"Billet-T" Frday Update

[AZCOWBO]

Had another good day of progress. I used Jesse's little air-powered buffer to detail the front billet. I discovered very quickly that you don't want to buff your nails with something turning 23K revs. per minute. Anyway, we got the bucket off of the traler this am and mounted the rear tires. IThe ride height made tha car look like a wedge, so we dropped it aout 4". It looks much better. We (Jesse) studied the wiring birdsnest for an hour. We then placed the body on the frame and found that the body at the rear set on the crossmember, which makes the side body mounts at the back approx. 2 1/2" tall. went to work on the wiring, which is a challenge, because when the frame was chopped for the billet suspension, they simply cut the wiring harness at the frame and dropped it back inside, where we can't get to it, without major drilling on the frame. By five o'clock the wiring was sorted out. The red wire was ground and the black was positive, which confused us a little. Monday, we start at it again and hope to be drivable by Wednesday. We had to give up on polishing the fenders and decided to paint them instead.

***Should I paint them Silver/Billet or Electric Blue to match the Frame and body.

 

[rooster57]

That one is gona be very sharp good job.

 

[jmr122848]

Ahm tinking bloooo here and rears to match

 

[estesken]

Looks great. Hope the class can pull off a car half as nice. If you don't mind post more pics of that front end set up and help a apprentice understand. is it Torsion ?

 

[AZCOWBO]

I will be more than happy to post some close-ups of the torsion-bar suspension for your class. Jesse, my mechanic, who looks 20 is actually 32. He taught automotive classes for troubled teens, for a few years. The court actually assigned him as their probation officer. He did a great job getting the kids on the right track.

 

[putz]

My bucket has the same problem tires won't fit between fenders on trailer maybe its a sign my bucket shouldn't be on one.

 

[Lee_in_KC]

Hey Ron, the T is looking sharp! I hope you're going to fab a decent mount for your radiator fan... those black dots on the front of your radiator really take away from the high quality look of the rest of the car.

 

[AZCOWBO]

Yep, t42 already told me I will be having leaks from the friction. It is to late to weld but I have roome to rivet some mounts. Does anyone have a suggestion?

 

[Lee_in_KC]

Here's how I did mine. I bought some aluminum strap at the hardware store. I had to grind the tip off the sheet metal screws so they wouldn't penetrate the core. I put red loctite on them and they haven't budged in four years. The sides of the radiator are completely covered by the shell, so these don't show at all. Well the rear-facing part of the brackets show, but I have polished those.

 

[AZCOWBO]

Thanks for the photos, KC. Because I won't have a shell to cover the wrap around brackets like yours, I will probably go with "L" shape brackets and double rivet them for support on the back. My ride height has dropped considerably since we set the body on and Jesse crawling around inside wiring things up. If I get on it and drop the rear end, the tires will rip off my coach lamps, ha. I now will go back and re-raise it after we drop in the interior. I end up redoing things about 4 times, before I get it right, it seems.

 

[Lee_in_KC]

Is there enough meat available on the rear-facing surfaces of the sides of the rad where you could rivet or screw into? If so, you could take a sheet of aluminum and make a combo shroud/fan mount. Cut the sheet to completely cover the core and overlap the sides, cut out a hole for the fan, run pan head or countersink machine screws from the inside of the sheet out to mount the fan, screw or rivet the sheet to the rad sides... and viola!, you're in bidness.

 

[Lee_in_KC]

When I say "rear-facing surfaces of the sides of the rad" I'm talking about the surface where the red line is...

 

[putz]

here is a pic of one with shroud

 

[AZCOWBO]

Well, I resolved the ugly black dots on my radiator. I went to Ace Hardware and purchased a section of strap alum 1/8" x 3/4" , wacked off 4 pieces about 2", polished them out, bent them to a 90 degree angle, drill the bolt holes for the fan, and two 1/8" holes for the pop rivets, and mounted them inside the radiator shell, so they wuldn't be on the top side and look crappy. The bottom of the fan frame sits right on top of the lower part of the radiator shell, so I don' have any weight to speak of hanging on the supports. It worked like a charm and looks good too. Thanks for the advice.