Folks Of Interest Clutch Popper Wednesdays

Hey Lee, its hard to see in the pic taken from the roof, but do you even have a taillight on the roadster? It kinda doesn't look like it. You rebel. What would Jonny Depp say.

 

It was a blast for sure. Rather cold on the way home though!

Yea the only shitty thing about Bucas Pasta is Johnny wasnt there to pay the bill haha

It sure does have a taillight! I've just got a 52 Chevy taillight under the rear valence for now, until I find some cool taillights.
And I'm pretty sure Johnny Depp would be jealous.

 

My bad. Keep up the Awesomeness. The roadster looks great by the way.

 

looks awsome and sounds great ..enjoy

 

So tonight we figured we would try the old New West one last time. We all hopped in the roadster and cruised down.
It was pretty empty inside, which is not normal.
To our surprise the special was Parmesan Chicken Spaghetti, which sounded pretty good so we all ordered it. When the waitress brought it out she was complaining how hot the plates were because they were in the microwave! The microwave? Really?
It tasted like chef boyardee with a chunk of chicken breast.
Needless to say, I think were done with the New West. It's to bad, I really like it there. Maybe Burger King still has their Wednesday Wopper deals.

Anyways, enough about food, back at the shop we had a few maintenance items to take care of on the roadster.
Last night I was going across town to have supper at my moms house, and just before her exit off of the freeway, my fuel line started leaking out of the fuel pump.
I tried to tighten the fitting up when I got to her house, but it only got worse. I had to leave my shoes outside as they reeked of gas!
I wrapped a rag around it for the drive home, and it slowed it down enough it stopped spraying on my feet.
So that was item number one on the checklist.


Dave got busy making a new fuel line, while Johnny tightened up a headlight that was loose, and I started some wiring that still needed to be done.



The headlight didn't take very long, so Johnny dug out my new generator and voltage regulator that Brant (Cali Kid) and his dad Dave Ingles rebuilt for me down in Calgary and brought up to the last Red Deer swap meet for me.
Thanks again guys!




Johnny took my old generator off and pulled the pulley off to swap on to the new one, and I started mounting the regulator.


We ran some wires, and hooked everything up and it all looked good, so we hooked the battery back up.
Thats when we had smoke and sparks and the wires coming out of my brand new SW amp gauge litterly melted away!
Once all the smoke cleared we removed the burnt wires, and hooked it all up again bypassing the gauge. Hooked the battery back up, and no smoke! So I guess my new SW gauge is a dud. Thanks Stewart Warner! I read all about their problems with the new "Made in Mexico" gauges after I bought them, but it was too late then, so I just hoped for the best. I'm not impressed haha. But the Tach I wired up earlier in the night works!





So anyways, we fired the car up, polarized the generator, and then unhooked the battery to see if was charging. It died...
We double checked everything, tried it again, and it died.
Thats when we called it a night. Tomorrow I will drive over to see my friend Badge, who is an automotive electrical whiz. I'll see if he can figure it out. If not, Joe at Joes Electric can make it work! In the meantime, I'll just do what I've been doing everynight when I park it, hook the trickle charger up to it

I let Johnny and Dave each take the car for a cruise around the neighborhood while I cleaned up the shop to make room for a 68 Mustang a customer dropped off tonight. They each put their fare share of work in to it, the least I can do is let them take it for a rip.

It doesnt seem like we got a lot done from the pictures, but we did get a bit of stuff fixed, and the car is one step closer to being finished.
Fuel leak is fixed.
Headlight is fixed.
Tach is wired up.
New Generator is on.
Regulator is on.
Charging system is all wired (except the gauge).
And Dave even had time to paint the chrome headlight ring black so it matches the other side.
It was a good night, and very relaxing as all three of us were having a pretty busy and stressful week so far.

 

Pretty Kool! Good Updates!

 

Thanks for the update Lee. Looks like you are getting really close.

 

RIP New West.

Good news for the most part about your roadster. Your experience with the ammeter is why so many rodders are going with voltmeters now.

 

Well it's finally time for some T-Bagger Coupe action!
Tonight Johnny and I went over to Harveys for a burger before getting started on the coupe.
Dave had to work late and couldn't join us until around 9:30, however we had another guest tonight to pick up Daves slack. His name is Darryl.

