Technical The Geoffrey Skene 1932 Roadster

PART 19

With all of those extra holes filled it was time to start making the inner frame channels that will make the legs of the 33/34 X-member continuous to the front and rear cross members. Doing this doesn’t just look neat. It doubles the thickness of the frame channels where they need it the most, ahead of the firewall and through the S-bend up and over the rear axle tubes, the latter being a very common place for fatigue cracks to occur.

I started with the rear extension channels since, because of the S-curve, they will be more involved to make. I laid out, cut out and dressed two pairs of 11 gauge X 1-5/8” wide flanges. To shape them I pulled out my highly sophisticated 4” tube clamped to the edge of my welding table with some 1/8” spacers under it (you can see this first used earlier in the project when I modified the center saddle.) Works like a charm.





There’s nothing special about this process. Just keep tweaking the pieces until they are a good fit. Once I was happy with all 4 flanges they were clamped in place.

Note: I made each piece 1/2” longer than need to started and did a final trim after they were fit. Always leave a margin. Nothing worse than forming a part perfectly but having it come up short!









With the upper and lower flanges fit it’s time to move onto the side pieces. There’s different ways to go about making a fitted pattern and I considered them all but landed on using blue masking tape. I cleaned the inner frame rail thoroughly with lacquer thinner than applied tape 4 layers thick, making sure to overlap the seams of each lower layer so that the tape would be sturdy when removed.



The tape template was then stuck onto a piece of 11 gauge steel and traced with black Sharpie. The tape was removed and the piece cut out leaving just a hint of black line showing so I could sneak up on the fit. Simply repeat for the other side.







The side pieces were slowly fit by repeatedly sanding and checking. Ultimately I ended up with a pretty exact fit on both sides.













Happy with the fit I pulled everything apart and sand blasted the new inner channel pieces.





Then the insides of the frame rails were cleaned thoroughly to bright steel and everything wiped down with lacquer thinner to prep for welding. I then went about fully spot welding the channels. This included more fun of turning the frame on its sides and upside down by myself again! I also added what will eventually be rivet holes and put temporary bolts to hold everything tight.









The next step will be to fully weld and metal finish to make both sides look like one continuous part of the X legs.

 

Fantastic work Dennis! Great thread!