My buddy just bought a 1950 Shoebox, and I was wondering how hard is it to convert into a 12 volt system. Can anyone suggest or give me info. on this, how to get started what I need and so on.. Here's a pic.
Very cool...glad to see he's finally got some wheels! i'm sure Crease can help you with 12 volt stuff...personally I would leae alone for now...I doubt he'll be runnin a big stereo or air bags anytime soon!
Chuckle head, Anything for Chup, he's "da man"! Damn good guy. We'll get him hooked up. You basically just want to switch over to a 12 volt GENERATOR (not spelled a-l-t-e-r-n-a-t-o-r). Switch out your 6 volt bulbs for 12 volt ones. We'll have to check out the gauges, senders and a few other miscellaneous items, but we can get it done. Personally, I would leave it 6 volt, but 12 volts is always a comforting feeling. Doesn't sound like the car needs much. The trick is gonna be not to go too over board. Goal should be do get it running, not on the cover of Hot Rod.
Oh, yeah. I forgot about the bulbs...headlights need to be replaced also. Dash, driving and tail lights are just 12volt bulbs...And crease does have a good point. If the wiring currently in the car is in good shape, there is no need to re-wire the whole thing and a 12volt generator and the correct voltage regulator can be used.
hey chuckle head all you have to do is change the battery to 12v as well as the generator,voltage regulator,all lights,and bulbs, you may have to change the ignition coil but im not positive as far as the gauges go you can buy resistors made for gauges to bring them back down to 6 v . you can just run the 6v starter with no changes. hope this helped
Yeah the resistor will most likely come into play when you get into the gauges, unless you just go after market. Dad's old roadster pick up used a resistor, it was a pain in the ***. It basically stole a **** load of power. The resistor acts as a voltage divider circuit. For the circuit to work right, it has to be matched to the load. If the load includes your head lights, you'll need one resistor for night time driving and one for day. You could wire a resistor into the light circuit, but why the hell would you want to do that? That's why I like to run as much of the system 12 volts as possible.
You don't have to do anything to the gages IF you power them with a transistorized voltage drop (12 volts for the car, and 6 volts for the gages). HOTROD DELUXE #2 had an article on how to make one with parts from Radio Shack. When I went to Radio Shack to get the parts, some of them were discontinued. The guy there studied the circuit diagram in the magazine and came up with a few different part #'s that would work (thank god for computer geeks). I think I built the thing for about $25. I'll go home tonight and see if I can find the part #'s and circuit diagram then I'll post them if you would like... LP
The Ballast Resistor mentioned above is for the ignition circuit so you don't kill the points. Get it when you get the 12V coil you're gonna need. The Tex Smith "How to do Electrical" book is $20 well spent IMO.
I think I am happier for Chris than I was when I got my first ride. The car is going to be @ my house tommorow. So maybe a few of us can get together this weekend to get the thing running. Chris is sitting next to me right now and would be grateful for any help this weekend. He also said what's up to all of you out there!!
Tex Smith's book is great, and you should really consider a whole rewire, not that hard or complicated as if you're not doing upgrades you're basicly just start copying you current harness. Biggest reason to do this that the cloth insulation on your stock wiring is now 50+ years old and will be very brittle, and as soon as you start moving it will start falling off and then you'll have shorts and possible electrical fires.
Another option is to use a 8 volt battery then you don't need to change anything and you get a big starter boost. just a thought. Pogo
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