History Eastwood & Barakat

Kevin-
We're talking about Tom Vandenberg. He is a master at metal and wood. Sense of humor???? You must be thinking of someone else!

 

Hey Rick

I guess you can still get VHT. Probably a more EPA friendly mix.

http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_fro...kw=vht+header+paint&_sacat=See-All-Categories

 

Steve-
Thanks for the link.
It probably has to be bought out of SoCal and smuggled in.
I'll probably get it from Phil at Blair's.

You know, keep the money local.

Rick

 

Definitely talking about T.V. Your fellow Vintage Tin member. Just take a look at the inside of Eric's shop-Incredible!!!!!
That's made of wood , Then looking at those headers = there great!!!!!

The project is looking great! keep up the good work!!! Can't wait to see the end result.

 

If you can't find VHT High Temp (header) paint locally, Jeg's stocks it ...I recently ordered some and had it in a few days.

 

Billsill45-
Like I said earlier, typical SoCal EPA ****! L.A. County is probably the most restrictive.
If I can't buy it at Blair's, I'll order from Jeg's.
Thanks Bill.
Rick

 

If you can't get VHT at Blair's, I'll look up in my area. San Bernardino county isn't as crazy as L.A. county, but it's damn close.

 

Rick, I just picked the shirt from the post office. It is Great!
I'm sure it will get attention when I wear it in events here.
Thanks, Jukka

 

No pictures and no progress this weekend. I am in Tucson, Arizona at my daughter's graduation from the U of A. Not a car guy this weekend just a proud dad!

Jukka-(He's from Finland)
Thanks! Wear it in good health!

Here is a little editorial-

The HAMB is absolutely phenomenal. I can't believe it has car guys around the world following it. I have shipped shirts to Canada, England, Australia, New Zealand, Finland, and Sweden. This is totally different than the way it was when we built the car the first time.
I wish we had had this much access to the way things were being done in other places 30 years ago.

Do you guys agree?
Rick

 

Yeah, Rick...but it's like with our own cars. In 1979, we built a LEGAL 'A' Street roadster for Baylands 'old time drags' in 2 months.
You and P-Wood built the Eastwood/Barakat car in how long?

And how long now? (my '27 tub is being set up for sheet metal work now, 6 years after I did the '32 frame.)
I feel like the train is at an idle. We were way faster in the '70s and '80s...Do we have an inertia problem? (or do we have to 'restore' every bracket?) Yeah...

 

Mike-
We built the original sedan in 12 weeks.
Now it takes a lot longer to find the right parts and and to "make it like it was".
Also, as a lot of guys have said, life isn't just Hot Rods anymore.
On top of that, add in the cost of doing a '32 today or any pre-48 car and that alone can cause an inertia problem. Unless you have built an early car it is hard to fathom the cost of each and every little item.

I guess this all adds up to why it has taken over a year so far. I am disappointed it's not done yet but on the other hand many great and important things have happened in that same time for ALL the guys that have helped on the project.
Rick

 

Well, Rick...

That amounts to most of it. I recall Pete having access to a wealth of spare '32 stuff then, (my shop was like a '32 wrecking yard!)
Plus, we were 'in the mix' of daily hot rod repair, so were 'geared-up' to do a ch***is, running gear stuff, etc.

I also did engines 'in-house', so it was just a matter of dividing priorities, all within 2500 sqare feet.

Tom Shall was a frequent 'drop-in' visitor to Pete's digs, and mine...
His reports on shop activity were fuel for our fire.

Yes, you have again rallied the troops in this project. Thrilled to read about every step.
Mike

 

Thanks Mike!
Are you in A****er near Merced or the A****er in SoCal?

As with every project little things pop up that are a pain in the ****. Fortunately, while I was talking to Bobby Walden the other day I mentioned a little hole in the cowl vent that someone had drilled for some unknown reason. Bobby said to bring it out and he would fix it while I was there. That is my field trip for this morning. I'll post the finished product this afternoon with some pictures.
Bad picture. If you click on it the hole is more visible.

