Another build thread? Yep, my track-style T

[J. Robinson]

Welcome! Yes, this is a great site. There are lots of friendly and helpful people here.

Please, call me Jim. If you call me Mr.Robinson I think I'm at school dealing with my students!

Seriously, I'm glad you find my work inspirational. If you think I'm good, be sure to look at the build threads by Itoldyouso, Ken Thurm, Brianrupnow, and Hotrod46, among others. Tons of good stuff here...

[J. Robinson]

Well, I'm getting down to the dregs of little things to do before disassembly. I have completed the wooding of the body, ordered my windshield frame, sent the hood sides off for louvering, and finished the bolt holes in the top of the roll bar (I enlarged the holes, welded 3/8" i.d. tubing through them, and ground them flush). I'm at the point of making a "punch list" for completion.

Near the top of that list is a mount for the battery. I am using the same small size battery that Don (Itoldyouso) has in his roadster. This little thing solves a major problem for me because there is no good place to put a full-size automotive battery. The fuel cell takes up all the space inside the rear deck. In order to run a full-size battery, I was going to have to cut a hole in the floor under the passenger seat and suspended the battery on the frame rail. Now I have a choice; I can mount the battery under the floor (this battery can be mounted in any position) or I can put it inside the car on the firewall. Regardless, I needed to make a battery box or mount.

The pictures below are pretty self-explanatory. I made the main part of the box from 2" thinwall (1/8") angle. The retaining bracket is made from 1/8" x 2" flat stock and a small T-hinge. The latch is a little piece of 1" angle, a 5/16-18 x 1 bolt and a wing nut.

[J. Robinson]

I got my windshield frame and stanchions yesterday afternoon. I ordered the "Performer" windshield from Total Performance and I am very pleased with it. To start with, the Performer w/s is only 14" tall and with the slanted stanchions it lays back about 15 degrees. The look fits well with the track-style theme of this car.

As with all the fiberglass T bodies I have worked on in the past, the corners of the cowl needed to be "massaged" a bit to make the stanchions fit correctly. I began by assembling the stanchions to the frame and then protecting everything with a layer of masking tape. The underside of the stanchions were carefully taped to avoid wrinkles in the tape.

I sanded the cowl corners with 40 grit on a D/A sander and then the windshield was put in place, centered, and anchored to the cowl with 2" masking tape. I also cut a piece of scrap wood and taped it between the top of the w/s frame and the roll bar as a brace.

With everything temporarily in place, I added a masking tape "dam" under each stanchion, mixed up some body filler, and packed it into the gaps under the stanchions. I actually did one side at a time because some care is needed with this step.

After the filler was in place on both sides and hardened, I removed the bolts holding the stanchions to the frame, pulled the stanchions off (the masking tape on the underside kept them from sticking), and removed the frame. The body filler was left with an imprint of the stanchion. It was now just a matter of working the filler to final shape with 80 grit sandpaper.

[J. Robinson]

More pics...

[J. Robinson]

With the stanchions now fitting the body, they need to be attached. Every body is a bit different depending on how the reinforcement is configured. In this case, the rear bolt passes through the wood reinforcement and gets secured with a T-nut in the wood. The front bolt passes through the body just in front of the reinforcement tubing under the dash. There is no room for wood reinforcement in that space, so it will just have a large body washer and a flange nut.

This is simply a matter of drilling holes in the appropriate places and installing the necessary hardware. Once the stanchions are bolted in place, the windshield frame can be installed and everything tightened up.

[Itoldyouso]

That windshield looks perfect with the rollbar and all. Good choice. Don has the Perfromer on his bucket too and it gives good protection from the wind. He also bought their mirrors that screw into the posts because he wasn't able to see anything behind him otherwise.

The other thing you are going to like Jim is that battery. My car sits for weeks at a time and one revolution and my engine fires right up. It has made a believer out of Dan, and he is going to use one to fire the 455 Olds in his car.

You are really coming along well. If not Turkey Run, Billetproof for sure.

Don

[Bob Parmenter]

The slant of the windshield works particularly well witht the stretched cowl.

[Dave Severson]

Looking good! I sure do like the angled windshield!

[stovens]

J.R. I like those metal brackets to the windshield. The slant looks very cool and retro!

[brickman]

Nicely done Jim, I like the way you improvised the mount and it looks like it works great. I too like the slant of the windshield, it just looks like it fits perfect. I really like the car and the way it sits, looks like a big guy like me could even sit down in the car and get into cruising.

[J. Robinson]

Thanks for the compliments, guys. Before I decided on the windshield, I mocked it up in cardboard. I tried it straight up first and that was OK, but when I laid it back and stepped back to take a look there was no doubt which one I had to do. From your reactions I must have made the right choice...

[simpsongreg68]

are you going to make bracing for the top sides of the so it hold its shape?
I really like the front and back bumpers, what rate are the springs on the front ?

[J. Robinson]

I think you left out a word... top sides of what? If you are asking about the body, I have already done that a couple of pages back.

I don't know what the rate is on those front springs, but they are pretty stiff. They are Honda Civic "drifting" springs that I got from a kit on Ebay. I may have to change them for something softer, but won't know for sure until I drive it.

[simpsongreg68]

the top panels of the hood, will there be braces on the back of it, so it holds its shape? just curious, oh yes by the way have you ever seen richard pettys headrests in the older cars? A round tube bent into a cricle with a peace sign in the middle, and a pad on the front, just a thought would like to make one for myself, keep up the good work

[J. Robinson]

Ah! OK, the hood sides have a 1/8 x 1 flat stock strip spot-welded along the top edge that the hood top overlaps and latches onto. That keeps the bottom edges of the top panels straight. At the top center, where the piano hinge is attached, there is a 1/8 x 3/4 flat stock reinforcement strip on each hood half. Since I did that, though, I have been considering replacing those with some small angle iron for extra stiffness. One day when I was working on something else, I laid my angle grinder on the hood and it sagged in the center. I realized, all I need is for some ham-handed fool to lean on that hood a little too hard and it will be permanently deformed...

On another note, I had a bit of good fortune on Saturday. I picked up another S-10 engine and 5-speed trans for $100. This one supposedly has less than 500 miles on it since a complete rebuild! It's nice & clean and you can see some of the edges of the new gaskets & permatex oozed out in a few places, so it's definitely been apart. It's supposed to have new pistons in a fresh bore job, etc.

As the story goes, this guy bought an S-10 that had a mint body, but high mileage driveline with a smoking engine. He had the engine rebuilt, but was disappointed with the lack of horsepower, so after about 500 miles he pulled the engine back out and stuffed in a 350. This 4-banger sat in the corner of his shop for the last year or so until a mutual friend got us together...