Back to work on the Nash after getting another project done and out of the way. My two main goals now are fuel system and brakes. I took the fuel pump out, figured out the Carter part number (M797S), and ordered a kit. There are no new pumps for this car, couldn't even find an old NORS rebuilt or anything. The kit was 95 bucks with shipping, but I guess I'm just glad I can even get one. So I moved onto the brakes. Today I made all new hard lines from the master to the rear wheels. Some of them had been replaced in the past but they used a single flare on the ends, and on the rearend they just left the old rusty ones clipped in place and put new ones over the top. I took the old ones out, made new ones and routed them through the factory clips which are actually quite nice. I had to find some new clips for the line that runs front to back but I had a stash. Looking at the pics, I do see that one loop of my line looks like it's kinda floating in midair, I'll adjust that so it's tighter against the floor, it's easy to do with Nicopp, which I really like working with. I got this SUR&R brand flaring tool last Christmas and it's so nice, you clamp it into the vice and it makes way better flares than those little parts store flaring kits, I never want to have to do it that way again. The tool isn't exactly cheap, but when it comes to doing stuff like this, it's so nice to have.
I swapped in my '55 grille today, was way more work than I expected, the only way to get access to the bolts was to pull out the radiator, so I did a coolant system flush right away, luckily it looked clean. Also had to reshape the pull handle for the hood release to clear the new grille, not too terrible though. I love the look of this over the original, the original looked too much like a Metropolitan. I also bought this kinda rough emblem to use on the grille. It was very foggy on the bottom and had a bunch of crazing on it, I wetsanded the plastic face to get the fog off and polished it, then covered it in Vaseline for a couple weeks. The Vaseline soaks into the crazing and fills them in, works really well. It came out great, but I mocked it up on the car and I like it better without. So not going to use it, but figured I'd show the before and after anyway.
Neat little car and you knew exactly how to fix the body.Is it difficult to change the tires due to the bath tub design of the body?
It's not bad. You have to jack up on the "frame" (it's a unibody so no actual frame, but you know what I mean) so the suspension drops down a bit but then they're actually pretty easy to access. The skinny tires also help. Apparently you need special adapters to do an alignment though, since a regular alignment rack has gauges that attach directly to the wheels, and that won't work on this car. Hoping not to have to figure that out on this one though.
The Jalopy Journal
