A short Break

I have not been able to do any Posting on this blog for some time now, I have had to take a short break.

I was layed off of the job I was working at in Oregon, and after many months of searching I finally found work in Kentucky.

So, we put all of our stuff into storage (Including the T-Bucket) and drove off to Kentucky.

Until I get a shop or garage or somewhere inside I can work on and store the car I guess it will remain in Oregon.

I will catch up on a bunch of old posts now that I have the time.

Here is a short video of the T bucket running.

Let me know what you think.

Building the Battery Box

There is a program on Google called Sketch-up, I used it to lay out my Battery Box.

Above is the layout I did for the top of the battery box.

Above is the layout I did for the actual box to hold the battery.

I went down to the local steel store and bought the required materials (1/16 steel sheet), 2 pieces came to a total of about $15.00.

I had the pieces cut and bent at one of the local shops, then I welded this together.

In this picture the parts are cut out ready for welding.

Here is another view of parts.

Here is the finished battery box, painted with rubberized undercoating inside the box.


Paint outside and on top is flat black.

Here is another finished picture.

Here is a finished picture of the battery box installed in the car.
I still need to come up with some sort of battery hold down.

Interior carpet

I know it has been a long time since my last post, and this is not much but this is it.

I had a friend give me carpet, It is/was carpet that was used in the manufacturing of a top name brand boats. I think it is really good quality carpet.

I made templates from paper of the interior floor and the transmisson hump and cut the carpet using the templates.

Then I cut out some vinyl to edge the raw edges of the carpet. Some of this was done with the sewing machine and alot of it had to be done by hand.

There will be more pictures later.

Notice the steering column is built and installed, I think the steering wheel (also a boat part) looks good.

Windshield

I orderd the windshield from Total Performance; it is their two piece traditional T bucket windshield -two 10" tall chrome frames with functional hinges. I have not completely decided if I am going to use both windshields all the time or what yet. I will decide later.



I mounted the windshield posts on the body, which is fairly easy - two screws on each side with "T- nuts" on the inside.







Here's a picture of the windshield on the body. For now, I just have the lower piece on.



Thanks for looking!

Fuel Tank

There would, and for that matter NEVER, be any way that I would pay $200 plus dollars for an empty rectangle tank to hold fuel. So after looking around and not finding something suitable for less money, the next logical step was for me to build myself a fuel tank.

There is not too much room for the fuel tank in a T bucket, so I decided the dimensions of my fuel tank would be 9 1/4" High x 31" Wide x 9 1/4" Deep.

I made a trip down to the local steel store and purchased the following pieces of steel.
One piece 32"x40" x 14 guage
Two pieces 10"x10" x 14 guage
And I got all the steel for around $35.

I ran down to one of my local wrecking yards and pulled a chrome gas cap and the filler tube out of an early 70's Ford truck. The guy at the counter ended up giving the stuff to me.

I added three inches on the front and rear side of the top piece of the tank and bent both sides down to look like a big upside down U with short legs.

I did the same with the bottom piece of the tank, but made the front and back legs the height of the tank. I slid the top, short legged, U into the bottem long legged U till the top was flush with the front and back and welded them together on the inside of the tank thru the ends.

I drilled out a hole in the center of the top of the tank and welded the filler tube in and made another hole centerd to the right of the first hole for the fuel tank quanity sending unit.

I wish I would have taken some more pictures of this thing during construction.

Here are some of the parts before welding.



I made a fuel outlet valve and a drain valve on the bottem of the tank before I welded the sides of the tank together.

I welded three "L" brackets to the bottem of the tank to mount the tank to the frame.

After I got the whole thing welded together I put a little air pressure inside the tank and sprayed it with soapy water to find any leaks, no mater how much I tried to weld these tiny holes up the leaks didn't get any better.

I went down to one of my faverite auto shops and purchased some fuel tank sealer (made by Por 15) for $35.

I put this sealer into the tank and let it cure, then reapplied, I ended up using 1/2 the quart.

The fuel tank now holds fuel without leaking.

I then primed and painted the tank black.



Thanks for reading along.

Brackets, Brackets and more Brackets

I know it has been a long, long, long time since my last post, let's see if I can remember how to do this.

One of the next pieces I built was the front spring perch. After deciding on the exact shape I wanted, I cut the pices out of 1/4 Inch steel.

After making sure everything was square and right where I wanted it, I tack welded the spring perch together.

After the final welding was done, I went back with the grinder and made everything smooth.

Above is the finished spring perch.

The next step for me was to weld the spring perch to the frame, after making sure the spring perch was centerd, square, and plum, I tacked it to the frame and then finished all the welds up.

Here are some more brackets that I built.

I built two rear lower coilover brackets. These will get welded to the rearend.

Here are the parts cut out and smoothed.

I made two identical brackets.

Here are the two lower coilover shock mounting brackets all done.

I primed these brackets with some cheepo flat black primer.

The Body

I ordered the body from Total Performance and the following pictures are of me unpacking and inspecting the body for any damage. I was excited to finally get the body and get the big pieces together! It looked like I was finally getting somewhere.

This is the Box the standard 23 T body arrived in from Total Performance.








Here is the new body unpacked. You can't see it here but I opted to have Total Performance fiberglass in the plywood floor, the transmission tunnel, and the seat riser.

After looking over the body everything looked great! There was no damage.

Now for the test, did I build the frame right and would the body fit on the frame?

Frame Construction

I made yet another trip down to the local store and purchased 20 feet of 2" x 3", .120 wall thickness, rectangular tubing to begin the construction of the frame.

The first pieces I cut were the kick up pieces, then I cut the rear pieces. I beveled all the joints that would be welded to about a 30 degree angle.

I then welded all these pieces together clamped back to back to keep everything straight. Next I measured and cut the main frame, (From the kick up - forward) and beveled and welded these in place.

Next I measured and cut the rear crossmember, measured everything to make sure the frame was square and tack welded it in place.

For the front crossmember I used 3" tubing. On the front of the frame rail I cut and notched the frame so this would sit in the frame rail flush.

I measured everything again to make sure the frame was square. and tack welded the front cross member in place.

After welding everything, I went back and smoothed all the welds and filled all the imperfections with body filler, then sanded everything smooth.

I gave the whole frame a coat of flat black primer.

I chose to purchase the engine motor mount and transmission mount crossmembers. I purchased these from Total Performance.

I installed both of these crossmembers to complete the basic frame assembly.

Th350 Transmisson

The same friend that gave me the engine also gave me a Th350 transmission. I pressure washed the transmission to clean it before disassembly.

I began disassembling it, bagging all the parts and labeling them. After I got the transmission apart I found out that the case was cracked. I traded some parts I found in my garage for another transmission case.

I bought a transmission master rebuild kit and reassembled the transmission.

Here are a couple of pictures of the finished (except for the final paint color) Transmission wearing a couple coats of top quality epoxy primer. I polished the cover and clear coated it.

This picture shows the passenger side, Lokar kick down cable installed and polished stainless bolts on the tail cone.