Building blocks. Never attempt to build a car without gathering
all the major elements together, and setting everything in place so you
can look at it from all angles.
Here's the roadster body panels thrown onto the chassis. You can
see the grill shell is too high. It needs trimming.
Grill trimmed down a bit, hood temporarily fitted, looks ok. This
was before the chassis was repaired at the rear with new kickups. The finished
chassis has a 106" wheelbase, so the body site 1.5" further back than pictured
here, and the hood no linger fits.
In this pic, the basic repairs to the chassis have been done, including
the rear kickup. The body panels (both sides this time) are all in position,
either attached to the body subframe or the temporary rear support frame.
Both axles, fitted with the correct size wheels and tyres are in position
at or near the desired ride height. The grille shell, (now replaced with
a 32 shell) is also in place, trimmed at the sides to align better with
the cowl. The engine and transmission are also in place, the engine on
temporary mounts. At this point, you can decide if you like what you see.
If it looks wrong, you must change it before you begin the proper build
phase.
Because I was happy with the general look, all subsequent pictures
will tend to look similar, just details will change. in this pic, the body
has undergone substantial repairs, and shot with a quick coat of rattle
can satin black on this side only.
Here again the general appearance is the same, but this time, the
mechanical brakes and 32 spindles have been re placed by the 37 spindles
and 40 drums. Hydraulic backplates have not yet been fitted, but all the
other essential mechanical pieces, ie the steering and brakes, are trial
fitted in place. The steering arm had to be taper drilled from the opposite
side to suit the rhd application.
Big 'ol 31A lights were bought at a swap meet. The ends of a Model
A light bar were bent to suit.
One target I set myself was that Old Rusty would be at the September
2000 Hot Rod Drags. I did want it to be running, but work commitments took
up so much of the summer I missed that goal by a couple of weeks. I dug
the T-Bird out of it's hibernation to act as the towcar, reworked the original
towbar from the Clockwork Orange, and dragged the ol gal down to Avon Park
for the Sunday.
Not sure of the legalities of flat towing, I thought I'd lessen
the chances of being pulled by borrowing a set of nice wheels and tyres.
Phil Sparks kindly donated his spare set, which look pretty good, in my
opinion. Dodgy signwriting was a spur of the moment whim.
One idea I was kicking about was the use of 300E van quarter bumpers
mounted upside down. The patinated chrome adds a bit of jaded sparkle to
the back end.
A bit of good old fashioned horse trading netted this nice original
32 grille shell. complete with it's original insert. You cant get patina
like this from Brookville. Thanks to Henry, Erwin and Hoving for putting
the wheels in motion on this deal.
Grille shell had to be trimmed about 1.5" on each side to allow
it to sit lower and align correctly with the cowl. '30 bonnet is a bit
too short. will need to be lengthened to suit the extra length created
by setting the A body on the 32 chassis.
Thats it for now, amigos, will add more when it happens.
Mart.
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