What width front axles are you guys using in '35/'36 Ford cars? I'm having my stock axle dropped and need to decide on a final width. F1 brakes, 16" steelies, 6.00s. Should my goal be to center the wheel along the crease in the top of the fender? My coupe is in pieces and my fenders are rough so I'm kind of having trouble mocking things up.
nobody answered....and I don't have a 35/36... I don't think anyone lines up the tire center to the fender peak. I think the issue is not having tire rub on the fender lip. Just me, but if the tire is way deep in the fender, it looks streetroddy if it's got a major lowering, using all the lowering tricks. I have a full fender 32 with a 35 Ford beam which I dropped, but I did not stretch the drop. So it lost a bit of width which worked out fine on my fenders for clearances wait for a 35-36 guy to help out?
Thanks for the info F&J! I'm not trying to go super low but I want a nice rake. I've got the fenders set up on one of my frames and have been moving the tires around in the wheel well trying to visualize the range of motion. I'm probably over thinking this, I tend to do that, but I don't have a clear sense of the range of motion as the front wheels pivot to turn. I was going to do a drop with no stretch but wound up doubting that after getting on the phone with Okie Joe. He told me to level out the frame and fenders and drop a plum bob off the point I want the hub mounting surface to be at, and give him the width. That sounds easy, but I don't know where I want that to be. The center of the front fenders is getting pretty narrow when viewed from head on. That is well inboard of the fender peak. I guess I'm better off being on the narrow side, I could always space it out with spacers. I've lowered a lot of cars but this is my first traditional hot rod and actually choosing the track width feels a little intimidating right now..... I had a bug in high school that absolutely ate its front fender lips and I don't want to repeat that mistake. I'll play with it more tomorrow.
Lewk, did you find any more info on the axle width thing? I'm faced with the same problem on my '36 Roadster. I don't want to be rubbing the fenders with the tires.
I wound up getting a regular 4" drop. I decided that I was over thinking the deal and to just do what everyone else has been doing since the 40s. I don't have the dropped front end ***embled yet, but I can take some pics with the dropped axle next to an ***embled stock front end if that would help you visualize. I'll get those later today.
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