Popular Post Spencer Posted December 1, 2013 Popular Post Share Posted December 1, 2013 Discuss here //oldschool.co.nz/index.php?/topic/41386-speenos-fifty-chebby/ So finally today my new project was delivered! top effort from the guy I brought it off to deliver it. SO the deal with this chevy is that it is a 1950 Aussie new chev, built in Ontario Canada and shipped over here for some final assembly (mostly trim I am lead to believe). The guy I got it off owns a coach building business that now mostly does hotrods, his work is amazing. He had about 4 projects on the go was moving shed so this had to go, ended up getting it for 4K which considering all the stuff that is there is a good deal (any Chevy like this here that is driving is like 20k+). The guy got it off the previous owner who had done the chop work and the 2 door conversion, he was the original owner for 48 years or something silly! apparently had all the chop work done at a shop and spent like 8k, which is reasonable for how much work they have done, its all legit too. As I was saying in Spam you can see that the rear proportions are off, not enough slope at the back! guy I picked it up off would happily redo the chop for a reasonable price (he thinks maybe 2 days work ~1k) something to think about in the future. One thing I like about it was how solid the body was. Most of the nice examples you see around the net as projects are pretty fucked when they get into them. This thing has a few small holes in both front floor pans, sills are not so good and a little around the lower boot valance thingy, pretty good. Has soooo many leaves and shit in it from sitting at the old jokers place for years. More to come soon. 26 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Spencer Posted December 1, 2013 Author Popular Post Share Posted December 1, 2013 So to make this deal sweeter it came with a 'rebuilt' SBC and a TH400. Will be moving on the 400 as its overkill for this light car and a SBC, have lined up a dirt cheap 700R4 out of a HSV VP which is much more suitable. Truck full of crap! KK I expect you to ID these heads for me. Visually it has new oversize pistons, and new head gaskets so its been apart. Probably just plastigauge and roll it. TH400 which I am going to chuck in the Brisbane river and float to Steve for his Premier. The original seats still have their trim which is neat, can just chuck a blanket on them for a start. It also has a HJ holden front end, yay! Kind of sweet but also yuck. One of my first tasks will be getting a steering rack in there and getting the geometry setup, cars that don't steer are gay. Plan here is to run P76 disks (go to ford stud pattern) also shrinks the front track that is now overly wide from this holden front. Will get some springs I have in there and see how it sits. It still has the underfloor brake master which is cool. I'll be going firewall mounted so will pull that out shortly Out the back it seems to have a poorly mounted HJ banjo diff, which will be going in the bin. Tom has suggested the exploder 8.8 which is winning the diff race at the moment. Overall this will take me ages, just going to go low buck and leave it sprung for now, max focus on things that just get it moving and driving. Chassis work (mount engine, sort diff and front end) and then getting the body on a dolly and blasted are high on the priorities and then see how we go. Discuss: //oldschool.co.nz/index.php?/topic/41386-speenos-fifty-chebby/ 20 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 8, 2013 Author Share Posted December 8, 2013 Went and nabbed a 700R4 out of a HSV VP commy on friday night. Lots of fun pulling a gearbox out of the grass, got it done quickly though around 45min and it was out, the guy lifted it with his tractor which helped heaps. Ended up paying $230 for the box, converter and driveshaft! awesome score as these non electronic 700's aren't easy to track down. Even more of a score as the guy who was parting the car reckons his son in law had the box reconditioned before it came off the road. Had a remanufactured by AC delco sticker on it so I tend to believe him. This thing has filler on it and I knew that when I picked it up. Was curious to see how well the 2 door conversion had been done as the welds on the roof chop were pretty good. Its actually not that bad, its no file finish piece of art but I can't complain. Will try get the whole outside stripped over the next couple weeks. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 12, 2013 Author Share Posted December 12, 2013 For KK. Front numbers and middle numbers. Also ports are stock as a rock, still casting parks, that other photo was just the angle and shadow I think. Also going to pick up a steering rack out of a VH commy tonight, should do the trick, I CBF grabbing the one out of the VP the other day. And even more exciting I managed to grab a cheap Exploder diff, $200 and its out of a 98. So disk brakes and 31 spline axles! its a gamble if its a posi but fingers crossed! man so much betterer than going Hilux diff. That's about my budget blown for this week! sold the TH400 and the money paid for the diff and steering rack. Next pay I'll spend my coin on some body work stuff and steel so I have heaps to do over the holidays. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 12, 2013 Author Share Posted December 12, 2013 Oh almost forgot the best bit! Got some P76 discs last week! this makes the stud pattern ford 4x4.5" to match the diff. Also brings the track in 1" which is greatly needed with this Holden front end I think. Leyland,Holden and ford parts in my ride! fail. 