Alright another day slowly marching forward but I got out there. Got the boxing plates drilled and the spring mounts mocked up. Got the spring mount brackets for the axle about 80% done. Just a little more trimming, grinding, fitting and I’ll have them tacked together. been messing with my new band saw set up because a cut off wheel in this thick stuff is a joke. Think I need to switch to a finer tooth blade but in general so far so good. My original plan of shackle mounted lower shock mounts is not going to work. There just isn’t room. But I think this latest idea will work. I’m On idea 4 or 5 for lower shock mounts lol. The ladder bars, spring mounts, shock mounts, pan hard bar all want to be in about a 5” space. Being careful to make sure nothing will hit each other and you can get hardware out of each thing with out taking something else apart to get to it. Some times it’s unavoidable but most the time I think there is a way. anyhow, still feeling good about progress. Hopefully have the springs and ladder bars all sorted and tacked by the end of this coming weekend. Then I need to find some longer bolts for the pan hard bar brackets and I’ll put that in place, shocks last and then I’ll move to the front end. Just a few things to button up there. “Should” be a quicker reward for work hopefully. Been thinking of some bump stop options as well. I think in the back I can screw some pointed rubber stops into the rear cross member channel. Up front I’m not really sure where they’d even go. The front rails are getting a little notch for the spring the travel in so it doesn’t bottom out. Maybe I’ll just add a 1/4” thick chunk of rubber in the top of the notch to soften the blow a little? Shocking how many hot rods are going down the road with the front spring bottomed out on the frame rail. Checked a lot of cars at a show years ago and the majority had the spring touching the frame rail with the car parked and no one in it! I’ll post pix when everything’s in place right now it’s just a blur of clamps, shims and stands.
They all kinda look the same right now. I’ll post some once I’ve got it together and clean up my mess a bit. I figure if I look at a photo I took and I can’t tell why I took the photo/ what it’s supposed to be showing, it’s probably not worth a share lol
Alright update with photos! I think I got about 15 hours in this week and I’m maybe a day away from really being somewhere. And maybe two from having this end wrapped up. the four bar and 1/4 spring axle brackets got mocked up on the passenger side a few times. Making sure they cleared threw full range of motion and I can remove hardware with out havjng to move anything else. I need to change to a normal shackle as the idea of a lower shock mounted off the extended stud in the shackle won’t work. There just isn’t any room and if there were it’s to high up anyways. When I do this I’m also going to swap the flat side of the shackle towards the ladder bars. It clears with the nuts with more room that appears in the photos so I figure with the nuts on the other side I should be set. when I grab the different shackles I’ll exchange this pan hard bracket. Ended up with one for a 9” not an 8” but it’s good enough for a mock up. Looks like it should work just perfect. Nice and horizontal and threads the needle wonderfully. this is my current thought on shock placement. I really wanted them on the front side but there’s only so much room. If I was really dead set on a clear rear view I could have used lever shocks, mounted the lower end of a tube shock off the ladder bars bracket or even laid the tube shocks flat and used a pivot. What I decided was to run them in the back as clear and simple as I can. There’s no need to over complicate it when there’s an easy option. info use a bracket similar to a 50’s Chevy pickup mounted to the existing spring pads I can snake the shock between the body and the rear bumper mounts to a mount welded to the top of the rear cross member and land around 20* which seems pretty acceptable to me. I may have to re work the bumper brackets for clearance but I think I’m going to end up cutting them up a little bit To change how they mount anyways so that’s no issue. Pulled the axle out and cleaned / made brackets and the tube and put it back together with both sides mocked up. Spent over an hour getting the wheels centered in the wheel wells- glad I made so many registration marks for my laser level! I also spent a lot of time getting the axle centered in the chassis which was a lot of frustration. Every time you tweak something it all moves a little bit somewhere else . I can see where chassis table with a fixture to hold the axle solid in relation to the frame would be a real time saver. Maybe in the future I’ll build some stands that bolt on in place of the wheels? That could be a good work around as well. So there we are ladder bars and quarter elliptic springs aaaaaaaalmost done. I think I’ll have about another day in making sure everything is exactly correct and tacking them in place. Then I’ll take the axle over to a buddy to tig the brackets all on 100% nice and solid. He does this work all the time so I feel a lot better about having him doing it and knowing it’s correct. once that’s done I suppose I’ll gather hard ware, put the axle in the car and get the pan hard and the shocks on. Im going to get the correct height tires swapped into these steel wheels as well. probably another week of work if I’m being hopeful. But the back will primarily be done then. It wont look any different but I’m really looking forward to the next time I get to push it back outside. Hopefully with the rest of the front end work done it’ll be a little easier endeavor than the last time.
I have all my driveshaft work done at Midwest Wheel on front street. Cheaper than Inland truck. Now I only get my driveshafts shortened there. When I needed a completely new shaft I called around but prices were ridiculous. For the completely new shaft with u joints and yolk I went through Fast Shafts in Des Moines. Super fast and price was cheaper than anywhere local.
The Jalopy Journal
