4-1/2 is what I did on my 30 back in the 70's. Seemed right. Definitely no less than that. IMO With bumpers off! I also made my own dropped headlight bar that I think kept the look right.
Here's a picture of my 28 Mercury Torpedo Salon. The body is similar to a 30-31 A, not a 29. But, I have 1000s of comfortable miles in it. It's been back together for 25 years or so. It has a 5" chop. And if you put the seats back far enough, you have no problem seeing out of it. But you lose the back seat area. A couple of hints. One -- make the rear window retractable. It will aid considerably in cross-ventilation and reduce buffeting. The Mercury has a side cowl vent that wasn't available in your year model Ford. And two -- don't worry about the visor. Take a look -- you can't even see the visor from inside. No, you can't line up the holes to look thru. You can't even see the holes. But they are good for at least .016 MPG in actual mileage tests. Plus, they look cool.
Curious the coupe w the 6.5 chop, how tall r u. If your the 1st car at a light can u see it. The sed you have can be cut at 2", 3", and the roof put back on till you see what you like. Like getting a haircut, you can't put it back on. Food for thought, in the 80's I drove a 4" chop 40 Chevy and was happy with it. Dingle Sent from my SM-G550T1 using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
Go see the Chrisman Bros Chopped 29 A race car it was just right Built from a 1929, the Chrisman Model A Sedan was a compe***ive racer in the early years of drag racing. See more hot rod pictures. Jack Chrisman's stylish Chrisman Model A Sedan was a formidable compe***or in the early days of drag racing. At one of its best performances of 1954, the car left the starting line at the Santa Ana dragstrip with tires smoking. Hot Rod Image Gallery
Barry, I am going to ***ume that you were speaking to me with the above question. When I chopped my Black open wheeled car I did exactly that very thing. I am a big man and I am 6'3" tall I really wanted a chopped car so when I did that one I chopped it 2" and without seats sat on the floor to see how much room I had. At a 2" chop there was plenty of room, so I cut another 2" out and try's it again, still plenty of room. In the end I chopped it a lot. I should have remembered that I was setting on the damn floor though as now it was done and I can tell you I had a hell of a time finding seats for that critter. Tried everything I could find and they all were to tall. Finally I tried the seats out of a C3 Corvette and they worked just fine. The reason I have sedans is because I can move the seats back a loooong ways, to gain the leg room I need with these old Hot Rods. Coupes as much as I love them are just to limiting for a big guy like myself. As to seeing the red lights, I use one of those prism deals that is attached to the dash. With that I can see the lights fine. I did get the roof sliced off of this car, chop ended up at 5". I cut it the 5" because of a car on this very thread. Another HAMB guy ( Beck) posted a posted a picture of his chopped Mercury and it was at " 5" and I loved that look. Thanks Beck!!
post says Mercury... do you mean Murray ?... ford bodies were built by ford, briggs, bud, fisher, murray and others as needed... the '29 Murrays had some '30-'31 traits, like the beltline and visor, but still used '29 grill and narrow firewall / hood ... Mercury was started in 1939... memory says they did not make tudors... nice !
Ford didn't make a Mercury in '28. So I did. The 28 Ford Murray 4-door cowl matches the 30-31 2-door moldings. My brother was a Model A restorer and used to pick up the cowls for $10-$15 a pop. Most didn't know that a 28-29 roadster-coupe-2-door tank lurks underneath. And usually in good shape being that it's been covered up for decades.
. . . and years ago, outside of Beatty, Nevada, at a fly-in brothel that not everyone got in (or out?) okay.
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