Hot Rods The Belly Button Bucket Build Thread

Sounds like a good plan. I had thought of powder coating for my own frame but I can't really match the paint color I have chosen with a powder coat color or the other way around. Seems it's difficult in some cases to match paint and powder, and I also want my frame to be body color.
So, paint it will be. (not to mention that with paint we can use a little filler and be less picky on perfect metal finishing )
My buddies T frame has been painted for a very long time with a 2 part acrylic urethane like the body and it has held up really well, as good as powder coat I believe.
Larry.

 

Well, it's my Friday at work, and I'm itching for the weekend... Here's a couple more fun-filled photos to go along with my metal dust-filled lungs...

Going from this...



To this (not the same area, but you get the idea- I was delirious, give me a break!)



To this...



And this...



To this...



And getting to the point where I'm happy enough to proceed to the other side....







I got a new toy, which was distracting for a bit... but now all my tools are in one spot, which makes me really happy - yes; my male modeling career was over a long time ago.





And onto the other side....



Derek Zoolander scene after he spends a day in the coal mines....






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Looks much better now all spiffed up.

 

Really looks great. A lot of hard work you have put in there.

 

Good work Tim, glad to see another local getting er done. If you need me to make ya look better I could post up some of my welds.

 

Been a while since I checked in. Looks great, man!

 

Getting there.... hoping to wrap up the rear suspension and sent off to powdercoat in the next week or so.


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Looking good.

 

Coming along very nicely Tim.
What are you thinking for color on the 9" housing, If you recall, I have that same housing and still have not decided what direction to go color wise.
Did you see the nickel plating on my suspension pieces?

 

May be a dumb question but how do you fill the rear? Your carrier have a drain plug or what?

 

The nickel plating on your suspension pieces - yes; I have seen and yes; I like a lot. Where did you get this done? I actually have been meaning to get in touch with you on that as I was considering sending out a small batch for chrome.....but that scares me ($$$), and I like the look of nickel just as well. Was that a local shop, and were they reasonable?

If at all possible, I want to plate all brake lines, all fuel lines, my windshield posts, my dash insert (assuming I can't get it to clean up - it looks pretty cloudy), my tail-light brackets, my door latch/handle assembly, and I think that's it...

The color of all suspension pieces will be black to match what I've got going on with the front. I used all polished stainless fasteners wherever possible to make it pop, and I still may/may not do all webs of the brackets and the web of the front axle with a Wimbledon White - what I'm worried about is a raised parting line between the white and black. I was thinking I could have a the parting line pinstriped, but like I said, I'm not sure I want to go there. All of that depends on what color I go for the engine because I don't want too many colors jumping out at you.

Your rear axle - is it in pretty decent shape? Mine was actually pretty rough. It took quite a bit of work to get it smoothed out, and it's still not perfect by any means. With the '32 tank out back, it wouldn't be super noticeable under there... I'd almost just go with a satin/gloss black depending on where you were going with the rest. Post some pics if you want - I'd like to compare your rear to mine.... lol.

 

Not a dumb question at all. I didn't know until I had one in front of me, but the 3rd member on a 9" has an NPT plug about halfway up for filling. When the guys at Dutchman narrowed the housing, welded in billet housing ends, and made the new 31 spline axles, they advised I have them weld in a drain plug, which sounded like a good idea.

Fill:



Drain:

 

Tim
I'll also probably go with the semi-gloss black on the housing.
BTW, did you get a quote on powdercoating the housing only, who do you plan on having do it?
I didn't plan on detailing my housing as much as you did but the area on the back cover weldment did need a little finessing.









This is the shop that did the nickel plating.
http://www.tfcplating.com

 

Just your basic old truck housing.

 

I have a couple of those.

 

Beautiful craftsmanship Tim.

 

Denny, that looks great! It's funny to see another housing like mine. Between me, you, and Marty, I bet we have cornered the market in the PNW! As for the powdercoating, I haven't gotten a quote yet, but I plan to have Russel Fork do the job. He did my wheels and my front suspension, and he was priced very reasonable both times. I imagine the rear axle will be a bit more $$ than what I had to pay for the front, but I don't expect it to be that expensive.

 

I would recomend to do the axle gloss black.
I belive flat would look dull under there.

 

Monumental progress this morning. The rev. Z panhard bar was the last thing I needed to finish before the rear suspension can be powdercoated. I only have the main leaf in there, so the bar should be pretty close to level once fully assembled and loaded.



Also this makes me really happy. Frame is dead nuts square despite me cutting it apart on jack stands and having little to no clue what I was getting into. I only have a few small things to tidy up on the frame before I can send it off to TIG weld all my tacks. Very very happy and thankful I made it this far!


