here is one members car similar green but white top for comparison. https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/1955-chevy-southeast-gassers-build.1084077/page-17
That green is looking great. I used to be a die-hard blue guy, but in recent years I've really come to appreciate the various greens. Can't wait to see this car when completed.
Not trying to recommend the white, its just what I did, If the client is set on those colors, you still have a few options in my opinion, just using the Green, *Green with top and post silver (< dont think "I" would do that one) Green with only posts silver, Green with green posts and only very top silver. Might take this over to the photoshop thread to get a general idea of what you might do.
In the booth pics it looks like green is darker and the top silver . Outside the green seems lighter and the top looks gray. Which way is it suppose to be. Just curious. Larry
Larry, the top color is Galaxy Gray, the bottom is Organic Green Kandy Basecoat. The gray is darker due to the reflection and the sun being indirect. Inside the booth it was using an LED light aimed directly at the panel.. Here's the gray with a bit more direct sunlight, as it would see on the roof..
Here's a sneak peek at our speaker trim rings just back from DGM Chrome in Philly. Looks like we'll get a couple set up with the stainless mesh so we can show them off at this weekend's car show in Leonardtown.. .
This is back woods engineerin' so don't laugh too hard... I don't have the fancy alignment tool and didn't want to pull the third member, so perhaps this is the next best thing.. My theory is that once you weld the pads repeatedly it should introduce some shrinking along the bottom side which should also cause deflection to both the housing and also the shafts bolted into that housing. I feel this also will deflect the wheels/tires that they will be pulled in at the bottom of the housing, which is the results we noticed. With the axle housing fixed on top of jack stands, a bent axle SHAFT would cause run-out as you rotated the tire. So first off, rotate the tires to insure the wheels are straight, to insure the AXLE SHAFTS are straight, to give us a good starting point. Then remove jack stands and set the tires on top of milk crates, open end of the milk crate is facing upward to help keep things from moving... Then the axle housing is rotated around the axle shafts. The shrinking from welding on the pads causes a short side along the bottom, which pulls the wheels inward. This pull follows the bottom (pad) side of the housing as it is rotated around. So the dial indicator shows where these narrow and wide spots are. The heat was applied to the widest spot of runout per each side, and once cooled, re-test and repeat. This is by no means as accurate as the alignment tool, but it's what we had to work with.. The dial indicator "stand" was a piece of rusty thick wall pipe that didn't move much, so it was moved into place depending on the end we were on and checked for shimmy before proceeding. OK, let the laughter commence..
Since we got our freshly chromed speaker trim rings back from DGM Chrome in Philly, it only stands to reason that we need to put another sample together for the car show in Leonardtown on Sunday. So today I stopped by Norris Upholstery and picked up a scrap to cover one of the kick panels to make it more presentable. Fake upholstery, if you will.. We planned on adding a plateau to the stainless speaker mesh rather than flat, so some pressing fixtures had been cut out on a water jet for us.. Comparing the flat to the plateau.... installed... This might even work.... looks a damn sight better than the plastic grills they come with..
Man you are one ingenious dude. Great thinking on both the axle housing and the bumped speaker cover inserts.
Outstanding! You guys are performing miracles down there, Robert. Loving the "plateau" effect on the speaker grilles. Amazing how a small change can make such a dramatic difference.
Thanks for the comments guys! On these grills, to clarify, the smaller (tweeters) use a smaller opening pattern (more holes per inch) than the midrange speaker next to them, so they would appear the same proportionally. McMaster Carr sells a sample kit of the mesh to help in picking out the size, p/n is 9231T11. For the sub we used 5 x 5 mesh (5 openings per inch) p/n 85385T31. For the midrange, 8 x 8 mesh, p/n 85385T42. For the tweeters, 10 x 10 mesh, p/n 85385T48. The grill for the sub will have multiple pressings, one to include a recessed crest emblem. That one will be the test..
