Hi Everyone, first time building a hotrod here so have some patience trying to figure out what rear end width would give me the look i am after and im hoping some of you have some advice and/or photos to share. building a 32 ford highboy-style roadster. using a quickchange in the rear (not sure of brand yet, Winters, Pacific, etc.). running 1935 16" wires and 7.50-16s tires. I am going after the look of the tires being as tucked into the body wheel arch as possible without rubbing of course. im not a fan when the axles/wheels stick out far past the body. what are your suggested widths for a rear end and do we measure flange to flange, back of drum to back of drum, front of drum to front of drum? thanks for the input in advance. -Steve
Stand your wheels up next to your body the way you like to see them, then measure in between the wheels and you'll have you're number. Can't miss !
Be aware the ‘35 wires will require a brake drum like a 40-48 to fit. Or else will need a thick adapter/spacer. After you do as Pete says, send the number to @krylon32 and he can order up the exact assembly from Winters and Boling Brothers that will give you a perfect fit.
Check my black Henry bodied 32 highboy roadster for sale in the HAMB classifieds. That's a 56 outside width Winter's rear with 16X5 steelies with a neutral off set and 750/R16 Excelsiors. You may want them tucked tighter but the 56 inch rear is what was I used in most of the customer chassis I did over the last 40+ years. I just finished another deuce chassis with early Ford wires and Boling Bro's Lincoln brakes. Only requires the thin steel wire wheel support plates for the wires to work correctly.
i think this is the best plan to order the entire unit including the drums as one assembly. at least the best idea for me since im new to this.
was going to run radius rods mounted to a some sort of centre cross member support and also a torque bar connecting the diff to the centre cross member as well. Not sure what a watts link is.
What @29Sleeper is trying to tell you is that with the wheels/tires tucked in, you will need to make sure you keep any lateral movement of the rear end assembly to a minimum or you will have a clearance/rubbing issue.
Give the guys at Moser a call - they have a huge database of vehicles, rears and brakes to get the axle lengths exactly right. Then again, those guys are probably on this board
Panhard rod, Watt's linkage, WOBlink, Mumford link, Satchell link, triangulated 4-link: this stuff is fascinating to a certain sort of brain. Most of these place the roll centre at around hub height. Triangulated 4-link suspension often has the roll centre slightly above hub height. WOBlinks and Mumford links are usually set up to place the roll centre as low as possible (you might not want to go down the rabbit-hole of learning why you'd want to do that.) The lower the roll centre, the closer the top of the outside tyre is going to come to the body for any given angle of roll. It's easiest to set roll motion out in a diagram, on paper or CAD if you've got. A good roll angle to work to is 6°. Most hot rod chassis won't allow even that much roll.
I wouldn’t trust the look of my hot rod to some guys that can’t lay hands on it and measure. There is no better way to get exactly the right look than to do what Pete Eastwood said. Roll the exact wheels and tires in place, then measure in between.
There is an upside to NOT doing this in that you get to have a selection of wheels for the next project.
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