Hot Rods Homogenized ‘28 roadster build

Go man - GO!

Looking great

 

I lied…so, way back when I had an OG matched set of 15x6 Americans on my ‘32. I went with BFG 5.90 front and 8.20 rears and they looked perfect. Since I already had firestone fronts this go-round I got stone 8.20’s for the back. But the narrowest wheels American Racing makes these days are 4.5, and 7. 4.5 is too narrow for an 8.20 so I got a backup pair of 7”. Figured I would get them narrowed to 6” by Eric Vaughn or someone. But wanted to see what it looked like first. So I popped a tire on a wheel tonight and I don’t absolutely hate it. Given the cost of narrowing these wheels would be more than the wheels themselves…I think I’ll run it this way for a while.

 

I like em. Not worth the $ to narrow them in my opinion.

 

Same here!

 

X—GASSER on here had somebody in the DFW area narrow some aluminum slots.

 

Back end blasted. Next time I’ll invest in a better setup but we had this cheap portable blaster thing at work so I used it. Should have bought more media. Instead I kept funneling it into a pile with the tarp, scooping it up and sifting out all the leaves and junk that would absolutely clog up the feed line, and dumping it all back in. Took all day but it’s done. I hope to start on getting the body braces welded to the subrails tomorrow. Will probably play with wheel and tire stuff too.

 

I traded the 4th for the 3rd but think I’m done on this for the weekend. Started with musical wheels/tires and got my new slicks mounted, then got to work on the quarters. It finally feels like a real body now. I got the rear half fit and adjusted. The main alignment point was the door jambs, which are now parallel to the doors and with an even gap. I got the jamb braces screwed into the subrails. Then went to the back end and took out the drip channel stuff and flat side panel brace pieces. I fit and drilled the tail pan to attach to the quarters which stiffened it up a bunch then cut out the very poorly installed wheelwell patch pieces just to have them out of the way. Then I got the reproduction back subrail piece tied into the Steadfast subrails. I’m feeling pretty good about how it all lines up. Finally I mocked up some ‘32 rear horns and a spreader bar. I want a little bit of shine on the back end and I think this will do it.

 

I just got caught up on your build. You’re making great progress while still keeping up with other projects and family stuff. That’s hard to balance. I’m putting a 283 with power pack heads in my 29 Tudor build. I opted for a V8 Monza bell housing and clutch cable set up. It fits pretty well with RJays under floor pedal kit. Looking forward to your engine build. I still need to get a cam. Might just follow your lead with the Howard’s cam.

Keep it up man, this is great! Might just be your best build yet.

 

Thanks Lee!

 

Good progress, really enjoying the build

 

Dropped off the crankshaft for machine work yesterday.

also found the perfect patch for the top of the passenger quarter panel, including the inner brace. Got the skin tacked in today. Played with the rear frame horns. I need to maybe cut and reposition some body stuff…it still needs to come down at the cowl and up in front of the back tire. Had to start somewhere I guess. Got the decklid hinges bolted on to see where that was at. Some issues but not terrible.

 

Woohoo go man!

 

Slick fit on that patch! You’ll be cruising in no time.

 

Nice work with the patch. Car keeps looking better and better. I like your plan for the 32 rear frame horns!

 

Thanks y’all!! Not much forward progress today. Ended up cutting up all the stuff I did last weekend and repositioning but I think I’m finally happy with how the body sets on the frame. Worked on some new bracing. Hopefully next weekend goes better.

 

Sometimes you work all weekend and it looks like you did nothing. Sometimes you work for twenty minutes and it’s a totally different car

 

Well, another wasted day. After yardwork I pulled the block out of the car and got to work cleaning it up. When I bought this engine for $150 I wasn’t expecting much. I really just wanted the short block. And I knew it had a knock. When I took it apart (and I wasn’t paying THAT close attention) I’m pretty sure I found a rod that was installed backwards. The bearings were junk and the crank a little scratched. But it wasn’t run long enough after the problem to cause major damage. I had the crank checked out last week and they cleaned it up and it was good to go. The block had been align honed on the mains and the bores looked recently honed as well.

But I a few weeks ago I also noticed a sleeved cylinder that I didn’t remember was there. Oh well, not a bad thing. So I decided today to run a ball hone through it to clean up the cylinders before I filled it with all my new goodies. And that’s when I found a crack in another cylinder.

Now I am faced with a few options. This is a ‘57 block. It is very possible that it is actually a 265 that is bored .155 over, which might explain the need for one sleeve and a crack in another cylinder wall. It’s kinda crusty looking inside the water jackets too. I could have the cracked one sleeved but that leaves me with zero confidence in the rest of the cylinders. The second option is finding a standard 283 block and have it taken .030 over so I can use my pistons and new rings. I think that’s the best bet. Option 3 is a 327 my dad has (that I sold him 10 years ago) that will probably need a bunch of work.

So I’m looking for a good 283 block in DFW! We’ll see how that goes. Back to sheetmetal and whatnot tomorrow I guess.

 

Bah that sucks

 

Bummer. I’ll keep my ear to the ground for a block.

 

I think I’ve found another ‘57 block but we’ll see. It’s cheap but there will then be machine work. Guess it could be worse and I’m not throwing in the towel yet but didn’t have a lot of wind left in my sails today. I sanded and Gibbs coated the quarters since it wasn’t taking long for them to get rusty. The wheelwell patches I ordered showed up yesterday, I opened the box and they sent one for a roadster and one for a coupe. I think at this point I’m better off just making them from scratch myself. The only other thing I got done was the cat walk to subrail braces. I just split a piece of 2”x2” tubing and hammered the top end flat to bolt in to the quarter/catwalk/t-strip flange like factory. At the bottom end I cut a strip of 1/8” to reinforce the subrail and tacked it on, then tacked the brace to that. It’ll get fully welded when the rest of this is a little farther along. It’s a little crude but it works.

 

If you get desperate for a 283 I have two extras taking up space in my shop. I could probably part with one of them. Not in DFW though.

 

Just going to leave this here for a minute

 

Oooooooooooooh!

 

Also small update…I snagged another block and dropped it off at the machine shop today. It wasn’t a ‘57 block but I can’t be too picky.

 

sexy

 

Beautiful

 

That's pretty!

 

Wow, headers are killer!

 

Groovy thread! I had missed it somehow. I still have a couple pages to read but enjoying it and your craftsmanship is off the hook. Love this kind of stuff.