow along.

 

Not only are you a very proficient frame builder but you can have your way with sheet metal?

Awesome skill-set, man..

 

I have a project or two to get finished in the shop so I'm just getting a little time here and there to get my frame ready for primer.

One of the things unfinished that I took care of was the "notch" in the center crossmember. When I decided to drop the car I Had to move the drivetrain up in the chassis to allow for road clearance and a good torque tube angle. This required rethinking the center crossmember. Mt solution was to put a "notch" in the top and fill the old unused area underneath.

I started by whacking a piece of 10ga. press bend to fill the top.



This was formed over a piece of schedule 40 to fit the opening in the crossmember and parallel the torque tube.





You can see how it tucks under the tube....



You can see how it lets the torque tube clear the crossmember and frees up the bottom of the crossmember.



I filled in below, this is the backside of the crossmember. I'm laying out my exhaust to go through, not under the frame. This will allow better road clearance and look pretty cool to boot.

 

A little help here guys!!!! About two months ago I had a computer crash that wiped out a lot of my files including stuff I had saved from the HAMB, Ford Barn and E mail stuff. I'm always buying stuff in the classifieds and I was able to retrieve/remember most of my old stuff to get hooked up with guys on ongoing deals. I posted up earlier looking for contacts I lost but to no sucess.

I cannot locate two sales I had in progress.....

Somebody out there had a set of front brakes, I remember they were green, that I still want if I can find out who it was. Also there is a Ford radiator out there somewhere, no idea where. If your out there, or you know somebody who thinks I wigged on a deal for this stuff give a shout! I think these are the only two things I havn't been able to locate.

Thanks in advance!

I'll have some new pics up any day now. I've been knocking some customer cars out and havn't had much time for pics. Everybody wants their cars done for Wildwood. That's a big thing around here so there's a lot of service work to take care of before the reliability run.

Later!

 

I would love a brief explanation of how you crown a panel with that slapper. Do you lay out a grid and go to town?

 

When I'm crowning panels with a slapper I think very much like I'm using the wheel. For panels like the low crown ones on this body I usually make a simple template or partial buck of 3/4" MDF from Lowes, (cheap and easy to shape but dusty!), so I have something to work off of. The slappers, like a wheel can stretch but not shrink. You need to be carefull to not go too fast. These things will move metal in a hurry so patience is very important. Lay a grid pretty much like you would for a wheel if the panel is larger or just go to it on smaller stuff and work one way at a time. In other words, I'll work across the panel, back and forth and the turn the panel 90 deg. and work the other way. Fit the panel up to the template frequently and it will just drop into place. Leather slappers leave little or no hammer marks so there is very little finishing to do afterward. They aren't for everything but are very useful for a lot of things and about as fast as a wheel. When I had a wheel yet, (I'm in the process of building a new one), I would move things very close with the slappers because they move metal faster and then dress up on the wheel. Since my old wheel was somewhat crappy I used the slappers for most things. With my new wheel they will still have they're place.

I'm not sure of what I'm doing is right or not. I learned from my Dad when I was probably 10 or 12 years old and he could make any panel in his shop. He learned the trade doing collision work before the war at Morganstern Chevrolet when there were no Shott panels and you made parts instead. There are a bunch of threads on this process over on the Metal Meet site and a few videos on You Tube. The YouTube videos show some interesting techniques but don't show what o can really do with these. I'd like to see some other peoples slapper work as a comparison.

Along with the wooden slappers you can use steel slappers and dolliers to really do some slick metalwork. I use the steel ones when I do hammer welds on frenched headlights and the like to just instantly straighten out some intricate folds. The are some shots floating around of Valley Custom doing some work on the R&C Dream Truck with wooden and steel slappers in the mid fifties. If you've ever seen the progress pics on the warped up mess that section job was at one point you'll have a new appreciation for those fellows skills with these ancient tools. Like a lot of metalworking tools I understand wooden slappers were devised by armour makers for shaping and finishing the iron panels of the tin suits.

 

Koz, how is the body coming? Having time to work on it between customer cars?


-Fry

 

Thanks for taking the time to explain that Koz. It is much clearer to me now!

 

I've been busy getting customer stuff out first and havn't done anything to it lately. Not having it for Wildwood kinda' took the pressure off and the wind outa' my sail. I do have the block ported up and the trans and the rear done. I don't have to tie up a bay for this stuff and can do it an hour at a time as the opportunity presents itself. In addition I aquired a '29 phone booth, (pickup), cab from Sr. in an around about way that I have been putting panels into. I was just going to flip it to get my cash back but it's so nice I hate to let it go! That's the problem with old Fords, they're like lost puppies, you just can't send them to the Pound.

