Projects My 31 Coupe's adventures and re build thread.

Though Id start a bit of a journal for the on going saga and life of my little A model.
A brief history on the car. A friend Adrian, along with a few other guys in a local club here in Melbourne called the Accelerators, went on a US hot rod holiday, where Adrian spotted and purchased this coupe as somewhat going hot rod, back in 05 or 06 from memory.
The coupe arrived in melbourne, i remember going for a spin around the back streets of Kensington with a friend George, with the doors flying open on every bump and the car rattling its arse off, sure had the look though haha.
Adrian had a few things done to it, including some electrical, floor and firewall work, but never really got a chance to get stuck into it, due to owning a few other cars constantly needing his attention. So the car more or less sat in either his, or friends workshops.

I cane about buying the almost by accident or luck. My boss troy and I were at Adrians looking at buying a 34 coupe as our 'Shop car', and we kind of joked around if he'd want to sell the A model or not (not that i had any money!). Fate would have it, The galaxie I had just brought in to tidy up, enjoy for a summer and eventually sell, sold after a week of driving me, and well i kinda dont like money so the coupe literally showed up on the tow truck, as the new owner of the Galaxie was picking it up haha. A house deposit can wait, i want to play hot rods..
This is how the coupe looked. Kind of like a glass eye- looked good but didnt really work as i soon found out.. But it had the look! Genny 32 rails that were pinched and kicked up, 327 with a muncie and a nice chop and channel..


The body looks good in pics, and to be honest i wasnt expecting so much fucking body filler haha. Im a panel beater by trade, and bought the car with the intentions of fixing it all up and into nicer paint..
The first thing on my agenda, was to get the commercial grille off. I sold that which helped pay for the passenger car grille with all the shiny shit.
Heres the some shots Chris Cooper took of it on its maiden voyage to our Club meet/working bee on Des Russells shoebox. I also robbed my shoeboxs (the first of many parts!) Old caps and put them on. Starting to look like my kinda car!



At Carlsruhe Service station.


Then came the shit/fun part. The corners of the quarter panels were split, so i decided id start stripping the paint off. After wire wheeling an even half inch think layer of 100% southern california bondo, the real work began haha.
I have a lot of photos on facebook, but im still a hack at my new computer so will try learn how to post them up later. The decklid that was on the car had a made up inner to suit the outer skin. I bare metalled it to find some pretty average work, so i bought a brookville...Only problem was when went to fit the nice new decklid, it overlapped both quarters at 1/2" haha, which is why the old deck lid was all hacked up. I few blocks of wood and borrowing the porto-power from work helped get the quarters back to shape. Always liked chevy tail lights on coupes, so i fitted these to replace the olds ones that were on it.

Heres A shot of the body after a few weeks of eating filler dust, and the new pipes a friend Mikey sold me. The coupe had great headers on it, but my intentions of driving this coupe more than around the block meant that i needed to fit a full exhaust haha.

I had ten weeks to get this thing at least driveable, as we had planned a road trip to sydney (about a 1200 mile return trip) for motorex, as Des was displaying his bare metal shoebox there. Was good to have such a fucked up deadline!
Every patch panel on the car was just overlapped, so they were all cut off and fixed... During this time, i had some wheels and tires coming over from the states, that were meant to go on my now sold galaxie. Ive always loved straight spoke americans, and it just so happened the Hurst slicks were a good size for my coupe, So i did a bit of trading between my dad, then a little more trading with the gals new owner and wound up keeping these bad boys. A little more saving and i bought a pair of Firestone dirt track front runners.

I really like five spokes!

About three weeks to go, i had the coupe getting closer. Majority of bodywork done, new column and steering in (prior column was joined in the middle, pretty fucking scary looking really haha). Starting to look like a car, was fun taking for test drives before its big trip!

 

Getting it done for the roadtrip was down to the wire, finishing it around midnight, then waking up @ 5 for the big drive. The exhaust was done the day before, a heap of electrical mess was fixed the that week, including putting on a powergen due to the generator overcharging. The little sum bitch made it to sydney without a hitch. Although not without finding a few million more bugs to fix! haha The rear shocks had about 1/8" of travel before bottoming out, so it made for one hard fucking ride haha.. But we made it!

First Service station meet-up. Danny Gigs sweet pickup made the trip also. Temperature was -3 degrees Celcius, fucking cold with no windows and holes everywhere!!!

more of coops shots


We made it! Pictured with Des' shoebox at our seedy hotel haha

Heres a shot Chris thorogood took, on our sunday night cruise through Sydney. just prior to this shot, i lined up against a good friend Andy in his 34 roadster, dumped the clutch and we both took off from the lights, except when i shifted into second i was left holding the shifter haha. after the intial 'holy fuck what do i do now' passed, a few buddies had some vice grips and we were back on the road, ended up driving home with the vice grips, they slipped off a few times which added to the adventure haha.



under the harbour bridge..

 

Awesome, nice pics as well

 

Nice looking car,how much is it chopped?

 

After the sydney trip was done, i got stuck back into refining the car.
First thing was to fix the suspension travel issue. The car at this stage had VERY little steel inside, and with the car bottoming out all the time caused a heap of stress fractures and splits everywhere. the lower quarters were first to go.

