Poboyross's Model A Build: "Faux'dster"

When I originally got the rear end off of RPMRex, it already had perches hanging off the back with a 40s Ford front spring of some type. We were originally going with that setup, until Johnny brought up the aesthetics of it. He suggested moving the perches out and putting a stock A spring hanging off the back using the same perches, just moved towards the drums to accommodate. He had a point, I do like seeing the pumpkin....so I went with it. Glad I did.

 

You're off to a great start!
Keep us posted!

 

I built a suspension similar to this for my A Tudor having an offset long upper bar. My car is on coil over shocks. I didn't like how my car reacted to bumps in the road. It could be a place that was an obvious hump or dip, or something as simple as a pooched expansion joint. My car felt like it wanted to bicycle to the left every damn time and was spooky at times. I also think it had some rear steer like some guys try to put into dirt cars.
I have since changed to a ladder setup based on the same lower bar length and also built a longer panhard bar--- 32" and change. The driving characteristics are so much better! I also believe my rear suspension contributed to the jack*** mode in the front of my car, could be wrong, but my drive to Joplin and back has proven to me I should be correct.
I know there's a strong possibility of a lot different kind of reaction with using a rear leaf spring vs. coil overs. Just my experience with what I designed, built, removed. I hope the best for you because I didn't like having failure/bad driving with my design. I'm sure there's someone here that can tell me why mine didn't work correctly.
Use marmonherrington for a search word and you'll see and read some of my design problems. I own them and am proud to have learned from them.

 

BUILD UPDATE:

So after Johnny got finished up with his (m***ive) part in this, he was kind enough to deliver the car TO MY HOUSE!!! He does excellent work...at the ripe age of 23!

I've mocked it up with the windshield that I'd like to use, from a 35 Packard. I realize that it doesn't fit the contour exactly, but I'm hoping to help it out a bit with the frame/stanchions I'm going to end up having to custom build. If nothing else, and I have to build another one from scratch, it'll keep this basic shape, I dig it. The headlights will be removed from the crossmember, of course, and mount off of the F1 shock mounts. They're 28 or 29 Chevy headlights. Anyway...here are some pics!





Sorry for the off center side shot...I had to hold the camera against my house and hope for the best:

 

looks good to me. good work guys!

 

Looks great, but those head lights are a bit to low..eh?

 

It looks great so far my friend. I'll follow the build... Who knows maybe I'll buy this one too. Course it'll come with a divorce but I mean the car looks great!

 

That's because my *** is dragging that low at the moment

]

HA!!! Thanks Man, what we put into these things DOES test the bonds of marriage, dudn't it? I saw you driving the "Fitty" home from work the other day...I was in the black Tundra honking and waving like a school girl at a Jonas Bros. concert.....my wife was in her truck right behind me and thought I had gone insane! LOL

I need to do a Photoslopping of this thing sometime soon. Anyone who has the time and skillz is WELCOME to help me out

 

VRF, I did the same in my garage with coilovers off. The road will surprise you if you did something like I did. My suspension could work good on a rock crawler too, but not fun on common road irregularities at speeds above 55 mph or sometimes slower.
I can't tell y'all why mine didn't work correctly. I can tell you it didn't. I honestly felt rear steer by the the seat of my pants while making a sweeping left turn at 30 mph or so while in traffic on a divided city four lane.
My stuff is all on me. I learned from it.

 

Am I missing something? Those rear bones were originally setup with a torque tube from Henry's shop....now this guy's gonna run a driveshaft with ujoints?!?!

A friend of mine put a 302 w/automatic/driveshaft/ujoints in his 48 sedan...didn't modify the rear arms and recently bent an arm up like it was made of copper. Then he fixed it by heating the arm with a torch and pulling it back down with a chainfall in his pit. Pancaked the rear tires to straighten it...even when it was hot.

The guy needs something to take the torque...no questions...

As for the design strength and the binding...yeah...it's not right. But the car needs a properly designed torque arm or something to take the torque.

 

1) If you're going to comment on someone's thread, it's better to talk to them directly, not as if they're some mentally deficient mook standing in the corner. "This guy" is not great etiquette.

