Projects Building a Tube Chassis for my '36 Ford Sedan

Ryan , Thanks for explaining your suspension geometry , my understanding only goes as far as Sprintcars so I soaked all this up with glee ...

I have a picture in my mind of a disgruntled Porshe owner , complaning about the Madman taking him on the outside in some outdated ****** Hotrod !

Looking forward to video of your first track day !

 

Damn, that looks nice...

 

I was too, but between when I started this project and now, Gateway has closed its doors, so I'm not sure where I'll actually find a track to put it on. It may only ever see parking lots in anger. Mores the pity.

Hopefully I'll find a place to run it though. Everyone enjoys ruining a Porsche owner's day.

Thank you sir.

I did a little happy dance when the tires touched down for the first time.

 

That's flat *****in! I hope you find the time to finish it cause it's gonna be a riot.

Engineering type question: how much strength is in those two bars that run on top of the backbone? I was hoping to accomplish the same geometric shap in my car but I was going to tie the crossmembers front to back with sheetmetal.....I got a pullmax and I figured I could hammer some ribs into it and form a pretty strong spine. The crossmembers will go up and over the trans, like a floor brace in a muscle car. Does that make sense?

 

Any time that you can spread out the geometry (or add al***ude, for lack of a better phrase), you increase the stiffness of a given shape.

Having those two tubes that form the drive shaft tunnel 8" higher than the floor pan bars greatly increases the stiffness of that section in vertical bending (along the fore/aft axis of the ch***is). Having a pair of dead straight bars running from the motor plate tower back and landing on the kickups would be the stiffest possible design, but then there's no place for the driver to live.

Basically, any time you can increase the section height (or width if you're trying to fight lateral bending in the horizontal plane), you increase the stiffness and load carrying capacity of the structure.

Doing that with a stressed sheet metal skin can be just as effective as if you'd done it with tubing. Formula 1 cars were made from stressed sheet metal monocoques from the middle 1960's up until the carbon fiber revolution in the early 1980's. The key with stressed skins is joint design and corner/bend/shape transition geometry. Sheet metal is very weak in one plane, and very strong in the other two, so you must bear that in mind when doing your design layouts.

Some Cobra kit cars use a ch***is with a central backbone constructed like this as well.

If you pay attention to the joints and watch your geometry, you should do fine with a stressed skin in place of the driveshaft tunnel tubes.

Find a copy of Carrol Smith's "Tune to Win" and "Engineer to Win", and commit them both to memory. He spends many pages in both on the proper design of stressed skin structures and the riveted joint (solid bucked rivets, not blind pop rivets).

Eventually, when I get the body hung, I will build a cage to fit the body shape, which will tie into the motor plate tower in the front and where the spring mount tube meets the kickups on either side in the rear. This will allow the stress from the motor plate tower to flow into the A-pillar bars, up into the roof halo, and then back down into the rear kickups through the rear down tubes, tying the whole ch***is and crash cage into a single unitized structure.

I just couldn't build any of that stuff until I had the body in place to measure to.

 

Just stumbled across this thread, very cool, when I get some chores done i'm gonna have a good read thru it. It will be good to see something different from the traditional stuff.

 

Man that is nice ! Wish I had the talent to fab up a ch***is that nice!

 

It's for sale.

You can have this one, and I'll build another.

 

I really like your frame. How long before we see the body mocked-up on it? It could be a good Mexican rally car, too! Gary

 

Depends on what comes up in the mean time. If things stay slow, it might only be a couple of months.

It might be a little low for a rally car. Ground clearance is only 6".

Also, I don't know about you guys, but I ain't setting foot in Mexico until about six months AFTER the chaos is over (just to be sure it's really over).

When gringos are getting kidnapped and murdered in Cancun, it can't really be considered a "vacation destination" anymore. If Cancun is getting that wild, imagine what the hinterlands are like.

No thank you, sir.

 

Really you shouldn't call that a ch***is.

Its a work of art!!!!!!!!!

 

Thank you, but I don't know if I'd go that far.

I am pretty happy with how it turned out though.

 

very impressive, I have had a nova road race car rattling around in my head for a while and this build reflects a ton of what I had in mind. I am glad you posted this on this forum, although out of the norm for the hamb, I enjoyed it throughly because it got me thinking and motivated.

The Norm gets very boring after a while, I wish more people on here would think outside of the box.

 

Wery beautiful work

 

Thank you both.

 

that is some way cool set up. great work cant wait to see it complete, bob

 

Thank you, sir.

 

Any new progress?

 

The ch***is was for sale in the cl***ifieds ages ago...my guess would be that it was sold...

 

Yes, it was somewhat disappointing to not see this one carried out to completion. I had my doubts as to the whole projects feasability and it seems I was correct.

 

I wish.

I still have it and the body, but I haven't done anything else to them (to speak of).

Ran out of money for the time being, so this project needed to set for a while.

I'd sell it if I could get a decent offer, but if not, it'll just set here and wait for me to get back to it.

As they say, "It ain't eatin' anything."

Never give up!

Though, a slight pause may become necessary from time to time . . .

 

Way to cheerlead for failure, BTW.

Cl***y move.

 

Sad to hear that, but happy if it gets done somewhen.

 

I have been wondering what had happened with this, especially after a 'similarly inspired' truck build has been on here. Would love to see this finished, but i'm sure you would too!

 

Not at all. It just seems the whole tube ch***is and other stuff as described seems a little off in left field.

However, it would be interesting to see if it all came together.

It's just life that sometimes these projects become too complex and are not carried through to completion.

It would be great to see this one done and to see your ideas work.

 

I would love to see this come together...in a greedy kind of way I hope it doesnt sell so I can see it progress!!

 

Your explination didnt take away anything from your nasty remark.

And it was way off base anyway.

You have no accurate way of judging the time or money somebody else has available to him ( fortunately...)

What you do have ( or would have if you would have been paying attention ), is the skill and knowledge Coolhand has.


I see no reason why this project couldnt be finished, if Coolhand can fit it in with his other priorities...

 

Someone started a thread on tube ch***is a couple days ago and it reminded me of this thread. I brought it back up to see how it was moving along, sorry to the OP for the drama.

 

Tube ch***ised cars have been around for a long time. I believe Dragmasters made a tube ch***is for the street back in the 60's. And there was a tube ch***ised car from the mid 60's posted on a thread not long ago.

Sure they're a little more work than your basic rectangle frame, but they sure are neat!

Dragmaster from 1964.
Larry T

 

Yes, Dragmaster did a T-bucket kit in the mid-sixties. There was another period photo of a tube ch***is T-bucket in Hot Rod Deluxe a while back.