LONG TIME SINCE LAST BLOG

Long time no blog. Marty and I have been busy. The fine folks at Brooksville were nice enough to send me a set of doors as well as a new trunk lid to add to my Brookville rear quarters . Marty had the body tacked together in no time.

Drew and I dragged the cowl and all the original body parts home and media blasted the pieces until we were looking at fresh metal. It was a lot of work, but nobody said eradicating rust was an easy job. No more toothpaste green panels. We used Rustoleum brownish red primer to match the Brookville pieces and I'm happy to report that it's beginning to look like a car again.

The wheels and tires are from AKH and Coker.
The next time you see shots of the front end, it'lll have a 327 sitting between the rails/
Here's a shot before we lifted the body onto the frame. Marty's busting his butt to get the doors and jambs aligned
Here's a clean shot of the frame. Note the 9" with rear wheels and tires in the background.

MORE PARTS AND INSPIRATION

Got my drop axle from So Cal Speed Shop/L.A. today. Tomorrow I deliver the part to Marty along with the front end parts so he can start mock-up. The next big shipment will be the rest of the body panels from Brookville. I've begun the search for potential painters and have had a couple of very interesting conversations with people whose work I admire. More on that later.

WHAT'S THE PLAN?

The new Mad Fabricators DVD is great. Between the chat I had with Piero before the Round Up, watching MFS 5.5. and the show itself, I couldn't be more inspired. The body's back with Marty South who's doing the metal fab. Here's a sneak preview: Lowboy, windshield deep chopped and laid back. 15" X 8.5" Torq thrusts on the back with 30" WW Hurst Cheaters, Chrome 16's in front with white walls; frame and firewall painted pearl white, body in lime greeen with silver or gold base. 327 with 3-2's, block and accessory brackets painted oldsmobile gold, polished intake with cad plated carbs and rear facing chrome scoops; 4- Speed Muncie; 9" Ford Detroit Locker with 3.50 gears, gauges TBD; interior TBD. Cowl steering using a 64 mopar aluminum box. Suicide style drilled drop axle with 40's Ford front brakes with drilled backing plates and 45-fin Buick drums. Adjustable elliptical rear springs. I'm thinking a sixties show/hot rod vibe. With the majority of parts being mid sixties, candy or metalflake paint seems like the right call.

So there's your sneak peak.

MORE PARTS PROCURED

Called the folks at Posie's and ordered an adjustable eliptical spring kit for the rear suspension of the 29. Also spoke to the people at Brookville to get more information on their body parts. Tomorrow I'm gonna make a big order, including both doors, a deck lid, and the part that goes above the deck lid. Ouch. I figure I'll take the pain now and save unnecessary bodywork and fabrication costs. Plus, I'll have a nice parts pile of usable prices to sell or trade for other stuff I need. By getting all new reproduction parts, Marty can get on with fabricating the windshield, the rear of the frame, the motor mounts, and setting up the interior. He's got a lot of boxing-in to on the interior, strengthening the structure around the inner firewall and cowl in preparation for the the cowl steering and routing the clutch and brake pedal.

SLEEVES ROLLED UP, THINKING CAP ON

Got the 29 body back over to Marty's with the Muncie 4-speed and bellhousing for mock-up.

We took a good look at the doors and after discussing the fabrication vs fresh metal decided we may be giving some more love to the folks at Brookville. Definitely need a set of door hinges and doors. We talked some more about the build plan and I showed Marty a Lime Green color reference I liked. We discussed Whitewalls vs. Black sidewalls and we're both liking wide whites. I need to call Hurst Tires and find out if they can make whitewalls all the way to the rim. I'm also going to have to call Brookville to find out the difference between 28 and 29 doors and check a few other prices.  I also need to order a pair of quarter elliptical springs for the rear suspension. As far as the look, we discussed the frame and firewall being white and the engine being light gold or the same green as the body. For the engine, we're leaning towards polished Cal Custom valve covers and a polished Edelbrock 3-2 bbl intake manifold and the Holleys cad plated, chrome linkage and chrome curved scoops topping them off.

We looked at the Aluminum steering box I pulled off of a 64 dodge and discussed the  the cowl steering set-up. There's going to have to be a fair share of fabrication needed to bolster the front cowl area for the cowl steering. We also discussed the importance of putting ass-pans into the floorboards to accomodate my Sasquatchian 6'5" frame. Boy, it feels good to be back moving on this project. More later.

MORE PARTS COMING

Had a great chat with a tech/sales guy at Pete and Jakes. Got schooled on the subject of rear coilovers, front shocks, brake and clutch pedals, accelerator pedals and the value of hydraulic throwout bearings. Great chat. Didn't place the order yet, but let's just say that Pete&Jakes is going see some appreciation for the info the very near future. The 29's body is going back to Marty South this weekend to get the rear of the frame fabbed up. Really starting to get pumped.

THE PARTS PILE GROWS

Drew and I hit the New Braunfels swap meet today and there were a lot of cool parts to be had.

I was specifically looking to find a bell housing, a good four-speed shifter with linkage, and perhaps a clutch. I ended up meeting vendor named Kajun Jon, who had all sorts of 4-speed parts and best of all, knowledge.

After telling him what I was building, I seized the opportunity to pepper Kajun Jon with all my 4-speed questons.  Should I get an 10.5" clutch or a 11" set-up ? Jon's answer? 10.5" less rotating mass for quicker revs. Should I go with an aluminum flywheel? "Absolutely!" Light cars love aluminum flywheels!" I'm thinking of going with a CenterForce clutch, what do you think. "Overkill, a single will work fine."

After bleeding him dry of info, I did the only thing a decent human being would.

I bought a zoom clutch with throw-out bearing, disk, aluminum flywheel and chevrolet passenger car bell housing from the dude.

The next step was to track down Jeff,  a guy who I'd talked to who had a 327 shortblock for sale on Craigslist. We'd arranged for me to look at his short block at this meet.

I'd already talked with him at length about the engine, which had only a matter of hours on it before he'd grenaded an Art Carr Trans. He'd already sold off the aftermarket heads. I'd balked at going to see it for three good reasons: he was a couple hours away, it was expensive and I figured it was way more motor than I needed.

As it turned out, the short block was in super condition and the internals were clearly new.

He provided the cam card, and had brought along a full set of roller lifters, ARP bolts and push rods, which all appeared new and were included in the sale. The engine also had a Fluidamper dampener .

We ran the numbers on the block itself, a 64-67 327 truck, corvette or passenger car motor. It was packed with high end goodies and the block appeared to be everything Jeff had previously described.

Despite the fact that it was more than I wanted to spend, I was mightily impressed by how tidy the engine and all the parts looked. I agreed to pay a little more than I wanted to and Jeff took a a fair share less than his original asking. I can't wait to hear it run in the roadster, and I'll likely be changing out the cam to something less radical and sousrcing some vintage heads in good running condition or rebuildable.

It was a great day out with my son, and the parts pile is getting higher. I did find a shifter but it was more than I wanted to spend and the seller wasn't budging, so I let him keep it.

I'll keep you all posted as the momentum builds.