You are killing it - some very nice work and ideas put to good use on this “make it mine” - I have used a mirror to fill the master from underneath for years. I couple that with using a squeeze bottle with a right angle nozzle to help out in the process - works great!
Found some more excellent loose nut and cotter/split pin work behind the splash apron.. I had no press available so I made a spring eye reversing tool and used a vice, it did the job really well. It worked best after I found out not to tighten the vice too much and just let the curve of the spring hold it in there as I moved it along. Not sure why the car appeared to sit quite so high, maybe the GRP fenders had something to do with that. With the reversed eye main leaf and with 3 leaves less in the spring, I reckon the front now sits about right as I'll be keeping these front wheels and tyres. Any lower and the tyres and fenders might meet when turning, in the narrow twisty lanes around here, putting two wheels up the bank to pass oncomig farm stuff happens a lot. The rear wheels and tyres may change in time if something turns up, most likely just larger tyres and loose a couple of spring leaves. To chop or not to chop? I'm itching to do it, but I really don't want to, if that makes any sense!
I think it looks really good in that last pic. If it was me I would probably not chop it. Bobbing and sectioning a little on the rear fenders would look cool though...
Liking the spring tool! How long is the bar and how much heft is required to do the job? A wash bottle will fill the master from underneath without spilling a drop, if yours careful, and use a mirror. Really cheapo on the auction site. Squeezy bottle with tube that feeds from the bottom. Not worth trying to cobble one together for what they cost. Chris
Glad you like it, doesn't take much to add coolness to a model A, but no bobbing for me as I like how it is now. I'll be making a filler panel down to the bumper irons to tidy that area up with a better number plate and turn signals.
It's a solid bar about 4 ft, but not much heft was needed, more like leaning back hard. Didn't take notes but it took a quite few goes along each side of the spring, it was easy to over bend it. I kept the tool against the vice and moved the spring along to the next mark. It was a good way of warming up in a freezing shed..good call on the wash bottle.
If you do try using this tool it's very important to use a square to make the chalk marks, and keep the spring level in line with the top of the vice, if the tool is not square the spring will end up bowed sideways.
Great little hot rod in the making! Can’t say I’ve ever seen anyone have to notch the backing plate to clear the spring hanger after the shock ball had been cutnoff but it seems to have worked for you just fine! I like them chopped but I would probably swap to some 16” wheels with the standard 550/750 rubber before I decided on how much needed removed. how you’ve got it sitting now you could take a slice but I don’t think I’d go as drastic
Stop it! Is that yours? That stance and chop are pretty near perfect for me, but I do want to keep my 19" front wheels. What are the wheel and tyre sizes please?
I think maybe it depends on what year backplates are used whether the notch is needed, I've seen other examples of it being done. Call me contrary, but I rather like the 19 inchers on the front, May do 16s on the rear if I come across some decent ones at a decent price, that's not easy over here.
My Chevy beach racer has a Stromberg 81 mounted on a home made manifold, which works very well. The Coupe has been casting envious eyes at it, so it looks like they'll just have to share it, the Chevy doesn't need it very often anyway. So I'll be thinking about making a manifold to fit the Coupe, it'll be simpler as no water is needed for heat but it'll be made of steel cos I don't have TIG for ally. It'll be summat like this one I reckon. One thing that might be a problem long term is internal rust forming over time, has anyone ever had experience of this happening?
the yellow coupes chopped 3 inches and has 17s and 5.50 up front 7.50 rear. 4 inch dropped axle and 3 leaves flipped /cut the rear springs
Here...tease you a little bit...a fellow I happened upon one day a few years ago I never cared too much for sport coupes until I saw this chop Like what you are doing....
Not sure what it is about yellow and black, but I snapped this one at Pendine the other year, it just looks so right to me.
The B engine in my Coupe had a timing rattle when I got it, I bought an ally timing gear but it was tight with no backlash after fitted it, and this had marked it when fitting so couldn't return it. Link to discussion on the banger thread: https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum...er-meet-thread-halloween-month.1302409/page-3 Call me a controversial over confident optimistic cheapskate, but as the new gear was now worthless, I thought I'd have a go at it. So here we go with my workaround to fix the zero backlash when fitting a standard ally timing gear to a B engine that has out of spec line boring. Following methods that have served me well when removing the high spots from any two metal mating parts, sharpy was applied to the non thrust side of the gear teeth. This initially showed up the spots to be filed off with a small diamond file, after a few cycles of filing and marking, rotaing the engine gradually became easier. In order to preserve the correct angles on the thrust or driven side of the teeth nothing was removed from that side, only the non thrust side had any metal removed. After quite a few cycles the engine became easier to turn, and witness marks became harder to read, after that point marking continued at every rotation, but was only used as a guide to show where metal was being removed evenly across each tooth, in order to preserve the tooth profile as much as possible. The change in effort needed to turn the engine once clearance was achieved was quite remarkable, after that a dial indicator was used to check progress after each mark and file cycle. I’m probably only taking off tenths per cycle (told you it was slow!) and I’m at .002” backlash now, I’ll probably leave it at .003” as some bedding in will happen. This may be a bit hard to follow so I’ve been taking pics and video, so I could put it together and post it if there’s any interest, I may live to regret that, as any criticism, good or bad, is always welcome! This seems to have cured the problem as it runs nice and quiet now, but time will tell.
