The last Grasp Special '34 3 window build

Geoff, please keep posting, and know that a bunch of us are watching while a couple very good buddies are making great memories. Hot Rods are a blast, but we all know it's the friendships and shared common interests that are the real reward.

Work on The Last Grasp Special is simply amazing. You fellows accomplish lots with limited time. Planning, talent, and working together - the formula for your success.
Looking GREAT!

 

Hi guys.Lookin good.Love it when the mad scientiests in the HAMB arise.
Keep up the great work.
Good luck.Have fun.Be safe.
Leo

 

Still enjoying all this as well. Thanks Geoff for sharing.

Rocky.

 

I have subcribed to this thread, and each time it pops up again it's the first I look at, always good for a read, and the pics are certainly worth looking at, thanks!

glenn

 

Just found this thread, great to see guys working together in a common cause, thanks for sharing your good times! Those 5 window model 40's are bound to be great when you two get done hammering on them!

 

Thanks for all the kind comments guys. Sometimes I guess I need to remember that we are not alone.
I guess one of the other things about the internet is we sought of get to know a lot of people, many of whom we will never meet. But one can still become good friends just the same.
Alex I did enjoy that thread when you first posted it. Your images at Rita and Tony's brought back many memories of the times I have spent there. Also some of the memories brought up by people responding to your thread.
One of my favoritie shots of your's from that thread, is this one!

That shot brings back memories of the impromptu conversion of Tony's full fendered deuce to a hiboy over the course of a few days. It was fun times.
Here are a couple of shots from that few days. Maybe I should start showing some images from Rita and Tony's I have taken over the years. Many that only a few people have ever seen!

Anyhow, that will do for now. I think next Saturday we are working on Frank's chop, doing the welding I think!
Geoff aka whodaky

 

Thanks for taking the time to post Geoff. Not only is it a great read, it's a nice little snapshot of friends just doing what they do and really enjoying themselves doing it. Looking forward to the next installment.

 

Geoff keep posting your thread is truly inspirational, your genuine contribution means allot to many like minded real hot Rodders - inspired also by the responses you're getting.

 

Well yesterday I headed down to Frank's. Tony was up from Port Fairy and we would be starting to weld up the roof on Frank's coupe.
As usual I arrived at around 8.45 a.m.. We had a catch up over a coffee and checked out a few things here on the HAMB.
We then headed out into the garage, where Frank showed me his recently purchased flathead. He has changed his mind as to what will power the coupe. So the SBC is being removed in favor of this low mileage partially rebuilt flathead.
Geoff aka whodaky

 

After talking about the engine for a while, we started to set-up for welding. I would be wielding the TIG torch and taking most of the images as usual. Tony and Frank would be doing the hammer welding. Well, Tony would be teaching Frank the art of hammer welding.
Geoff aka whodaky

 

We only got the left side done.
Geoff aka whodaky

 

Although, Tony and Frank also removed the panel below the deck lid. It was a little annoying though, with them rocking the coupe whilst I was trying to weld. But hey you get that!

The rough section of floor will be cut out and replaced with another section of floor Frank has.
Geoff aka whodaky

 

Tony always tries to use my camera and sneek images of me. He actually got this one, although I thought I had ducked out of this shot!

Of course I always seem to get shots of Tony goofing off, whilst Frank and I are working hard. Tony is always drawing on something with chalk! He might even get good at it some day!
Geoff aka whodaky

 

So we had our usual productive, but fun Saturday. Tony and Frank were hoping to get a little more done on the Sunday.
Here are a few random images that may be of interest.



This last shot is for reference on the Last grasp coupe.
Geoff aka whodaky

 

Magnificent work, true hot rod Artisans at work!!

 

Looking good

 

Thanks for the update Geoff... At this rate the coupe will be on the road sooner than later!

HC.

 

The last time I was down at Rita and Tony's I had said that I would come back down on the Melbourne Cup day weekend, for 4 days.
Here we get a public holiday ( a Tuesday ) for the Melbourne cup horse race! At work the Monday was an RDO (rostered day off ), so that would give me a 4 day weekend.
The initial plan was that we would spend the whole time working on the Last Grasp Special. But plans change and I had said to Tony a couple of weeks prior to me going down there, that maybe we should concentrate on getting his roadster running and driving. As early in December, Diane and Lance Sorchik are visting from the USA and will be spending some of their time here at Rita and Tony's
Geoff aka whodaky

 

The flathead in Tony's roadster hadn't been run for many years

A couple of weeks before I went down, Tom, George Peel and Barry went down to give Tony a hand to fire up the long dormant flathead.
George is a bit of a guru when it comes to the flathead V8s. Actually he built the flathead that will be going in the Last Grasp Special. I will do a post on George and that engine another time.
Anyhow on that weekend, the guys did get the flathead going; but there was a fuel delivery problem. Unfortunately time ran out before the problem could be overcome. So that would be the first job Tony and I would tackle when I was there!
Geoff aka whodaky

 

Ónce again I made my usual 4 a.m. start from home and headed my trusty old pickup west toward Port Fairy.
As we are mid way through spring, the weather was a little more pleasant than my last couple of trips, with no fog or rain on my drive down. During my 4 days away the weather was glorious. So good that I was able to have a pleasant walk along the beach each morning!
Around mid morning Tony and I headed out into the garage. Not long after, Carol, Frank and their girls ( Victoria and Rachael ) showed up. They were also spending the 4 days at Port Fairy. Staying in their caravan at one of the local caravan parks.
Frank would be helping Tony and I at various stages over the 4 days.
To begin with, we decided to pull the fuel tank out of the roadster.