I also cut up the trunk floor and lowered it four or so inches to give me a heap more room. The Battery needed a piece of foam on top of it to prevent it from shorting out on the deck lid haha. A smaller new dry cell and dropped right down fixed that.

New lower quarters done!

One more problem i encountered, the rear body mounts had snapped off on the way to sydney, and the way the floor and mounts where set, made it impossible to ever remove the body haha. New mounts were made and one less problem to deal with.

Now, I had exactly three months before my next road trip, except this time it was to Valla beach, about a 17 hour drive north!
We were still working away on our shop coupe, which took up a fair chunk of time as I played a lead roll in the styling of this.
Heres a shot of it basically finished, apart from final ride height..


My main intention for the coupe, was to originally have it painted by Valla, but due to the amount of shit wrong with it, bare metal had to stay. The annual Chopped show was four days after valla, So i had to have the coupe reliable enough to not only make the big road trip, but be able to drive to chopped, get thrashed, and then make it home haha. I had this stupid idea of running a 6x2 setup my boss and I scored, i had exactly 7 days to get the car back on the road at this stage, and chickened out and put my four barrel back on.
But fuck it looks sweet! haha


A little bit more trading and selling stuff, plus trying to save haha, and i had my dream set of wheels. I think i have a fetish or issue with wheels and tyres, but im not complaining!!
I originally bought the rear 16" slicks a few years prior, whilst collecting parts for a 35 pickup, and had them sitting in the attic. The wheels were a special order from wheel vintiques. Now the coupe was starting to look like my kinda car!

The shop coupe, on its maiden voyage from the workshop, to home! IT stayed here due to a blocked fuel tank haha. But the car was exactly what i had built in my head.

In the meantime, between getting our own cars finished, we had a customers car that was to be finished for a street rod run in a beautiful little town called Bright, in victoria. that was four weeks after we got back, and this is how we left it before heading off. This was another car i got to restyle from an ugly as shit street rod into a much nicer looking truck.

In typical fashion, we had both cars finished the night before. I had a few issues with my new wheel and tyre combo, and ended up bolting the steelies back on..
Some more real highway miles!



Both coupes made the journey, around 5000kms in one week, which is pretty damn good, considering the 34 is powered by a '38 flathead and 3spd! The only issue we had was my SBC distributer cap failing, and a blocked carb! which was typical considering i only put the four barrel back on to make it reliable haha..

Nothing much beats an early morning, no traffic and just the road in a hot rod!

 

We swapped cars a few times to break the trip up a bit. Was cool to see my coupe on the road for the first time! I had to drive home with no rear shocks, as i broke one of the mounts on the rear end doing burnouts, made for an interested trip home! every bump would send the rear of the coupe twitching haha..

We drove home, thinking we would stop in sydney which is about 7 hours from valla, with the main reasoning, we wanted to eat some awesome food at a friends resturant haha, When i found out they werent open sunday, we decided fuck it, lets try make the drive in one shot. We left Valla Beach at a leisurely 9:30am, and made it home at 2:30am, driving straight through, only stopping for fuel, food and wee wee stops haha.
I didn't look at the car for the four days leading up to Chopped, which is our best run of the year, put on by a few of the members of my Club, the Eldorados. Friday afternoon i jumped in it and drove the hour or so to Newstead racecourse..all the madness can be seen on the new Mad Fabricators dvd Piero did covering the madness!
Man it was fun giving the coupe a hard time in the dust, then mud!


Now another car that had a big piece of my mind, was our other Shop car, this 56 Ford my boss purchased. Both coupes were kinda put to rest for a few weeks, while we thrashed to get the vicky, the gold pick up and a channeled 34 coupe finished in four weeks.. The five window was another ugly car i had to try make a bit better haha,..

 

We got the little gold pickup done, finishing this and the vicky at 2am before the Bright rod run, guess we do sleep when we're dead!
But the pickup came out pretty damn cool, and even came home with a top ten trophy!

what it usedto look like, pretty sweet rig hey

I had a ball changing this car, a lot of it was on a pretty tight budget.

The 34 five window was also finished for the customer in time, which also came out pretty cool.

it too, had an ugly past.

 

After that month of madness, i started work back on the coupe.
Aaron from Weird-o-pholstery re trimmed my seat for me just before the road trip, which looks cool and is great to sit in.
More rust repairs to the body, and cutting open the A pillars, as when it was chopped, only the outer was re welded, with the inner (the actual structure) left open, causing further stress cracks!

If you hadnt noticed, I also like dimple died holes! haha

I got one doors lower outer patch welded on, and decided to make new inner doors, continuing with my dimple die holes and sixties show/drag, almost weesner-esque haha.
Coming into our summer/xmas, the coupe proved reliable apart from shattering a rear uni-joint two mins from home.
Gotta love a local dead end road for impromptu photos!


My new inner doors. Will have a rolls and pleated insert in the gap.

like this!

At our work christmas break up party. My bosses 2 year old son is getting brainwashed early!


