Projects Tomcat’s Crazy '31 Model A Build Thread (2010-?)

I signed up here in 2010 when I first bought this 1931 Ford Model A coupe. My very first question to the great minds of the H.A.M.B. was to ask what front axle I had on this new to me machine.

The story goes, back in early 2010, I found this car. The seller sent me several pictures and I was hooked. The seller advertised it as a new build, with a 350 sbc, Turbo 350, 9 inch, and a Super Bell front axle. The pictures were great and I just had to go see it in person.

Knowing all too well how much work building cars is, and after driving it, and looking it over for probably two hours, I struck a deal for what in hindsight turned out to be way too much money! Don’t ask.

I noticed a few things wrong, and that I did not like, but said to my self “I can fix that” and “I can change this”. No problem right? HA!

As it turns out, the engine was a ‘72 307, a pan bolt was stripped on the TH350 and was leaking, it had a light weight one leg 9” out of a Fairlane or Comet, and the Super Bell was not a Super Bell. Thanks to the H.A.M.B. it was identified as a forged So-Cal axle.

The rear of the car has coil over shocks and was held up by a 1” square tube cross member which had been flexing and cracking at the frame. As if that were not enough, the seat is from a mini van and was mounted at the front on hinges. It had one end of the seat belt bolted to the floor and the other end bolted to the center of the seat. WTF! The battery was in a boat type box behind the seat. The fuel tank mounts were welded to the sheet metal floor. This car was not safe to drive.

As you will see, a lot of booger welds and poor craftsmanship can be hidden under bondo, carpet, and paint. Fortunately the 4 inch chop was done fairly well and the most of the body except for the floor and rear sub rails was not too bad, This car turned out to be a rotten onion.

The car will not be a totally period correct car. The theme is one that could have been built late 50’s and later evolved into the mid 60’s. It will have many vintage parts from those days along with a lot of custom fabrication.

I’ve wanted to do a build thread but, never wanted to spend the time loading all the pictures and doing all the chatter, but now figure I’d better start one before I get too old, fat, and retarded. I’ll start with some pictures from the beginning and try to bring it to the present over the next few weeks.

 

It looks nice anyhow.

 

Yes, good looking car. I'm looking forward to your thread. A forged So-Cal axle is better than a Superbell isn't it?

 

Outwards the car looks good, that rear crossmember is so undersized plus they did that offset that made it even worse. Look forward to the updates.

 

I won't ask since you said so and you have no need to answer my chatter as far as I'm concerned. I'm interested in where you have the car to, now some 10+ years later as it sounds like you wanted a driver not just a looker...

 

I dated a girl like that once. Beautiful until I got her home and she removed her prosthetic leg, took out her teeth, her glass eye, and pulled off her wig. Unlike her, your car can be fixed.

 

Thank you. I think it's better. I think it looks better. Drilled, chromed, forged.

Thanks. Yes cross member was a failure waiting to happen.

No worries on the chatter. Car is in my small two car garage. Yes, I just wanted to own and drive and nice hot rod and not build one from scratch. I backed into the garage in 2010 and have been working on it every since. But pealing back the layers of the onion resulted in a complete re-construction project. Every inch. Some one had to make it right.

LOL, sound like a real double bagger. That's when you wear a bag over your head just in case the one she has on rips. Eating the elephant.. one bite at a time!

 

One of the first things to do was to find a TIG welding machine. I have a Miller wire feed MIG but didn't want to deal with the splatter. I found a practically new Thermal Arc 185 complete with bottle, regulator and cart on craigslist for $600. It does everything including pulse and being an inverter it is small.

Next was build a small welding table. This was done with MIG.

 

While the weight and everything was still in the car I decided to cut out the weak 1" rear cross member and all the triangulated 4 link stuff and mock up a new rear suspension using the existing coil over shocks and a new heavier 1-1/2" square tubing cross member.

This included installing a new heavy duty Moser 9" housing with 31 spline axles.

After weighing options like the Pete & Jakes ladder bar set up I decided it looked a bit too weak for a high powered car so I decided on this parallel 4 link set-up.

