Thread: Lethal Weapon, Project A-Bucket

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Originally Posted by Whiplash23T

Thanks Charlie for that and yes I answer to Whip most of the time but I have been called far worse at times.

Originally Posted by Whiplash23T

Thanks Charlie for that and yes I answer to Whip most of the time but I have been called far worse at times.

I was having a lazy moment, I hate typing when the hands don't want to comperate.......... I'm bad with names. I think I know what yours is but you won't catch me in a lie this morning.......

Question for you A guys. Crown on bottom of windshield or top of cowl. Same roadster to closed cab? I know it narrower, but not sure of radius.
Bob?? Don?? Posted question in hot rod talk, but didn't know if you guys saw it.

Thanks Charlie

Originally Posted by roadster32

Steve where do you get those great smilies?
Charlie cool thread, I have been watching this one, but have no experience with these old ford tbuckets, roadsters and rpu's but am learning from what your posting!

Originally Posted by dlotraf33

Question for you A guys. Crown on bottom of windshield or top of cowl. Same roadster to closed cab? I know it narrower, but not sure of radius.
Bob?? Don?? Posted question in hot rod talk, but didn't know if you guys saw it.

Thanks Charlie

Don't have any 28/9 closed car to compare to, and haven't ever seen any authoritative commentary. The best I can do is put a straight edge across the bottom of my roadster w/s frame. At the center it measures a nominal 1 7/8" to the bottom of the arch of the w/s frame without rubber.

So we now know what Sue got Steve for Xmas and it wasn't a new pair of shoe's...... no no no it was a new set of SMILIES !!!!!!....

Steve i found them on the net.

Originally Posted by stovens

Steve where do you get those great smilies?
Charlie cool thread, I have been watching this one, but have no experience with these old ford tbuckets, roadsters and rpu's but am learning from what your posting!

Originally Posted by roadster32

Steve i found them on the net.

Yeah, Steve has all this time on his hands. He only has like 20 car projects going at one time, so he needs something to do he other 23 hours of the day! Sue must be pumping him full of vitamins.

Don

Originally Posted by Bob Parmenter

Don't have any 28/9 closed car to compare to, and haven't ever seen any authoritative commentary. The best I can do is put a straight edge across the bottom of my roadster w/s frame. At the center it measures a nominal 1 7/8" to the bottom of the arch of the w/s frame without rubber.

Thanks Bob, that should help. I can trace arch of closed cab on cardboard, then mark the ends of roadster windshild frame, I have bottom width, and figure out how much arch there is. Thanks Again.........

Originally Posted by dlotraf33

Well my computer is not coperating, so now I shall continue.

Here is the other one I am drawing from.
Attachment 47328

This body is kind of a cross of the two.

So I scrounged up the dimensions of Henry's 28 roadster pickup from the H.A.M.B. and started to mock it up. I used some cardboard to make the back and sides then put a seat on the floor so I could play with the lenth of the cab. I wanted to make sure I had enough leg room, and did not want to have the steering wheel up thru the floor like a t-bucket. I think I ended up with a streach of 4 to 5 inches over stock. I am not sure exactly as I had no front to back measurment just a diag. from firewall to rear corner of cab. I also got made fun of, the wife comes out and I'm sitting in basically a modified card board box, on a seat with steering wheel in hand. No I wasn't making the vroom vroom noise, at least not while she was in the garage.......

Next I made a patern of the floor on some 5/8 plywood and made a jig to build the body on, and also roll it around. I attached the firewall with some washers and screws. Made the back of cab from the ply leftovers. Then I took some 1/4 ply and made sides and screwed togerher. A little 2x3 for the cab top sides. This should approximate the thickness of the finished side tops. I intend to use 1 1/2 box for the top and bottom rails. I took a scrap bed side top and added it to the back, for a little character, not wanting it to look like a box totally. In my mind I see the bed top rail just below the round on the back of the cab. Here's what it looks like so far.

Attachment 47329

Now time to stare at it from different angles, squint and try not to see the wood grain. And of course sit in it and make the noise. My daughter came home from school and ask if it was going to be made of wood. No, but I told her its easier to mess up 12.00 worth of ply than 100.00 metal. And after doing this I see somthing. the sides are about 2 inches too high. Looking at the ply bone and at pics on puter I knew it didn't look quite right, too tall in door area. See, easy to cut down ply, harder to cut and reweld.

Here's another angle, with a seat, will continue later as it is time to take her to school and start work.

Attachment 47330

Man that Candy Red one has always been one of my favorites. Lookin forward to seeing your build.

Well the weather STINKS! Really it's only cold here, but I guess Dallas got some ice. My distribution center is closed, and if I get a truck today, doubtfull, all the product I wanted to install today and tomorrow has already been delayed till monday. Crap! Oh well might as well make some metal dust.

After looking at the mocked up cab for a couple of weeks, I decided, as Bob pointed out the cowl in the pillar area was just too bulky. After studying it for a bit, it looked easy enough to narrow. I just had to cut a couple of rusty bolts, and some really bad welds, looked like old coathanger welds, to remove it. Rrilled out a couple of rivits and we have three separate pieces.

DSCF3072-600.jpg

I cut out the corner, that wraps around the gas tank top, so sides could be slid inward. Once fit I'll trim the removed piece to fit the cowl top and weld back in the pillar.

