Dont get me wrong... I didnt start this Thread to sing the praises for Billet. I loved ****era's early stuff. His parts looked more like Racecar parts than Streetrod Parts ( and given his history they probably were...) His 3W Coupe is one of my 3 favorite Hot Rods. But for me, the downward spiral started with Vern Luce's coupe which hit the magazines right after ****era's 3W. And it has only gotten worse since then. Carving aluminum is a lot of fun, though....
I did machinist training when I was young, and wish I had stuck with it, but I graduated from machinist training in the middle of the recession in the early eighties, I was paid ****, and no-one would offer an apprenticeship. Working in the sawmill paid a hell of a lot better, and I had no foresight, wanted my toys, and wanted them now, so I went back to grading lumber in the mill. It have been decades now since I have touched a lathe or a milling machine, maybe someday I can get some decent equipment in my garage. You can make stuff on a mill that looks and IS very traditional, its all about how you finish it, and what look you are trying for. Finish it with a grinder, drill it full of holes, and polish it up or engine turn it, it will look like it fell off an old indy car. Everybody seems to be so hung up on catagorizing everything and coming up with quick, disposable buzz words, and they are completely missing the big picture.
JOE KERR ( INDIANA LOOK )makes some BAD *** **** of BILLET take a look at George POTEET's 32 Truck, Joey did a lot of **** on it, plus JOE's CAR is SPOT ON! Everything from the MOTOR to the FRAME to the CHOP, to all of JOE's machine work...
I make my own **** all the time, never had the stomach for store-bought billet, not that all billet is bad. Function wise, it often serves a purpose. Bob
My goal was to recreate the Miller style of the late 30's while improving the function of the engine. Making a pattern and having it cast would cost a lot more than fabbing, and you still have to machine a casting. Pat
I'm with that thought! If it can be made without a computer in an average Joes's shop it should be able to be used on a traditional car. That means someone back in the day with the right amount of ingenuity coulda made the part too then right?
Metalshapes, can you share some of the details on the carbs? CFM, what they came on, ect... I really wanna run Weber style carbs on my 460 but can't afford new ones.
Sorry...No. Looks like there are a throttle position sensor, serpentine belt pulleys, and a Ardunesque cover on someting other than a Ardun headed flatty. That is not really what this Thread is about.
Excellent work! I wouldn't do anything to make it look like, frankly, an inferior cast piece. Do you think early hot rodders would have turned up their nose at machined aluminum, had it been relatively inexpensive to use back then? Stuff that would have taken weeks to whittle the old fashioned way takes hours, or even minutes with modern CNC equipment. Although I do hate to see the average street rod (even musclecars now) that looks like you threw a Billet Specialties catalog at it, there is nothing wrong with billet, especially if you machine it yourself. If I had a machinist's skills, I'd use a lot more of it.
I'd like to see some comments on "Moe's Modified-Banger equipped" thread. I'm confused on the application of the billet work to this car.
Billet is cool when you take a grinder to it, file it down, sandblast it then polish some of whats left.
I think the word "billet" is too much like a red flag. Hot rodders with access to lathes and mills (like kids in high school shop cl***) have been whittling stuff out of metal since the start of the hobby. If you need it and can't afford it you male it. The "billet look" is not traditional. But making things, like carb adapters, brackets, shift knobs, you name it, out of block, round, plate, and bar stock of all sorts is how it has always been done. Look first = billet. Function first = innovation and self reliance. Craftsmanship always.
Just throwing in my 2 cents, but... Do you guys realize that billet aluminum has been around since the early 1900's as a manufacturing material? You can draw your own conclusions about how "traditional" of a material it is. But considering how much of it was used during WW2 and that returning servicemen were basically the original hot rodders (what we call traditional hot rodders today) is it worth debating...? I think Bib has it right when it comes to appearance factor. Form over function is just a matter of taste, function over form (in my opinion) it what car customizing is about. Just sayin'... Chris
I feel a bit more relieved after reading this topic, because I really didn't get the opposition of "billet" items, or the labelling of such articles. I'd read about such things on a few mags and here at the HAMB, but the doubt remained. I have always liked machining pieces for my own use, and have recently bought a small lathe that I'm intending to use for my rod build someday, either to make mechanical parts or even small decorative pieces to finish it off, and I really like working parts from aluminium stock. I'm definitely not the kind of guy who builds a car from mail order catalogs. Why don't you simply label stuff that way - mail order bits? You're giving genuine billet-made items a bad rep that's not totally fair... that is something old-school mechanics would use if needed, especially when making stuff work together in a non-stock configuration. I had the pleasure of learning quite a lot from old mechanics, and I saw them making parts from scratch for repairs and modifications to old cars. The back of the shop was always filled with bar stock and offcuts of steel or aluminium to use with the lathe or the milling machine. Fabrication is cool... and now I rest easier knowing this is the mindset of choice here. By the way, the stuff you folks make is absolutely brilliant! Love the wheel, looks awesome! Cheers, Eddie
Its only cool if its for enternal engine parts...to make you go fast. Thats when its cool...I dont know if my statement has anything to do with this thread, but felt like saying it.....
Billet is cool when you made it to do something you couldn't or didn't want to buy. Bullet is uncool when you bought it.
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