haha no worries sakke being so chopped its does look different thats for sure, thanks il do some updates again soon, gotta download the most recent photos of my phone, Thanks Charlie
next i started looking at and going through the brake system as i was planning on getting it on the road soon at this point even though my plan changed as i needed to take the body off the frame to fill some holes in the firewall, so thought as its apart i might as well paint it properly too as it would save me so much time stripping it all down again for paint months later, but those photos will come later heres the front wheel cylinders rebuilt and painted up ready to go with stainless hardware, then i went through the mustang 8" rear end brake and replaced it all throughout another job on the list was to look at and change the inner part of the drivers door and to make the latch i had fit, as the inner door skin was different only a little compared to the other side, it had a bolt in latch where it just pushed up against the outside of the skin, and not put in from the end/inside of the door if that makes sence other wise the door was the same as the passenger side so im not sure what the door was from or if it was a later one or just a different inner door skin, but started but cutting out the piece of inner door skin that i needed from a spare rough door i made the quarter windows from, and then cut the same amount out of the good door im using If any one knows which model/year this particular door inner would have been used in it would be great to find out as iv not yet been able to figure it out another overall photo though it will look totally different once its properly painted next i started looking at my dash, now I had a pretty straight and very solid dash but sadly i had to cut it up, i thought for months on and off how i could do it and make it a dailey driver by leaving the original two hole center, but i really like to have and wanted to use the usual 5 gauges larger speedo, and 4 smaller, oil, water, gas and temp gauges so thats what i decided to go for, i started by cutting out the two hole center nice and neatly so i could save it for something in the future if needed, then filled in the square hole, and ground it nice and smooth, then I looked at laying out and hole sawing the 5 holes evenly into the dash, I also had to move over the notch for where the steering comes through as i had to move my column over a smidge from the stock model T position for comfort and making it straight with how my seats are set up for some reason i forgot to take a photo of ot finished and dressed off nicely, but you get the Idea next i had to fill some larger holes in the firewall and the easiest way to do it seemed to be to take the body off the frame, as the easiest way to get in there and make the pieces and weld them in was with out the motor in the way as also the cowl are is just so small its a pain getting under there with a welding helmet on so here i started taking her apart, headlights and grill shell off kind of like its look like this and maybe just leaving the headlights on, as the rad is in the trunk i could rock around like this without the grill every now and then for fun to get some strange looks of "how the heck does that not over heat with no radiator
I also started looking at making some inner wheel arches though im not sure if im going to run them so i only made one so far and will add them later if I need them, I wanted it somewhat like the model A ones with the beadrolled piece in the center though my axle comes way up into the top of where the center vertical line would be so did my own version of it which i think turned out quite nice, not really going to see much of it anyway being behind the wheel lol the next task was doing the door bottoms as they had the usual rust plus the drivers side having the most discusting patch i think iv ever seen the whole way along the width of the door, here i started replacing the inner skin lower bends there the outer skin is wrapped around the bottom lip, this one was so holey it had pretty much fallen off once id got the lower outer skin cut off, heres the old and the new patched, made the new one, one lunchtime, and cut out the one while i was at it il have to try and find the finished photos as i cant find them again annoyingly, next i started looking at the rear body mounts, I happened to have some original model A chassis brackets and chassis to running board brackets which came with my model A frame rails, for just behind the seats i used the bigger ones, which were welded on the outside of the frame not too dissimilar to where they should be anyway and then bolted to the body straight up through the new subframe i had already made this should make a strong body mount in my opinion and like the way i used some more original parts, for the rear body mounts in the trunk I used the very small ones that were welded on the inside of the rear crossmember, and I then made a piece above on the body side of the mounts welded to a crossmember I welded to the body, side to side, under the trunk which helps hold up the very rear of the body, it was originally used to help put the body together when it was in pieces but decided to keep it there as an extra mount as it doesnt hurt to have another in the rear sorry for bad pics iv only had access to my phone for photos for a while thats it for now maybe some more updates tomorow, Charlie
