Thread: Help Me With My Suspension

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here ya go....

Thanx For the pics, i think that will help
Heres a Question why is there always a giant hole in the roof of all the old coupes???

Yup, the hole was filled with canvas. The challenge is to put tin in there and make it look like the factory did it that way.

heres a pic of a hair pin,

That would be a wishbone.

This is a hairpin attached to a tube axle.

I've got a steel body i picked up in the desert in nevada for free' no doors or deck lid . it 's about the same size as my glass 32 ford roadster I plan to build a low to the ground minimum cost rat rod. i will build what is called a suicide front end, the stock ford I beam will be mounted out front with the center bracket going up from a tube cross member then foreward to the spring. with less weight on the front end i'll probably rework the split wishbones to have more castor. to be stable you need either more more king pin angle which mean's changing spindles and bending the axle (hard to do at home) or adding castor. more caster adds stability to only one wheel in a turn but it is the best compromise. if i use a buggy spring rear(1 spring crosswise I "ll also do a raised perch bracket then extend some tubing for body support and a crash-push bar. the ideaq for a rat rod is to have something other than a 1 800 credit card car, and build it cheap but make it a lot safer than we used to.

my first rat rod was a 31 chrysler roadster on a 36 chevy frame with olds engine. trans rear and cut down instrument panel only had to buy was a 55 ford hanging brake pedal and master cyl(fire wall mount) and pay to have the drive shaft cut. It was easier to buy tho whole wrecked car (olds) and transfer the parts to the rat rod> it used the 2 parallel leaf front springs with a 28 essex grill shell over the olds radiator Opps we had to pay $5 for the shell. some later gm bigger brakes are a bolt on to the pickup beam axle. the frame rails sticking out in front made it easier to build tow bar brackets you could tow your race car with out getting a ticket for no lic or registration. good luck

The hole in the roof was because the metal and dies couldn"t form a smooth shape until later. ford usually waited to replace the machinery until something wore out to buy something new. the 5.0 ford started in 1962 as a 221 and had to be machined on the y block 292 machinery Ps a forged crank from a truck 292 can easily be made to fit a small block since most of the centre lines are the same ( i was an engineer at ford for 15 years)

that must have been a popular thing for the manufacturers to do, because I know that you can drop a 348 Chevy crank into a 454 block to de-stroke it for making a class or whatever.

KustomKoupe,
Are you looking for a cheap front end or have you got one? I have a straight axle from a 29 Buick and parrallel leaf springs that were converted to Hydraulic drum brakes. Everything was just rebuilt before disassembly.
Ed