Derek's 1950 ford coupe shoebox build and introduction

Derek, f@(k those idiots that dis your ride man, they prob think that there vl commo with no springs is way tuffer...
cheers darren

 

i dont wanna talk about your box Dezza! .....just let me sit here for a while pls

 

how deep are the air ride notch plates Des?

 

About 6" more then enough to have the spinner sitting on the rails.

 

ha ha ha ha ha gold, yeah lets all just sit and look for a little while, man she was a big tall ass girl, i dont consider myself that short but she fucking towered over me, good times but
des

 

they are plenty big enough and really nice actually, me and morgs finished it pretty much last night aroun 12 and sat the fidd back under with the tyres on and lowered the body back down and the tyres hit the wheel tubs before the axle will hit the notch rails, probably 4 inches left to go and only 3 or less from the rail to the ground. ill put up some pics shortly

 

I dont understand why anyone can say something bad about your shoebox,thats a sweet ride.
But i guess opinions are like assholes,everyone got one...

 

ha ha ha i didnt mind though i find it funny, they werent hotrodders/custom car guys so they had no idea, it about time i got a negetive comment or two and were were making heaps of noise in it slightly drunk at a swap meet on the fri night so they are a different breed those guys ha ha

 

i dont think they liked me side stepping the clutch in it either haha

 

well what a damn productive weekend so far and i still have today, first off im gunna do this notch step by step how we did it, not saying its right better or anything like that, just wanna do it how we did it so people who havent done one can see step by step how to do it and hopefully end up with a nice neat looking job and strong as fuck with a hopefully engineerable outcome for those playing at home (australia).
all thanks to my good buddy from bright morgs who is currently doin the same to his 49 chevy and has a nice build thread on here, u can see how much skill the dude has, anyway i started thurs night by cuttin out my boot floor, and spare wheel well, leaving as much as possible in there that i didnt need to cut out at first and trim everything later so u have stuff to work off when remaking ur new floor. i am amateur at all this so bare with me i gain knowledge as i go and am keen as to ask what i dont know, so anyway cut that out and trimmed a bit just to save some time on the weekend, fri i went and got 5mm plate steel and inch box tube for bracing and stuff pluss cut off wheels and beer.............

 

next the original rails are open in the rear in a c section type deal so we had to box in the rails to strengthen and give the notch something to weld to at the back part for extra strength and looks alot nicer and stronger looking.

the way we did it is i had 5mm x 100 plate steel strap, i measured the length of the section of rail that we wanted to box and the cut to peices to that length, then held one up against the rail, scribed a line on the inside to get the shape of the rail to cut, then cut on the inside of that line to allow for the 3mm of the original rail, test fitted that and made some adjustments in the way og grinding down the plate and moving the rail with a hammer cause there not exactly sqaure when rolled, once it fit nicely we used that tp make the second one and had 2 ready to go, we cleaned up around 10mm on the rails were the welds were gunna go, we then sat the plate in with a nice amount of haf of the plate sticking out so we could weld in the gap of the 2 edges instead of just along one edge, it makes for a better weld and good penetration in the seam. a bit of a clean up and sand and they looked good. me and morgs shared the work doin one side each and cleaning one side each...........

 

next

we roughly clamped in spot side of the notch plates, marked and cut out the side of the wheel tub to allow for welding and fitment of the notch.

the stock rails go skinnier at the end of the car so we wanted them the sane thickness well closer to for when putting the notch in so its not to fat to skinny so we made a cute down the top of the rail at the back to pull out the boxed plate and rail to allow for a nicer fit of the notch and will weld it back up later,

 

next

once the notch plates were clamped in the spot we wanted them measured up and had out centre line mark for the axle we scribed the inside of the notch plate as they are a universal item from air ride in melbourne, we scribed them got all four bolted them together on the bench using the holes they came drilled with for plug welding later, we had our marked one on the outside and i cut of the meat and grinded and sanded them till they were all down to our line mark and cleaned up nice at one end which gave a nice look and fitment on the rails.

 

next

sat morning we made a carboard (empty slab box from fri nights work) template of the top and bottom plates we needed to cut and shape for the notch. 5mm plates was used and the notch plates are 3mm, we did one each cause cuttng through 5 mm plate with a grinder is time consuming and wprks out the hand muscles ha ha ha
we did the top ones at home then headed off to the metal shop to get some more 5mm plate then up to waddingtons to drag ahron out of bed to come in the workshop with us and get some shape into these plates,
once we realised we could use the plasma cutter for the bottom plates to cut them out that was alot nicer,
once all four were cut and right, i marked 10mm lines the whole way down each side of each plate with a texter so when using the folder and checking them on the notch plate we had with us you could pick which line to fold on.time cinsuming but made for a nice shape.
ahron and morgs killed it in folding them up and we aslo used a sheet metal bender to roll some parts, the two bottom ones were donr mostly in the bender, and all came out really close and nice to what we wanted, after some chips and coke me and morgs headed out to my house to get these suckers welded in...........

