Projects Coupe to truck to tub build thread

The shop is cold and the farm is busy so progress is slow but I was able to make it out to the tub for a little bit this weekend. The task was to replace the lower area between the door and rear fender so that I can continue getting the body squared on the frame and door gaps correct before starting on making the floor.

The loop shape piece of metal pointing out from the frame is just a scrap I welded to the top of the frame to hold the body at the right height. It allows me to slide the rear portion of the body forward or back and side to side so I can get body width and door gaps correct however with the body being rotted out in this area it's not much use so...time to repair.

Here's the patch panel under construction.



Checking the fit.


The body has a bit of a curve down there so I used the shrinker to curve the patch to match the curve of the door bottom

Here it is being welded in for the first time....Yes first time, I got excited tacking it in and started welding it in but once I stopped for a coffee and came back out to get back at it I realized the bottom edge patch wasn't level with and was actually pointing down hill towards the rear axel. So zippy out and a pie cut along the weld edge to raise the back of the patch to correct this. I was a bit unimpressed with this so no pictures of it but I can guarantee it happened, this was also when I stepped on my "cheaters" and had a difficult time welding the patch back in.

Here's the finished pic. You can see where I tacked the body to the brace sticking out from the frame. This is now the width and height of the body. The rod in the door gap was to help locate the rear portion of the body and will be removed once the top edge of the body on this side is made and welded in. Hopefully I'll be more regular with updates now.

 

This is really cool! Great job, I love it!

 

"this was also when I stepped on my "cheaters" and had a difficult time welding the patch back in. "

Lol...been there, done that...I now buy them by the dozen (Amazon) and have drawer full of them. Keep moving forward.

 

Made it out to the shop this weekend and the plan was to continue finish welding the panels that were tacked in. That meant today going after the cab corners. I'm still using the Tig to weld everything up and I decided to do the welding from the inside so I wouldn't add too much weld to the outside of the belt line. Doing this kept the bead crisp and made it so I didn't have to remove much of the welds



Still some cleanup required to the edge of the bead where the weld penetrated.

Awhile back I started to think that the cab corner on the drivers side might not be sitting level and that was why I fixed up the door pins and releveled the body. Turns out I was right so I had to cut it free on the lower edge and line it back up with the rest of the body line. I clamped a straight edge along the bottom of the bead to have something to align it.



Picture shows the problem.

Everything is aligned there now so now I can start building the last part of the top edge between the cab corner and the door. Thanks for looking, stay tuned.

 

Probably a lot of guys more tuned into the GNRS this weekend than my build but my plans to go there fell through and I'm behind on an update or two here's what's been going on. Building the top edge of the body between the rear corner and the door is the same for this side as it was for the other side so here's a few pics of that.

If anyone is wondering why the panel doesn't go all the way to the edge of the door, it's a matter of measure twice and cut once but make not making sure you cut on the line you marked.


Fully tacked in.

Fully welded and smoothed.

 

Next thing I felt like working on was the subframe for the floor. Started by cutting a piece of 1x2" box tube to the width of the body at the rear door edge. This required cutting a few pie cuts in the tubing to follow the shape of the frame crossmember that is directly below it.

The 2x2" box tube that's in front was just a temporary piece that was tacked in when I started this project a bunch of years ago and will be removed shortly.

Here I am starting to lay out the door sill. I made this out of 2x2" material.

This is welded in place to the cross bar and the door hinge pillar. I also cut and continued this piece right to the firewall and welded it to the the firewall brace.

Same for the other side and here you can see the temporary brace has been removed.

I can tell when I'm making really good progress and getting shit done because the cords get more tangled and I get wound up in them.


Next step is going to be removing this rear section of the frame. I'm wanting the body to roll under and it can't do the with this section sticking out. Later

 

Time to chop the frame. As mentioned I don't want the frame sticking out past the body so I started this project by tacking a couple pieces of box tubing to the top and bottom of the frame rails at the rear to stop it frommoving once the rear portion is removed.

I also attached the tubing to the wheel wells to steady the back portion of the body.

Gone! I was actually able to remove the spring shackle pivot bolts without a lot of trouble. At this point I used the floor jack to raise the rear end to my desired ride height and I tacked a piece of rod between the frame and axel to hold it there for now.





