Projects Austin Somerset Gasser Build (DragNasty)

After double checking all the measurments, we set about welding the spring perches up.



When they were complete, we squared them up on the crossmember plate, double checked the measurements and welded them solid.



You may have noticed we also added a backing plate to the perches. This will help us ensure the springs are aligned and assist in keeping them in place.

 

If there has been any confussion on the direction of this new suspension design, the next few photos should answer all of them.















I am really happy about the old school look and I really think it is going work well. The only thing left is to square up the crossmember and weld it to the top of the frame on the wheel arches (as shown above). Then fab mounts with shackles for the housing...more to come...

 

Cool choice for an axle car, gonna be a handful with a bbc and a stick. I vote primer gray and a 60s hood scoop. Flaming skull graphics made me barf a little. Cheesy names are just that...let that rowdy bbc speak for the car.

I dig the cragars, wiping the 'hoosier' off the sidewalls is a good call.


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Agreed on the flaming skull...too much! But I really like the old school names on race cars. I am going to leave it. Besides I own the domain name. It must be pretty popular because I have had 20 or 30 people try to purchase the domain while it has been parked.



It's not like I am going to build a bright orange car and call it "Pulp Friction" or anything...LOL!

 

Go man, GO!

Really dig this build.

One quibble though.

You are gonna have to beef up those spring mounts you just fabbed, or the springs will twist it all to crap when you launch the car that first time.

It's not just vertical load you gotta absorb, but also the large torque load that the spring will apply to the mount as the suspension tries to flatten out the spring pack when weight transfers rearward.

I'm sure you already realize this, but just in case, I thought I'd say something, 'cause what you've got built there right now ain't gonna cut it.

I say "I'm sure you realize this", because all the other mounts and such you've done thus far have been hell for stout and well thought out. I might have done the ladder bars a bit differently, but that's just the engineer in me being nit picky.

Like the Cragars too. Don't see them enough around here IMO.

 

Yes your are correct. The perches and cross member (as shown) are put together to get them in place on the chassis so we can mock up the shackles on the housing. The cross member will be strengthened with a horizontal brace from perch to perch which will aid in the twisting factor.



The ends of the above ad on brace will be tied to orginal frame and the roll cage as well. Plus underneath both perches have a .25" plate triangular gussett that is 4" across.

 

I figured you had it in hand, just wanted to be sure.

On more than one occasion, I myself have made a bonehead maneuver right in the middle of an otherwise stellar project. lol So I know it CAN happen.

 

Subscribed xxx

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WAY TO GO RYAN! I just noticed all the photos from this build thread are finally back. Thanks for all the hard work. I will start back with the updates. I have a lot to catch you guys up on over the past year!

 

We have a lot of catching up to do now that this thread is back up and working. So after the quarter elliptic spring mounts were welded on, the old car was finally sitting on its own for the first time. My headers showed up so I decided to change ends for a while and play around with them. HEADERS. What a pain!

So I have to have fender well headers, right? I mean there is no way around it. If it were a Tri-Five or Nova, one could just order a set right off the shelf. Furthermore, if it were any number of full sized cars, the Tri-Five stuff would probably fit. But remember this is a Austin and those things would be more than a foot too wide. I had basically relegated myself to either building a custom set or having them built when I hit the Maple Leaf Festival Car Show in Carthage, MO.

There was a 32 Ford Roadster there with a big block Chevy wearing an interesting set of headers. I struck up a conversation and found out they were from Sanderson. After doing some measuring at the show it was obvious they were nearly perfect. Austin Somerset Fenderwell Headers right off the shelf! Almost...



Here is what Sanderson says about them: CBR101 outside chassis Roadster header is designed for narrow 1927-34 chassis with excellent wheel clearance. Furnished with 26" mufflered turnouts that slip over the header collectors. Other optional turnout lengths are available.

Engine : Big Block Chevy 396-502 - Primary Tube Diameter : 1-7/8" - Collector Diameter : 3½"
Weight : 48 Lbs / 21.8 Kg - 16-Gauge Primary and Collector Tube Thickness - 3/8" Thick Flange
Patented Flange Design Requires NO Gaskets - Tightest Fitting Header Available Anywhere!
Made in the USA



Remember, I said "ALMOST"! You probably noticed the headers on the car don't exactly look like the Sanderson photo from their website. Well they did when I took them out of the box. As Maxwell Smart used to say, "Missed it by that much!" They fit nearly perfectly except for where they turned back under the car. We missed it by about an inch or so. They were too short. SOoooo....as you can see in the above photo I cut them off in the area on the down sweep where all four pipes were together (same as when they went into the collector). That's right, something you hate to hear in the same sentence (Sanderson and Cut). But I chucked them up in the vice like they were used drain pipes and whacked them off (Dad about had a heart attack)! Then I cut the collector off and with a bit of careful grinding got the ends out of it with enough space left to stick it back on and weld it up.