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I slid the sides in to give me what I found to be the most pleasing ammount of reveal and clamped into place. Then I trimed the top so it would fit. All sitting in place, and then step back and eyeball from several angles. Yup that should work.

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Marked all the holes so I could drill them. A quick trip to TSC for some bolts and a new set of bits and we can finish this step. Holes drilled and the pieces bolted back on the cowl.

DSCF3075-600.jpg

Although I stated I am not trying to copy the roadster cowl, this does look more pleasing to the eye. It did look too fat at the top of the cowl. At this point I decided not to put the pieces back into the pillars, where they wrap around the tank. I want to decide how to handle the windshield posts. I havent yet decided weather to use roadster posts, modify the closed cab posts, or just fabricate some of my own design. I think I really need a windshield frame before I box myself into a corner, and have to redo somthing.

Here is a couple more angles of the cowl so you can see the improvement.

DSCF3076-600.jpg

DSCF3077-600.jpg

Maybe today I will re-cut the back of cab, as this modification will change the angle of the radius and cut down the sides and put back together to see how these changes will look.

We'll travel back in time about 2 weeks and look at the front axle I'll be using.
It's a 47 ford f1 axle I picked up with center link, springs, and drag link for $40. I wish I had gotten ahold of the guy a little earlier, he sold the brakes to another guy. Oh well still a good deal. The width is just 1/4 wider than the 32 stock axle. So it should work good.

I trimmed off the spring pads and smoothed the axle some.

DSCF3049-600.jpg

I ordered some radius rod, spring behind mounts from Noxious Customs and when they arrived I fit to the axle and tacked them in place. I have to finish weld them later. I have to find me another stick welder. I loaned mine to my brother in law, you guess the rest........ I just hope he electrocutes himself with MY welder........

DSCF3052-600.jpg

DSCF3051-600.jpg

The brackets need to be smoothed some. They were a little rough on the cuts. Also not sure about the points, they may need to be rounded. Overall I like these better than the mounts I used on the last one. These actually fit the axle with no modification to the cutout that fits inside the web of the axle. And they wrap around the top and bottom of the I beam.

Now Charlie, that was worth the effort wasn't it? Looks terrific! Cleaned it up nicely.

Here are a few suggestions on the windshield. In order to carry off what you've started you want to make sure you maintain the trim look, no heavy posts/frame.

The first two pics are of folding stock style stanchions. The first are the cast bronze ones I've got, the second are more economical cast aluminum ones that a guy named Williams down in SoCal makes. It's not that much further of a trim job from where you've taken yourself now to cut away the tops of the cowl ends, weld in a bracket and emulate the stock roadster. But you said you might not want that. Okay, then the third pic for ref. This is a set of stock stanchions that have been pie cut at the bottom and slanted back. Old timey mod that's not too uncommon. These are available in steel and could be welded in place rather than bolted to a bracket as stock. As a fourth option you could use some channel stock and fab your own and either use the channels to drop in a piece of glass or make them to hang a framed glass similar to the stocker. The key is to put the same kind of taper to the post as the stockers, or start them thin toward the bottom and maintain the dimension to the top (though that might look more street roddy than traditional). Whatever you choose, you don't want to clutter it with a bulky look.

Thanks for the pic's Bob. Yeah it was fairly simple to do that. And only took a couple of hours to do, including the trip to TSC, and a few smoke breaks. I totally agree, it makes all the difference in the world. I have seen some where they just left as it was on the closed cab. Makes you wonder why not do what I did. And I don't have that much real talent........ I'm just a shade tree mechanic, with no shade tree.........

On the pics you posted, I really like the first one. The look and shape of the pillars. Second is ok, although slanted back too much, but could be adjusted for less rake. The stock pie cut, would be ok, but again too much rake, to me the windshield looks broken. Also after seeing these shots, I'm not sure I like the stock windshield frame that much. I really like the tubular one in the first shot. I like the look of the fixed glass on the green dodge at the beginning of this thread, but with my clumsy ass, I am afraid I'd grab the windshield and break the glass. I can do some stupid stuff sometimes, and then think, hmmm maybe I shouldn't have done that......

Back to the first pic. A couple of questions. First where'd you get that frame? Stainless? And what is the diam of the tube? Ok maybe more than a couple of questions. On the pillars, does the base wrap around the back side of cowl, in other words three sided and slips on then bolted. I am looking at that and I think I could make something similar out of steel. Hmmmmmmmmmm might could even make that frame, I guess I could do stainless...........Hmmmmmmmmm...... I think a scale drawing is in short order.

Thanks again for the pics and input.
Charlie

Yeah, a couple hours work for a "lifetime" of proper look.........but then that's what attention to detail is all about. Some get it, some don't.

The frame is from Speedway; http://www.speedwaymotors.com/Garage...ome,30596.html

It's 7/8" dia, with a 3/8" channel, could be done in stainless if you've got TIG for the lower corner welds.

Here's a pic of the backside, yes, it wraps and fastens to a "tab/or stub" inside the box section that has a floating nut plate for adjustment.

If the pics don't show it's because I'm tired of the crappy server timing out, I'll post up later if necessary.