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 13, 2013 Author Share Posted December 13, 2013 Whoops. Anyway today I went and collected a bunch of parts I had been lining up for awhile. First a smelly Commodore power-steering rack, looks to be a bit wide for me but will build a jig to measure bump-steer and dummy mount this and play around Also got this exploder diff for a good price, thanks tom! Poor mans 9" 31 spline exactly the right width and already disc brakes It had the diff tag missing which is annoying! Anyway popped the cover off (it had been terribly siliconed up at the last service by the looks) and bam its a posi! you can see the clutch plates in the end of the nugget. Its also a 3.73 ratio which I think will work out lush with the OD on the 700, at 65 MPH and a 26" tyre its somewhere around 2000rpm. I also picked up a 1000L IBC water tank, Im going to chop the top off and turn this into my citric acid dip tank for rust removal. Guys have awesome results with the stuff so should save me a fortune in blasting. I'll keep you up to date with that once I'm all setup., pretty much anyone on OS doing up shit cars should get into this stuff. Have fun at the drags, I'm jealous. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 13, 2013 Author Share Posted December 13, 2013 . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 14, 2013 Author Share Posted December 14, 2013 Finally had a full day on this yesterday. I hate cars with no steering! so gay to move around so that was the first thing to attack. I jacked it up for the first time and the wishbones stayed stuck in max slam mode haha. So basically tore the whole front down and lots of WD40 and re-tapping all the fasteners. The bushes are OK (they are nolothanes lol), but all the steel collars are rusty and fucked so it will need a round of bush. The commodore rack is all metric spec and has a slightly larger taper on the tie rods, so I got to crack out my trusty taper reamer! only used it once years ago. Then dummied up the rack on the jack, got it all squared away and in a reasonable spot. Made up some cardboard templates and made some temporary mounts. Once these were zapped up I could adjust the rack up with shims and play around with bump steer. These commy racks are a tad wide, but was hoping with the HQ steering arms I could get away with a full length rack. Can't quite get it high enough to get the bump steer acceptable, well I could but the boot would be rubbing the chassis. This was kind of expected, but some people get away with these full racks, my subframe has been recessed into the chassis rails so this is why it doesn't work for me. Will track down a manual steering rack out of a VL etc and shorten it 20-40mm and get the rack allot lower. At least the wheels steer in the same direction when I move it around the shed haha. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Spencer Posted December 20, 2013 Author Popular Post Share Posted December 20, 2013 So knocked off super early from work and spent pretty much all day deciding where to mount this engine! Its pretty much home in this pic but light was gone so I'll add some details/photos tomorrow. 10 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 29, 2013 Author Share Posted December 29, 2013 OK so took a bunch of photos while making the mounts. I am no fab guru but just copied what the off the shelf mounts for these look like, took about 5 hours I'd say but better than spending $200 and it not sitting where you want it, most after market stuff is made for Mustang II front ends, not smelly holden ones anyway. OK so photo bomb time, somewhat in sequence. made up some pads, these sit into the older style chevy mounts, bolt goes through the tube Got a cheap reciprocating saw and removed the factory gearbox crossmember. These no removing the gearbox in place on these old closed driveline beasts. Had to lol at these mounts that were there, wtf were these for. I would almost bet they are for a 308. Gone Motor in Leveled it all up, its all centered to the chassis the best possible. This thing is my favorite tool because its a johnson. All happy and tacked it up. Its fucking tight in the trans tunnel, I will have to fab up a new trans cover anyway as the lokar style shifter sits on top of the box. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 29, 2013 Author Share Posted December 29, 2013 . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 29, 2013 Author Share Posted December 29, 2013 . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 29, 2013 Author Share Posted December 29, 2013 . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 29, 2013 Author Share Posted December 29, 2013 Had to take the front subframe out to weld these up lushly, man that sucked! awkward and snapped most of the bolts holding it in. Anyway gob was easy once that was gone. Buzzed up the top of the mounts. And cutout and welded up some gussets that go down to the chassis lip, bit dark in this shot. Anyway the motor now sits on these just fine, currently whipping up a gearbox x-member. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted December 29, 2013 Author Share Posted December 29, 2013 . 