Thought id do a quick update as its been a while, iv been haulin away with the coupe and she's all painted back together and running and driving now and hopefully a week or two away from the road now so thats my excuse for being so slow with any updates, im going to continue with the project thread with where i left off rather than skip straight to the finished car, here i started to make up the floors pans, had to make a few holes to clear the booster and M/C which i raised as high as i could get away with to make everything level with the bottom of the frame rails to make as good a scrubline as i could, especially as its going to be on air once through its inspection, gotta have an inspection before getting my title back as the registration for this car was lost long before ICBC (British Columbias insurance company) but is still possible to get it back as I have the original frame rail/ engine number the car was issued with so its easy here you can see the M/C cover I hammered out one night it was abit of a combo making it, moving to and from the hammer and sandbag and a planishing hammer to smooth it out, now the floor was done I took the body back off the frame ready for body work, now this was where my boss was good and didnt make me keep the body outside as it was still end of winter here at this point and keeping a body outside when applying bondo and priming everyone knows is a big no no and he let me keep it inside throughout the whole body and pain process, was nice looking at it all day during work though while doing all the necessary sheet metal repair as it was outside in winter I kept spray bombing it to stop the rust on the new sheet metal as the rest of the body had already been sandblasted and I didnt want to have to sand blast it again, so i had to use laquer thinner and scotch brite pads to remove the tremclad i had coated it in, was a bit of a tedious task but in my book well worth saving at least 400 or 500 bucks to have it all blasted again, here the body is in the booth after first little bit of bondo was done ready for first coat of primer any bare metal parts were spot primed with sealer you can also see in the photo I had already filled in the visor frame and drilled and dimple died it, think I went with 9 holes seemed to look good and fill the visor nicely with the size hole I went with which i cant remember right now, thats it for tonight maybe another update tomorow or over the weekend Charlie
Awesome build. I really like it. I've a hate/love relations with tall coupes. The look too tall, just standing there. When someone sits in them, it aint that bad. I would love to see a "de-sectioned" Tall T-coupe. Something throws me off about the look, when the engine is bigger/taller then the cowl. But nice work, nice vision and ad it boy.
thanks guys, glad your enjoying the build so far, I actually took the coupe to its first show on the weekend and everyone seemed to love it there too which was nice, nice to see people appreciating it after all the last years hard work Charlie
few more photos while it was in the booth, this is it i think after its few coats of slick sand, nice product to use and really helps fill any little low and sands very nicely, here I was starting to sand it down again we like to leave slick sand to chill out and cure as long as we can at our shop usually 3 or 4 days while were getting on with another project so I did the same with my car, I was grit refining as I went sanding down, think this photo was of it in 180grit also a photo of the 27 T roadster body I had and started out this project with, but just recently sold it as I have my other T thats almost finished in England that il get shipped out here at some point as I like it much more than the 27 body style guide coating it as i go here it is in its finished colour, just wet sanding to go, its gloss cream its a ford colour, "white chocolate" im very happy with the colour before stripping the chassis for sandblasting, I test fitted the body back on the chassis, just to double check a few things as unbolted down to the chassis the doors didnt close and had the typical old ford door syndrome but all bolted back down it was fine as i suspected while it was back on the frame I also used the oppotunity to wet sand the body
here I stripped the chassis back down, and when apart finished up and tidied up a few welds here and there and also cut/thinned the Z in the front of the chassis down, to make it thinner as I was always unhappy with how it looked, dropped everything off at the blasters and got an awesomely cheap deal now while everything was at the blasters the only last bit to work on was getting the motor all cleaned up and ready for paint, now the body was done and the rest of it was away being blasted this was the perfect time all the ancilliaries were stripped off and wire wheeled it to remove any loose paint and rust and smoothed out a few bits on the block here and and there, then it was sealed 3 coats of course metalic silver base coat, 3 or 4 RootBeer Kandy, then 2 coats of clear, time will tell it this will hold up on the engine but I have heard of people doing 3 stage paint/Kandy on engines before it looks nice right now anyway, hopefully il find a pic of it done later Chassis hung in the booth for the gloss cream paint to match the body, windshield frame painted with new laminated glass installed with fresh rubber seals excuse the bad photo but everything else hung and also the motor in the booth with the fresh rootbeer kandy paint on it, rear rims with my nice Firestone deluxe champion whitewalls, rears are 820x15 fronts are 560x15 same as rears, all starting to go together, brake lines in rear axle on, rims tyres etc, front rims were waiting for the new wide whites to arrive, I was covering the motor up with a tarp at night, here you can see the Z thinned down, body back on with the Visor, its starting to shape up radiator positioned I still need to make a top clamp to stop it rattling/bouncing around,