We started off by pulling the o'l 283 off the engine stand and bolting up the 4 speed to it so we could start mocking up the engine mounts.






With the engine sitting roughly where it should, we went to fit the cowl to check firewall clearance. Of course it did not fit, especially with a 4" Z and a 4" channel.
So out came the firewall!




With everything sitting level and square I tacked the motor mounts in place.


We then went out back and dug up a 35 - 40 X member and trimmed it to fit. Sounds easy when typing it all out, but it took a few hours with the tape measure and sharpie before any trimming was done.
Johnny has a 39 - 40 pedal assembly, which should work pretty good in here.
The X member will have to be modified a bit for the clutch pedal to drop all the way down.






Dave showed up just before we decided to clean up (perfect timing) so Johnny and I threw the cowl on to give dave a rough idea of what it's gonna look like.







Anyways, hope you all enjoyed!

 

Dave looks unimpressed. I think it looks cool.

 

Cool! I love T coupes.

 

"Building a T coupe is like putting 10lbs of shit in a 5lbs bag" - Johnny Phillips

 

Haha! Only 10lbs?

 

that thing looks cool already.

 

I'm just unimpressed that I had to work late and missed all the action.....

 

Yo Dudes! So Wednesday night has come and gone again! Once again we were short one member again, as Johnny had to go to another big wig corporate steak diner all the way in Toronto!
Dave and I decided to try the Yellowhead Inn for supper tonight, so we hopped in the roadster and cruised on over.
For those not familiar with the Yellowhead Inn, it's a popular stop for truckers on their way through town. It's also famous for their real shitty strip club! On my 18th Bday my friend took me there, and since then I've had no interest in strip clubs at all! It's that bad!
So for supper I had the Texas Burger, which looked great, but tasted disgusting! Dave had liver and onions,which he says "tasted like deep fried cardboard."
The restaurant did not have the "greasy spoon" feel that we enjoy so much. Instead it reminded us of a food court in a mall. And for some reason it stunk like urinal cakes? Maybe it's from all the cleaning chemicals in the strip club? I dunno.


Back at the shop we got started on the fleetline. Well actually Dave is on holidays, so he was working on it most of the day. If you remember from last time we were having issues fitting the rear bumper.
Today Dave busted out the zip discs and the welder and made it fit!










While he was doing that. I got started on the windshield. One side was good, but the other side had a crack, and Dave happened to have a replacement for it, and a brand new rubber. Always got use a brand new rubber!



So I started taking the old glass out to replace the seal. And thats when things went shitty. I cracked the good glass! Damn!
So that put an end to that. Dave is going to phone around tomorrow and see if by chance he can get some new glass locally, if not an order will have to be placed at o'l Bobs Auto Glass in Washington.
But while the windsheild was out, I cleaned up some minor surface rust that was starting and gave it a good coat of Zinc primer.






After that I put the new rubber in and placed the old glass on top and taped it in to keep the weather out until the new glass arrives.


I don't know if it's readable, but the glass says "Installed by Dirty Daves Used Auto Glass" Dirty Dave is cheap!


And this side says "Pre Skool Rodz Approved!"



Right about then our friend Sasha showed up. Sasha Matic is a local photographer who has been coming by every Wednesday for the last 2 months and taking photos of us and the cars at the shop. I don't know why I haven't posted them up yet. Maybe I will one day when I'm bored. Their pretty rad.
Anyways Sasha wanted to do a little photo shoot with Dave and the Fleetline, followed by me with the roadster, so we had to stop working, and pretend to be rockstars for a few hours. It was actually kind of fun.





We even uncovered the 348!








Until next Wednesday.... Keep er' shiny side up!

 

Man you guys are running out of greasy spoons on that end of town your going to have to start packing a lunch

As always thanks for the update.

 

Yea the greasy spoons just ain't around like they used to be. There is few cool ones in this end of town I have lunch at sometimes, but they're only open until late afternoon unfortunately.

