Build a car out of leftovers?

And I don't mean last night's meatloaf. I know a lot of you have been building cars for a long time. A lot of us collect parts here and there and they end up piled somewhere in the garage or barn or rafters... after years and years go by you suddenly realize you've ac***ulated enough 'junk' that you could actually build another hot rod! The original project is finished and all the extra leftover pieces are starting to ***emble themselves in you mind. Sooooo?

 

All my cars are built like this. The kind of stuff that now one else wants, ends up on my projects.

 

I've probably built a dozen cars like this since 1960. After owning over 200 cars since then the parts and partial cars just seem to ac***ulate. And, as stated, one day you realize there is another project just begging to be ***embled. A vast majority of these were not HAMB friendy rides as I was heavily involved in Camaros, Corvettes, Chevelles along with a few dozen early Fords during this time period. Along with the planned cars it's kinda exciting to realize you've aquired a BONUS build once in awhile. Also, most of mine were some of the most fun I've had with cars seeing as how with little invested I tended to treat them with a little less respect and had a ball seeing how much I could wring out of them.

Frank

 

Literally everything I have ever built for myself is constructed of leftovers. That's always been the only way I can afford stuff. A s**** here, a s**** there....

 

alot of the gear i end up with is s****s, i don't buy much good or new stuff. I'm looking at building an early 1930's stock car made up from pannels from than four diffrent makes- with the ch***is/running gear it'll be even more makes, i've pieced together bits and bobs, to make a few projects, then normally someone else buys it before i finish (haven't finished a car yet).
Gotta say collecting bits is awesome- i have alot of parts for alot of cars i don't even own but when i need a bit i have it- and most, if not all of the bits where free form s**** piles and tips. and alot of the time you can modify a part to work in something else.
I went searching in a bucket today and found a honda motorcycle horn, which i modded to fit into an old harley horn case to go on my bike, cost free, and i didn't have to got to a shop.

 

Jim Jacobs' decoupage tub was supposedly built that way.

 

The vintage speedster style roadster (for lack of a better name at the moment) roadster that I am building now is pretty much one of those. My leftovers or someone elses that were given to me.
I have more money in gas from going and getting parts that guys gave me than I have in parts so far but that started to change last weekend. I did spend money for wheels and a brake and clutch pedal setup.
The largest single expenditure on the whole project will be the tires and that will probably be at least half the cost of the car when it runs. almost everything else is coming out of my shed or my buds s**** pile except the engine and trans.
The engine was donated by a fellow Hamber who needed it out of where he had it stored. Free engine with the cost of 150 bucks worth of gas and a nice lunch with my wife on a 400 mile road trip.

Frame = old truck frame that I drug home years ago from a field that I was clearing junk off for a former employer.
front axle= was under a trailer at one time
rear axle = My buds junk pile
Engine = donated by a fellow Hamber
Most of body= left overs from my truck or trucks. Lots of cutting and fitting.
Cowl = 10.00 swap meet item from 25 years ago. 1919 Buick as far as I can tell.

Wheels = 35.00 for four last weekend at swap meet
18x something vintage style tires $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ unless I find a Model A clubber who is upgrading at the swapmeet at the end of the month.
Trans isn't decided but it will probably be a three speed out of a Ford F-1 to match the 254 Flathead six.

I think a lot of projects get started with the "hey, we have that engine and trans out of________ and that rear end out of___________ what if"?
This one got started because I had the cowl laying around and over a period of years collected parts to go with it. The trick is making those parts flow into a presentable car that looks right.

 

I have built one project totaly from left overs and any other car I work on gets parts from the s**** pile. I love junk!!!

 

I posted this on another thread,.....


The Unintentional Graffiti Clone

In the early 80's I got a really rough Deuce 5/W body in trade,... (I allowed $600.00 on it) I had a spare Deuce frame I picked up in Hillman Mi. for $75.00,..... And a garage full of left over parts from other projects,... So I started to put all this stuff together,... we started calling it "The Pot Luck Deuce",..... (I was building it on a dare, at that time everybody said you couldn't build a 32 Ford Hot Rod for under 10 K! ) it wasn't intentional,
but at about the $1,800.00 mark,.... this, minus intake, headers, and grill shell rolled out of the garage on a sunny Saturday morning.