2) The bones themselves aren't the weak link, they're almost solid now that they have a 1" rod running their length, the question mark will be the cast ends, always will be. They'll snap *long* before the rods bend. The torque arm is no smaller than the ones that are sold commercially, and structured the same. Will it withstand that POWERmill of a 305? Maybe, maybe not.

Forgive me if I'm reading your post the wrong way, but it just seemed kind of...well, like you're implicating someone is stupid over misinformed.

 

Update on the rear suspension, realized I never popped off any pics. The torque arm tab was moved parallel to the bones.





Gawd I wish it would stop raining....at least 3 more days to go XP

 

Hey you mentally deficient mook, you're making a **** ton of progress!!! Nice dude!!!

 

Dude...I can't take credit. It was all JohnnyBBad's great work....all I did was chew the fat with him from time to time about options and try to get mah learnin' on.

The true test of whether I'm any good will come once I get settled in CA at the end of next month, pick up a MIG, and get to work.

If you're interested, the debate rages on another thread as to correct *** geometry and my car...or at least it used to be about my car:

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?p=6931324&posted=1#post6931324

 

Ross, you will have a couple thousand miles on the car and folks will still be arguing about your bones online, with a pile of parts and ideas in their garages but no hotrod on the road.

 

The rear suspension looks good from this angle. I'd go with it...

 

Yeah sorry to bark...but I took offense to the original comment from OJ, where he said that your torque arm would serve no purpose and that you should hang it on the wall, and that the original bones on their own should be strong enough....obviously that statement is....well whatever you want to call it....misinformed is the polite description.

My comment was aimed at OJ, and I'm sorry I didn't reference your name, didn't mean any disrespect. Just jumping in hot!

Regardless of my tone, my point still remains the same. With an open drive setup and that style of rear wishbone...you need something to take the torque....and obviously you agree...because you're running something to do just that! haha

Adding the torque arm, in conjunction with the bones, actually transforms that twisting torque force that the rearend exerts on the bones into a push/pull type transfer of energy that runs the length of the three rods (bone+bone+torque arm)....accomplishing basically the same thing as a ladder bar setup would. And without it, you end up doing what my friend did with a 302 in his 48...bending the bones. I know everybody thinks the weak link is in the cast ends that attach to the rear, but obviously in his situation, they held up fine and the tube didn't.

I'm just trying to clarify here for everybody else, because you already know, that those bones will never be strong enough on their own with an open drive car...period!! Running the rod through the middle of the bones like you did is something I would do just because I'm an overkiller by nature...but that didn't have to be done at all. You don't have to worry about the cast ends, or the tubes now.... with a properly designed setup using a torque arm, there's not much, if any, shearing/twisting force on any of the three locators.

The binding issues that OJ and others have talked about....you obviously are doing your homework on that...made some changes and feel comfortable how you have it set up now.

And as for the strength issues, like I said... I'm an overkiller....so I would probably design that torque arm with two SOLID attachment points at the rear....like Danny (hotrodpro) posted on your other thread.

Again, sorry for the tone, and hopefully this clarifies my motivations and my points.

-Steve

 

No big whoop, Steve. It's the bane of interweb text communications....you often don't know where someone is coming from

I can keep on giving more descriptions of the .250 wall tube used for everything, inside the bones, too....but I think TMan has said it.....going to run with it, see how it works, improve as necessary. Over engineering is good when you've got the time and money, but is often not necessary in a real world condition taking all things into account.

That's not to say that on my next build I won't engineer it into oblivion, as I plan on putting a MUCH beefier engine in it....I'm thinking a Hemi?

This little 305 will likely be swapped for the 50 Flathead I've got in storage once I get around to rebuilding it. Not going to hop it up, just restore....that'll be even LESS torque on the setup.

I think a good thing to live by in most situations is "Application appropriate".

 

"Application appropriate" is definitely true, and I agree that you can always fix stuff if it doesn't work. I made ladder bars using 36 rear bones...tied them together by using a piece of 1 inch tube as the top bar and connected them with gussets. Kind of like the Rolling Bones setup on the other thread.

I'm using a eurothane bushing at the front mount...connected to a So-Cal dropped tube crossmember/trans mount section. The mounts are inboard towards the centre of the car...like your bottom bones are.

But some guys would argue that you can't use ladder bars on the street?!?!?