I next made up some tail light and tail light/licence plate, stands/brackets, started out with some straight small diameter pipe, and curved them into an "S" shape and matched the pair as I went to make them as symetrical as possible, I had picked up from a swap meet an old cheap licence plate bracket not sure what its from but modified it and used it on my bracket, windshield also went in, next up was wiring, I ended up using an E-Z wiring harness which was an easy installation, on my other T in England I used a Rebel Kit which was also good, theyre both very similar in my opinion, though the rebel kit is a bit cheaper I think, we have headlights my tri 94 carbs now on headers also back on and I ended up making my lakepipe turnouts using a 3.5" short 90 degree bend cut in half, they cost me next to nothing to make rather than costing I think usually around 99 bucks on speedway motors, I tigged them from the inside to make a neat joint from the outside for my gas lines for now iv used 3/8" copper line and brass fittings for even more of a vintage feel, as you cant get a tri carb intake for the buick 350 I ended up having to get this Vintage speed intake that bolts straight on to 4bbl manifold, I managed to find a 4bbl manifold and got that on to find that the original quadrajet carbs I think they were that came on 350 buicks have a different bolt pattern than my Vintage speed intake, so I had to make a simple adaptor, then my Vintage intake bolted straight onto this not my ideal way of doing this set up at all but it got the job done and has the look I want! I know it wont perform like a true 3x2 intake manifold but it shouldnt be any worse than bolting a 4 barrel onto it which are meant to wake these motors up quite abit as it was a 2bbl engine originally, but a 4bbl is boring and doesnt have the look I wanted
I painted the turnouts black to match the rest of the header, think thats it for now unless I find some more photos soon, theres also a quick video of it running which il try and get uploaded soon, im halfway through making the Exhaust pipes that will running along the side of the car under the doors and then out to the back under the panel below the runk, this is mainly just to get through inspection as exhausts here in canada need to exit behind the doors, though im probably going to be running around with just the lakes headers and turnouts with a baffle in each side, has anyone ever glass packed a baffle in lakespipes before and had good bad results? might be looking to tone it down a little for everyday driving and longer trips and help keep the cops off my back hehe Charlie
Heres a quick Video last weekend getting ready to take it to its first show, sadly on a trailer but that will be the first and last time trailering it to a show lol I dont believe in that, just that I havnt had it inspected yet https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10154551685685107" Charlie
Looks great, really like the contrast of white chocolate and rootbeer Kandy, nicely done, cheers John (yjohnb)
WOW - I am impressed at your metal working skills & attention to details. One comment is that rear end in the paint booth hanging in the air - if you hung that up the same way you hung up the smaller parts I do not think I would want to arm wrestle you...but seriously, ENJOY YOUR COUPE - IT'S REALLY NICE!
Thanks Gary, Im the head welder fabricator at my work so its my daily job metal working and love what I do but my T was still alot of work, as it was all done in my own time in about a year after work and I work Full time, iv done a few T's now, and a few other hotrods for myself as personal cars. Haha, that would be impressive, I can lift a rear end on my own to that height but no ways can I tie it up on my own aswell lol a buddy who helped me with the body work helped me lift it and tie it up there, thanks for the kind words on my coupe im very pleased with it and cant wait to drive it everyday I wish I had taken all the photos on my nice camera as the photos just dont do the car justice, but I didnt want to take it to work everyday Thanks Charlie
Congratulations,just seeing the car move under it's own power is impressive,you have done a great job thus far! HRP
Thanks for the kind words HRP im excited to have it on the road hopefully in the next few weeks, its getting pretty close Charlie
