As I've been going over the front clip tin on my Styleline, I've been assessing the fresh air system, firewall and fender aprons. The ari vents are pretty rotten with rust, the firewall looks like swiss cheese with all the holes and I qill be needing to do some significant patch work on the fender aprons. I live in mild California climate and rarely see myself driving this car in rain/snow. I don't want to add A/C. To Top it off, I love clean, simple and austere engine compartments. I know kustom engine bays are not a typical focal point but I still appreciate the sharp clean aesthetic. Will vent windows and roll down windows be sufficient keeping me cool or will i hate life without the fresh air vents? My other car is a roadster so i need very little in the way of creature comforts. Thanks!
On my 53 bel air the wing glass creates a tornado effect at 35 mph. My wife was surprised at how ventilated it was. She had assumed she'd hate riding in it without ac. I myself was surprised how effective the wing glass was compared to other wing glass equipped vehicles I've had. I also deleted the fresh air vents to clean up the engine bay
You might try swapping to a 53/54 Chevy square heater though. They'll still work on recirculate without the fresh air vents
You can buy a Vintage Air heat only heater for less than the current cost of repairing an old Chevy heater. As far as air flow goes, that is a pretty much an individual thing and a lot depends on where you live. Here we have had a bunch of days in a row over 100 and even with the wing window all the way around to pull in air and the vent open the truck I am driving with no air is a freaking oven at low speeds. As far as the "clean look" clean firewalls are for street rods real hot rods and customs have stuff on the firewall and real Kustoms never should sit with the hood open anyhow.
those engine compartment vent tubes put a lot of cool air in the car. if you have the deluxe heater with the heater core in the engine compartment and don't like that you can use the small under dash standard heater and get the standard vent tube for that side. this car did not have a heater or defrost when I got it so I added the standard heater.
Thanks guys. I think I will make vent block off plates allowing vents to be retrofitted down the road if need be.
I live in Orange County and added air to my 56 Ford and made sure to keep both the right and left fresh air ducts. Wind wings are a definite plus and I always drive with the leaf one open some. If your in Napa it is colder that whee I am so I feel you will be fine. You do have wetter weather but you say you normally don’t drive in it. So I would blank them….
Got to googling and figured I'd end up leaving a snarky response to that but turns out you aren't far off. Using parts from O'Reilly (already have the 57 Chevy blower motor installed) I'll be about $300 into my original heater said and done. But after seeing this I may go this route. Definitely will on my 54 lol
local and long distance cruiser... Hello, My wife and I grew up in mild So Cal weather all of our lives. It is the best for warm coastal weather and in 2 hours can be in cold snow for a winter ski session on the slopes. Yes, A/C is a fact of life in the whole So Cal area, for homes inland and some folks have a/c in the coastal areas, too. (We don’t) Recently, we looked back to those early 60s days and nights for what we did during our summers and we knew what we had to do to cool off in our 55-58 Chevy sedans. As teens, we all had nice Chevy sedans, but each one did not have an A/C system. For the cruisers and drag racing, the extra belts were horsepower robbers and were not necessary. For the cool cruisers, if A/C were available, it would have been purchased. One of my friend’s dad ordered a new 63 Chevy Impala two door. It was supposed to be a 409 version, with hopes of driving around in a 63 409 Chevy Impala. but, he got a two door 327 powered sedan with A/C. Yes, we borrowed it for several hot weekend cruises with full a/c and rolled up windows. It was not a hot rod, despite the 327, but just a cool (pun intended) cruiser. Jnaki My 58 Chevy Impala had the vents and windows for full natural Air circulation. Without those in the car vents, the circulation was not always flowing in for the driver and with all windows down. As cool looking as it was, it did bother those that hated the wind blowing their hair all over during our cruising sitting next to me or in the back seat. So, the vents and wind wings worked overtime and cooled as much as it did. But, hot summer days coming home from the beach was towels on the seats, all windows open, the wind winds facing inward and all lower vents open for at least some cooling on the drive home. the full windows down swirled all around, but after a day at the beach, everyone enjoyed the swirling wind ride home. hair be damned!!! For my Impala it was a necessity to not have A/C. but for the others, if A/C were available, then they would have bought cars with it. But, during the gas crisis and wanting a new car with SBC power and great gas mileage, I chose a 65 El Camino. The 327 4 barrel was powerful enough, but I did not order A/C. Again, it would have robbed me of valuable horsepower and lessen the M.P.G. overall. Yes, I should have ordered A/C since it was available. Within a year, we were now in the Mojave Desert area almost weekly and sometimes twice in one weekend. It was hot racing our desert motorcycles and hot coming home with all windows down and vents angled at their best. Within a year, the gas mileage crisis was over and my friend bought his 66 El Camino with a 396 and also ordered A/C. smart move! Note: For all the comfort and usage of a source of wind coming into the cab, those vents and windwings do play an important part. Our choice, fix them up and get over it. Who looks into the engine compartment daily to see what is built in or added? Functionality, design and comfort is mandatory for all drivers. have we seen any new cars or trucks with windows down driving around? Perhaps old Datsun pickups or early Chevy trucks now and then. But, those original designs were there for a purpose. Get them fixed. You will need it. Note 2: My wife and I have been to the whole S.F. Bay area so many times we have stopped counting. Either a destination spot with car shows, boat shows, photo shoots or even just for a vacation or two, in the red 65 El Camino. Each time it was hot, we used the vents and windows down to the extremes as we drove through central California coastal areas and definitely hot inland highways next to the mountain ranges. Near the Steinhart Aquarium in downtown San Francisco. 1966-67 But, during the fall/winter months, the heater was definitely useful, even in the small El Camino cab built for two 20 somethings and a small dog. So, we have been accustomed to the S.F. Bay Area weather in all seasons and times of the year as we rolled through the city or stopped across the bay. We even stayed in a small motel in San Rafael as the nice rooms throughout the bay were full for a big car show we covered one year. It was cold and warm at the same time and a heater was a necessity. YRMV Plus, you don’t want to be labeled a hack for doing some repairs that some folks here on the HAMB see and laugh at the same time. Those items are labeled as something they would not be caught driving or associated with as far as hot rod builders or creators. So, no hack jobs, just fix it as if your car is a daily driver that will show case your talents.