It just burns me when guys argue the ridiculously minute science/geometry points to try and shoot holes in %100 tried and true street applied setups. Not to mention that alot of opinions or points expressed are book read and regurgitated...not truly understood or ever even applied and tested by the guys commenting.

Any rodder worth their salt will know how, or learn how, to create a setup that can take torque and will not bind or break stuff under hard driving/braking.

Nobody is worried about how the thing can articulate if you take it rock crawling!!!! haha.

Some of the arguments are ridiculous, vague, misleading, or just plain wrong.

But at the end of the day here, you're on the right track and that's really all that matters.

-Steve

 

http://s274.photobucket.com/albums/jj268/patrickmoran1966/2011%20HAMB%20Hotel%20and%20Drags%20pics/?start=0
Again the need to talk directly and to have a hotrod on the road for a few thousand miles to know how your car reacts to what you had built.
PM with same info will be sent because of the rockcrawler comment. I AM NOT STARTING A FIRE HERE OR with DZ. My ride to the HAMB Drags was very fun with having the need to read the road by colors, because the so many vehicles leave the same mark just after a road irregularity.
Poboyross, keep making progress and keep the construction looking good as you are doing!
Dubbzilla and I know how to play together so everything is good. No fire.

 

Car looks good did you box in the original rear crossmember? I've seen way to many cracked to trust hanging a spring off the back of one without reinforcement not saying you have to just a thought.. I like the stance off your car alot im building a coupster also.

 

Yep, rear crossmember boxed, with openings for changing out the shock studs.

Got any pics of your coupester?

BTW, ya'll, I'm going to have to continue to keep this a low-budget build. I need to prime/paint the frame and running gear after using some OSPHO on them, but I don't want to be spendy and use the 2k primers and urethane paints. What are your thoughts on the off-t******lf stuff like cans of Rustoleum, Rust Bullet, etc?

 

SO....*tiny* update. I finally got moved into our place here in Burbank about 3 weeks ago. Unfortunately I haven't had time to touch the car until now. HOWEVER, I did have a kick *** cross country road trip with my dad towing the thing out here...ALL the way from North Jersey to SoCal. It was a great time.

Since I'm poor now from the move out (a big thanks to the big banks for f**king my house value and forcing me into what appears to be a short sale at best, foreclosure at worst), and even poorer from the move in, I'm just doing things that I already had materials beforehand. I'm going to take it apart, hit it with Ospho, then see if I can s**** together the change to prime and paint the ch***is and get it all put back together sans the body, which is a whole other can of worms. Note the new primo cowl at the front of the horns covered in black plastic....I'll be selling my other one if anyone is interested (the one right outside the garage)....it's a basket case, but probably good for something.

 

Hope you like Cali, bro.
Took me 39 years to realize it's not the state I was born in anymore...

You made the right move fixing the top link, BTW.

Looks like an awesome little build so far. Keep diggin....

 

Well, the first time I lived here about 10 years ago, I swore I'd never return. THEN I lived in North Jersey. You find out (in spite of a small group of good friends) that the rabbit hole can go MUCH deeper. The wife's family is out here, my field is centered out here, and as hard as it is to believe, the gun laws are easier! We are only here for about 5 years, then back to the homeland in TN. But even there, it's not what it was even 20 years ago. It's all about getting to the place degrading the least, unfortunately.

All that "sad *******ness" aside, I'm loving being back here! LOL!

 

Little update...

Once my dad and I made the long road trip across the entire country with my car in tow last November, we unloaded it into the garage at the new joint and there it sat for a month or so.

I then began braking down the whole car into its components so I could finalize them individually at some point. Around December I met Lucky of Lucky's Garage. He's an excellent guy and his space just rocks. I'm going to get him to work on some of the more problematic issues with getting the body straight.

The car pretty much sat dis***embled for a month or so until this week, when I finally got the frame sandblasted and hit it with acid etch primer tonight. I'm goin to be using Eastwood inner frame primer/converter before finally hitting it with rustoleum black epoxy. You can see the 305 that's going in the car temporarily while I rebuild that 50 flathead you see against the wall. That'll take some time though. My goal is a mostly finished ch***is by summer. We shall see.

 

Glad to see you're back at it... Keep up the good work...

 

Got outside this morning and hit the spindles with some Rustoleum appliance epoxy. I heard some decent things about it on here, figured I'd give it a try.

 

Nice!