Technical can you help with a '49 shoebox measurement?

Brand spanking newbie here hoping to tap into the knowledge pool. Bottom line: I need to find out the measurement from the center radiator mounting bracket hole to the front axle/spindle centerline on a '49 business coupe.

Background - my teenage son talked me into starting a frame-off resto-mod of my highschool car. It hasn't run since 1995, and had a Buick 350 and TH400 because as a broke kid that's what I had access to. Now I can do this project like an old guy with a checkbook and we're going whole hog. Body off the frame, cut the frame right before the bulges for the shocks & control arm, new stubs and a Mustang 2 style front end as the first step. Due to a couple of mistakes and mishaps, we fear we have lost the precise marking for the front axle. We know we have the center radiator mount bolt hole precisely. We need to see if someone has or could measure the front to back distance from the radiator mount hole to the transverse centerline of the front spindles.

one other reference point we know we have perfectly is the place that the body braces in front of the firewall connect to the top of the frame rail just where the frame levels out behind the cross member. The distance from there forward to the axle center would be fine as well.

My thanks in advance... I hope to be a productive member of the community and I'll start a build thread shortly.

 

I can’t help as we made a custom independent front for our 49 coupe,clipping the big bulges off , the numbers are not set in stone . As an idea can you bolt the front clip on and centre the wheels in the fender . When it looks right the get an accurate measurement from a known point on the frame on either side . The as a final check square up the wheel base accurately

 

Thanks for the reply. with the body off the frame, getting a fender to check before welding the crossmember in is going to be a real bear! We have a measurement, but I'd love it if someone was able to throw a tape on their car and give us another data point.

 

See if you can find a frame measurement chart from a body shop,They have them for doing frame straightening,try ebay i see them on there sometimes,or find a old bodyshop that might have some of the old books left.They would work for what you need.

 

Good advice, thanks. I did find the technical data sheet from Ford for the model year, but it doesn't list any of these measurements. I may end up having to split the difference and just deal with it if I get the centerpoint off by 1/4"

 

if anybody has the book "How to Build Shoebox Fords/Mercurys 1949-1954" I understand the dimensions I need are in there. it wpuld take me a while to get a copy. The green bible does not have any dimension that references the centerpoint of the front spindle