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Tim, that is quite a sexy rearend you got there
That emotion you're feeling is something I've felt more than once on my roadster, but it's been awhile due to the llimited activity lately.
You couldn't begin to explain this feeling to non car people and the people that buy finished cars will never experience it.
It's these moments that really motivate us to move to the next phase of the build.
Make sure to enjoy the process.
Really happy for you.

 

Your doing some great work Tim, I'll be in spaces 6465, 66, 67 this year, stop by and bring that fugitive Kiwi..

 

Prepare for a lot of frame shift on bumps, and during weight transfer under braking.

 

Elaborate?


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I think what Gimpsy means is that your panhard bar mounting points are not level horizonaly. When your rearend moves up ( suspension travel) the rear stays set but pushes the frame sideways via the panhard bar. You usually want a panhard bar as long and as horizonal as possible to keep the sideways movement at a minimum. All depends on how stiff your rear spring is, if there is not much suspension travel, there will be not a lot of swinging, but it´ll be a harsh ride. I think with a heavy rearend in an otherwise light car a soft suspenion and good shocks are the goal...
But I´m just a barber, what do I know, just my 2 cents.

 

Roger that. I can assure you this is the only plausible configuration I have been able to come up with given the narrow width of the frame and size constraints in general. I can also assure you that I have multiple leafs I have cut down from two springs to tailor ride quality, and I'm not afraid to change shocks, socks, and underwear after a bumpy ride, then crawl back underneath and rip out the panhard bar to add to my art-projects-gone-wrong scrap pile. I am facetiously estimating my suspension travel to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 1/8" to 8"..... in other words I have no seat time, no data, no bumps to hit and rip my frame into a twisted pretzel. Time will tell, and I am just the messenger.

 

Your panhard bar should be horizontal, and preferably as low as possible, in relationship to the axle housing.

The lateral shift on the the chassis on suspension cycling is a factor of the bar length, and the installed angle.

The shorter the bar, the tighter the arc that it swings in. You have a fairly short bar. It swings in a fairly tight arc. This alone will will shift the chassis over the axle by an excessive amount.

To make matters worse, you have the bar installed at a very steep angle. This amplifies the shift under cycling and weight transfer.

This configuration will also cause the chassis to rise above the axle in a hard left hand turn. It is hard to day how bad this will be, but the first time you find out the hard way could be an unfortunate experience.


The bigger the e distance, the bigger the s distance. Your bar is installed with a positive s offset, as it is built. A horizontal bar has zero s offset, as built. Look at the red bar above, and imagine it moving up and down by the width of the red dot at the end of the line. See how small the s offset is?

Now do the same, imagining the bar on the r line. The s offset is rather remarkably larger.

Also, as has been mentioned, since you are also using a cross spring, you will have the bar fighting the spring. This will make for a harsh ride, biased to one side. If you can maintain control of the vehicle, it won't be a pleasant ride.

Finally, the panhard bar sets the roll center. Lower is almost always better. Vehicles with multi-link suspension soften have theoretical roll center (front/rear) that are below the surface of the ground.

 

I understand, and thank you for the demonstration because it is helpful. I can only say that straight bar no workie in this case. Low bar no workie either. Current bar comes out with two bolts. I have shown disastrous attempts of previous panhard bars, and those are only the ones I was willing to photograph and share. Out back the shocks are in the way. In front the kick up is in the way. On top the axle is near the floor of the pickup bed in height as it is, without having a bar on top with additional clearance as well. This is a compromise, and, if needed, it can be repurposed as a hood ornament after seeing the "rat rod" display at the Portland Roadster Show a couple weeks ago.

 

I could cut out the bend and have my axle mount near the top of axle off to the passenger side slightly. It would be fairly horizontal then but shorter by about 6" laterally. Thoughts?

 

Do you even need a panhard bar?
You have a buggy spring. Is it set up to require spreading to attach to the shackles?

 

I was thinking the same thing, Hackerbilt. I thought the Panhard bar was more for coil over deals, because with the leaf spring mounted securely to the center of the frame and the ends of the rear end, side to side motion is virtually nil. The metal in the spring isn't going to stretch and contract, so the ends of the spring are going to remain pretty darn close to a set distance from the center mount. What can be an issue with a buggy spring is body roll, and you could use a sway bar to prevent that (if it's a problem). Tim, my Total Performanxe car has a Watt's link on it with coil overs, This eliminates the side to side push of a Panhard bar, but as you say, it IS tight in there (it sits directly behind the pumpkin, gotta look at your pics again to see if that'd even feasible for your car). I can try to shoot some pics if your interested in seeing how they did it. Your car is looking really good, just not sure you need a panhard bar at all. I'd probably leave it off till I got the car running (leaving the mounts for now), then put it back and work out all the engineering only if you find you need it.

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