Whats the scariest thing youve seen on a rod?

And nothing ever tore loose?

Looks like diamond plate would eventually just crinkle up with an V8 attached to it.

 

Oh yeah, I almost forgot......on my first test drive after the last rebuild on my 38 chevy coupe, I had u-bolted the 9" rear in on top of the spring saddles and after getting the pinion angle right I went on to something else and forgot to weld the axle housing to the saddles. On the first drive when i hit the brakes the axle started to rotate which in turn pulled the emergency brake cables tight which in turn locked up the rear brakes making the rear housing rotate big time ripping out the drive line in the process. Luckly I was only going about 20 at the time and I live out in the country where there was no one to witness it. So it didnt really happen did it?

 

I once saw an oval track Stock Car Camaro experience a similar problem with the rearend rotating. They had used clamp-on leaf spring perches without so much as a tack weld to keep them from rotating.

The car accelerated off one of the turns, the clamp loosened, rearend spun and the driveshaft got pulled out of the transmission tail housing.

When they towed the car in, the driver couldn't get out of the car because the shifter handle was locked against his leg. The driveshaft had let go so violently that it broke the transmission loose from the bellhousing. The transmission then rotated until the shifter handle stopped against the drivers seat and the driver's leg. Lucky for him, the seat was stronger than the leg and all he got was a bit of bruising.

The use of a "trick" clamp-on mount (that was supposed to give him the ability to adjust pinion angle) ended up costing him a lot of money and time.

The driveshaft and yokes were junk, the pinion gear was broken off the rear axle, the 4 speed Muncie transmission was junk, the $600 clutch was ruined as well as the hydraulic clutch linkage and the Lakewood bellhousing, the shifter was broken, the aluminum seat bent, the floor boards trashed and the headers and exhaust system were bent.

It was a few weeks before that racer returned with a repaired car...and welded axle spring perches. He said he spent something like $2500.00 putting it all back together.

 

not a hot rod, but i saw this on a jeep. look at the driveline angle, and the u-joint.
i asked the guy if he ever had u-joint problems, and he told me no.
yeah right !! i highly doubt that this thing was ever taken off road, but he did drive it to the show that we were at.

 

Spotted on the road. 69 El Camino body [and a nice one too] on a 4x4 truck chassis with 38" mudders. But the body wasn't actually attached to the frame, it just sat on it. It was loosely chained to the frame,........at least in the back. He had torched a hole in the bed floor, removed the tailgate, and run a chain around the rear cross member and the tailgate sill. The front was held in place by the steering column. Amazing.....

 

On the same 51 Anglia I later poured the bolt together roll ball full of molten lead/solder to add weight to drop a class. The real seats were actually plastic laundromat chairs borrrowed from a 24 hour laundromat and attached to tube frames. This thing actually ran 11.50's back in 1971 with stock 1-1 Anglia steering. You lined it up straight and never touched the steering no matter where it went, it would end up straight in high gear. I am an idiot and my name is Woody

 

Way back in 1965 my buddy and I went over to a local body shop to look at a 34ford 5 widow coupe. we took our wives as they controlled the family budgets.as we looked it over we were in fantasy land.It was a old rod, nailhead 39 box and the body work was done.As i was sitting inside turning the wheel my wife stuck her head in and said" how come the fender moves up and down when you turn the wheel. we lifted the hood and looked at the steering box. I was welded into a hole in the frame that had been cut away with a torch. There was about 1/2" of frame left and the whole thing flexed several inches when the whjeel was turned. A good bump and it would have broken needless to say the ladies turned thumbs down othe idea. It still was probably worth the $250.00 the owner wanted

 

I'll bet it's strong as hell, but how do you control the play in the suspension pivots on this one?

 

Is this a Fab show U-Haul theme vehicle?

 

First quick change frontend Ive ever seen!

 

some things just shouldnt be.

WOW!

 

A killbillet decal.

 

A fifteen pound Rats nest of wire under the dash of a very nice 56 Chevy......There was not a single fuse anywhere.