 

once back home, we ckleaned up and sanded the rail pretty nicely to make for really good clean welds later, then set up one side of the notch and clamped it in, the used straight edges and a angle indicator to make sure they were even and level were they sat on the rails......

after this we tacked them both in place, we removed the clamps and used rhs box tube to brace between the back of the rails and up to the front leaf spring mount, bassicaly were the leaf used to sit, this is somethong handy i leanrt cause of the amount of heat youll be pumping into those rails when welding them up u wantto stop the chassis from moving when being heated and cooling other wise every chance your boot lib may never close again properly. really good to know and makes alot of sence so just like anything else when u tak the strength out of anything like the roof u have to brace it to stop it moving and loose you factory spec and stuff.
anywaym once tacked and ready morgs fully welded up the cut in the rear part pf the chassis we did to move it out top and bottom then fully welded the inside of the plates to the rail, the full outside section and all the pulg welds on both plates,
i am more than happy to tack and d some welding as i love it and using a mig is fairly easy but seeing as morgs is alot more experienced than me i decided to let him go nuts with the important things like structural welding ion ur chassis rails and he does an awesome job i must say.

 

after they were fully welded, it was time to set up the top plates and tack them in with a nice edge to weld to which was the side plate and the top one with the top plate sitting ontop but with the edge of the notch plate sitting out half its thickness if that makes sence to weld in that groove and give u awesome penetration and a stronger join.

anyway, we got the set in place using a hammer and clamps to get them nice and take up any little gaps to they sat flush.

next we welded and x brace from each corner of the other brace we had already put in to stop the rails trying to pul in and thingd like that as they cooled, made it extremely hard to get in and around and weld but we got there with flying colours and were really happy with all the welds we got and how nice we think the notch turned out.........

these will be cleaned up grinded and sanded a little for a nice appearance but not to much as to take out all the weld, but they worked really well and look great.

 

morgs fully welded one side then i welded u a few little things on that side and felt confident so i welded the other side and was pretty happy with it its alot easier to weld thick shit with the mig goin flat out and u can control it better so iwas fine, turned out pretty nice i got morgs to finish a bit on the inside of the wheel arch but over all they came up great. a bit of a grind and sand and some chassis black and they should look a million bucks>>>

after that the more fun times started and we cut out the center section of the original rail and was gettin to late to start the bottom plate so we decided to just slip the diff in and put the tyres on and put the sucker back on the ground, we had some discusions earlier about the tyres hittin the wheel arch befoe the diff hitting the notch or rail on the ground, unfortunately im goin to have to put wheel tubs in it cause the tyres are a tall ass firetone they hit ad there is still 4 inches roughly of travelfrom the axle to the diff so no point coming this far and not having it lay frame,

so tomorrow the wheel tubs are coming out to let it sit right down, still low as fuck just may aswell do the extra work to get it right down,

thanks again morgs for all ur awesome work and helo and teaching me a thing or two, really did a killer job and couldnt have done it with out him and ahron again for everything u help out with and using the workshop. good to have talented good buddies who love this shit as much as i do maybe more, i owe u guys again.

 

yeehaw!! thats slick.

 

thanks brother

 

Looking good Des and a great tech as well; being tech week you should do a quick cut and paste on a separate thread, you never know you could win and flog the prize in the classifieds for some shoe money haha.

Andy.

 

ha ha ha excellent idea, never dpne that before can i just cut and paste the whole lot pics and all

 

Derek, the spinner is now scrappin low buddy. Looks fantastic..

 

ha ha ah should be soon, a little lower yet, will post pics once its got the bracing and wheel arches cut out.

 

just some pics i took while i had a little break while morgs welded, it deffinately makes it look like i do nothing cause im always on the camera but i swear i do, i swear, i swear fellas ha ha ha

 

a couple more

 

Derek, rear fender cut is great. That pic is insane, looks like lava erupting through the metal..

 

ha ha ha thanks mate but thats actually the mig when welding from the inside notch just had the shutter open for a little while and got all the sparks falling i really liked that one too,

 

i was glad to be of assistance Des, any time.

You have to send me a pic as soon as the tubs are out and its all the way on the deck.

 

absolutely ahron i coming over tomorrow cause he has his heart set on me goin to addingtons and making a set for it do im down with that, hes gunna come round and have a look tomorrow ill cut em out and drop that ducker onto the ground

 

Hell yeah bitch!