Car is coming back together it’s a lot harder trying to not scratch anything Dash sets in nicely against the blue One thing I wanted to change was the 3rd brake light I decided I wanted a wood trim strip I then got some very fine LED strip lights and set in into the wood and covered with a pice of the old 3rd brake light to have a set into the wood.
Well the car is now altogether. Made a few trips around the block and so far so good. Trying out the look with and without the hood
Your car looks awesome! Mine is stuck in paint shop jail and I'm a painter after painting cars for close to 55 years I just can't seem to get mine done. What color blue did you use and with brand?
I’m not sure on the brand or colour code I can ask the paint shop when I stop by for a few touch ups I have heard lots about paint jail. I guess I’m lucky mine got turned around in 5 months
Time for an update on the car. I have put about 300 miles on the car since putting it back together after paint. I have had a few issues I’m sorting out Ignition timing- for the life of me I could not get the timing too set. The marks were jumping around 20 degrees on me when setting base timing. The engine seemed to run very well so I figured it must be my timing light picking up bad signals from the solid core wires running through the steel looms. I replaced the red solid core wires with a set of 7mm Petronix wires. That seemed to do the trick and I was get it set to 4 degrees and 26 total by 2500RPM. I preferred the look of the red wires but I must say the insulated boots make it easier to work on the engine with out getting shocked Front tire shake - once got above 50mph the frontend would start to shake enough you could see the radiator bouncing around. Lucky it just needed the front tire balanced and that gas seemed to take 80% of the shake out. Was able to do a little 60MPH trip out side of town Brake drag - once the car would get hot my front brakes would start to drag. I found the plastic bushing in the pedal was grabbing and preventing the master cylinder from returning all the way causing the front brakes to drag. A little work with a flap wheel and it’s returning with out binding anymore Brake lights - Out driving I have had a couple people tell me my brake lights don’t work. They are wired in with a pressure switch and do require a bit of pedal pressure to activate. With down shifting and a light touch on the brakes guess is not enough to trip the light. My plan is to use a mechanical switch in parallel with the pressure switch that will activate with minimal pedal Made the first car show this weekend in Airdrie AB about 100mile round trip car ran very well 170F 50psi oil pressure @60MPH. It is definitely a new experience driving this car in heavy fast traffic
Just passed 1000 miles on the car. A few minor issues have been popping up and I’m slowly getting them all ironed out Fuel boil over – any time I would shut the car off hot my carbs would boil over and pour gas down the intake. I tried setting the float level lower but that just seemed to create more issues as I was now running very lean, and the car would not accelerate off idle. I ended up settling on 1 5/16 float height that seemed to be its happy point. But to keep the heat out of the carbs I pulled the intake machined up some blanking plugs and blocked off the exhaust cross over. Additionally, I installed some phenolic spacers as well. So far this has stopped the boil over. Now I just need to get them to stop leaking fuel around the top plate I suspect new gaskets are in order as I had reused the old gaskets multiple times Rear wheel run out – I noticed that my left rear wheel had a lot of run out when driving and you could see it walking around. Checked and had .100” run out on the rim. After pulling the wheel I find it was my axle that was not true and had a .022” run out compared to .002 on the other side. I was able to mount the axle into my old lath and do a face cut on the flange to remove the high side. All back together the rim run out was under .010” now. Not surprisingly my fender no longer bounced around as much on Rear axle ratio – I built the car with a 3.80 rear gear but I did not factor in the T5 transmission was out of a 4cy S10 so I had the extremely low first gear. I found first was almost useless and once you were moving you needed to be in second. Even making left hand turns you were shifting just after you cleared the opposite travel lanes. I picked up another center section that had 3.50” gears. After cleaning the gear surfaces of light rust I installed in into my car. After the swap I was much happier with the car. First gear was now usable and around town I was always bouncing back and forth between 2-3 with the higher ration most side streets are 2nd gear [ The fall weather is still holding around this part of the country so I’m trying to put get some more miles on then car any chance I get. It’s even been doing the preschool pick up and drop off the last few weeks. About as opposite as you can get from the other parents in the minivans. My 4 year old loves cruising around town in it so how could I say no when he requests the hot rod for transportation.
Love the car, nice to see your working out the bugs and the details to your fixes. Got to love a large bore Logan lathe, perfect for running larger diameter stock through spindle.