On doing this and then removing the fuel pickup tube, we immediately found the cause of the lack of fuel delivery. The elbow bend in the fuel pickup tube was blocked.
Geoff aka whodaky

 

We cleared the blockage and were now confident the fuel pump would draw fuel from the tank.
Tony has a small electric impulse pump back at the fuel tank. But he also has a stock mechanical pump up on the intake manifold. The fuel pump push rod is removed, so this pump is only there for looks; with the fuel merely filling the fuel bowl and passing through this psuedo pump.

Anyhow we were able to get fuel up to the carbs and fire the engine. You should have seen the smile on Tony's face when this flathead with straight out pipes barked into life once again.

But we only ran it momentarily, as we now had fuel leaking from the stock fuel pump. We also noticed coolant leaking from the water pumps. So with these couple of problems needing to be fixed we decided to call it quits on the roadster for the day and spend a little time on the Last Grasp Special.
Geoff aka whodaky

 

Last time we worked on the Last Grasp Special, we had braced the body and had removed the messed up cowl from the body. We had bolted the replacment cowl onto the chassis with it's 4 mounting bolts. But we were finding that the cowl was not aligning nicely with the body to allow us to get reasonable door gaps.

This is how the body/cowl had stayed since we last worked on it. Since then we had thought about where the problem could be, as well as taking some reference measurements from Frank's 5W body. With this information and thoughts, we were ready to get this fit-up right. Something that had been done to the chassis, in it's dim dark past, by someone else, was the last 3 feet or so of the chassis had been cut off and rewelded back on. Looking more closely at our misalignmet problem we came to the conclusion that the last 3 feet of the chassis had been 'kicked up', maybe as much as 3 inches. So this told us we would need to trim material from the rear underside of the body, to allow it to drop down. As soon as we started to remove material our misalignment problem was diminishing. As we may be channeling the body, the removal of this material wasn't a real concern to us.
So after a couple of hours on the 3W we had made great progress and decided to leave it for now!
Geoff aka whodaky

 

The next morning we went out into the garage. Tony would start on the water pumps and I would start to stripe Spencer T's lil push car, now that it is painted.



Now that the striping is done Tony wants to clear coat the body. Then it is some upholstery and a few other small details and it will be done.
Spencer T really loves his lil push car/hot rod and he looks so cool in it.
It is a real credit to Tony for it's build and it has been good to have been a part of it.
Geoff aka whodaky

 

Early in the afternoon Frank turned up,by this time I had finished striping and Tony had the left water pump off. With the pump off Tony had found the cause of the leak. There was no gasket and the lower bolt was broken off in it's hole.

So now Tony would be trying to remove the broken bolt, whilst Frank and I would be putting the front floor section back in the interior.
Geoff aka whodaky

 

Actually I got a bit ahead of myself in that last post. When Frank had arrived today, he brought with him a couple of treasures he had found at an antique mall in Warrnambool. These being a couple of old bead rollers, probably having been used by plumbers. So Tony and I got to admire these and also to have a bit of a play with them.
Geoff aka whodaky

 

After us all having a tinker with Frank's new/old toys, Frank and I would concentrate on the water pumps whilst Tony would have a go at stopping the fuel leak at the mechanical fuel pump.
Around this time Renee', Sam, Spencer T and Jude came by, so we now had a couple of more helpers in the form of Sam and Spencer T.



When Frank and Sam got the right hand water pump off, they also found no gasket and this time there was no lower bolt at all.
Geoff aka whodaky

 

So the rest of the afternoon was spent getting new gaskets made and refitting the water pumps. With all this done we eventually filled the radiator with coolant and fired up the shiny mint green hot rod roadster. Spencer T was not impressed, he said poppy's hot rod is to noisy. Don't worry we will educate him.
Unfortunately we still had some minor leaks at the stock fuel pump, but at least there were no leaks at the water pumps. The leaking fuel pump Tony will fix another time.
I will add a few more posts about that weekend over the course of the next couple of days!
Geoff aka whodaky

 

Geoff great job with the write love the pictures.

 

You guys certainly have some treasures! Thanks for the update.

 

Wow, can't believe I missed this thread, fantastic work you guy's are doing there. I think the best thing about this thread is the distinct display of Aussy 'Mate ship', five and a half hour drive to spend a weekend working in the garage with a mate.
Awesome.

Although I do see one problem, I'm pretty sure it's illegal (At least I wish it was!!) to have more than one 3 window in the garage so if you can just drop the 36 off up here in Queensland, that's not too big a detour between Melb and Port Fairy.....is it??

Doc.