My 26T Coupe build

[langy]

I've been asked to post my 26T build here, hope you enjoy it as much as me.


Just started collecting parts for a new project, Hopefully my 32 will be soon finished and I'm really getting the urge for some track action again, Was going to uprate my T but it would mean some major modification which would spoil the look to be honest so decided to start afresh.

New project will be a street & strip car and as my T will have crossplys, Body will be channeled 4" over the frame but full height.

I've picked up a 26T Coupe body which will have a heavier duty version of my T chassis under it as the motor is going to be a Cadillac 500ci I picked up, I had a bit of luck as I was going to buy all the parts for the engine from MTS who are one of the Caddy experts but when I joined their forum I managed to pick up all the parts for the engine from a guy in the states as brand new parts still in the boxes 30% cheaper than new

Engine should end up at 500+ cubic inches and has the following spec

10-1 Keith Black +60 pistons
Scat forged rods
MT20 very lairy Cam
MTS Valve train conversion
MTS Heads
Edelbrock ported intake
Edelbrock EPS 830 carb
Full balance
Cloyes heavy duty timing chain
2" Headers
Art Carr TH400 with transbake (Thanks Crusty)
B&M 2200 stall convertor

My aim is to build a 60's style T again with Radir Tri ribs, Copper metalflake paint & a White fur interior !!! Hope to run very low 11's or maybe high 10's on crossplys, Maybe more on slicks.

I'm aiming for this kind of look but with Copper flake and obviously a 26T body

Here's a few pics of the used body i bought

Here it is mocked up on a friends frame, This is very much how mine will look.

Sue has been telling me to move the 6metre length of polished 100mm x 50mm stainless box from the side of the house, wasn't quite sure where to put it so decided to cut it up to size, I got a bit carried away and ended up making the side frame rails, still save having to do it later !!!

This is what i started with.

This is the front suicide mount which i drew up and had laser cut.

Here the side frame rails are marked out, the chassis design is the same as my 23T but i've goneup a size on the box as the Caddy motor has twice as much BHP and Torque as the 23T. The 100mm x 50mm looks very klunky on the front of a T so from the firewall forward will taper to 3". Side rails also taper in from the firewall 3 degree's

Here's the mockup in Ply

Once i had the side rails marked out it was time to get the 9" grinder out which was fitted with a 1mm stainless cutting disc and the sides were sliced. once i had finished cutting i noticed that the sides of the box had moved all over the place, this will be corrected with clamps before tack welding.

Here is the side rail being clamped back together and tack welded.

Here i'm marking out the lightning holes in the side rail, they are graduated to suit the taper and will be sleeved

Holes were cut with a selection of good quality hole saws, they cut perfect holes out quite easily, i used 1/8" wall tubing to sleeve them but due to the holes being graduated some are not available in stock size so i will turn the odd sizes on the lathe.

Here the ends have been rounded off to 3", i used 3" x 1/8" wall tube which made the job much easier.

The ends are now boxed off

Here are the suicide mount parts polished, Ready to weld together

Here are the engine mounts i had laser cut, They will get polished very soon.

These are the front steering arms that i drew up and had laser cut. I have yet to add the threaded bungs to attach to the spindles. the holes are graduated and were drilled after cutting.

Will update as i progress, Thanks for looking.

 

[langy]

These are the other half of the engine mounts and the Trans mounts, And the engine steady bar.

This is how the engine mounts go together, They will be TIG welded through the holes and then dummy rivets put in to cover the holes and give the look that they are rivetted in place.

A bit more progress, The front spring perch and front chassis legs are finish welded and had a light polish. Next it will all be finish welded on the chassis jig.

Had to make a slight modification to the engine mounts, The original method of fixing was to weld down through the holes and cap off with a rivet, this turned out to be a pain so instead the holes have been counterbored and they will now bolt into threaded inserts welded into the frame and then capped off with rivets to complete the look, well off to weld them up now. I'm afraid progress is going to be a bit slow on this project as i'm in the middle of painting my 32 roadster, just working on this when i'm waiting for paint to dry

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[langy]

Engine mounts now welded

Finally got round to polishing the engine mounts today.

Got lucky at our March swapmeet and picked up a pair of Impala rear light bezels that i've been looking for over the last 12 months (thanks 58delray)

I've fitted them with dual 59 Caddy tail lights, should look cool lit up on the rear panel

Took them to the chromer next day and he said he could return them to show quality despite them being quite pitted


First job was to drill out the old bases.

