Has anyone done the old way of fabricating a center crossmember for an AV8 using an upside-down A rear crossmember? How did you mount your transmission and pedals to it? Are there any old pics of a chassis with this?
I think an F1 crossmember is a popular era-specific choice. I haven’t heard of an inverted rear crossmember. Where did you read about it?
I saw it mentioned briefly on an old thread on here first, then I read on Kustomrama that the Niekamp roadster originally had one for its rear engine mount. Naturally I went out and looked at a rear cross member and it definitely looks plausible, but I haven’t been able to find an example .
Seems like a curious way to get that done but stranger things have been done. Personally I'd stick with a tried and true method of putting it together but if you go a less traditional route share your progress.
Found this just searching around. Niekamp Roadster. Sure looks like it could have been a cut down rear crossmember…
I'm not seeing any advantage to flippign a rear crossmember to use under the trans unless you are using a later trans with a tail shaft mount or if you want to set the engine a bit lower in the frame for some reason. Looking at the photo in post 6 "some reason" is that the front mounts are set somewhat lower than stock mounts would be in most cases and with the deep channel the engine was lower to clear the hood. In this shot it looks like the engine sat a lot lower in the frame than we are usually used to these days.
It’s also might be worth noting the frame under that roadster is a ‘27 Essex rather than a Ford. Maybe there wouldn’t be an advantage to do it now with our accessibility to options, but maybe before in “ye ol golden era” it was more viable
This is interesting ibe never heard of it done but I love old tricks like this. Repurposing early parts is what I love about hotroding
I built a crossmember out of 2" square tubing that mounts ahead of the stock center crossmember and mounted the master cylinder and solenoid on it. For the pedals I used a bracket to mount the stock pedals to a V8 transmission the Model A vendors sell.
My brother did it on his roadster I will see if I can find some pics. I have a f100 and pedals if you end up wanting to go that route
Here is a pic. I think he mainly did it cause he didn’t have a F1 at the time. It turned out slick used some model t rails I think to strengthen it up and use for the actual mount.