And another update, Dave just called me and he found a windshield from a local supplier for $350!! Should be here in about a week

 

That's a pretty cool group you've got. Cool cars and guys to hang out with that appreciate and help each other out.
I wish I had friends like yours. All my friends are so worried about getting their hands dirty. It pisses me off. I'm going to have to dig around and see if I can get my own greasy spoon club going.

 

you guys don't appear to be having any fun at all. maybe hire a clown or something...i dunno. actually, you all need to realize you're doing some killer shit in that shop, and living the dream- i am stoked for you guys, and wish i had something like that going on in my world right now. I am stashing parts for a chassis these days with no garage, so for those of us in my predicament, make us proud and take full advantage of your situation like a good gearhead would! looks like that's the case, so keep it up ya'll

 

Sounds like you need to find some like minded friends!
It's hard to build cars if you don't want grease under your finger nails.

I hoarded parts for 5 years before starting on my roadster. It takes time. One day when you find a garage it will all fall in to place. Johnny just has a little one car garage with a dirt floor, and Dave doesn't even have a garage!

 

Okay so tonight's episode, the $130 interior.
I had a seat frame in the roadster, but never got to the actual seat part yet. For the time being I was rocking a couch cushion and a yoga mat my sister left in my truck after I helped her move.
Needless to say, it was
a) uncomfortable,
b) looked like shit, and
c) Fred was not impressed the couch was short one cushion!





So we started off the night by hoping in my 64 F-100 and taking a little cruise over to fabric land for some foam and material.


Yep 3 dudes in a fabric store... pretty gay


After about 45 minutes of trying to translate to the asian lady helping us, we finally got out of there with the foam and vinyl. This part cost $94. But thanks to the asian lady selling me a $13 fabric land membership, I saved "Fity Five Dollar!"
This was kind of akward now, as it was raining, and I have a buick straight 8 in the back of my truck that fell over spilling oil, so I didn't really want to put the foam in the back of the truck.


Next stop was Rona where we picked up some cut off plywood for the seat back. This part cost $6
Riding Wood!


Last stop on our journey was Tokyo Express!
For 3 rice bowls and some California rolls came to $30. This was the total for the $130 interior.




Back at the shop, Johnny got started cutting the plywood for the seat back, and I started cutting foam for the seat bottom.






Here is the seat bottom installed.


A little wrinkly but I'm happy considering this is my first time doing anything more than wrapping door panels. It can't always be perfect first time around!


Doing the seat back now.


Johnny and I having a smoke break and trying out the new seat. Yes were smoking in my new interior, what a shame.


Somehow during our translations we ended up with WAY more material than we needed, so we decided to make up some side panels.




And in keeping with our Asian theme for the night, Steevil decided to join us. Here he is showing Dave the fist full of tickets the local police gave him yesterday for enjoying his hot rod. They threw the book at him!

 

And here we are finished up. It's by no means a pro job, but it will work for now. Once the bank account catches up I will be getting the interior done by a pro, and in leather, not cheap vinyl, but in the mean time, it's better than what I had, and Fred has the couch back.




But wait? Where was Dave?
Well Dave was busy modifying the headers. As you may know if you follow this thread, I used to have a stock model A box in the car, and the header was bent to go around it.
I've since changed to a 39 ford box mounted under the frame, but the header still had a funny bend in it, and did not flow with the rest.
So tonight Dave took the center header off, cut it apart, and rewelded it back together to match the rest of the pipes. It looks way better now. Thanks Dave!

 

looks way better! if you do the door and kick panels use luan plywood and spray glue it on. congratulations on you fabricland membership.

 

I think I am in love with Dave...

 

Yea have enough material left over for the doors and kick panels, just ran out of plywood for the backing. I've never heard of luan plywood, I'll check it out.

 

Dave will be so happy!

 

luan [and i might be spelling it wrong] pronounced loo-on is thin like paneling. i save it from shipping crates, but it is available at home centers.

 

So I looked in to the Luan stuff. Sounds like it will work perfect.
http://www.insidewoodworking.com/luanplywood.html

I used some left over panel board for the side panels, and it worked great, but there is not enough left for the doors. I think I'll try this Luan stuff for the rest.
And after Dave and I can build a wicked doll house with the scraps!

 

yaaay doll house! I want a barbie fleetline!