Cactus1, You are quite welcome. I'm not very good at a tutorial I hope that disertation helped! I'm going to be making a cab back for a pickup in the next week or two. I'll post up some pics as it progress's that might help as well.

 

Koz, I just love lakes style modifieds, and yours is looking like it's going to be an absolute treat.
Looking forward to seeing updates soon.
Cheers.

 

Koz....any updates??

 

WOW! I'm late to the party. One of my favorites. Thanks for bringing it up so's I could see it dirt. SUBSCRIBED

 

Referring to post 16 about the Muncie transmission, I found this on another forum posted years ago.

"I have seen many names referring to the same basic transmission - Getrag, HM290, 5LM60, NV3500

NV stands for New Venture Gear.

When I received training at the GM training center in Minneapolis in 1991 on this transmission. The training manual (which I still have) refers to it as a 5LM60 Formerly HM-290. At that time I was told the transmission was currently being built by New Venture gear and New Venture Gear is a joint venture between GM (Muncie transmission) and Chrysler (New Process Gear).

Not all these transmissions are equal.
There are two designs for the input shaft and input shaft bearings. The first design 1988-1990 had a ball bearing and a roller bearing behind it on the input shaft. The second design only has a ball bearing but it was a much larger bearing. The first design bearings often fail. They were failing when these trucks were under warranty with very low miles on them. "

 

KOZ , Update?....... Please!
Terry

 

Unfortunatly the car was traded to Homemadehardtop57 on here to make some room in my shop. I just didn't have the space for another car in here. When he took possesion of the carcass, it was a virtual roller. I had a bunch of the body panels done and the frame was complete. I understand he currently has the car for sale for cheap on here. This thing could be a driver in a month or so. I'm surprised nobody has snagged it yet. If somebody does pick it up, I can give you all the specs for any missing parts or help with any of the completion they might desire.

I've had more interest in this car than anything I've ever built but I just don't have the space to store another toy. I still have the drivetrain, including the shortened torque tube and driveshaft along with the motor and trans, if anybody buys the car and and could use it.

I miss this car very much but it just ain't gonna happen until I can find a bigger shop. Anybody who's been in here knows what I mean.

I just checked his thread and it's marked sold. Somebody got a helluva deal! Maybe he'll post up here and tell us where it went.

 

Well here goes round three! I have my entire early drivetrain collected and have been ordered by my wife to have an open car on the road this summer and definitly by Fall Wildwood. For one reason or another I have not had a rod for the reliability run for three years now and I'm starting to embarass her!

Here goes.... I eworking a set of "A" rails as the origional rails just look right to me. The fabbed frame I was building was real nice but it just didn't set right with me. The new frame is perfect. It's at the blasters right now so I'll have to post pics later. The thing that bumped me into moving was the aquisition of these valve covers.



Students of hot rod history will immediatly recognize these as the origional valve covers off Jim Inglese, (JimBob on here), "Full House" deuce. This car is possibly my favorite rod ever and just touching a piece of it is totallt amazing to me. As a result of this aquisition, (Thanks Jerry!!!), I am using the traditional Ford box and an ancient Offy adapter I have along with a 283 I just picked up.

The motor is really nice just very poorly maintained. It looks like they just ran water in it with extra rust added just in case it wouldn't run hot enough on it's own. As there are at least three other clones of the Proulx roadster being built that I am aware of, and all of those are a lot closer to the origional than I was going to do. I'm building this one in the style of the Proulx roadster should it have survived into the early sisties. Same set, and lines just a bit more updated with the small block. Ain't no way these babies are hanging on a wall.



I stripped out my block tonight and it has an engine code of 3896948 which doesn't show in my Chevy book. Anybody know what it really is. It has a 3 7/8" bore and I havn't measured the stroke. Also if JimBob catches this do you remember what breathers you had on these covers? I think they were Offys but I can't remember. It's been at least 15-18 years since I've seen the car.

Most everything else is the more of the same.

 

'67 283 2 bolt main 195 hp

http://www.castingnumbers.info/site/detail/87/3896948

Flint casting. I've seen it referenced to Chevelles and Impalas

 

That's definitely awesome! You'll probably still get your car driving before I do. I still have a ton to get done on it before even taking it around the block.

Say, what intake are you planning on running? You know a righteous 283 has got to have multiple carburetors.