Winter 2008 Update
We'll start with the transmission mounts and then get to some more pictures of the woody.
You can see here that I've got a 2-piece Getrag 245 5-speed tranny (bottom). It came with the car when I bought it. Most conversions use the more common 3-piece Getrag 245. Unfortunately, the 2-piece 245 is about an inch shorter than the 3-piece unit. So the usual conversion kits and instructions won't be so helpful for me. Here I'm measuring the lengths of the transmissions to determine how far back to move the brackets.
Before removing the bracket I marked the original location of the bracket. I also widened the tunnel so that the distance between the brackets will be about the same.
After a little massaging, the bracket fits into its new home. I moved the brackets back 55 mm.
A shot from bottom to give you an idea of how far the bracket moved.
We've been working on the woody for about six years. When my Dad bought the car from a junkyard in Iowa the wood was missing and there wasn't much left of the floor. Now after a ton of work, the restoration is probably about 80% complete:
- The frame has been dipped, blasted, and powder coated.
- Most of mechanicals are done.
- The original flathead has been rebuilt with a stroker Mercury crank.
- We've replaced most of the floor, plus the inner and outer rocker panels.
- The wood has been recreated by a local woody expert.
Once everything is painted and color sanded, the wood can go back on and I get to return to my 2002.
Here we are at the wood shop. Actually it's the garage of a retired Denver firefighter. All the wood was custom fit to the car.
The Maple framing is constructed first. Later he'll fit Mahogany plywood behind the Maple.
Back in my Dad's shop. The Maple framing is finished. Tinted DuPont clearcoat was used instead of varnish.
The Mahogany plywood gets clearcoat in our DIY paint booth.
Fresh paint! We've been using PPG products: DP epoxy primer, K36 primer surfacer, and Delstar acrylic enamel paint. We've done our best to match the original color.
Considering my amateur painting skills and our crude booth, I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.
It took a lot of work to get the roof this straight. This poor old beast definitely wasn't pampered.