I wanted something more adjustable, something that does not bind up and something that has some potential to hook. Not full drag race but, something stronger yet still street able. I was thinking I just might want to take this to the track some day.

I know I might catch hell from the traditionalist's for doing this.

 

The next thing to figure was how to get the body off the frame. Some 1-1/2 x 3/16 wall tubing and four trailer tongue jacks, some grade 8 fasteners, a little cutting, drilling, and welding, and walla! It's a one man job and is now on wheels.

 

I believe I recognize this car, does it have a candy paint job on it?

 

Very ingenious on the body lift.
I’m going to keep watching. Thanks for taking the time to share.

 

Welcome back TomCat11 .... when you upload your pictures, select the LARGE option for us that want to see easier.

 

No sir. It is a one off Maroon single stage job.

 

Thank you. It's going to get crazy deep.

 

Well OK, I can do that, I was just trying to save a little space. If there's no difference, I can make them all big.

 

Here's a few things I've collected to fill the rear axle housing,

3.75:1 Ring and Pinion.




Factory Nodular Iron Center Section with Daytona Pinion support and a Billet steel yoke. The original Daytona yokes seemed hard to find and were too expensive.


31 Spline Moser Axles



Yukon Differential. It's a similar design to the Ford factory traction lock, but better. I debated long and hard about whether to use a Detroit Locker or one of the other designs out there. I didn't like the driving characteristics of them for this application and besides I got a nice deal on this. Now all I need is the bearings.

 

Here's a few pic's of the old frame center section. Time to get out the saw-zaw and angle grinder.

 

Cut out all the center structure and body mounts.


After a ton of work the rails are all smoothed out. There were a lot of grinder gouges from the previous builder. All filled with TIG rod and metal finished.

 

After the initial engine/trans mock up these funky motor mount, shock mount, and steering box brackets needed to get cut off and replaced with some Pete & Jakes stuff. The engine angle was all wrong.

 

I think I dated her sister.... same story, except I told her when she got to the part I wanted, to toss it over to me!

 

I am in total awe of your willingness to learn and work through all the setbacks you've encountered with this car as well as your ability to maintain a clean garage floor at the same time. Did you exact retribution from the sorry S.O.B who mis-represented just about everything in the car? I just don't understand people like that. There is no defense for their actions.

 

Thank you alanp561, The floor has not always been clean. I usually have to stop and clean up my small garage. It's a weird deal cause it seems my mood and work quality is better when things are cleaned up.

No, I did not exact any retribution. This onion revealed more and more issues as I pealed back the layers and my frustration grew until I came to the painful realization that I would either have to sell it or completely rebuild the entire car. I could not live with myself just passing it on to the next guy. I had a vision of how I wanted the car to be and 13 years later I'm still at it. The cat I bought it from probably didn't know half of the issues. It was built for him by a small fly by night shop. Some people have absolutely no business building cars.

 

I was very impressed with your roll around body cart what I really like is it's adjust-ability. On the last two projects I "jury rigged" roll around body carts that worked fine but yours is a step or three better than either of mine

 

Thanks vtx1800, The rafters were not going to handle any weight and I needed to make it a one man deal. It's a little tricky inserting the cross supports and later removing them but it breaks down and takes up less space. I have to go around and around turning the cranks so it's a bit slow.

 

Options for the new frame center section were rectangular tube, round tube or possibly an original type X member. I settled on a "kit" from Speedway using 1" x 1-1/2" rectangular tubing. So that is the starting point. They have round tube kits but from a fabrication stand point rectangular tube offered more options. Some modifications are needed.

 

Rough engine/trans mock up completed. Engine/trans will get lowered a 1/4" and moved 1" rearward for better weight distribution and more clearance for the cooling fan and that funny looking pulley.

 

Got rid of that drive shaft loop, Cut and fit some more tubes by hand with a hack saw no less (wish I had a chop saw) and broke out some blue imagineering tape. Tricky fitting as the rails curve inward toward the bottom.

 

More tubes and new motor mounts tacked in place. Some tube are intentionally left out for future work. Front Shock mounts deleted.

 

Looks beefy!