My 49 Buick has air tubes that scoop air from each side of the grille. When going down the hi way it's like a blast of fresh air at your feet. I would never remove them. And I do have an air conditioner.
Those that say AC is not required have never lived in the hot, humid south! Sure, when you think you’re indestructible and in your teens and twenties, you can get away without AC. But when you start approaching your 30’s, your body starts changing and cold air can feel mighty good on a body. I generally worked outside all the way through my teens and 20’s, AC wasn’t a high priority, but that all changed as I got jobs inside. I didn’t own a vehicle with working AC until I was well into my 30’s, and we only had a small window unit in the bedroom to help sleeping. You start to get accustomed to it, and need it more and more. I spent close to 40 years driving trucks, sitting in AC and heat, thinking how lucky I was to work in a climate controlled environment instead of freezing my ass off in winter and melting in summer. That’s why all my vehicles and my house have HVAC now. Sure, you can survive without either heat or cold air, but why do it when there are options out there? Just because you have it doesn’t mean you have to use it all the time. There are lots of comfortable days here in the humid South where I’ll never turn it on, instead replying on whatever air can get into the cabin from outside. I’ll never build another car without it. Much easier to implement it early in a build than come back later and add it in.
Having only roll down windows can allow stale air to collect at your feet. Keep in mind that regardless of outside temps, the engine on the other side of that firewall is your most significant source of heat. Getting that heat out is way more comfortable. All my stuff has either kick panel or cowl vents and I wouldn't dream of deleting them. My 62 Bel Air has vent windows and kick panel vents. I use the kick panel vents all the time and also use the vent windows only if it's really hot.
Don't know how well weather sealed and airtight your car will be. But you may want to consider keeping some kind of outside air ventilation system intact. Depending on how the exhaust system is designed and routed you'll want to make sure that any exhaust gases can't find their way into the driver's compartment and become trapped there.
Keeping the cabin pressurized with outside air drawn from the front of the car, keeps exhaust and oil smells from the engine from getting into the inside where the occupants are.
When I built my '46 Woodie I contemplated installing AC. When I talked to the AC guy's at the Louisville Nationals all told me that because of the massive, uninsulated, black top area I would need the biggest AC unit available and I would need to eliminate the cowl vent and I didn't want to do that. I have driven the Woodie from Long Island to California thru the desert at 116 degrees with only the cowl vent and vent windows and it was no big deal.
You mentioned that you don't plan to drive this on rainy days.......and that your other car is a roadster.........so I assume you don't drive it on rainy days. So, assuming a little more, do you have a third car that you drive during inclement weather? If so, try driving it on some hot days and maybe some cool ones and don't use any A/C or heat and see if it satisfies you.....and the wife if you are married. The one thing that I find true 99% of the time is that if a car is comfortable to drive, it gets driven more often. When they are too loud, geared to low, underpowered and shifted a lot, too hot or too cold etc........they tend to get driven far less. Be realistic about not only what makes you enjoy the drive as well as other family members.
My truck (49 Dodge) has a functioning (opening and closing with a manual lever) cowl vent, vent windows in the doors, as well as the two roll down windows. No AC, and the heat/defrost is completely separate from the cowl vent air. With the cowl vent open, the fresh air comes through the cowl, down along the firewall, under the dash, and up and out the open roll down door windows. With the cowl vent closed, and the windows open, (vent windows closed) the fresh air comes in the windows, swirls around my ears, through the back of the cab, and back out at the front edge of the roll down windows. There is a lot more wind noise with the cowl vent is closed, and no air circulates near your feet. With the vent windows open, the incoming air tends to hit me in the face. I don't like that at all, and seldom open the vent windows. My coupe (48 Plymouth) has a cowl mounted fresh air intake as well, but that air passes through the heating system duct work and dumps on the floor through a closable vent door, mostly on the passenger side. With it, I needed the ability to turn off the water flow through the heater core, or that air was always warm, even though the air did not pass through the heater core itself. The coupe also has the vent windows, and the roll down windows in the doors, and no AC. The passenger compartment on the coupe is larger then the truck cab, so the air coming through the rolled down windows circulate through the car a bit better (no cool and no hot drafts) then the truck cab, but both the cowl vent air and the rolled down air tend to build up at the back of the passenger compartment, and it seems to warm up the inside faster on hot days then the truck does. The vent windows on the coupe don't open as far as they do on the truck, so they tend to send the fresh air around the glass and towards the windshield. The circulates the air more inside the car, but also increases the wind noise. Between the two, I believe I like the open cowl system on the truck better.
If your door seals are good you might get sick of having to slam the doors to get them to latch properly. Fixed vents also act to equalise cab air pressure.
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