Next job was to remove all the sticky out bits.

Next some simple brackets were made up after shortening the stud posts the thickness of the bracket material.

The lights now fit in the bezels nice and snug and nice and deep

 

[langy]

Was playing with colours a couple of days ago, I was looking for a burnt Copper flake, anyway i came up with this colour so tried it on my Caddy valve covers (I chromed them first) as a test.

What do ya reckon ???


media blasted

Epoxy primed

Painted

 

[langy]

Well made a bit of headway but its taking longer than i thought Its a real pain working with polished stainless as even your fingers leave marks if your not careful and after each stage it needs to be repolished

Well i got the body mounts all in the frame while its not welded together as its easier to handle, they go right through the frame rails and are welded top & plug welded at the bottom. They are tapped 10mm x 1.25

Got the rear x member made up with 3 positions for rear coilovers for adjustability.
This was the worse bit of stainless i've had so far, real grainy and a pig to polish. Maybe i should of used round tube as that always seems to have a really good finish which means less polishing
Its a bolt in jobbie so end caps will be welded on when in the jig.

The chassis is now on the jig ready to be welded so hopefully some more interesting pics next couple of days.

I bought a new TIG torch as welding on the chassis is difficult with the pedal, this one has a roller button on the torch for varying the current, I need to practise for a couple of days to get used to it but so far its very good, another useful feature is it has a flexible head which saves bending your wrist for those awkward bits.

I'm using a 55 f100 master cylinder that will be chromed, I didn't like the black plastic cap it came with and was wondering what to do with it when steve (rustycoupe) produced this aircraft cap, i had to chuck it in the lathe and remove the theaded portion but now fits a treat, thanks Stevie.
It will get polished to take off the billet look later.

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[langy]

Well took a day off today as I needed a hand with the frame and my good mate Des (Tiki Des) came over to help, He was quickly dispatched on polishing duty while i welded some bits up.
The chassis is made in 2 halves as it needs repolishing after each bout of welding with a hand held polisher.

Another good mate Ian (Bigbossman) got me some low tack vinyl stuff to protect the polished surface as its very easy to mark so the rails were covered up.

The postman came this morning with some bits i've been waiting for, They are the fishplates for the inside and outside of the kick up and also the firewall joint in the main side rails, The fit a treat but need polishing before being welded in place. thanks Paul.


Kickup fishplates

Firewall joint fishplates

The main rear section rails are now fully welded so needed to add the rear crossmember to tie them together, also added a kickup spreader and weld in some gussets I had laser cut.

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[langy]

Well sometimes things in hotrodding world don't go smoothly
I had welded up the rear corner fishplates and were polishing out the welds amd daydreaming and the next thing i knew i had made an undercut in the main rail It looked terrible and i couldn't believe i had done such a stupid thing, My trusty helper Gomez said it wouldn't show but i just wasn't happy with them, anyways i had to carefully cut off the plates and make 2 more which were slightly longer to cover the c0ckup

They probably don't show in the pic but they are quite deep.

At least i think i got away with it I'm off to finish weld now.

Coilover x member now finished.

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[Gerry]

Hi Steve.
Welcome. I hope the guys will appreciate your work as much as I do. I know its not a bucket but come on theres so much to learn here. I cant wait to line up the Fad and the coupe together at the Nats one day. Steve post some pics of your bucket as well please.
Gerry

 

[langy]

A bit of progress in that I started making up the rear triangulated 4 bar, was originally going with ladder bars but seeing as traction is gonna be an issue i'm hoping the 4 bar will be better

Bars are made from 1" od 316L stainless tube, the ends are bungs that are tapped and welded into the tube. I'm using stainless urethane joints (5/8" UNF thread with 1/2" eye) at the axle end and stainless rose joints (3/4" UNF thread with 5/8" UNF eye) at the chassis end.

Chassis brackets bolt on into threaded bungs that are welded into the chassis, they attach with ARP stainless bolts (3/8" UNF) , these were not lazer cut as i couldn't wait for them so were cut out with a thin cutting wheel and shaped on the linisher, they are 5mm 316L flat bar.

the bars bolt to the brackets with 5/8" UNF bolts and will have castle nuts and split pins as soon as i find some, I may have to make them

These took me 3 long evenings to make so you can see why progress is slow


Here are the bits made up before polishing

Here after polishing and welding

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[langy]

Not much to post i'm afraid but I did get the flip body rear chassis mounts made. Base plate is 8mm and the upright is 10mm, nice and sturdy stainless steel threaded inserts were welded into the chassis first for the attaching bolts.

