Projects OT: Ratrod reckoning

Jersey dropped safety inspections.... Stupid idea. Best state inspections that I've seen are Missouri and Maryland.

And this thread, IMO, is far from OT, ElPolacko is posting a build, and a kickass build at that.

 

Note to Ryan: Keep this thread open as the fixes are a real education in how to do things right. Yes, rat rods are OT here; but with the reach of the HAMB on the internet, people need to see the correct way to do a car. In my 30+ years of engineering, I've found you can learn a whole lot of the correct way to design and build, by studying the wrong way and mistakes of others. Thanks.

 

Good to see that thing off the road and getting help. That brake line wedged into a hole through the frame is enough to scare a maggot off a gut wagon......

 

+1, except for me replace the 30+ with 15+.

Glad to see you making the much needed fixes this car needs!

 

Please make sure that each and everyone of you goes to the top of the page in the red bar and find the clickable item marked THREAD TOOLS click your mouse and select UNSUBSCRIBEFROM THIS THREAD as this will removeany further updates from your view. If you do happen to see other people commenting on this thread and it continues to be "bumped" for the next few weeks, please refrain from opening it again and for the sake of your own sanity do not respond to this thread again.

I'm going to save this, i think it will be quite handy.

That style/type of car is not for me.
However, The chassis that you are building is full of fascinating stuff and anyone who can't appreciate that just isn't looking. Thanks for posting

Will I like it as a whole car when its finished?
Nobody cares but ill wait till then

 

A great thread, love your style. You have probably saved a life or two with this thread.

 

Couldnt agree more.

 

Quote:
<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%"><TBODY><TR><TD style="BORDER-BOTTOM: 1px inset; BORDER-LEFT: 1px inset; BORDER-TOP: 1px inset; BORDER-RIGHT: 1px inset" class=alt2>Originally Posted by LIFESTYLZ
I remember Ryan saying that if you have to put OT in the title then the thread doesn't belong here.
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Quote:
<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%"><TBODY><TR><TD style="BORDER-BOTTOM: 1px inset; BORDER-LEFT: 1px inset; BORDER-TOP: 1px inset; BORDER-RIGHT: 1px inset" class=alt2>Originally Posted by F&J
We are rebuilding rats now, on hamb?
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
Quote:
<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%"><TBODY><TR><TD style="BORDER-BOTTOM: 1px inset; BORDER-LEFT: 1px inset; BORDER-TOP: 1px inset; BORDER-RIGHT: 1px inset" class=alt2>Originally Posted by Beau
I don't like the new version any better.
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EL P, Thanks for this thread, and exposing the work of so called "builders".

This type of work could be on any type of rod, as there are too many

chuckle-heads with welders, and an unlimited supply of crack. As far as the

naysayers, they just like to bitch, like a 12 y/o girl with a broken iPhone

Thanks again for making a safer, well built, frame, steering, and

suspension.

 

well said

 

I kinda like the connecting rod cantilever idea, althou the execution is questionable, making it just a pile of unappealin parts. And doesnt belong in a hot rod anyway, but i can see a well built mini with such a set up...

 

I fully intend on carrying on, and on, and on....

The previous disclaimer is for those that don't wish to see this thread. And for them, move along, there is nothing for you here.

 

Great thread, even if OT.... taking something that is unsafe at any speed and making it safe again.... even though this subject car is a RR, I've seen way too many hack jobs done to Traditional cars also, bad welds, bad fabrication, bad design, bad what-ever, are not only limited to RR builders....

Keep this one going, and keep up the good work...subscribed
Tom

 

This master builder (ElP) correcting this mess could have done so in secret. Afraid of what 'guys' would say. He is hanging it out there, for all to see. And when it's finished it could autocross compared to the dreck before. And whip some serious doughnut's.

 

minga! I been working on my hotrod for 5 years now and when I see shit like this! why is it takeing so long to build mine? oh ya cause i dont let dick heads do my work! glad he is ok,cause of assholes like this is why they want to take ours cars off the road!