As a diversion from scrabbling around under the car making brake lines, I had a look at turn signal light positions. Made a temp angle iron thingy to try out positions, it wasn't meant to be the final design as it looked a bit clunky, I couldn't be bothered in the end so just made a twin, added speed holes and called it good. Cleaned off the cheap rusty chrome blinker lamps that came with the car and made them black, they will be changed for some clever LED ones that shine white for running lights and amber for turn signals.
Laying in bed I had an actual real 'light bulb moment', ain't it strange how the answer to a problem pops into your head when you're not even thinking about it. Best bit is that the idea worked out just as I imagined it would, and that doesn't happen very often. These cheap plastic lens rear lights have been about laying for years, I took the innards out. Cut bit's off and reshaped them until they fitted in the repro cowl lamps that I'd removed from the coupe earlier. Removed the innards of the cowl lamps too. The modified lamp holders are held in by a screw through the original rivet hole in the back, now looking for a SS slotted one for that. Tripple heat shrink tubing to stop any chafing on the metal. I masked off the glass and sprayed a silver strip in the inside to hide the innards. Also sprayed the insides. They work fine and I reckon they'll look way better than my first effort, which didn't really do it for me at all. Before and after pic. So there you have it, combined blinkers and side lights the easy way. What's the skinny on getting them to fit in the cowl without flopping about, looking drunk, and pointing straight ahead? There is only one block of wood with a hole in it which the lamp spigot passes though, I suppose the other one has gone awol. Seems to me that if I tighten the special bolt up to squeeze this block tight it will distort the cowl and the rubber grommet will still let the lamp flop about. Most of the model A cowl lamps I've seen are a bit wonky but there must be a way.
Well it took some fiddling but I got the cowl lamps fitted, got them pretty well straight too, made new hardwood spacer blocks that fitted really snug, so the bolts can be really tight without distorting the cowl. They're high, bright and hard to miss, which is good, I changed the silver paint to black but still not sure I like them so I'm hoping they'll grow on me..
Just a tiny but satisfying update this time folks. Halogen chromed amber bulbs fitted, never knew such a thing existed till a friend told me. Poached egg look gone forever! I do like them cowl lamps a lot now..
Although they looked like replacement ones the Ford shocks hadn't been serviced so no oil and the levers were so loose on the shafts that they were worn to toast. They wouldn't have worked easily with the dropped front anyhow. I had some free Armstrong lever arm shocks on the shelf so in they went, with a bit of fab work. Made a couple of raising brackets to clear the wishbones Turned up a couple of balls to fit the arms and welded them in. Knocked some nice splined studs with lock nuts out of an old Chevy diff housing, turned some spacers to clear the unthreaded parts, the spines went through a little bit into the shock bodies too which was a bonus. Don't mention the goof in the ball, it don't affect anything! Cut the links in half and made the welding angle in one go. Turned the parts so they fitted both balls on one side and welded them up. All fitted in nicely and they are quite stiff cold, hope they still work as well in the summer! Yeah I know there's no rubber link seals but they can wait till I get some in. It was then I spotted the ****** awful mess that's been done to the tie bar end balls! Someone's welded new balls in there that are far too short in the stem. This type is sold to fit a model A over here and I can't find the right sort anywhere. Forgot to take pics of the before, it was all hidden in a big mess of grease, I did wonder about so much grease, now I know! these pics are after I managed to get them together again, just. How ever they got them together is anybodies guess, but they mangled the metal seal retainers which were covering a mess of black silicone instead of rubber. After I got the metal bits out they turn easier but the teflon inserts were fubared, I fitted new inserts and it's safe now, it'll do till I can find the right replacement type balls in UK. Will most likely fit tapered bolt in ones, not happy at all cos I'm going to have to take both spindle assemblies off to do a proper job..
Because of the pot holed state of our roads around here and the tiny spring to frame clearance I've ended up with, today I snagged a '33 front axle. The idea is that with it fitted I can put back the three leaves I took out of the reverse eye spring and get the same drop with near to stock spring to frame clearance, which will be a big driver stress reducer Is my thinking good here? Anything to watch for when doing this? Any pics would be a great help.
My '31 Model A had death wobble twice at low speed (reversed spring, a couple of leaves removed) otherwise stock setup. This is the 53-56 F100 steering box conversion fitted, hopefully most are done a bit better than mine, it sometimes felt a bit odd and clunky so I had a peek inside. The worm may have been rather worn as it looks to me that it could have been built up with weld and hand filed smooth ish, if so that worked well then! I may be wrong on the welding but it would match the builders style. It might just be that the case hardening has broken off. The sector shaft and roller are undamaged. The shaft was beautifully grafted on. The steering wheel had been slightly loose, even though the nut was tight, the usual cause of this is the key being slightly too proud, but not this time, turns out the taper has been welded up and inexpertly hand filed not too close to perfection. Outer column was expertly welded to the box box over a sheet metal spacer Box mounting mod was just about acceptable though, even though the nuts and bolts were not as tight as I'd like, and without split pins or washers. There were no big chunks of metal in the box, just sparkles, which is odd, so the question is, did previous death wobbles cause the damage to the worm, or did the repair fail and cause the death wobble? Will we ever know?
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