Also got around to making extensions for the model A wishbones i'm using, they are a little on the short side so i spun up some tapered extensions in the lathe, They are now a nice 47" long, these will be tig welded in to the bones at the weekend so they can go to the chrome platers on monday, rear joints are stainless Rose joints or urethane stainless rodends 5/8" UNF

Well i'm pretty close to joining the 2 halves together at last, got the wishbone mounts made up and fitted. I'm still not sure whether to use the urethane stainless joint or stainless rose joints on the end of the wishbones or maybe stainless track rod ends, urethane joints look a little klunky whereas the rose joints look more slinky and the track rod ends stick out a fair way ???

All the bolts thread into stepped threaded inserts that insert from the inside of the rails and are welded on the outside.

I made up some stainless cone washers to allow the rose joints to articulate slightly, the larger one goes under the nut in case a joint fails. Suppose i had better polish the inside one too.

Heres the 2 styles of joint.

Had a few hours spare today so decided to drill and detail my F100 front drum backplates, Not sure whether to chrome them or paint them in flake at the moment.

 

[langy]

I used a 5/8" UNF stainless jam nut to hold the pivot in place but wasn't completely happy with it then i remembered i had some 5/8" stainless castle nuts, i think it looks much better now. I'm using them all over as i think they look old car if you know what i mean.

Well not much progress but its getting there, here is the suicide mount all finished and polished.
Perch is welded in at 10 degrees, 7 is the castor angle and the other 3 degrees is the cars rake.

I got one side of this joint perfect but *floop*ed the other up so decided to polish out the weld completely.

Here's some polished holes just for Brizey

The joining of the 2 halves is imminent so the joining plates were cut, they have been sized to snugly slide inside the box section and are secured by a bolt to pull everything together nicely and inline (this will be done on the jig) the bolt goes in the centre hole and the other 2 holes are for rosette welds then the bolts are removed and again rosette welded, then the joint is welded and polished out.

Polishing has vastly improved timewise due to my latest buy Its a 4HP 3 phase Pro polisher 2800 rpm that i'm running off a single phase to 3 phase digital convertor, its an amazing bit of kit that i reckon saves me 50% polishing time as its impossible to slow down and you can really lean on stuff.

My rad supplier in the states made me up a chopped radiator in ally, Looks like the grille shell needs a bit out of it

I will be losing the brackets from the sides as the rad will be mounted on some custom stainless brackets with the original Fords springs and bolts, in stainless of course
I will be welding some 10mm ally with tapped holes to the rad sides to take 2 bolts to hold the rad brackets.

Rad brackets (yet to be polished)

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[langy]

I've got most of the bits for this project squirrelled away but was lacking some door handles, had a look around but nothing floated my boat so decided to make some with holes in them to follow the theme in the car.

Luckily I had some 10mm stainless offcuts in the bin so a shape was drawn and cut out with a 1mm cutting disc, as this was easy to hold in the drill vice I drilled the holes before cutting out.

Once the shape was cut it was linished smooth ready for polishing. At this stage the shape was put into the handle with a soft sander and a curve was put into the handle by clamping in a vice over 3 small lives of bar.

Here we have the polished handle, next I spun up a couple of pieces of stainless bar to weld to the handle to act as a extension, I forgot to take a picture of these I think

Here we have the handle welded up and the weld polished out, I'm pretty pleased the way they turned out
I robbed the baseplates off some old handles so these will be rechromed.

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[langy]

I'm stuck with welding chassis together as the jig has a frame on it at the moment so i decided to make a start on my 40 Ford dash, Its a fair bit wider than the T body and its usual to narrow them in the middle and recurve the ends.
I didn't want to narrow it so i cut it to length and will make new curved ends for it later.
One problem is with the 40 cluster is that its almost impossible to get a speedo and 4 small gauges in it, I've elected to fit just a speedo, oil pressure and water temp, my voltmeter and fuel gauge will be going elsewhere.

I made up a baseplate in 2mm stainless sheet and made the surround from 25mm x 5mm stainless bar, its made in 4 bits and welded at the corners. The baseplate is held to it by 8 x 3mm countersunk screws.

