DEUCE OF SPADES HOTROD FILM UPDATES - photos from the Saugus and dry lake shoots

Yes and I replied earlier today, did you not get my PM
Let me know ...

PS: You rock!

 

I bet Terry at "Canadian Hot Rods & Cl***ics" magazine will give you some press......he's a good guy, and he's always looking for stories........I think you have his link.....

 

Hey Faith, that is awesome. Congrads!!! I wish you the best on this and I can't wait to see the movie. It is always cool to see your updates on your progress on the Deuce!!! One sweet car.

 

OK, so I get this email yesterday from a fellow hotrodder who follows my blog. He saw the HOLLEY pump photos and contacted me to warn me they are not supposed to be mounted upside down. . OK, so I called the manufacturer, to be sure and surely enough, after holding for over 20 minutes, the nice man said: "Oh no, it is not recommended to mount it upside down. for 2 reasons: 1- it can cause it to malfunction on and off and 2- more importantly, if your seal ever fails, the gas will leak into the motor compartment and cause a fire."



And all I could imagine was the deuce, on fire, zipping down the freeway and some kid in an SUV saying:

"Look Mom!! what is that? A comet? A wingless plane? An Allien ship?"

Nops, it's just hiboy girl with her *** on fire. Great. Just what I need.

So tonight we took everything apart (AGAIN!!!!!!! This is the THIRD time) and flipped the pump.

In short, when we first mounted the pump, we mounted it upside down and BACKWARDS... Yop, WE'RE GOOD... REALLY GOOD

The upside down thing was out of necessity, it fit a lot better under the car that way, but somehow, a couple gasoline showers later, we were able to revert it back to an upright position tonight without suffering from too many more set-backs.

primed the pump, started the deuce and no leak as of yet... Now moving on to the next project: Installing the hard line and fabricating a transmission cover to inside the ****pit... May do it at Gene's shop, I would love to learn.

 

Hello again!!

 

Howdie Good to see you here again.

How's that dragster?

New prop: Just arrived in the mail, donated by a relative of Jerry. This will be Johnny's kodak camera he had in 1955, which will resurface in 2008 - with a film still in it.... OoooooOoooooooo :

Brownie 127

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[FONT=Arial,Helvetica]Type: Solid body eyelevel rollfilmIntroduced: 1952Discontinued: 1959Film size: 127Picture size: 1 5/8 X 2 1/2"Manufactured: UKLens: Meniscus f/14, 65mmShutter: Single speed 1/50 secNumbers made: Millions (1,000,000 by Aug 1954)Original Price: $4.75 Description:Moulded smooth plastic body with broad horizontal steps; optical direct vision finder. Between May 1953 and Sept 1954 263,000 of these cameras were exported to America.

[/FONT]</PRE>

 

UPDATES

More work on the deuce.

Tonight we make a tranmission tonneau cover cardboard template to work off of...

Tomorrow I have the honor of being invited to the SCTA banquet. It will be nice to see some of my friends there... Special thanks to Richard Parks, for making this happen and for having me as his guest.

Sunday I head down to Jerry's house to finish the trunk. We ran into problems (it figures! LOL) with the rumble seat set-up getting stuck in the side pannels when we tried to open the trunk lid. Had to chop them up some more... Now another fitting, hopefuly the last one.

Let's hope the fuel pump, now flipped upright, will not leak from it's many fittings... The weather should be nice, I look forward to cruising down the coast for the day. Maybe I shoud pack some teflon tape with me LOL.. I intend to test the pump new set up tonight by cruising up to FLAMES with Jimmy.

Wednesday it's back to Kent Weaver (Lord of Tri-Power ) to install the hard line on my tri-power... I got screwed as far as the gl*** sediment bowl goes, cause the UK manifacturer told me I can buy fittings for it anywhere in the US. But he was WRONG. His threads are 20 thread per inch and US fittings have 18 (or the other way around - no matter - they are not compatible)...

We are trying to find 1/4 inch tapered pipe fittings with 20 threads per inch on one side and flared fitting for a 3/8th hard line on the other.

yeah. RIGHT. Like that's gonna happen anytime soon.

Anyone know where to find this?????

Otherwise I guess I will have to can the idea of having a firewall mounted gl*** bowl on the deuce. Unless I get a Model A gl*** bowl and fabricate a braket for it. Maybe that is what I should have done in the first place.

