this is going to turn into one hell of a car! the K member is brilliant... i swear you guys across the pond can do better stuff with our cars than we can...cant wait to see it done
Hi Nathan. Nice to see your build here.Inspirational workmanship.I shall be stealing ideas for my next project throughout this build. Cheers, Mark
Here you go... http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=234645 http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=267679
Ah the Tot rod,Pete built this one from scratch for his daughter Ellie (check out the name of the car) Stainless tubular chassis, 100cc 4 stroke engine with hand built mock hemi motor that your feet slide into. All 8 exhausts are plumbed into the real engine, home built sprint car steering. The bodywork again is all hand beaten and rolled. Pete says there's still a whole load of work to do until he's finished. I reckon he might have a touch of the OCD's!! Easily the most talented bloke I know. Check out www.chopsnbobbers.com for more of his work
While I was stuck on the Isle of Wight freezing my ass off driving the dumper round the building site in the freakin rain, Pete was making progress on the Coupe's interior, here's his account...... "Been back working on the coupe the last couple of days and while it doesn't look much, progress is moving along. We left it last time with the body being placed on the chassis to get an idea of how it'll look, so now it's time to start sorting how to mount the body and making new structure for the floors etc. The body is generally good but for the usual places where they rust plus some areas around the rear cross member which were expertly butchered. First was to make some support for the plywood floors around the gearbox tunnel. The wood will sit inside the 'L' and be screwed down with the trans tunnel either screwing down ontop or be sandwitched under, not made up my mind yet. You can see where the gear lever will come out. I needed to make a floor panel to cover the rear cross member and chassis kick-up. Had a hard time trying to picture how it would be but just drew a blank, nothing would come to mind so I just fab'd it as I went. It's not very pretty but it'll do the job for this season and more thought can be given to it as the year passes and it can be re-done next winter when the body gets done. Next was to make a sub rail for behind the seat for seatbelts. The floor here will be just plywood again so I made a small tapered panel which will be braced will some 4mm plate."
Pete gives us another narrative on how he tackles the need to make a little more room for the Flattie.............. "With moving the body forward and closing the gap so a standard hood can be fitted it will be necessary to recess the firewall. I want to do it in a way that won't stand out and look shit, so taking a guide from how Andy did the one on my roadster I started to make a compound curved panel which will have the ends bevelled over which will be welded to the firewall with it's edges bevelled over so it'll hopefully look like the original pressing just bigger. That's it for now,I need to wait for a while before I can cut the firewall. Tomorrow I'll hopefully do the front wishbones if I don't get snowed in again." (Snow, yeah we had enough that the bloody country came to a stand still, how on earth the UK got through two world wars I don't know!?, anyhow we all took time off work and went sledging and making 6 foot high snow penises)<!-- google_ad_section_end -->
Nathan, The rebirth of your "A" Coupe is coming along very nicely. Keep us updates as you make progress. 41 Dave
Cheers Kelvin, I haven't forgotten that I need to come round and see you and Becky at some point. I need to have a look at the Hemi Coupe you're putting together and I to drop some money off for the hood and sides. How's the truck coming on?
haha it's amazing that we can actually find something to keep us amused in the summer months.....oh shit maybe that's why we've got cars
Excited you bet, to be honest excited doesn't even come close. I know there's a way to go yet but I can almost taste it. Pete is doing some sterling work as ever, every piece he does whether for himself, customer, industrial, one off, bike, car whatever, the amount of thought and care that he puts in is amazing. I'm hoping to add some photos of the engine build up when Jim gets a break from his busy schedule. The last I heard the intake ports were getting some serious hammering! I also got really lucky this week and managed to secure a pair of heads as well...new old stock! The picture isn't that clear but they're a pair of Canadian Ford ali heads, girlfriend thinks I'm nuts because they look just like the stock Merc heads I have now. I might as well just sit there with pencils up my nose, pants on my head and say wibble <!-- google_ad_section_end -->
Had an email from Jim during the week giving me an update on the motor. He's been busy with the Dremel and scouring pad making serious headway into porting and relieving of the block. Picture showing the relieved transition area and the porting work on the intake runners (Jim polishes these to a mirror finish and then later finishes them with 80 grit) this photo shows how much material is being removed from the intakes, the pen line indicates the original size of the runners which are now opened up to the same size as the gasket! Top work Jim, at this rate the block is going to be a couple of pounds lighter (more than can be said about me and my ill fated New Years diet )
Well we finally recieved the exhaust flanges from Paul at Wengparts http://www.whengparts.com/ (seems like DHL got lost in the Christmas rush). Laser cut in stainless, with a spare mild steel header flange to send to Jim to enable him to start on the exhaust ports. Don't know if any of you non Brits know but flange is one of our many slang terms for lady bits, the front bottom, hairy clam (guess you got it now, I'm not going to draw you a picture) Pete's put a lot of work into turning these 90 bends and flanges into these mad headers... <!-- google_ad_section_end -->
Nick, you know that Pete likes to get fancy with metal from time to time, I think he ought to make a piece as a prize for the Flathead Meltdown, what do you reckon?
Nick, no 6ft cocks!! Pete, possibly something along the lines of the rear view mirror mount you made...
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