 

The quote is about right. I managed to get thru the first 24 pictures and then couldn't take it anymore.
There is so much wrong about about this, when i saw the first pic i thought well, the builder did a poor job and this is fixable. After 24pictures i now find the owner to be more at fault than the builder. At some point the owner has got to become knowledgeable enough to stop the fool of a builder.
There is lots of problems here on many levels.

 

I whole heatidl agree with ElPolacko for taking on this project. There are a load of these things running around up here that make this one look like a SoCal build. The worst is a '50 pickup with about 1" of road clearance and a Massey Ferguson front end. It looks like it was welded together with bird shit. There is another shop whose' specialty is "clipping" front ends with a Sears stick welder and loads of Bondo to cover up the shitty fabrication. We need to help the RRers see the eror of their ways. Sadly they think we're the jerkoffs who waste good money on stuff other than tattoos.

Keep up the good work. I'll be following this one.

 

Back on track from where I left off last night. I reviewed what lay before me with the intent on just trying to fix what was here to make the Scud-Hud safe and reliable but was stymied at every turn. I could not find a frame or fitment satisfactory. My options were dwindling and knew I was just wasting time and energy. I decided that everything forward of the cowl was a lost cause. Nothing save for the brakes, spindles, HEIM joints and air springs themselves were about the only items worth salvation.

I went through quite a process to create a whole new front section of frame. I was unsastisfied with the look and condition of the 1941 Ford front I-beam axle and decided to trade Mr Funk one of my standard Model A axles. I also wanted to improve the pedigree of the old rat to a more upright citizen of the motoring kind. This meant standing the radiator and shell proper upright and rearranging a few items bringing the car into fine shape rather than the slough it was mimicking.

Firing up my digital computing machine and manipulating my figments the new front end started to grow on my screen. New formed frame rails with giant speed holes to help shrink the overall visual size of this car, it is rather large. I also placed a facsimile of the Model A axle and placed new connecting links and "batwings" to hold all the various bits in place as "traditionally" as possible given the circumstances.







Rumaging through my pile of cast offs I found a set of Delco Lovejoy shocks from the rear of a 1938 Cadillac that were in fine sporting condition and though they would be a very nice addition to the front of the Scud-Hud. As the car had no shocks front or back and the nature of the "suicide" mounted front mounted axle tends to not be friendly to airplane shocks. The long lever shocks could be mounted on the flanks of the frame rails with their spindly arms reaching forward to the axle.

My intent was to clean the lines of the new front frame section and draw your eyes away from the tidbits that were visually unappealing. The placement of the Cadillac engine afforded me just a bit of space behind the engine mounts to create a location for mounting the somewhat repulsive air springs. To connect the axle to the air springs I created a shaft and lever system mounted on bearings. This gave the appearance of torsion bars, a much more accepted look to the discerning Trad-Rodder.

Just installing simple levers did not satisfy my visual intent and did not articulate the air spring properly. I tipped the air springs outboard by 30º and created an unequal length and nonparallel linkage system that pushes the top of the air spring reasonably close to the the 30º line the air springs are mounted on and this also gave me the opportunity to use longer bellcranks for the leverage ratio I wanted. As an added bonus, I could install a polyurethane bumpstop under the upper control link and make it adjustable if needed to prevent the newly built vehicle from actually touching the pavement.

The clevises used in the four link bars are common rod ends available from my favorite hardware dispensary, McMaster-Carr. The ends are attached to the fabricated "batwings" using large shoulder bolts and PEEK plastic bushings That allow rotation in one plane. Using a HEIM on this end would not work properly as the weight of the car is going to be hanging from the batwing and a few inches aft of the axle. There will be forces to pull the batwings inboard, this arrangement of connection will hamper this action.

 

I was standing in the parking lot at IC when this rolled in. A quick look and I had to walk away!

Major save by Steve.