Over the christmas break, i had two weeks off, and decided that i would pull the coupe apart once more, to finally Steel out the front of the car. At this stage, the steering column was mounted only to the dash, which had no framework whatsoever. But first, Good friend andy flew down from syd, to see an aussie band called the Living end play in melbourne. We had decided to shout ourselves an xmas gift and use one of those discount hotel websites, which landed us a cheap as hell two nights in a 5 star hotel called the Windsor, which is super fancy and accross from our parliment house. Bet they'd never thought they would valet a bare metal A model coupe hahaha. Was a fucking pisser watching a very well mannered, well dressed older gentlemen try climb in the coupe and drive off

The two weeks after that weekend are almost a blur, getting up a 7, working til 1-2am everyday trying to get it finished in time, for the Kustom Nats, which is a week after new years day.
This photo was taken around 3pm the day before. Americans probably dont have zooper doopers i dont know, but when its 45 degrees Celsius in the shed, they are awesome! haha

Yet another late as hell night in the shed, and the coupe was back together, with the front now all steeled out, plus a bunch of other shit sorted out. Man the coupe drove so much better!


You dont often get the chance to drive around one of the worlds best GP tracks!

 

My old galaxie payed me a visit a few days after the nats, such a sweet car! Am lucky that it lives only a few doors up the road now. Hauls ass, with a worked 390 and gear vendors o/d c6.


Decided to have another crack at getting the car to work with the white wall slicks. Played with tire pressures for a while and eventually got it set pretty good..

At the victorian hot rod show, with club mate Rhys and his sweet 34 tudor.

And took advantage of our summer nights!

One of my longtime friends TJ, is a pretty awesome up and coming sign painter here in melb, and needed a car to paint something on, for a short film being made on him. i gave him my coupe as a blank canvas, and we decided to temporarily call it 'mas chignon', Suits the car well! Bit of history in the name, as it is also the name of an album from one of our favourite bands, blazing haley, which we used to listen to a fair bit before starting a band of our own years ago..

]

 

Basically left the coupe as it was for a few months, but in the past month decided its time to take it to the next level.
I had my shoebox on a body rotisserie, so i put it all back together, managed to take a couple shots of the two cars together haha.

I then started on the last few aesthetic things i wanted to change. The first being dropped the headlight bar two inches.



Some late night donuts on the way home from our monthly club meet. You americans dont know what you are missing out on, round-a-bouts can be awesome!


the next day, it was on! a couple friends, some KFC and we had it all apart, with some sweet poses too haha

 

Cool hot rod

 

and this is where i basically am at! The frame is now at work, and on hold til i can afford to get stuck into it, have decided to re do all the cross members, just need to save some cash!!

Basically, i have cut out all the shit that annoyed me on the car. Have now moved the fuel tank closer to the rear seat and across, which let me mount the battery next to the tank, giving me a heap more room. To make it look a bit neater, i am making a little trunk which opens and closes for access to the tank and battery, plus a little tool tray that will bolt on top of the tank.
More dimple died holes too! haha


Oh and the vicky has progressed too, late last year not long after we got it going, i was driving to a club mate/hambers wedding when i had a nasty fuel fire...
Have spent a fair chunk of time re doing it all how i originally visioned it. Hoping the car will look like something Larry watson would have built in the late fifties, with a slightly exaggerated stance of course



Will try keep this updated as i go along with the coupe and all the other stuff i get to play around on!

 

Cool Car,Cool Thread!

 

Bad ass! That's all I have to say

 

Great thread, thank you for taking the time to post your experiences with us. The fun and adventures of hot rodding, that's what it's all about. Looks like you and your friends are enjoying yourselves. Nice ride.

I dig the Aceholes decal in the front window!

 

Nice work

 

Awesome pics, awesome cars. Nice job.

 

Amazing pictures!

Model A's are #1 in my books!

 

KOOL COUPE, great story! GOOD LUCK on the rebuild.....the 56 looks killer too!

 

Very cool story, car/cars and some great pictures!
Going to keep an eye on you!

 

Good stuff man. I really like the Olds caps. Those look like Instagram pics, no?

 

Neat. Enjoyed your story and car a bunch. Gary

 

Most enjoyable read. Subscribed.

 

cool cars ,that 56 is F'n sweet Thanks for the pics.

 

Thanks for sharing...I'm subscribed! Great looking coupe! You guys are really doing it right over there!

 

Wow,you do some really nice work. I really like door panels and trunk panels in the coupe. looks badass. I want to do something similar in my model A.

 

The truck came from my home town when it was ugly! Everyone used to say "Did you see the Hot Rod" around town? I would just smile, nod and try not to tell everyone it was a street rod heap of shit. The coupe looks awesome and I vote for the chromies. The Synx is a great young Auto trimmer for a hobo!!

 

Great photo story, I loved that you keep re-inventing the look with different wheels- what are those fullsize hubcaps off, are they 15 inch? Tony.

 

"Mas Chingon" I didn't know they have Chicanos down under? BROWN!!!

 

I Enjoyed the Ride Along.............Many Thanks for

Posting,

Loved all The Photos !
Kool Works



smokey2