Cut and fitted a piece of 2x3" bow tubing to become the rear cross member of the frame.

 

Next on the list was to finish the floor supports so I can start making floor panels. Pretty straight forward job, I did dummy a transmission into place to check clearances between toe board and transmission bell.

I'm pretty sure I'm not going to use the Powerflight transmission because I'm a firm believer that hot rods have 3 pedals but it was big and what I had laying around and if I make it fit the floor any other transmission should fit.




I'm not going to need much of a transmission hump because everything fit nicely under the floor but where the toe board meets the floor I needed to "bend" the floor support around the transmission bell. this is how I decided to do that.

There's about 3/4" clearance between the transmission and the floor support.

I'll finish welding it and smooth and blend it before it gets welded to the rockers.

Thanks for looking.

 

Nice job on the subrails!

 

I thought it might be about time for another update. I've been picking away on the floor and rear of the body but I also took some time off the visit some goods friends in California and tour around with them (all work and no play, right? )
Here's the finish welded sub floor crossmember....


...and here welded in place.


Welded in a crossmember where I cut the rear frame horns off.


Decided with that done it was time to start making the panel for the bottom rear of the body. My sheet metal brake is homemade and can only do about 30" so to break the edge it was bench and hammer time.

Made a gauge to check how much to bend the bottom lip.

First fitting.

I used my shrinker to get a curve in the panel. I would have loved to use my english wheel to put a bit more of a crown in the panel but it's fairly flat down there and.....


....I haven't built it yet.
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stay tuned more updates tomorrow.

 

Thank You for sharing Your build

 

Lol on the haven't built the english wheel yet. I too had a box of english wheel parts kicking around for a number of years before building mine, so I know exactly what you're talking about. You won't regret spending a couple days on putting one together.

Good to see you're still moving forward and that you made it down to visit friends in Cal.

 

Good job bud! Somehow I missed installments in February so your progress looks even more impressive. I like the trimming off of all the stuff from the rear and finish panel. What's your plan for rear suspension?

 

Thanks guys. I'm contemplating quarter elliptic suspension for the rear but haven't fully researched it yet. Something sort of along the lines of this but we'll see when we get there.

 

As promised the rest of the update. Next step was making up the rear most body mounting points and tacking them to the frame so I could make sure everything clears.



Here's the filler piece for the bottom of the quarter and the starting platform for the floor.


And here's the rear of the body starting to be tacked in. I thought I had more pictures of shaping it but I can't find them.





I'm still Tig welding everything and enjoying it but there are times where the Mig is definitely easier usually because it's hard to find a way at times to run the pedal. This is where the progress stopped while I went to California and enjoyed the hospitality of my southern friends. Plus I got to ride around in the roadster that was the cause of all this again!

 

Here's some pictures from the trip in case anyone is interested. I had a great time cruising the coast of So Cal and checking out other builds and a visit to the NHRA museum and the Planes of Fame museum.
This is the roadster that "bit" me!!! It's all sorts of cool and owned by my buddy Bill. This picture was take at a quiet diner in Silverado Canyon.




Here's a few pictures from the NHRA Museum


Some from the cruise down the coast.





I got the opportunity to see one of the AMBR runner up cars in person in the garage where it was built. Absolutely beautiful car!




Also got to check out the talented Mr Bill's Model Eh project. It's a really neat car lots of cool details and he's got a build thread going on here called "poly begets a hemi" https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/poly-begets-a-hemi-begets-a-model-a.1194565/


Final picture is from the parking lot of the Planes of Fame museum of the cruising group. I have a ton more pictures but this is my build thread.

 

Ed, your pics look a lot like mine during the GNRS...hangin' with the cool kids was all kinds of fun!!

 

Time for a small update and probably the last one for awhile since crop season is just around the corner. Since I'm basically building this from scratch and not repairing or replacing rot , a lot of the time I'm winging it and letting the car build itself. Having made the rear panel and the rear body mounts I needed to make something that connected the two. I started out by making the body section that sits on the frame....I'll figure out what the floor will look like later.
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Once that piece was made for both sides and bolted down it was time to connect the two across the back of the body. I'm going to have to invest in a decent sheet metal brake on day. The hardest part of making this part was beating it with a hammer over the corner of the bench. I have also since learned that if I run the piece through my bead roller using a tipping die to score where I want to break the metal it will bend easier. Yes I know the tipping die will break the metal fully but mines not motorized and my wife has had enough of coming out to the shop to hold things.