 

Well, if it came from the UK there are two possibilities; British Standard Pipe Thread would be 1/4-19. Metric would actually be .7mm with a .175 thread per inch. It is probably the British Standard and fittings are available over here.

 

I agree,he would probably be very interested especially right now during the "slow season"up here.

 

WHERE????

It needs to go from that british standard threaded tapered pipe to 3/8 hard line, eiterh flared fitting or compression fitting... Where can I get it? I spent 3 hours on the phone yesterday with mis company that make fittings and it was A TOTAL WASTE OF MY TIME. All I got was a migraine.

 

Neck rub?

All I got was a migraine.

 

So, you're looking for something like this?
http://www.jegs.com/p/Earl's/754064/10002/-1



Why not just have the guy send you a length of fuel line with a fitting that will go into the fuel bowl he sold you on his dime? I mean, he DID kind of lie to you. And besides, the fitting's like a buck or two, right?

Anyway, then you can cut the flare off the fuel line piece he sent from the UK and take the fitting off. Then cut the flare off of YOUR hard line, plumb it to the bowl, slide the fitting on, re-flare it and you're set! Viola, a custom fuel line!



Hell, for that matter, maybe somebody here with a Jaguar has a fuel line that's pretty messed up, but that the end fittings are good on that you can HAVE. Or another unlikely source might be a bike shop that specializes in old Triumphs or Nortons... a wink and a smile later, and one of the guys in the bays might have a few of those fittings in their tool box they'll just hand you - maybe even off of a former brake line. Hell, who cares as long as it works, right?

What about re-tapping the bowl?

~Jason

 

hey Faith...have not seen you around town,got my roadster on the road and went by your place ...no luck,saw an old neighbor of mine on his bike and stopped to say hello, he said " there goes that girl in the highboy again", how long? "5 min a go"
so i just missed you, im going for a cruise tomarow let me know if you need a flaring tool,or some thing.......good luck Brian

 

hey Faith,
try these guys for help and ,they are in chatsworth,ca

http://www.ormebrothers.com/

 

Wow!

I just read this: http://www.ormebrothers.com/who.html

Impressive!

~Jason

 

Cool history too,almost fits into Faith's movie timeline. http://www.ormebrothers.com/about.html

 

McMaster Carr has lots of fitting, bolts, etc.

 

hey there Brian - sorry we missed each other. I left you several messages on your phone over the last 4 weeks but never heard back... Now I am thinking maybe you never got them at all...

Yes, above guys were also recommended by Jimmy, but Friday by the time I got back home from work they had already closed. . I will go there tomorrow and pick their brains. I will bring the bowl with me.

Looks like Jimmy and I might be heading up to Gene Winfield's Saturday to try to fabricate my transmission cover for the inside of my car. Looking forward to learning how to work metal... We made a template Friday night, were at it until 2 AM .

Cardboard was failing, so I got smart and pulled out my CINEFOIL roll. Worked like a charm!!! Easy to bend and shape and will hold its shape, too.

or those of you wondering what the heck CINEFOIL is, it looks like aluminum foil, but much thicker and it's black. We use it in filming, to blog off the lights (flags), create light patterns etc...

 

Ok, I just googled them and found their HUGE site. Will have to call and talk to them tomorrow... Oh joy... More MIGRAINES

 

yeah when I read this:

:Orme Brothers was founded by Ray, Joel, and Verl Orme, in September, 1944 as a Union 76 service station in the quiet little rural town of Northridge, California. Mostly orange groves and dirt roads, Northridge boasted celebrity homes and ranches of Walter Brennan, Monte Montana, Barbara Stanwick, Jack Oakie, and many others in the early days of Hollywood" it brought a smile to my face...

Orange groves and dirt roads.... All I can think about is the jalopy race teaser #2 ...

And also JOhnny driving his Deuce alonside bettie, as she walks to school, between two rows of avocado trees and cactuses... Awsome shot

 

Cinefoil is a great idea! I will have to try that sometime. It would be really handy. Hope you get your fuel line figured out without to much more trouble and hopefully no more migraines.

 

IT'S OFFICIAL - THE DEUCE IS TRYING TO KILL ME

Went to a car meet yesterday morning, drove off and floored it. Just like everyone else does when they leave... deuce sounded sweet and all three carbs opened up... Tires are screetching and engine is roaring...

