Just Can't Gut Tractor Grilles

even the tractor grilles that look somewhat ok, never look as good a 32 ford. I know people want to do something different, but 99% of the time its ugly

 

Precisely. Well said.

 

I love old tractors!!!

 

Let's not forget: A poorly chosen automotive sourced grille can be just as bad.

I've seen some pretty hideous old homemade track noses. Well finished, just hideous.

 

Sure are a lot of opinions in this thread. I guess everybody has one.Most of you traditional guys don't seem to like tractor grills on rods. As an old fart, I had never heard of it or seen it until most recently so I tend to think people didn't do it back years ago because it looked like a tractor grille on your car.And I have to say, I have never seen one that looked good on a car/truck.
Some of you guys would probably put dualies on your rods.

no accounting for taste......

 

"back then" and "what they had"...well, they had the basic car and with '30's-'40's incomes they needed a reason for changes. And do note by looking into the history books early rodders seem to have had lots of aesthetic sense...they did seem to note that Ford shells looked pretty good, and when they changed one out it was to something that made sense aesthetically like a similar year DeSoto or Pontiac to achieve a different look without getting over to just odd. And another factor...an elderly tractor was worth something as an expensive tool, an elderly Ford was cheap.
Go up to the siver roadster...note how lines break between the tractor bit and the cowl. Almost square shell has shoulders that not only don't like the more rounded cowl, they rise too high to blend. You see swaps to other shells on early rods but not swaps to other shells that don't flow...
Thickness is also often a negative on this...extra mass in the shell usually is not good on an open wheel rod.
Race car nose totally changed contours and mass up there, but curves were carefully fitted and the extra bulk up there was used to complete an entirely different sort of flow from nose to cowl...

 

Speaking of ugly shit, is that your car it your pic.

 

^^^^^--------^^^^^^^^^
I was giggling while rereading this then some ASS HOLE shows up & makes it persona! fucken A dude you haven't even mentioned what your working on------O shit wait you made a grand total of 4 posts,i haven't made the greatest post either, but shit dude---take it down the fucken road!


Sorry to any of ya that might have offended,but damn!

 

Thats funny,, you have to tell us the full story

 

Yeah, that's my ugly old Riviera in my avitar picture, currently getting a shiny paint job applied. It's a '65 so it doesn't even really belong around here since it was made after the GTO came out and the true hot rod period ended. But I squeek by because it's the same bodystyle as the '63. And it doesn't have an ugly ass tractor grille on it! However, I have been eyballing mailboxes as candidate hood scoops...

 

P.S. Beaner, Larry, Ed, and especially Bruce know what they speak, and the rest of us(smart one at least) are just lucky to sponge up the knowledge.

 

More like trying to teach calculus to a duck...