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Spencer Posted December 30, 2013 Author Popular Post Share Posted December 30, 2013 Oj so motor is all self supported in the car. Tans x-member is just some RHS tacked between the chassis rails, I will make something nice when the body is off the frame and I can get some more steel! Just about to pull the steering rack apart and cut it down, then see how much clearance it has with the sump. May have to notch it a little, or probably just get a stock sbc sump instead of this yuck deep one Anyway happy new year OS! 12 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Spencer Posted January 12, 2014 Author Popular Post Share Posted January 12, 2014 OK so been busy over the weekend, been climbing under the car allot and the way the rear end is bolted in gives me the shits. So time to bang in the exploder diff so it doesn't fall on me. It currently has a Banjo diff in there which is a reasonably undesirable diff from a HQ/HJ etc holden. Which has a stellar 2 wheel studs on this side Check out how it was mounted! only the one square U-bolt, dodgy as. U-bolts for the explorer are a pain, they are 3.25" and most off the shelf lowering block bolts only go to 3". Luckily there is a leaf spring shop litterally 5min from my house, they do mostly 4x4 and truck stuff and had some 3.25" bolts on the shelf! $40! score. I had to absolutely destroy the Holden diff to get the mounts off, but he saved me a few $$ Removed the old mounts off the 8.8, they were crazy strong 6mm steel, so much grinding to remove them nicely! I used my Johnson to level out the other existing mount, then installed the new mount level with this. I guess this puts the diff at the correct angle? seemed like the way to go Then turned the welder to 11 and stuck them on. And one huge diff installed in the car, man its massive! notice the bucket of protein powder needed to lift it around/hold stop it tipping off the jack. So yea all done, I will go silly and add lowering blocks and reset/upgrade the leaf pack later down the track. For now just happy to not have that huge diff in the way in the shed. I also went a bit silly with some paint stripper and grinder as I want to gauge what rust panels to order. Appart from someone welding the door closed it looks pretty good. 16 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Spencer Posted January 16, 2014 Author Popular Post Share Posted January 16, 2014 Its been a pretty good week for the chevy, blew my budget but I'll just scrimp next week. First up a weird listing popped up in my gumtree saved search one morning it just said "carb - suit 350 chev, $20" I waited until a decent hour and rang the guy. Turns out it was a quadrajet all in complete condition, I have a few spare parts I could build something out of but always after cheap cores. So I rolled around and got chatting as you do, it was bought as a new -refurbished carb for a mercruiser year ago but was never put in service, awesome score for $20, I popped the top and its all new, they just paint them to stop corrosion in the salt environment. Also they guy gave me a SBC starter motor while we were chatting about my car, its only a stock AC delco starter but suits me just fine! Cheb now has a starter and ready to go carb for $20 Next up I was put onto a guy who had a 'few' chev utes sitting out the back of his place. Few was a understatement, the guy had at least 8-10 49-52 utes sitting around, it was amazing. Some were OK some completely gone, so many good parts on them though. The guy also had a huge shed with maybe 15 complete running american classic cars in there, I didn't have time to check everything out but there were nice 55,57 & a 59 chev at first glance, noticed a nice XM coon too. Anyway over to another shed this time full of parts, guy had doors,hood,fenders off all sorts of classics, but most importantly a wall of factory SBC bits and peices! so for a tiny sum I ended up with a bunch of parts I was missing for my engine. Picked up a timing cover, factory intake manifold, pulleys, some logs and a flex plate. Also there is a 50 chev steering column which I needed. The logs don't quite work, but the guy had all sorts of others so I'll grab a few more next time. Oh and the water pump was just grabbed to dummy up pulleys and alternator stuff. Oh also got these doors, I was missing the with vent mirrors and some other bits and he only wanted $20 a door! And grabbed some citric acid and finally got that setup. Cut the top off this 1000L water container and filled it up. and chucked in this rusty panel to test things out, results in 2-3 days! I'm excited. 12 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spencer Posted January 16, 2014 Author Share Posted January 16, 2014 OK so here is the results after one night in a pretty strong solution. Who would have guessed that still had so much paint on it! I am going to disassemble and paint strip the rest of the paint off then give it a final dip. 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Spencer Posted January 23, 2014 Author Popular Post Share Posted January 23, 2014 So here's the finished result of that part, it looks a bit grubby/rusty but that's just some water I got on the phosphoric acid, it will wipe clean. And I chucked both the front inner fenders in the soup, was surface rusted to shit and still had lots of paint on it. It came out like this: Still all yuck and rusty. Next step is to waterblast them, I have a cheap $120 blaster and I think it is invaluable for cleaning these up. Notice most of the old paint just comes off. (it doesn't come off this well with just the hose) I left it to dry for 10min and you will notice how quick it surface rusts, especially since its 30 plus degrees and humid as fuck. At this stage if you scuffed it down with a scotch brite you would knock it back to shiny steel and you could epoxy primer it asap. I want to wait and bomb all the parts at once. So I wipe down the parts with Ranex it is available from bunnings. All finished, this will keep looking like this for AGES as long as it doesn't get wet. In the future I can scuff this up and hit it with epoxy & topcoat. Been stripping down the car and sorting the steering too, not ready for an update though. Just thought I'd pop up the progress for you chaps keen to try this. 14 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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