Hey guys. Its nice to find this place. I am getting alot of crap at most other boards because of what my current project is but I think I will be right at home here. My project is to rod up a '55 Thunderbird. I am not exactly a kustom cause I am only doing minor body mods. Can I call it a hotrod with out getting beat by the hard cor rodders out there? Mostly I am redoing the engine and suspension. I want her to run like the car she was meant to be. I want her great in the straight line but also on the curves because she is a sports car. Most importantly though I want to do this while using almost entirely vintage parts. Here is what I am doing. Body wise she is excelent so all that is happening there is I am touching up the paint. On top of that I plan to either put traditional scalloped flames or Von Dutch style pinstriping. I am leaning toward pinstriping. I also will shave the bumpers and fit them closer to the body. Suspension wise I will of course replace all bushings, tie rods and so on. I will also add my one concession to modern safety. Disc brakes from a Grenada. This will lower the car 1" in the front. I will get new springs front and rear and cut 3/4 of a coil to lower the car another 1" up front. In the rear I will add a leaf. High pro shocks are a must too. From there I will adjust swaybars and so on as I need to. I am keeping the wide white Diamond back radials I have and the rims for now but will likely do something vintage like spider caps or moon hubcaps later. Now for the fun part. In the engine I have a W&H Ducoil distributor for the 292 y-block. I have a vintage Edelbrock 573 intake which I will polish and put Stromber 48's on with a real vintage air cleaner not a look-a-like. I will then add a 272 advertized 224@.050 and .440" lift cam and custom stepped race headers. These will be connected to 2 1/2" chambered exhause with no other mufflers. An early greendot c-4 rounds out the bunch. I am trying to determine if the 7 1/4" rear which I think my car has will be able to take 300hp and 370ftlbs but there is very little info out there on the thing that I can find. I have 3.31 rear gears. Estimated power will be 311@ 5000 and 369@ 3500 with a very flat torque curve and a 5500 rpm redline.. Estimated quarter mile runs between mid 13's and low's high 12's depending on tires. Essentially I am looking for ideas about what would work better, be cooler, more vintage, things I haven't considered, and general debate. The only things already set in stone are the Edelbrock 573, the W&H Ducoil, and the C-4 since I already have those. Thanks alot guys. Chris
Oh and here are some pictures of the stock car at Hot Rod Power Tour. She is a long hauler. http://s9.photobucket.com/albums/a79/Ranat1/Hot Rod Power Tour/
that'll be a sweet hot rod in my book! You're going for performance, it's not a flashy comfortable family hauler, it's vintage, don't know what else you'd call it? Plans sound spot on. What's the interior like? Tuck and roll?
Interior is the factory original so it needs replacement after the Tour. I will probably go with a stock replacement if I do it soon. If I do it later I will put a simpler custom one in there that I think will fit the idea of the car better. We'll have to see. I gotta make it go before I make it show!
Don't need the pics I know what a '55 bird looks like. my first race/streeter was a '55 vic with a '57 Thunderhawk 312. an consistant 12s. The edelbrock is a 3x2 intake??? if so your Y block wants stromberg 97s. Your rear will be OK but look into a '57-9 9" ( actually 83/4) for a more permanant installation. Your setup sounds pretty clean, don't tell anyone it has discs not that anyone will really care i know a guy that has a '38 coupe ( maye be its a '39) that has 4 wheel discs and everyone really respects him. I met kenny ( more than once) and he was a good striper but on the bird I would lean toward tommy the greek style stripes, more subtle and period correct. its just a personal preferance. OH and by the way you have come to the right place, if you wanna tweak it the HAMB is home. Gotta fly PM me later and we'll chat. benno
Sounds like a cool idea to me ! As to the rear end, I'm not familar with a 7 1/4" unit. BUT, being that it's got a Automatic, you won't be 'shocking' the ring & pinion like you would with a 4 speed, so it may be OK.
Tbird sounds like it's going to be a great car. The way you write sounds like your rear is wider than 7 1/4" though... (Are you a girl, or just British? )* I don't know, but, I just call them "it" till they they break down on the road, then they become a "she" or more likely "bitch".... I have one comment, on the paint... I think you should check out some pics in '54-'57 era Road & Track or Auto Life, or Motor Trend Magazines and come up with a road racing paint sceme instead of the "rockerbilly" flames and stripe stuff. Something like a racing stripe or two and blank racing number dots on the doors and hood, something like that would be more in the period performance style of the rest of your build ideas. There's a two seater Tbird here in L B that's been tooling around town as a daily driver for decades rolling on original 5 spoke American Torque thrusts with just weather beaten dull gray paint. Just walk away from the anal retentive restorers when they start squeezing their pickle about YOUR car. *(We always initiate the newbies with some verbal abuse. That's your punch from me.)