 

GM pioneered air suspension in 1953 on the GMC buses.
When I was a little kid my family had a couple of buses and the first air rides they bought were in 1956. They were not dependable back then and were the double bubble type. But the upper and lower mountings were attached with rings with about 24 5/16 bolts with crazy keyed heads to fit the retaining rings. These looked a lot like what bead lock wheels look like today. Being an 8 year old got me the job of sitting between the axle and air beams and removing and replacing those rusted bolts and bellows. I have hated air ride ever since then. In 1960 they went to rolling lobe bellows and two upper studs and two lower studs. That wasn't so bad and by then the technology and materials of the bellows was a lot better. Later still the double bubble bellows could be replaced with bellows assemblies that were 4 stud mounted. Not bad.

The GM heavy duty air ride system turned out to be a very good system. Eventually well engineered and easy to maintain. Buses and trucks use this stuff today.

Car air ride that is backyard engineered always looked like afterthought cobbled together shit to me.

ElP has taken car air ride to a level I have never seen done on cars. Totally intergrated into the suspension. Designed for the air bags right from the start. Not as an aftertought.

Thanks for posting this job.
Frank

 

Might be an OT car, but they work that's being done to make it right is very applicable to what we want to see! I'd be very grateful if I lived in the Phoenix area and knew this was no longer a danger to me!
Extremely nice work ElP!

 

As a longtime admirer of your considerable fabrication skills I am amazed at your intestinal fortitude to take on a project like this. I believe that in doing so you have saved civilization as we know it. Therefore, I am nominating you for the NOBEL PEACE PRIZE and I have no doubt you will win it hands down!

 

WOW!!!!! Just looked at all the pic's and that front end is amazing.That's gonna be one nice ride when your done.Thanks for saving its life....

 

I couldn't believe the owner would have you fix the front half of the frame and leave that barf of a back half. So glad I peeked at the link to more pics. Major save you are performing there.

Is the "builder" of this car the same guy who did the Chrysler sedan that you fixed?

 

So, the new rules are.........you can post anything you want, no matter how off topic, as long as you post a disclaimer?

I'm seriously shocked. Never thought I'd see the day.

 

when you do as much for the board as ElP you can talk.....

 

have you read any of this thread?

 

x10

 

While I was designing the save for the front half of Mr Funk's Scud-Hud, he had a conversation with Dr Marvelus about repairing the less than satisfactory body panels and possibly taking care of a few more items on the car. I was waiting for materials and supplies to show up so in order to keep things moving along, the good Dr Marvelus sheared up some sheet steel and went banging away.





As the materials showed up, I processed the solid model drawings I had made into a language understood by my plasma machine. Cut the parts and started to assemble the individual components to make up the front clip.







I spend some time machining tubes to accept the bearings of the lift shafts and securely welding them into my motor mount/air spring structure and radiator core support.



And Dr Marvelus attacked the rear with a new apron to cover the Scud-Hud's neither regions.

 

Oh My

It really should be possible to bring folks who "Fabricate" stuff like this up on "Criminal Negligence" charges BEFORE someone gets killed! I know I could certainly win the case for "C N" after the tragic accident that kills someone!

 

Trust me, 'Polacko is abou the only person that could have done much of anything with this car... I wouldn't have done it!

OH, you don't know the half of it! I know steve is classy enough NOT to post the glamor picture of the original builders "crew" (used in the finest of inner-city slang) and the car. Let's just say you nailed the genre...

See my post above. He is about the only bulider I am aware of that could have helped find the diamond in this goat's ass... And after talking with the owner for a bit, he's a great guy that just wants a hot rod and flat got took. I'm thinkin' 'Polacko's deeply hidden paternal side kicked in just a bit...

Nor here in Arizona! I find that state inspections are more of an East Coast kinda deal. The problem here though is that since nothing really rusts and comes apart, things wear to the extreme as the car is driven sometime hundered of thousands more miles than it's engineers ever thought it would be.

Trust me, Steve has showed you just the tip of the iceberg on this deal so far. It gets far, far worse. I for one, as someone who spends allot of time on Arizona's roads am WAYYYY happy this thing is not headed down a street pointed at me!