 

That hole is there to relieve the internal pressure when you break the sound barrier, so your ears won't pop.

 

Bobby can take care of that in a few minutes, no problem. He's one talented dude, and a nice guy to boot.

Maybe you guys can go to lunch in that blown '32 3-window that he had in the shop the day we were there. That car is too cool. Loud and fast comes to mind.......

 

Bobby is quite the wizard. What he can repair/fix in 20 minutes I can screw up in an hour!
As you can see from the pictures, he starts with a plug of the correct diameter and hammers it into place. He then welds it and hammers it into place. He then rough grinds the weld and hammers it into place. He then uses 150 grit for the final finish.

Alex-
As far as lunch goes and having fun, that is for the weekend not weekday.HMMM maybe I should have gone on Saturday.

I picked up the engine today. Looks good. I'll post pictures tomorrow.

 

Rick:

A****er near Merced. Otherwise I would probably have hunted you guys out, and said hello to Pete...
Say, are you fellas gonna come up to Eagle Field next weekend??? (the 19th)

 

Mike-
I would enjoy going to Eagle Field but I have to many distractions now. I'm hoping to get the sedan apart and the frame blasted for this weekend so I can prep for paint.

 

I just finished machining the wheels. All I have to do is drill the bolt pattern and then off to the polisher. For those of you have been following the thread, I'm sure you remember my last experience with machining the magnesium. It took me this long to build up the courage to risk another shop vac.

 

Ha! I damn near set my whole garage on fire polish just one Halibrand about fifteen years ago...

 

That took some intestinal for***ude!

 

The wheels look good! Working with magnesium is pretty dicey. Sometimes, you get lucky, most of the time you don't. I've seen some pretty spectacular flash fires from that stuff in my 30 years of aerospace.
Most shops will not even mess with Mag at all. Is Eric Vaughn going to drill the bolt pattern?

 

No. Eric won't deal with magnesium any more after several fires at his shop. I borrowed a jig from him and did it on my drill press. They are off to the polisher already. By the way, I moved my drill press outside to drill them. It was a pain in the ****, but better safe than sorry.

 

I just got the mufflers in today. What a pain! When I worked in a parts store 38 years (G & H Auto Parts in Alhambra, CA) you could look up mufflers in a catalog by specs. Much harder to do now. These are Hemi mufflers from Walker part number 18339. 2.5 in and 2.5 out. Online and in their catalog it is listed as 2.25 out. At least where I searched. Anyway, one more thing checked off the list.

 

Hemi mufflers.....I remember those were used by alot of guys that wanted to tone down the exhaust noise on their big-block cars back in the day. They worked really well. On the original E&B car, were the mufflers at the end of the exhaust? If so, I figure you can fix that issue with a 2.50 turn-down.

Pulling the body this weekend?

 

Yep the Big Orange Autoparts Store. I grew up going there with my Dad for every thing. They had a fairly competent machine shop in the back.

G&H, Blairs, Husco's and Super Shops pretty much sums them up for my early years.

 

Rick, you are right, trying to find a replacement OE style muffler (or a lot of other parts) now is much more difficult. Now, most of the counter people can't find anything if you don't have year, engine size, with or without AC etc. I dealt with C&L on Valley Blvd, and most of the time when you went in, they didn't even need to look it up, just went in the back and got if for you. Of course, now with some of the aftermarket performance mufflers they are still available by specs. I use Magnaflow a lot.

 

The body is finally off. I'll strip the frame tomorrow and take it to the sandblaster on Tuesday. I can start painting all the small parts now the sedan is apart.

The picture of the inside frame rail is the e-brake handle mount incorporated in the boxing plate.

 

Excellent thread, Rick. I've just read it from the beginning. I'm very happy to see you're going for authenticity in the recreation.

It's great to see so many HAMBers step up and help out this project. Neat stuff.

 

looking good Rick. I could not help but notice the impaler parked in the back ground.,

glad to see you hung on to it all these years......