The one on the right is finished and the left still in rough weld. I am really happy with them. I ordered a 3.5" mandrel bent 60 degree elbow to turn them to the back. Then they are off to Joplin, MO for ceramic coating and polishing. Now was that so hard? LOL!

 

Buy the way, something interesting about Sanderson Headers. When I tried to just initially bolt them up I found they would not fit flush. The flange was hitting the lower head bolts. I called Sanderson and told them what was going on and they said, "You must have ARP head bolts." I said me and anyone else that just built a high performance engine. They said their "High Performance Headers were designed for use with stock head bolts." GO FIGURE. Not that it matter since I had already butchered them up anyway, but after it was all said and done, I also had to grind on the flanges to make them fit!

 

Pretty common thing for most maker's headers to not clear ARP, or any head bolt that's more than stock. My BBC is using ARP stud kit, and I really had to grind the flanges to clear the nuts on the heads.

 

The roll cage has been a trip. It started as a very simple plan for a basic hoop with a couple of runners down to the rear frame area. Then it expanded a bit to a six point cage with a planned hoop up front around the "A" pillar posts and across. We bent it all up and tacked it in place. It looked amazing. In fact, it looked and fit so well that I put the hard weld to it and we moved on to other issues.

However, and I hate to admit it, the cage sat all winter untried until we were getting ready to start sheet metal work on the interior a couple of months ago. At that point, I put the racing seats in place to wrap up the racing belts mounting points etc. I sat in the car and found the "leg" on the main hoop (at my left shoulder) made it nearly impossible (at least comfortably) to set in the seat and do simple things like steer!

So out came the plasma cutter and grinder and out came the cage. With some very careful planning not to mention trying the race seats about every 3 minutes, this is how it ended up.




Counting the runners that complete in the engine compartment it is officially a 14 point cage. It is hard to tell from the photos, but most of the cage is tucked into the "A" and "B" Pillar post areas, over the door area and then right at the roof. Even with that many bars running around, you basically have to stick your head in the car to see 80 percent of it.

 

There's an old A40 Austin van sitting under a tree a few suburbs from here, been there for years now. I've always thought of dropping in and seeing what the owners were doing with it. Perfect gasser material after reading this

 

Oh man that would be wild. I was originally looking for an A40 of that model...(a Dorset) to build a gasser. During the search I stumbled across the Somerset. But that thing would awesome!

 

Before Bruce sees this and gets on your case again I have to ask why the side bar rolls down where it intersects the first of the two main hoops and, apart from the two overhead tubes, what connects the second main hoop to the first? Rather than the two longitudinal bars, a diagonal in the top would have been better and more in line with what is required for certification in the faster classes even it it is not required at your performance level. A tighter radius bend would also have helped keep the main hoops further away from the driver's head although it is a little hard to see from the photographs how much roof clearance is available to do that.

Roo

 

There are several pieces of the cage that are still not installed. They are cut and fitted but because I need to do crucial structural interior work on the rear window areas they are not in place. They connect the middle and rear hoops around the side areas but just above the window line. I am trying to build as safe a cage as possible but if I am really honest, it is as much about aesthetics as anything else.

 

So while sitting in the driver's seat this Winter and making car noises something became very apparent to me. The straight gate 5 speed Hurst shifter was going to be a real pain in city driving. It was obviously going to be killer running through the gears, but coming back up, that is another question. You have to stick two fingers in that loop device and pull up and the lift the shifter back in place all the way up the tree!



While watching me play, Dad came up with a great idea:



We built a nice handle out of roll bar tubing, filled the end and put a bracket on the other side to mount to the shifter lever. Then we took a busted 1/4 drive ratchet handle and fabricated a lift bar for the upshift device. It works like a charm. Now you just reach and squeeze...it is a killer addition! Believe it or not, I got that vintage looking (albeit 5 speed) ball from Amazon.com!