The intake was on the workbench (for another project) the headers were in the rafters (for another project) , and the grill shell was just brought home from a swap meet the weekend before for about $35.00 for a buddy. Some friends came over,....and friends,.... being friends ,... started to mock that stuff up on this car. heres what it looked like.

I ended up (unintentionally) selling it a few weeks later, I was trying to build this car on the "extreme low down dirty cheap" with discarded parts, everything was used, abused, straightened out, hand made , home made, and whipped together. It was a turd in the truest sence of the word.,.... but I can't tell you what a mistake I felt I made, as it was on someone else's trailer heading in the opposite direction.

 

Did it with a non HAMB friendly car. Bought a car for parts,wanted the engine and some misc small stuff,so I bought this half stripped hulk. The GF at the time had an 18 year old son who needed a car and wanted to learn how to work on stuff. Offered him the car and fronted some money to get a ****** for it and some other stuff, all on the condition he do the work and pay me back. He started off great for a few weeks and then petered out and then me and his Mother broke up. So I built it up and use it as my throw down car. Thing runs mint and I don't car if anything happens to it.

 

so lets see some pics of these cars!!

 

Yup, leftovers and ac***ulated parts right here.

 

my whole ford is built out of left overs that,s why it,s called loose change

 

It has to be the easiest way to sneak a car past the wife, bring it in piece by piece and out comes a car, mission in progress. Body is going to be a hard one to sneak in

 

My Wife, quit asking a long time ago,.... early on after we were married, when I would bring home a frame or ch***is,.. she would ask, "Do you need that for a car your building?" and I would say "well I have a 32 Ford, and this frame is better than the one I have"

Then when I would bring home a body in the back of the pick up,... She would ask, "Is that body better than the one you already have?" I would say,... "Well not really, but I have that other ch***is,.... and it will be worth more as a more complete car,...."

I was a Baaaaaad Boy !,.... over the years, She just quit asking,...
I LOVE my Wife !

 

Thats to bad! Harms Way. That deuce was spot on!

 

The A pickup I sold last fall started out as a freebie frame, front end, hood and other parts from a coupe - a family friend had helped some people go hot-rod with it and they just rolled a 1-800-ch***is under the body. First he offered me the rolling ch***is for $100, then he took a few other pieces for his stock A and gave me the rest free.

Then I helped some folks with an estate 200 miles up the road clean out and got a front axle with '40 brakes and split bones, and a '40 rear on an A spring, take-offs from an old hot rod, free for the taking.

Next, got cleaning out a junkyard of goodies and bought an AA truck with the filled top - tried hard to sell it whole for years - that's the door in my avatar. No luck.

I also at the same time picked up a '30 sedan that had been cut down and a factory bed put on it, and cut the crossmember and steering out of an F1, found a front spring literally laying on the ground....

So finally I dragged the frame over, set it on the axles on some roller tires, ordered up the repro bolts and shackles to make it a roller, and put the pickup bed on it. Then I brought the AA over, slid the cab across from one to the other, bolted it all down, and I had a little fenderless pickup that I didn't even have $1000 in. Done by myself, in a field.

It sold before I could keep going, I wasn't sure what way to go next since most of the motors I have would need to go open drive.

And the last picture I got of it showed it in Norway, it survived the boat ride, so it couldn't have been too bad of a clunker for all that.


So this summer I'm going to take the rest of the leftovers and the car that was cut down into a pickup, and see what I can cob together out of that stuff. Either this time I end up with a hot rod, or I sell another one - either way, so be it -

 

yeah!

 

Im building a I-H truck like this now, they are not all my leftovers but they're free. I have almost everything to do this truck & Ive only spent 100 bucks so far, I think another 500 will get it done.