Next up was the speaker grille which actually will house my radio instead, easy way out would of been to get a repro chrome 40 grille but i did that on my 32 and while it has classic looks i wanted something different so i set about making something that would reflect the lightening hole theme in the car, again i started with a piece of 2mm stainless sheet and marked out my design that just happens to be the same as my grill insert, more about that later.
The outside finisher is 15mm x 5mm stainless bar again welded in each corner and radiused, the sheet is then secured to the back of the finisher with small screws.
It hinges up for access to the radio, I wish i had kept the hinge templates from when i did my 32 as they would of saved me a lot of time making it all work again.

Polished hinges are welded to the 2mm stainless baseplate and connect to a hinge plate that is welded to the inside of the dash.
i was originally going to polish both baseplates but thought i might get reflections that might dazzle me so both will be copper flake, I think it will also highlight the polished stainless edges better.

I was originally going with small bullet shaped thingys in the small holes but i've now scrapped that idea as i just didn't like it when i put some in, now i will be going with small rivet heads.

Where the ends were cut off the cut went through the ashtrays so fill in pieces were made and welded in and smoothed off.

There are quite a few holes to fill, some are stock but a fair few have been added by the various owners over the years.

The original radio hole needed filling so i used the piece i cut from the top of the dash, no wastage here. The bar you see here is the hinge bar for the hinged opening grille.

The piece was shaped to fit nicely and tack welded in place.

Then fully welded and smoothed off

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[Rick]

I'm stuck with welding chassis together as the jig has a frame on it at the moment so i decided to make a start on my 40 Ford dash, Its a fair bit wider than the T body and its usual to narrow them in the middle and recurve the ends.
I didn't want to narrow it so i cut it to length and will make new curved ends for it later.
One problem is with the 40 cluster is that its almost impossible to get a speedo and 4 small gauges in it, I've elected to fit just a speedo, oil pressure and water temp, my voltmeter and fuel gauge will be going elsewhere.

I made up a baseplate in 2mm stainless sheet and made the surround from 25mm x 5mm stainless bar, its made in 4 bits and welded at the corners. The baseplate is held to it by 8 x 3mm countersunk screws.

Next up was the speaker grille which actually will house my radio instead, easy way out would of been to get a repro chrome 40 grille but i did that on my 32 and while it has classic looks i wanted something different so i set about making something that would reflect the lightening hole theme in the car, again i started with a piece of 2mm stainless sheet and marked out my design that just happens to be the same as my grill insert, more about that later.
The outside finisher is 15mm x 5mm stainless bar again welded in each corner and radiused, the sheet is then secured to the back of the finisher with small screws.
It hinges up for access to the radio, I wish i had kept the hinge templates from when i did my 32 as they would of saved me a lot of time making it all work again.

Polished hinges are welded to the 2mm stainless baseplate and connect to a hinge plate that is welded to the inside of the dash.
i was originally going to polish both baseplates but thought i might get reflections that might dazzle me so both will be copper flake, I think it will also highlight the polished stainless edges better.

I was originally going with small bullet shaped thingys in the small holes but i've now scrapped that idea as i just didn't like it when i put some in, now i will be going with small rivet heads.

Where the ends were cut off the cut went through the ashtrays so fill in pieces were made and welded in and smoothed off.

There are quite a few holes to fill, some are stock but a fair few have been added by the various owners over the years.

The original radio hole needed filling so i used the piece i cut from the top of the dash, no wastage here. The bar you see here is the hinge bar for the hinged opening grille.

The piece was shaped to fit nicely and tack welded in place.

Then fully welded and smoothed off

Holy crap i'm totally SPEACHLESS.What a build.






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[Ted Brown]

You guys sure do have a lot of time on your hands, will be a fancy one off for sure...

 

[phantom]

I bow to the master, it's that sort of work that inspires

 

[sstock]

Bucket or not, this is flat amazing to see. Thanks for the thread. I will look forward to it coming together.
Big thumbs up.

 

[HAceT]

Stainless steel must be easy and cheap to get your way.. :jawdrop:.....Looks great...keep it up I love the thread so far.

 

[VegasBruce]

:thumb: Sweet!!

 

[Gerry]

Steve.
Though the guys would like it. Had no idea you would post the whole lot in one go, but thanks. Oh by the way Im looking for a slip yoke for my 350.
Gerry