 

Subscribed - not a huge gasser fan normally, but this has piqued my interest from the start. Love the build!! keep going (I know it's too late, but I vote for radiused wheel wells)

 

Thanks. The radius has always been in the plan, but the car has such a great line running through the rear quarter area and currently the tires all tuck right up inside. So JUST FOR NOW...I have not cut them yet. Eventually I will but for right now, I have plenty of custom body mods to take care of with out causing more! LOL!

 

Man, Your car looks great. Cool to see these orphan cars being built. Are there any other options for a scoop on those carbs? That is the one thing that looks out of place to me. Maybe more of a Hilborn looking piece would work. Or a two piece Cal Custom unit.

 

How cool would that van be!!!
Kinda like the Dog Catcher Willis drag panel.
Always liked the A40's, but every time I see one I have mixed emotions about them.
When I was about 17 (1971ish) I drug home a pretty nice parts car, basically the remains of of a guys drag race project after he cherry-picked everything. I had no place to carry out my dream of building my first race car, so I sold it to an older dude here in town, and this will really kill you guys; was just wanting what I paid for it, 40 dollars, and guess what, the guy never paid me for it.

 

Also over the winter we knocked out the pedals and steering column. I have said it before but this project is like setting up dominoes. In a car where room is at a minimum, there are so many things that have to happen in order it is ridiculous. We couldn't set up the pedals and steering until several issues were settled including: Where the headers ended up, how the lower firewall was placed, where the seat ended up (both left to right and front to back)...etc. etc. etc.! The loud pedal came from Speedway. The brake pedal and master cylinders and Clutch Pedal and cylinder came from JEGS! I put the exclamation mark there because when you say JEGS you are supposed to say JEGS! Right?



It is a little hard to tell from the photo, but that entire unit is bolted in (Clutch, Brake and Loud Pedal). The front portion literally drops down into the area to the floor pan. It has been very handy to simply grab the entire unit and move it out or in etc. After everything was in place and we were happy, there was plenty of room to keep all the reservoirs inside the car and complete the lower firewall.

 

BTW--I think it was a 48, weren't they a carryover body style for a few years?

 

Agreed. I have tried several looks, including a (Two Lane Blacktop mailbox scoop):




Still playing around BUT SPOILER ALERT! - Last week we sort of switched classes from A-Gas to AA-Gas! That's right, there is new Weiand 6-71 on its way!!!

 

The Steering column pieces also came from JEGS! including the steering wheel.
1 - solid .75" steel steering rod
2 - weld on universal joints
1 - one standard Heims end
1 - firewall .75" column bearing mount
1 - .75" weld on vega steering box shaft end
1 - very cool steer column mount arm
1 - quick release steering wheel mount and weld on end.
1 - wooden steering wheel with blacked out center
Grand total just under $250.00





Here is a great tip that I got here on the HAMB...after spending a couple of hundred bucks on column pieces drop by Lowes and spend $6 more. I picked up a 3/4" dowel rod and put the whole column together with it first. Then after all the cutting and changing and angle finding I simply took the wooden rod pieces out, cut the steel to match each and welded it all together.

We also worked pretty hard on the sheet metal transmission tunnel. I really hate sheet metal work! It took several attempts to get a design in place that looked cool and was functional etc. That might be an understatement! In reality, the sheet metal scrap pile outside the shop from this endeavor looks like a Cessna crash site! LOL!

 

We installed the radiator this winter as well. It is a high performance aluminum radiator also from JEGS with Derale High-Output Dual Fans worth more than 4,000 CFM. The fans are pullers and came in their own shroud. I have had them in boxes just waiting around for almost a year. We unpacked them and discovered the fans in their supplied shroud were about 1" too wide for the radiator. So we built our own sheet metal version.



While we were at it, we killed two birds with one stone, designing a custom mounting system into the sides of the shroud with heavy 1" square tubing.



I did not snap a photo before it was installed but basically on the sides (inside the shroud) are two upright 1" square tubing pieces welded solid to the frame rails. Our new home made shroud also allowed us to stagger the fans. Take a look below, when the hood is closed we still have almost .75" of clearance...

 

I was just noticing, it has been a while since I had a teaser photo of the whole car, it has been a long winter! I am currently putting together the photos etc. from the tilt front end build and I will have them up soon. We had a nice day back in February so we shoved her out to catch some rays and snapped a few photos.

 

Did a wiki search, some interesting stuff on these cars, never sure though on the accuracy of "facts" from Wikipedia.
Question:
The name Devon, does it have anything to do with Devonshire, I suspect it does, just have not researched it.

 

Austin,s County cars were named after counties in England.