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Before I start this article, I want to say a few things about street rod parts. Most of the time, they are designed by the manufacturer to be installed in a specific orientation. Some parts are not. If the installer wants to mount something in a way not endorsed by, but also not discouraged by, the manufacturer, he (generic “human being”) should expect that the part may not work how it was intended to work. Things may not quite line up, or in this case, headlights may point heavenward … Read on…
 We’ve liked this headlight/ shock mount combo from Pete & Jakes for a long time. We didn’t think about installing another bracket, because we like the curves and gracefulness. A stock ’32 headlight (the big one) has the mounting bolt coming out of the bottom at an angle of about 30 degrees towards the back. This means that when the bracket is mounted to the frame, the headlight mounting cone has to be tilted forwards at the same angle. Pete & Jakes designed the bracket to be mounted perpendicular to the ground at ride height. I held it up there, and thought I’d like it tilted back a bit, to match the caster of the axle (about 6 degrees). What I didn’t realize I was doing was bringing the angle of the cone more towards horizontal, and when the headlights are mounted, they’re more effective as airplane landing lights. I tried to modify them to work, but came up with an easier idea. The brackets are also designed to mount perpendicular off the frame rail. Because our frame is pinched, and because I’m kind of a sucker for details, I decided to trim a bit off the back side of the tube so the bracket mounts parallel to the axle (perpendicular to the centerline of the frame). Also, because we have the front c-notched, the bracket wouldn’t go on the back side of the shock because it was right over the c-notch. All that means is that the headlights will be an inch or two ahead of where Pete & Jake meant them to be, which means there may be some tire interference.
So, all that said, these are still great looking brackets. I’d use them again. I didn’t use them as intended, so I spent more time making them work.
 Instead of grinding, grinding, grinding, I ordered two new cones from Pete & Jakes and lopped off the old ones. With the die grinder, I notched the end to accept the tapered , angled radius of the cone. I had to keep in mind that the headlight bolt couldn’t interfere with the shock which would be mounted right behind.
I know it looks screwed up. But I tacked the cone with it welded to the headlight, so I knew it was at the right angle. In this picture you can also see how much the front end needs to come down – the shock is set at ride height. Since we’re using the short shocks, and the shock mount bracket can’t come down any further on the frame, we’re going to have to figure out some other way of lowering the front end. I guess we COULD use regular shocks, but the shorties look so much… shorter. And I’ve never complained about having to go lower.
We have these monster 12″ long 5/8″ bolts around that I used to set up the other cone to the same angle as the first one.
While holding the bolt with one hand, and tacking with the other, I got it close and then tweaked them to match. You could use a threaded rod for the same effect.
It worked.
They’ll look lower when they’re off the lift. Before you finish weld anything, make sure that you can turn your wheels both ways!
Mirror Installation
Mocking the mirror
Resembling a scene from The Jungle Book, my mirror hangs precariously on the side of the door supported only by a few thin strands of masking tape. I’m using cowl mirrors from a ’40 Ford made by Bob Drake, minus the cowl attachment piece. They’re quite swoopy and I think will match nicely with the door handles.
They have a very nice contoured arm that comes to a perfect point at the back. There are no screws in the head (we can all attest to that joy) so it’s nice and clean.
Make sure you sit in the seat you’re going to use so that you know you’ll be able to see well. There’s nothing worse than having side mirrors that are completely useless.
There are two studs on either side of the threaded hole, which I’m sure will keep it from swiveling.
I transferred the holes to the door by pressing the studs and threaded hole onto a piece of paper, making indents. All I had to do then was make sure it was level (or parallel to the body line) and drill the holes!
Brake Lines
If you were wondering how I ran my brake lines, this will be the article which answers that burning desire.
Starting at the front, I brought the braided line out of the Wilwood caliper with a 1/8 NPT to -3 90 degree fitting. Because this is an open wheel car, I decided not to run the lines directly to the frame rails because I wanted them to blend in as much as possible. Short of wireless brake line technology that hasn’t been approved by the NSRA yet, I felt this was the next best thing. Using a 9″ braided line (as opposed to a regular brake line kit which is around 16″) I dropped down to the tie rod. I could use such a short line because the only movement is in the very slight angle change of the tie rod and steering arm. In suspension travel, the flex line has to put up with a similar angle change, this time in a vertical arc. Again, it’s peanuts compared to the angle change between the caliper and frame rail during a turn.
I machined clamps to hold the -3 joiner on to the bar and also machined the hex off the joiner fitting then centered it in the clamp. A set screw on the bottom of the clamp holds them to the bar.
Let’s play “where’s the brake line?”
I ran both sides to a T fitting under the drivers side frame rail, slightly offset to the engine side so it’s harder to see as you walk up to the car. This is where the most flex will occur, because the tie rod is going back and forth under the rail.