So I thought i'd do a quick update as iv not done one for a little while, for those that are interested this afternoon I finally got around to fitting my pertronix kit and flame thrower coil I picked up the other day, which I put off buying for a while for a few reasons, one being before getting my new job the extra money for stuff like this just wasnt there, and two I was going for a traditional ish Hotrod but finally after driving it hard for the last few months I decided it was a good way to go, and might help sort one of the problems I have with the coupe at the moment, now it has this kit in it, its like driving a different car, within a split second of turning the key its running straight away even from cold, no cranking and cranking it over to get it started like before, now also when warm and driving it, there seems quite a power and throttle response difference too so in all im super happy with this upgrade one of more to come, also thought id show a few recent photos we did for our engagement photo sessions as we used the coupe in them, photos also show my old shop name lettering that I also did more for fun as i dont have my own shop right now, and the straight pipes that are now on and done that I was previously planning on doing for inspection but actually really like how they turned out so kept them on there for now next up is going to be the wooden roof frame kit I need to order and put in then I can do my removable canvas top, be nice to be slightly more water tight than it is right now lol Charlie
truly awesome body fabrication. How did you make the body line under the back windows? Copper gas line can work harden and crack. I use stainless
Thanks manyolcars well in one of my posts I thought I had shown how I did the rear quarter window panels with body lines? but I ended up cutting two very rough doors in half and using the top half for the quarter windows and with alot of cutting up, splicing, sectioning, pie cutting, curving and finally welding I finally had some rear quarter windows as i just couldnt find any to buy, anywhere no one seemed toe have any with out the rear quarters, the only ones i found were on Ebay and the guy wouldnt split them from the rear quarters they were on and another older guy here in B.C never got round to finding some he thought he may have. so cut my losses and made some lol, thanks for the heads up re the copper lines though I did know that already lol, but they are very well supported and P clipped where possible, theyre kinda a semi permanent fixture right now I do want to change them I think at some point not sure what I want to do yet though, might include using a 1 in 3 out fuel block into Kunifer (cupro nickel) lines in the near future, Thanks for the kind remarks Charlie
Car looks great ! You've done a lot of nice work in a relatively short period of time. The frame looks 100% better thinned out. Like the idea of the radiator in the trunk. I'll give that some serious thought when I get started on mine. Nice work.
your T coupe has a real '50's Rod & Custom magazine vide going on......which is a good thing! Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
Thanks Baron Im way happier with the Z thinned out now too, yh I liked the clean look of the front end with nothing in the grille shell and the rad in the back lol, it looked interesting but it keeps cool with the rad up front now which is the main thing, it got a little hot before with the original rad in the trunk, which blew the tank seem lol, I think it got a sudden air lock on its first longer trip out and about (on the way to its inspection) one of my plans is to either figure out the rad in trunk idea abit better over the winter (got a few things in mind) or to weld up a custom smaller rad up front so I can again fit the smaller chopped A grille I originally did for the coupe, which I like alot better and properly lines up with the top of cowl as it should, not like the one i'm temporarily using in the photos which is too high really lol, that and the rad was just temporary to get me on the road for the last few months of summer which was great Thanks very much Maurice the original plan was for a 50's esq looking hotrod so im liking what your saying haha hope you guys are all doing well up there in the Valley Charlie
So Iv been working on and off on the coupe recently and if iv not been working on it iv been ordering things I need for it, so this week I had a day off work and started finally making up my Bench seat iv wanted in it since its been on the road just used the kind of bomber style seats temporarily as I had them, I started off making the seat base and back out of 3/4 plywood, and used a pair of Hinges to help set the back's angle and also make it pivot so I can use the space behind the seat, im planning on making a large pocket behind the seat for storing maps other stuff like that out the way, like modern cars have but longer the whole width of the seat it will be hidden so you shouldnt be able to see it but will be valuable storage space in the T especially when extra space in a T isnt really in abundance Heres a photo of the basic base and back, tomorrow I should get the pirrelli webbing on the base's hole and im picking up my seat foam and batting thats going over the foam, so il be able to start sticking that down too, then il have to look into getting my leather and seat stitched up soon Charlie
also next up on my list of things to do is get my new top wood kit installed which should be a bit of fiddling to get it done, Photos to follow Charlie
Nice build I also like the look of nice finished wood in a car like that. I am still collecting parts for my 29 pickup build and plan on having nice wood in that. I see that you are a full time builder as I am also and would love to have you add your story of how you got that dream job building hot rods. Here is a link to my thread. http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/how-did-you-get-that-job-building-hot-rods.946796/ Jim Ford
Exceptionally well done Tall-T. The color white was a very good decision. Some day I hope to do a similar project, or to be truthful, have it done for me. Congrats on keeping it a Tall-T.
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