Here's the start of the rear floor section. Also me pulling every muscle in my body trying to hold the panel and turn the bead roller and keep everything straight.


Test fitting it. The two slots cut into each side are for the frame rails. I want to sit in the car not on the car so I'm trying to keep the floor as low as possible. Also my bead roller doesn't have a very big throat so to make the recess part I had to do as much as I could reach and then flip the dies over and do the rest so I was always working from the outside edge. All this distorted the panel quite a bit and in my Plymouth when I built that floor I didn't try and get the panel flat again so it oil cans sometimes when you move your feet and it drives me nuts, so not this time.


I really would like to get better at knowing how to shrink and stretch metal but I'm still struggling at it so I did what I know how to do and that's cut and weld to relieve the buckle.

Test fitting again. You can see the cuts now for the frame rails.


Here's the frame rail coves boxed in and tacked for another test fit.


Finished welding the frame rail coves


All cleaned up, drilled for spot welds and ready to install.


Now on to the plug welding.




Done! Till next time.

 

One of my favourite builds on here and you will certainly have a unique car when finsihed. Love you work! Thaanks for sharing.

 

Great work Ed!

 

ditto!!

 

Impressive. I’m following.

 

Thanks guys. I appreciate the encouragement.

 

Well I guess I've been a little lazy in updating my build thread. I have been slowly making progress but it come in fits and sparts and sometimes I forget to take pictures so the following is what it is.

Decided with the rear section of floor done I was tired of climbing over the side to do work inside and it was time to tackle making door jambs. I was trying to imagine making them out of multiple pieces and welding everything together but then I had the idea to see if any part of the door leftovers could be used and bingo. I knew there was a reason I don't throw stuff out!
using the edge of the door where the door skin folds over and reversing it and using it on the other side makes a perfect (enough) jamb.



Inside of the door becomes the outside of the jamb.


I tacked a piece of scrap across the door to keep the body line straight while I tacked in the jamb and marked out the latches and dove tales. I used the old factory Chrysler latches out of my parts bin.



Made a little tab at the bottom of the jamb to add more strength. I'm concerned about making this area as strong enough for latching the door so there'll probably be more bracing on the inside as well.

 

Nice job seeing door jams in the old door frames...good thinking.

 

Ditto, re repurposing what might've become scrap! Did that with some of my Eh stuff and its a good feeling, eh!?

 

This is not a dead build thread. I repeat NOT a dead build thread (for anyone still interested). Farming got busy and I'm helping an old fellow that has become a great friend get his car painted. He had been working on the body for sometime and it was supposed to be ready for paint but it was as smooth as a golf ball so I've been spending my time on that instead of the tub. I have a small update on the tub as I do occasionally get tired of sanding filler so here's what I've gotten done.

With the body lines straight I realized that the top edge of the body was on it own different path to the back of the car so I threw a straight edge along the top to measure what had to go up and what had to move down.


Here I have cut a piece of 1/8" stock to reenforce the latch edge of the body. I used to ride to school in a late 60's 2 door Fairlane hardtop that kept cracking the paint because the body would flex when you closed the door and "when in doubt you make it stout." The slots are to allow adjustment of the latch catch.



Moved on to the front edge of the door to cap off the end of the dash and top edge of the door. This is one of my favorite areas of a deuce roadster, the transition from the door to the dash so I'm trying to mimic it on the tub.

Next I started back on setting the top edge of the body right. It required a few relief cuts in the high spots and some hammer and dolly work but I finally got it flat and started welding the inside fold over.


Here's the top edge of the body welded and smoothed

Next step is fixing the top edge of the doors as there is quite a gap checking with a straight edge.


Final picture is David's car that I'm painting.

 

Nice work. What do you have down on your floor in the last pic above? Durability?

 

Your tub just keeps getting better and better! Good work!