The middle flex line goes back just behind the steering box where it meets up to the hard line. Instead of using a bulkhead type fitting to connect the lines, I drilled out a front panhard bar tab (from Welder Series of course!) to just under 7/16″. With a bit of filing on the tab, the round part on a 3/16″ fitting will press in to it, and hold securely. It can’t come out because the hex is bigger than the round part of the fitting. If you have one in your hand, you’ll see what I mean. A -3 joiner holds the other side of the tab.
Further back, we see the Wilwood 10# residual check valve in place, attached to the line with two -3 to 1/8NPT fittings. I used another panhard tab to hold the frame end of the braided line. Braided line is being used just in case we want to use a power booster some day. All we have to do is add the booster… no bending up new lines. It also makes it really easy to drop the master cylinder if we need to look inside it for some reason.
From the braided line going to the rear line, I attached the proportioning valve right to the residual check valve with a 1/8NPT to 1/8NPT joiner. The frame rail got tapped to hold the prop. valve. Yet another panhard tab holds the braided flex line coming from the rear drum. The other line goes along the rear crossmember to a flex line on the passenger side.
One of the local events we decided to check out was the Hyde Park Lions Club Cruise, held at Steve Plunkett’s Fleetwood Farms in London, Ontario. It’s about an hour drive for us. Since it was our first time at the cruise, we didn’t really know what goes on but there appeared to be an area set aside for some ‘special’ cars in a feature area. As the evening wound down, we were asked to bring the car back the next week to park in the feature area! Here are some of the photos from the cruise, taken by a Lions Club photographer.
“Don’t golf near the car, please!”
For more images, please visit the Hyde Park Lions Club Cruise website: click here.
Some Miscellaneous Stuff
Here are a few random shots of what I’ve been up to lately. They don’t each require a separate posting, so I’ll just throw them all in here.
I made up these little spacers for the wiper posts, then painted them black.
Here you can see my heater lines. I decided not to run #10 heater hose just because of the size of the car. A #10 hose has a 1/2″ i.d., so by running 3/8″ hard line, I’m not losing all that much flow. I’m using the head as one connection, and the water pump for the other. The hose clamp on the hose going to the water pump will be replaced and eventually will look like the one just below it. Remember to flare the end of the hard line so it’s tight in the hose. I’m also trying to figure out where to run the spark plug wires.
I made up two 3/8″ double clamps to hold the e-brake cables.
Here you can see the Specialty Power Windows wiper motor that’s mounted to the steering column mounting plate.
I couldn’t exactly hide the A/C drain behind the upholstery (because what you see is the “upholstery”), so I had to come up with another way. I decided to use the leftover trunk weatherstrip I had. It’s hollow, flexible, and has an adhesive back. It’s not stuck to the firewall yet, but when I’m ready I can just peel off a few small sections of backing and hold it in place.
And here’s where we are, pretty much up to date.
A gas tank needs a vent. Otherwise, as the fuel leaves the tank and is blown up in the engine, a vacuum is created and eventually the fuel pump won’t be able to suck hard enough. Try this: plug your nose. Say “wukka wukka wukka!” No seriously, plug your nose and breathe through your mouth. Then cover your mouth with your hand. Not for very long though. Now release your nose. Your nose is like the vent valve, your lungs are the engine. Oxygen obviously represents gas. As your lungs try to get more air, pretty soon the reserve in your mouth runs out, but as soon as you open the vent (your nose) the engine runs smoothly. If this experiment didn’t work, see a doctor – you’re not plumbed right.
Moving right along, here’s how I vented the tank.
Revision 1 was slipping a rubber hose over the barbed end of the gas tank vent. Revision 2 was copying Cam, who slipped a short section of rubber hose over the barbed fitting then transitioned to stainless hard line. Here’s revision 3:
The brass piece on the right is the rollover valve/ vent. You can see the barbs on the top of the fitting where hose normally slides over. I’ve ‘toned down’ the barbs.
The 3/16″ stainless line *almost* fits inside the barbed part of the brass valve, so I machined it down just a bit so it slips tightly in. Remember, this line is mostly for vapors, with the occasional fuel sloshage. The two hex fittings are threaded on to a joiner fitting which I machined the hex off, just like the front brake lines.
Here’s the final product (I hope). You see, the tank is already in place so I had to use a welding rod to get the basic shape I needed, then transfer those bends to the stainless line. I put the joiner fitting in place so that the fitting can be installed and then hooked up to the vent tube, since there’s not enough room for the whole thing to twirl around as the vent is tightened.
As the car goes back together, we’re finding little things that we’ve wanted to get done which have made their way to the bottom of the proverbial pile. We had talked a long time ago about making some sleeves so we could put 3/8″ button head bolts in the spreader bar holes instead of the 1/2″ bolts that came with the spreader bar. The thought was brought up again during reassembly, and instead of trying to machine some spacer/ washers so the 3/8″ bolt wouldn’t be sloppy in the 1/2″ hole, I made a pilgrimage to the lathe and removed some metal. Here’s the result – a smaller, thinner head. This is a before/after shot, with the before bolt in hole on the right.
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