The owner said..... "It sparks every once and a while"

 

I have a 1/2 drive craftsman swivel I use on an impact everyday and it has never broken.......so I see your point .Im sure this dudes arms when mixed with a steering wheel would definately impose more torque than an impact gun

 

In high school ('82-'86) a guy had a '69 Nova that had 4"x4" pieces of wood installed vertically instead of front springs with no shocks. The rearend was welded to the bottom of the leaf springs for the Gasser look, and the engine was sitting on the front crossmember with a come-along holding the engine down. The come-along was attached to the upper control arm shafts on each side of the engine. It also had no front brakes what so ever. One day the welds holding the rearend let go, and the whole assembly exited the vehicle, luckily he nor anyone else was hurt.

 

And yet...somewhow, you never read: "family killed in crash with home-engineered vehicle" You would think they would be all over that...well...we'll wait for a slow news day, or a faltering career.

 

i had a friend in high school that drove his 55 chevy around for several weeks using a pair of vice grips for a steering wheel.

 

First you should appreciate that our class of Rose Parade float typically weighs in between ten and fifteen tons on parade day, occasionally more, and we'd been driving this chassis for five years prior to this.

We were in the process of relocating the 390 motive power to a more efficient position. After lifting the thing out I whacked the right frame-side engine mount a good solid one with a 3 pounder to shake off the accumulation of decoration dust so as to avoid starting a fire with the cutting torch. Didn't need the torch after all as that mount fell on the floor, nearly on my foot. a close look at the welds revealed the beads to the frame itself (while acceptable looking visually) were only burned into the mount and merely laying against the actual frame beam except at three points (possibly the initial tack welds). Never caught in the many inspections and never noticed during trials or annual tests. No record of who actually threw those two beads and I haven't seen the like of'em before or since. And the left, front and C-6 mounts were good as gold, took two hours to cut'em all and grind'em clean.

It took me a few days actually, to deduce that the torque directions under load had actually been pressing the mount more firmly against the beam and gravity had helped hold it there otherwise. It had never seen a torque unloading (that would have lifted it) due to the nature of float operation, the low speed and the compounded gearing used. Sheer luck of the engineering draw, it hadn't actually been dangerous.

Still, scared the crap out of me thinking back on all the folks along five years (thirty some total miles) of parade route and the rest of those welds. Needless to say I did the new mounts personally, including the re-engineering to a full crossmember design.
Also went over the rest of the chassis with a one pounder checking ring tones. Paranoia'll do that to ya.

And yes, a float's more hot rodding than a lot of hot rods. It's scratch built, then it's scratch bodied every year.

 

Oh shit Batman! WTF is up with the trailer hitch susp.!

 

Hey its got brand new radial tires on it. It must be safe!

 

Saw this car at the Moonshine run in Georgia this year.
Muffler clamp suspension, rear brakes only, One used brake line.
Can you imagine building a car and using an old brake line for the on flexible brake line on the car.

 

Well...ummm...My trailer weighs a LOT more, loaded, than this does...I don't ever expect to look back in my mirror and see it lying on the road! provided it is hooked up properly...
uhhhh...as for its handling/maneuvering characteristics...

 

Think about how those hitch joints are being loaded...... it is the opposite of a trailer......... That is scary as hell.

 

Whenever it corners (if it ever does) isn't the load going to push up and side ways on those trailer hitches?

There is no way that front end setup was the "easiest" to pull off, there is so much engineering in having the crap Ranger 4x4 split front end under there, that they could've just put their money and time into an speedway kit or something.

 

I just had two scary ones in the shop lately. The first one was that the guy took the the stock rod ends out of his steering link and replaced them with 5/8 heims. The ones he removeed were 11/16. Then he used 3/8 hardware grade bolts to bolt the hiems to the spindles. He used spacers to take up the gap between the bolt and hiems. The spindles still had the tapper holds in them.

Second one was a rod with Mustang II steering rack. He had the rug joint on the steering shaft at the rack end. The rubber in the rug joint must of went bad because he had a piece of wood cut and bolted in place of the rubber.

I was able to talk both of them into letting me fit them.

 

Guess I shouldn't have left this out:
I, for one, wouldn't do it...besides...its also ugly as F@#$#%!

 

Yeah...they are certainly not being forced TOGETHER !

maybe he should just flip them upside down...
I think this is imaginative, anyway! lol...

 

Christ! That pile looks like a pipe organ fucked a trailer...

 

- Yeah, what he said.

 

I agree.

Just noticed the rear end is also attached with trailer hitches...