Yes the big Logan sure did the trick. Was not sure how I was going to do it but a 4 Jaw set up on the seal race and then I used a dual indicator on the wheel bearing to get that true and then verified that I was still high on the spot I marked seemed to do the trick You will never know how useful a lathe is until you have one
Got to love the lathe. The new centre section is the early design so the flange is a bit thinner. Last weeks fix was stick a washer in the panhard bar. Spent an hour today to turn a new aluminum spacer bushing
A few small changes I have beet having trouble with my mechanical brake light switch the micro switch is too light and just bends so I needed a heavier switch. Before I installed one I realized I needed a brake pedal return spring. My setup work but a return spring would provide the needed force to actuate the brake switch. I salvaged the spring out of a broken grease gun and made an aluminum adapter for the other end and put it over the brake push rod end. It worked well on the brake so I did the same for the clutch. This time found the right sized frost plug and just drilled a hole through that for my clutch pedal return spring. Made up a couple brake pedal stops that bolt to the floor and limit the travel up on the pedal. Painted it all black and it just disappears Brake lights work great now with just a little pedal movement. It’s looking like the last weekend for the season. Sunny but a little chilly out this morning at 35F. Yes that is snow behind me
Well I have found my transmission oil leak. There is a fine line between too much RTV and not enough especially in the right places. When I put the transmission together I missed a small section in the front bearing retainer. Just enough to allow for a leak after it was run. Going back together this time a a real fight after a few attempts of bench pressing it into place a gave up and fabricated a transmission adapter for my floor jack to give me that 3rd hand to finally wiggle it into place
Really enjoyable build to read through. Being a fairly traditional guy i winced at some bits and pieces but its yours and honestly, end product is quite a looker. I will say this and I hope no offense is taken. If your grill shell moved south 3/4" your hood would look way better, the angle just doesnt fit. Its fine and dandy and not a huge deal but it sure is a purdy rod and I am sure 3/4" would be enough to match it to the rest of the great lines! Contractors eye...I spot every picture in every house I walk through thats crooked even ever so slightly...its a blessing and a curse! Thanks for sharing the build!
No offence taken. This was my first full car build I have ever done. I would have changed a few things I did on the chassis during the first few years but decided just to keep going forward. The grill is as low as it can go on the radiator. The pictures always make it look worse then it is the shell is lower then the cowl but a lot of my photo angle make it look like the grill is higher. Ideally it would be great to drop it slightly more but that would require new radiator
I just looked back a couple of posts and saw the broken grease gun spring, and freeze plug trick. Good use of an inexpensive "cupped washer retainer". We found a bag of similar sized springs in the surplus section at Princess Auto. Just a tip for future.
Couple small projects was to build a cup holder that swings out from underneath the seat to hold my coffee cup. I also made up some covers for my king pins. They are matching my air cleaners I also modified a cheap 5.0L mustang shifter to fit the GM T5. I wanted a shifter with positive stops to prevent any fork damage. I then got to do something new on the lathe and tapper cut a new shift lever. First I did one in mild steel to prototype it then the next one I made in stainless steel and polished it up. It was a nice +5c day out and couldn’t resist taking the car for a spin the 2hrs of cleaning was well worth spin around town. Now I’m just waiting on spring when the gravel is picked up so I can get the car out again.
Guess it’s been a few years since I last updated the thread. The roadster has been a reliable cruiser. I swapped out the 94 carbs for a new set of Strombergs. I struggled with constant leaks on the 94’s and the throttle base shafts were very worn. I must say the Strombergs have been great I dropped the jet size and seem to have it running well. Last fall I noticed a small coolant leak on the L/H head. Removed the head and installed a new Felpro head gasket and fresh Teflon paste on all the studs. Fired it up only to find now I had a coolant leak up on top of the head and 4-5 studs that would not stop leaking. I tried done ceramic head gasket in a bottle but nothing worked. Defeated I drained the coolant and parked the car up on the hoist for the winter. Recently I pulled the engine back apart. The new Felpro head gasket uses integrated copper sealing rings around the coolant passages compare to the old gaskets that had none. Seems like the combination of my block and heads just catches the top of the copper ring. This caused a pressure point right at the top of the head and explained my leak. This time I switch to Best Brand gasket that do not have any sealing rings. I tried Permatex #2 sealant for the head studs. That seems to be the fix. No external leaks and not one leaking head stud this time. It’s never fun having to redo your own work but at least you learned something. I have a few other small items to address but it’s nice to get the car out for 2025.
Best brand "Graphtite" gaskets were the fix for my flatty head leaks as well. Cars are looking good for spring!
Sometimes it's the combination of parts that does it, either right or wrong. Glad you found the source and cure. We'll be in Canmore and Springbank area in a couple of weeks. Are you anywhere near there?
The Jalopy Journal