I fly up to the upcoming busy intersection, the light is RED - Cars everywhere...

And then IT HAPPENED...

MY THROTTLE IS STUCK

I'm hitting the brakes, but the deuce won't stop, it's a runaway jalopy, 2000 pounds of hotrod heading full speed ahead, straight to a pile up.

It took me all but 4 seconds to figure out what was happening. Put in in neutral, hit the brakes and killed the engine. The engine was revving up pretty darn high from the sound of it... got the deuce to stop, just in time...

Sheesh - that was close.

Took a good 30 minutes to figure out what was going on. Problem lays with the linkage. It got stuck and wasn't able to come back to resting position. I was able to fix it so i can drive the car, but no flooring it until Kent has a looksee at it wednesday to see what the heck is going on.

I noticed that the ****erfly shaft is sliding so the linkage is not tight enough around it, it is slipping a bit, enough to end up in an "up" position when it comes back down.... And mess me up.

Ah the adventures never stop (and neither does the deuce LOL)

 

Went to ORme Brotehrs this morning and they are gong to help me with my tri power stainless steel line. they are making a fitting for me to plug rubber line in and make it look good.

As far as the sediment gl*** bowl is involved I am SOL.

The unit aws not drilled deep enough for even a standard british 1/4 pipe fitting to go in. And since it is pot steel (however you spell that), they can't do a thing about it.

I AM PISSED

Time to call the manufacturer and ***** ***** *****.

 

WTF?!??!

I'd be pissed, too!!! Think you can talk the manufacturer into a refund... or the right fittings?

~Jason

 

YEAH, one more item on my LOOOONG "TO DO" list...

UPDATES:

Spent all day at Kent Weaver's yesterday and ***isted him best I could with the upgrades. I was smart and bought extra fittings from ORME when I picked up my hard line. They did a great job at braising a polished fitting onto the stainless steel line by the way.

I also found cloth covered fuel line, looks real neat so I bought some. I also bought a special sleeve to protect from heat, to slide onto the cloth covered fuel line, where it comes closest to exhaust pipes. Note that the cloth covered fuel line is even more safe than the normal rubber fuel lines. But I still wanted to be extra safe.

I'll take photos tomorrow and post them here.

So I was more than prepared when I showed up at Kent and it helped the session go smoothly. Adding hard lines to the tri-power sure cleaned up the engine compartment A LOT!

It looks real gooood.

We worked for 10 hours ...

But that's because we also had to trouble shoot my stuck throttle incident... And we figured out what had caused it....

More on this when I have more time to post - right now must go back to work. (yop, I am at work... cause I got to pay those hotrod repairs BILLS)

 

I'll bet it cleaned it up a lot! Can't wait for pics!

Hell, post a pic of the wooden block under your gas pedal mount...

~Jason

 

Glad you survived the stuck throttle (not everyone does). Luckily, your cat-like reflexes saved the day. Again. Glad you're okay...

 

Can't wait to see how the Deuce is coming along....

 

Well you guys check this out: Turned out the accelerator pump of carb #1 was defective (we rebuilt those carbs back in May) and it snapped. the metal shaft came out of the plastic part of pump when I floored it. So then when I lifted my foot off, the pump got stuck, unable to return to its original position is got that carb STUCK and since that carb and carb #3 are linked with linkage, now BOTH thosew carbs could not close. Last but not least, the linkage slipped around the center carb ****erfly shaft and that was the kiss of (almost) death.

Now who's to say my other plastic accelerator pumps don't do the same thing one day????

Which goes to show: They just don't make them like they used to...

Below: MY linkage:

 

Ok sir, here are some photos of misc progress:

1 - HEADERS were painted cast iron grey.

"Before" photo:




"During" photo:





"After" photo:




A little easier to see color on this shot:




we also debated whether I shoud go for true 1955 stock headers, but they have a weird shape to them... Unusual. I am not sure they would clear my steering shaft... but will look into it some more later...




2- DECK LID

Cleaned it up:




Jerry made a plate to cover big hole at latch (thank you Jerry! Jerry is like my big brother - He watches my back ):




I painted the inside and Jerry made the nogahide panels. Here is everything, ready to go back on the deuce.