Thread: My hand built Rat.. or whatever it is

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Originally Posted by toofast_28

Are you going to put gussets in the corners of the frame where you stepped it up for the rear end? Having built street rod frames (and other vehicle frames) before thats your weak link, if no room for gussets i highly recommend cutting a 3/16 or 1/4 inch "z" plate to cover those joints. if you want to keep it clean on the outside just do a 1/4" plate on the inside of each side of the frame. Go back about 3-4 inches (at least the height of the frame rails (2x3 tube i believe?) on the lower and upper portion of the frame on the "z" for max strength. Nice build, i just don't wanna see problems for ya. Always best to make it a little stronger in the beginning than have it all done and cracking and have to go back and fix it later!

yep. It'll have gussets.. they have always been in the plan and I ran out of 2x3 and kinda got side tracked .. actully I'm thinking more along the lines of cutting 2x3 peices to triangulate that part.. I got to take it all back apart to clean the welds up also.. but I want to get the body built first, and figure out rear suspension so I can mock up ride height and figure out a safe amount to channel it

Originally Posted by Matt167

yep. It'll have gussets.. they have always been in the plan and I ran out of 2x3 and kinda got side tracked .. actully I'm thinking more along the lines of cutting 2x3 peices to triangulate that part.. I got to take it all back apart to clean the welds up also.. but I want to get the body built first, and figure out rear suspension so I can mock up ride height and figure out a safe amount to channel it

Good thinking, i know that kind of stuff is an oversight for some people, didn't want to see ya get going down the road and have a failure, that 11 guage wall is plenty strong straight, but holding at the bends like that I feel it would fail without supports. I honestly wouldn't gusset, the side plates cut to a "z" shape with a 3-4" leg down the tube on top and bottom would be just as strong and cosmetically friendly. Have a '34 Ford coupe with a 'glass body that was built by someone else and the frame is heavy as sh*t!, have like 7x7" gussets in the step up in the rear frame like this, and when its sitting down you can't set it, but just replaced the rear end in it and its just gawdy underneath. Whom ever built it made up for their lack of engineering/craftsmanship skills with going overboard on all the reinforcement under it. the frame is 2x6x1/4" and its no pro street or anything, just a nice cruiser, blown 350, but about the smallest Weiand blower they make, so the frame is not built like that for the track.

Anyways, i know yours is a "rat" and maybe part of your vision is to let that kind of "roughness/crewdness" to be shown. I am too much of a perfectionist to build a "rat". What are you doing for a rearend/rear suspension set up?