Robert, as always your work is impeccable ( I'm running out of adjectives to describe your work ) the newest update on the speaker grilles are beautiful. BTW, I thought about you earlier today as I was having a cheeseburger at Arnold's, I sat in the same booth you , John Micheal and I sat last time you were here. HRP
I was just down in SC last week, but closer to the coast in Fairfax.. Will have to swing by again sometime...
The Ford axle housing you have is prone to warping, DAMHIKIJK... An easy test for housing straightness is to check to see how the axles go in/out. On a dead-straight housing with clean bearing bores, you can push/pull the axles in or out with your hands, maybe some LIGHT tapping may be needed. If you have to step up to a slide hammer to remove/install, two light-to-medium whacks should be all that's required; it's slightly warped, but still should be OK. If you need heavier/more whacks, the housing is bent enough that axle bearing life will become problematic. If it's bent that much, you'll probably have to have the ends cut off and re-welded with a fixture. And if you're planning on a rear sway bar, DO NOT use a bar that attaches to the housing with end links to the chassis; it WILL bend the housing and start eating axle bearings. Use a chassis-mount bar with the end links going to the axle. This is how Ford installed their bars on the leaf-spring cars. Art Morrison straightened my housing three times before we figured that out. That's also why I own a slide hammer... You can use a housing-mount rear bar IF you step up to the coil-spring housing as those are considerably beefier. Or use a late (late '60s up) truck housing as Ford did fit housing-mount sway bars to some of those.
The craftsmanship on this thread is mind blowing and hits very very close to home for me! Heres my Green and Pearl White 210 55 for reference.
So last weekend I went to Ron Yeager's shop in Kingsville, MD for a metalshaping workshop. Reconnected with some old friends and made some new ones.. Thanks to Ron for opening his shop so we could all learn some new tricks and methods.. Today I got another speaker trim ring put together.....this one for the sub in the cargo area of the wagon. We planned on a recessed crest in the stainless mesh, so the mesh was aligned in our aluminum plates and pressed in the Diacro press brake using flattening dies. Video Version.... .
Thanks Don! Spent last night getting an assembly line going to get the rest of the speaker grills assembled. Just say no to plastic speaker grills!
I think that if the bill for all the hours in this project were accurately calculated and invoiced we could call this the quarter million dollar 55
Well it's been rather hectic around the home front as E is nearing graduation. Seems like yesterday she was showing me how to properly wet sand bare foot.. For shop activity, Mike has been working on a sign for a "Drummer's Lounge", since we had the wire edging tool already made up for the Biederman, he used that to give the outside bands of the arrow the beaded look... CAD drawing: Parts is parts: Video: Meanwhile, I've been block sanding, and priming.... here the rear kick panels are now ready for upholstery... I did break out the Meco torch again the other day to get the dust off.... This first coupon shows how Peter Tommasini teaches tacking in gas welding. Tack a spot, then the next is placed where the HAZ (blue ring) touches the seam between the halves. And repeat. Note how this method leaves an almost perfect HAZ for minimal distortion.. And we had a blowout. Don't stop, keep going and come back to it.. This is fusion welded, no filler, front side shown first, then back side Stephen has been mocking up the power windows in the front doors so we can side step all the components and find a good location for our speakers. No pictures yet, I'll get some this week...
We're making some speaker "adapter" rings to be able to mount the speakers in the door. We used some 18 ga CRS to form rings, the seam was gas welded. The outer flange is started on the Fasti-werks bead roller using the tipping die and the lower die we made last week. Once it started to resist the tipping (needs stretching of the flange) we changed to using the linear stretch dies in the Lennox TE250 Originally we were looking at using the area below the power window motor, but in order to clear the power connector it would be too close to the bottom of the door... With not much else for room in the door, we opted to open a hole at the rear area of the inner hinge brace. With space above for the tweeter, this will closely mimic what we have in the rear kick panels.. The rings will get TIG welded in place, but before that we'll add a bit of structure back in the hinge brace.
kick shrinker took it over to about 20-25 degrees, then used Vise grip tuckers and heat on the tucks, hammering on a 2" diameter slug of steel.
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