Thread: 55 Chevy stock car

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Originally Posted by pastor bubba

This is the business end of the car which could get me in trouble. It is pretty solid and even has a thick metal grate screen. I have always wanted a big ugly truck that I could push stupid people out of the way such as people who park halfway in a parking stall so that it is hard to go through an aisle in the parking lot.

You`re scaring me now...! Like the build, I remember all the 55 thru 59`s that were destroyed at Ohare raceway in Shiller park Ill as a kid, awesome then...sad now!

Well, a lot has happened since I last updated. I do have most of the roof hammered out even with a couple of setbacks. I was rear ended in January that slowed me down a bit and just when I was healed from that, my doc decided to check out my heart and see if there was one. Long story short, I didn't touch the car for about 3 months and so once holy week is over, I will spend some time out there recovering. I did get knew power run out to my garage because the previous owners hooked up all lights and outlets in both garages and the outlets outside in back of the house on the same circuit. So we pulled 220 from one end of the house to the other while we were repairing the basement and then hired an electrician to hook it up to the box in the basement and take it from the house garage to my work garage and put in a box. He put in a breaker for 220 and four 110 breakers. So I ran conduit and the necessary outlets and will not be tripping breakers all the time anymore. I did leave the lights and old outlets on the original circuit for the tv, radio and stuff like that. But the compressor, welder, plasma cutter will be plugged into an outlet all its own. That is about all that has been happening on my project and have ruled out having her on the road by August, but I could still surprise myself on that one.

Good having you back! Sounds like you've had a real fun time recently! Ready to settle into the old routine again???? My friend Schultzie went in for his DOT physical in March, after he was done with that he'd been through surgery with 5 arteries bypassed!!!!!

I'm thankful that my arteries were just narrowed and were not bad enough for stints or bypass. The downside to treating with meds is that it took a while to get to this point so it takes a while to reverse it. But I am feeling better so something is working.

I started working on the rear and something just didn't look right. That became even more evident when I attempted to hang the doors. There was a bout a 2 inch difference between the top of the door and the rear quarter on the drivers side and the passenger door was about 3 inches too long to fit in the opening. I asked a friend to come over and we determine that the rear part of the car was just thrown on and welded without really being concerned about how it fit. Granted, it is a stock car but I at least expected the body to be put on correctly. I also noticed that there was a part of the frame that was tweaked a bit and it was an area that I could not see until it was on jack stands. So we determined that it would be a lot easier and cheaper to find a new car.
I found another 55 2 dr ht that was in the junk yard and was able to get it fairly cheap so bout that and started cutting up the old stock car. The things that were bad on the new car were actually decent on the stock car. Not sure how I lucked out on that one. Once I cut everything off the stock car that I wanted to save, I hauled her off to the scrap yard. This is the final resting place about a month ago. I went back this past week to dump some more metal and I could barely see the roof and the front of the fender.
I will have to stop for now because this program doesn't like how I have the pics saved. I will take care of that and post them.

Here is the pic of the final resting place.
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I replaced the body mounts except for three which I have to cut and weld new metal so that it will be solid. I was also able to weld in the firewall patch panel and grind down my welds. I used the firewall from the old stock car to fill in the hole in the new car. It turned out fairly decent and will finish the tunnel once I get the motor and tranny in place so that I know it will fit.
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Once I had the firewall fixed and grounded, I installed the gear box and steering column.
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I was able to get some wheels lined up for it today, which was one of my goals. I wanted to get the wheels done or the seats mounted. I bought 3 15 inch wheels from a friend that are wide Oldsmobile rally wheels and so went on a search for the missing wheel. I was able to find 3 14 inch wheels at a local junk yard so bought 2 of them for the front. So I will use the 3rd wheel I got from Bob for holding my air hoses or electrical cords. After cleaning them up a bit so I would have a good seal, I went down to the tire store in hopes of them having the tires I need in stock. No such luck on that one. I ordered 60s for the rear and 70s for the front so it should look pretty decent.

Good to see you found another car and are back on the project!!!

Lot's of progress goin' now! To bad about the first car needing so much more work but, it sounds like it has all worked itself out and your on your way. The firewall looks good and it sounds like the tire/wheel selection was painless... and thanks for all the pictures!

keep up the good work....

Old race cars are deceiving, loads of fudging, that was a big project to take on. Races cars are cages with a motor and wheels, the bodies are just decoration for the dirt and sportsman's side of the game. Good move on cutting your loses, 55 was and still is a popular shoebox, what will the theme of this project be, as in gasser, nice stocker or something nice in between?

It will still be a dirt style stock car. I am still bouncing between using flat paint so that it looks more weathered or using shiny paint. No matter which way I go, the body work will be completed correctly.

Dirt, that sounds good also, going with sheet metal interior, will need some bars and a hoop. Could really do a nice functional dash, with toggles, starter button and manual choke. Put the battery cut off switch and brake bias control right on the dash, don't want no sissy looking dirt track racer. Speedway motors could have some dirt style parts you might be able to use to pull it off also.

Cannot wait to see this come together so be sure to post some photogs as you go along.

Sounds like several of us started in similar circumstances. Here's a pic of me with my first checkered flag in 1970 (started racing stock cars in '69).

Looking forward to seeing this project come together and I vote for shiny paint (if I get a vote).