Lookswise, what you propose sounds pretty cool, but if that car were mine, I'd go a different route. I'd keep the plain red paint, shave the bumper guards, lose the fender skirts, and add white or black steelies with black wall tires. That would change a nice looking T-Bird into one tough looking machine. Food for thought any way. It sounds like you have the performance aspect worked out pretty well. Should be a bitchin' car. P.S. I just read DrJ's idea about the racing style markings and I'm digging that idea too. Maybe some white '60s style race striping (large stripe w/ smaller stripe next to it) offset on the driver's side and white number dot's with black numbers on the doors and hood. Hmmm....
Point taken. I am a 250 lb 25 year old Man. Its the rear in my car that is the little one. Signature changed. And I call the car rose because of the Poison song "Every Rose has its Thorns" It was playing the first time I got pissed and threw something of hers. I think it was stripped oil pan bolt. Anyways. I will have to look up some of those racing scheme shots. Anyone got some favorites that they can post or link too. If not I will start buying some magazins off ebay. Most of the birds I have seen that are hot rodded go the route of loosing the skirts with black wall tires and removing the bumber gaurds. I appreciate the advice because it does work but I want to look a little different. I want to actually combine the bumper gaurds with the bumper and shave the bolts smoothe so its all 1 piece. I will keep the fender skirts because I think it makes it look sleeker though it does limit the tire width. I will likely remove them at strips and bring wide white drag radials. The wide white are my personal snub at the restorers because everyone of them has told me that bird does not look right without wide whites. So whenever one tells me I screwed up the car I will point to the wide whites and say "See I kept the white walls! What don't you like them?" Then walk away. You got any pictures of that '55? I'd love to see it. I know about the new 97's and everyone seems to love them but supposedly the 48's flow 15 more cfm each. Also I believe that that is what I see most when I look at vintage engine pictures with tri-powers on real hot rods. If I am wrong though I would love to learn I am not all that familiar with Strombergs. I also have an Edelbrock fm255 with is an aluminum dual quad. However I would have to use either the Holley 4000 or the Rochester small base carbs. I Can't seem to rebuild the 4000 without massive leaks so the 4000 is out (and rebuilders want rediculous amounts for rebuilds on them if they will do it at all) and I have an irrational aversion to Rochesters. No reason just do. I will be selling it shortly with 2 complete holley 4000 cores. I will even polish it before I sell it though so if you want to give it a try with 4000's or use rochester's let me know. I am not familiar with which pinstriper is which so PorknBeaner who are those guys? Do they have a website or email or phone number where i can look them up?
Kenny aka Von Dutch, and Tommy the Greek, no longer in business http://www.letterhead.com/profiles/tommy/
Ah OK... I am just learning about pinstriping and vintage hotrods so there are alot of things like this I still need to read about and do. I also forgot that I will be adding the ecz-g heads with the higher compression and the large valves.
Here's a pic stolen from a Google image search of Mille Miglia 1957. It's a Ferrari but it shows the type of racing graphics I was suggesting
There's a guy outside of town that has a black 56 bird that he bought new, hopped it up with all the good aftermarket speed parts he could get and ran it locally. When he started gettin trampled on in the early sixties he bought a new Vette, 62 model I believe, same story with it. He gave up racing in the late sixties, but the cars are still sitting in the garage.
Here's my 55, 292 Y block bored .060 over, forged TRW's, ported C heads, double roller chain, Holman Moody 882 cam, factory '57 intake with Holley 4000's, Mallory Unilite in the distributor, MSD6AL box & Master Blaster coil. I'm running a Borg Warner Brute force 11" clutch and pressure plate with lightened truck flywheel and World Class T-5 tranny. Stock rear with 3.31 gears. Suspension has been upgraded with bigger sway bar up front and added bar in back, KYB gas shocks, new coils up front with 1 round cutoff. Also '78 Granada spindles with 11" disc brakes and '87 Buick Skylark rack and pinion modified to work with my original A arms. This also allows 1" lower ride height. This is what it looks like now with American Racing Salt Flat Specials And this is what it looked like with Cobra R wheels when I went on the Power tour in 2004, Arlington TX to Green Bay WI Rebuilt in spring 2003, 10,000+ miles now and still going strong This 55 was at the roundup last yr with 3-2's, I believe he said the reason for the custom scoop was to make room for the 3-2 setup I has some trouble with the Holleys at first because the cam wasn't giving enough vacuum and I had to modify the power valve spring pressure to get it working right. Now I'm getting 18.9 mpg on the highway with the overdrive 5th gear and the 3.31's
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