Hot Rods The serious work begins...Tomarrow. My Buick Roadster Modified

Well I am finally liking cars again, so I started working on my Buick today! I began this car nine years ago. I had gotten the body from a friend of my dad. That year I made all the mod's to the body but never finished them and sat the body in the corner and forgot about it for a couple years while I worked on customer stuff during the day and relaxed at night...

The next thing I did was in 2007 when I built the perimeter frame with a friend, mocked up the body, tore it apart and hung it on the wall.

That brings me to today, I recently quit smoking and have only had a hard time when I am idle, so Kevin (friend/co worker) met me at the shop this morning and we went to work. He had to do some work for his project and said he would give me a hand when it was needed.

We placed the perimeter frame in the jig and centered it up and adjusted the rake, our jigs are set up with 3 degrees rake, but I didn't want that much...

Placed the Engine and trans in thier respective holes and set the cowl. Some may ask, "why is the engine so high?". Ground clearance. I do not want the oil pan to be lower than the frame, in fact if I can make it work I don't want anything lower than the frame, not sure that's gonna happen though.







I went and grabbed my nose off the wall - this heavy son of a bitch was built in 1952 and use to reside on Doc Gage's channel'd and chopped 3 winder (I have pictures of that car somewhere) - and mocked it up.



Proportions looked good so I threw on the rear body and taped on a "hood"







So then I HAD to grab my tires and tape them on too...haha tape is expensive! but so useful.



So tomarrow the real work begins, the engine and trans are exactly where they need to be and centered up. Motor mounts here I come!!!

And I would like to thank Kevin for the help and for the nudge...Dad too...

Matt Lesky

 

I thought of that frame a few weeks ago, wondered what happened with it.

Mock up looks good.

 

Mat that looks awesome! Are those blister in the frame for exhaust like on the Doane Spencer Roadster? I am pretty excited about it. There seem to be some really cool modifieds being built right now. Can't wait to see it some together.

 

Great looking car. Buick in a Buick, who woulda thunk it. Gary

 

That is a nice frame table. I like the car too!

 

I dig the motor up high. I did mine that way also! Should get the carbs up over the cowl! nice!

 

VERY interesting project. I really like the molded in mini turtle deck styling of the Buick body. Do you plan on having working doors, or filling the gap and make it a hop over?

 

Looking good.

 

Man there's some creativity goin on in that shop.

 

Yes, It will more then likily get a belly pan, and a cage too!

 

i love it!

 

Matt, Have you tried lowering the nose a bit? I'm thinking about a 1/8" should do it. did you think you'd get away without anyone injecting their opinion? Fat chance Just trying to help a young guy out, no sense letting you make a rookie mistake
BTW, is the '32 5w still around? Fuelpump and I were discussing coming over but wanted to see the car.

Frank

 

Rich I will be making some doors for it.

 

yes dig where its going. and i really dig the table. next frame i do i am building a table to work on. cant wait to see where this ends up.

 

Five window won't be here by the end of next week, so get your asses over here!!

And thanks for the advice!

 

LOL, what happened to those doors you got from me? I know the correct doors make that thing WAAAAAY long. Maybe I can get back on mine at some point...



I think they are the same body. I'm using a pair of 4 door doors. They're much shorter, though I'll have to do something for rockers...

 

Awesome Matt! So your gonna have this thing finished for autorama, right?

 

that thing is cool

 

You should know by now not to ask such questions, the answer is always so speculatory (new word)..... maybe next year?

 

Man, the proportions look good on that thing

 

Go man go...cool roadster.

 

Love all but the windsheild,looks way too narrow,not a match for how nice the rest is starting to look to me.

 

I like the looks of this a LOT! My first impression is that you have a hole saw or punch, and enjoy using it. How old is the body 1923 or so? Like the late '30's INDY car or GP car nose.

 

The nose is too fat, I'll either have to take a couple or more inches out of this one or start fresh which may be the better route beings this nose is full of lead and would be a bitch to weld..

 

Zman's is a '22 and mine I believe is a '22 but his has wheel wells and mine didn't, possibly just a different body manufactor.

Thanks!

 

This is a cast windshield Russ Martin sent me to make fit the cowl (all of ours, zman, Martin and mine have the same cowl). What I have found is I will more than likely be building one from scratch, and making a mold so the other guy's can have one if they want.

Thanks

 

Roger that! Great looking project

 

Looks like it'll be WAY more fun than smoking! I have serious frame table envy, seeing as how I used 4x4's, planks and sawhorses...

 

About time you got working on it


Chris tell you we got his car painted last weekend?



I need to talk to you about a frame for my coupe



see you autorama weekend you saying at my bro's?

 

Yeah we figured out I spent three hours a day paying somebody else to die! pretty wild, not to mention that's almost twelve dollars a day and Forty cig's!! Wow, I feel a little dirty admitting that!hahaha