37 Ford build--IE: old Header issues thread /37 Ford/5.0/GT40P heads

[Irelands child]

Interesting thread to anyone who has ever put a Ford in a Ford street rod. I am new to this site and hope you don't mind an unrelated question. I recently sold my 32 5 window (302/C4) and am in the market for my next project. I am thinking real hard about a Brookville 30/31 A on their 32 chassis with a 302 or 351/AOD combination. Brookville says that I do not need a recessed firewall with this combination but I would need to use the Motorsport short water pump. My 5 window was a Downs body and chassis combination and there were some clearance issues on the front of the engine and the fan shroud. Since you have experience with Brookville products, do you think a 302/AOD would fit without a recessed firewall (it will be on a 32 chassis)? I have had good luck with the Cooling Components electric fan and shroud combination (it gets hot down here) and I would like to use that on this car. Thanks.

Don,
There is one thing about Brookville - that sometimes they do NOT know their own product. Even with a '32 chassis, the '30-'31 firewall will need to be recessed. The '32 firewall is to a certain extent, already recessed about an inch plus for all intents and purposes, flat. The '30-'31 firewall intrudes into the engine compartment ~3". Take a look at the attached and even with the added couple of inches or so of chassis does NOT make for a fit. If I were to do it again, I would purchase my Brookville with no firewall or a stock type if they insisted I have one, then install a Bitchin' or Direct if they make one. Both are neater looking then the OEM style. I am using a CCS fan with a '32 Walker radiator with a Brookville '32 grille shell. Do a search in CHR on my name to see some of my other Brookville complaints as well as here: http://hotrodders.com/cgibin/rls/mag...1&icon-status=
If Brent deletes this competitors link, PM me and I'll send it to you.

Good luck if you go this way

[Deuce Don]

Thanks Dave, that helps a lot. I have built two Downs 32s, a roadster and a 5 window, and have been pleased with them. I did purchase both cars with recessed firewalls and the only issue I have had was that the motor mounts were too far forward on the 5 window and that was corrected with the short waterpump. What I should have done was to move the motor mounts back to where they should have been. Live and learn. Thanks again.

Don

[randyr]

Hi Randy,
Made it back safely from Beautiful Burbank - but am still about an hour off kilter as far as time.

The engine looks nice and clean - what rockers are you using? They don't look like my Crane Energizers. Time for a paint job on it - and that's always a bundle of fun.

The firewall sure looks a lot better than that piece of Swiss cheese you had originally. Fits up real nicely. Did you get the trans tunnel as well?

Gotta finish getting my taxes ready today for my accountant - so will be basically off-line for most of today.

Welcome back Dave. Hope you had a good trip.

My rockers are Scorpion 1.72 rollers. They came highly recommended by the guy who designed my cam. I don't have all the specs handy at the moment but can fill you in later on that...

They painted my engine the new Ford Gray. It doesn't photograph as well as it looks in person. I kinda wanted to go with a pewter/stainless steel look on the cast iron parts and add subtle bling with polished alum valve covers, coated headers etc. The plug wires and dist. cap are red.

I got the entire floorboard to go with the new firewall. Once I started cutting, it just seemed to make sense...lol....I'm also moving the master cylinder back under the floor and putting the shifter on the floor instead of column. On my old setup the column shifter linkage cleared the exhaust manifold by about 1/4 inch. The floor shifter makes sense to clean up the congestion in that whole area.

I decided to buy a little Lincoln welder. It should be here tomorrow. It's a wire feed mig with the hoses & guages to add the gas. I'm excited to get it so I can do this stuff myself rather than trying to schedule time and money to get someone else to do it.

Anyway, glad you're back online. Good luck with your taxes. I still have to do mine too.....Egad!

Later,
Randy

[Irelands child]

Randy,
I like that engine color - it looks like gray cast iron.

I've not heard of Scorpion rockers but they appear to be fairly hefty. My Cranes are the 1.7 version - which will, hopefully, give me the low end with the mild SVT -E303 cam and a bit of economy. At least our gas here isn't over $3/gallon yet like yours is now. I saw for self serve as low as $3.11 in Burbank to $3.85 in Beverly Hills for 87 octane (phew).

From what you are saying, you have the bases covered with new floorboards, master cylinder relocation and floor shifter. You are right that it will clean up the area - a lot. It's amazing that when you start on an update how many other areas get done as well. There is just so much more "stuff" available now then when the car was originally built plus there may be some more discretionary cash as well.

With your replacement master cylinder - are you using one of the new style 'vette designs with the double sided outlets? They came out a couple of years ago, right after I did mine, and make the plumbing job much neater, as you don't have to loop the tubing as much to get back to the frame.

I'm using a 16" Lokar floor shifter as the brackets seem to be much more rigid then the Gennie. The Lokar e-brake handle also bolts to the floor shifter bracket - another item to consider.

Not sure which 110V Lincoln welder you are getting, but I have run the H@## out of mine and am happy with it - but have to know its limitations. A 2# roll of wire and a 40 cu ft gas bottle run about the same length of time. Just make sure you shut the gas off even if you aren't welding for 15-30 minutes. The internal (handle) valve seems to always leak a bit. You will need a decent auto darkening hood, a pair of Mig pliers, a pair of heavy welders gloves and a heavy cotton long sleeve shirt (no poly - if it were to catch fire, it will melt into your skin, causing 3rd degree burns). Then, unless you already know how to weld, practice, lots, or take a short course.

I've gotten all the tax paperwork together and off tomorrow @9:00 to the tax man. Nothing unusual this year so it should be straight forward and maybe I wont owe (too much). Then back to the car if the weather would turn - rain and cold (and some snow) predicted for the next few days again. Regardless, I still have some handle and latch holes to weld up (with my Lincoln welder) on my hood sides and can do that in the basement. Good for a few hours.

[randyr]

Randy,
I like that engine color - it looks like gray cast iron.




With your replacement master cylinder - are you using one of the new style 'vette designs with the double sided outlets? They came out a couple of years ago, right after I did mine, and make the plumbing job much neater, as you don't have to loop the tubing as much to get back to the frame.

I'm using a 16" Lokar floor shifter as the brackets seem to be much more rigid then the Gennie. The Lokar e-brake handle also bolts to the floor shifter bracket - another item to consider.

Not sure which 110V Lincoln welder you are getting, but I have run the H@## out of mine and am happy with it - but have to know its limitations. A 2# roll of wire and a 40 cu ft gas bottle run about the same length of time. Just make sure you shut the gas off even if you aren't welding for 15-30 minutes. The internal (handle) valve seems to always leak a bit. You will need a decent auto darkening hood, a pair of Mig pliers, a pair of heavy welders gloves and a heavy cotton long sleeve shirt (no poly - if it were to catch fire, it will melt into your skin, causing 3rd degree burns). Then, unless you already know how to weld, practice, lots, or take a short course.

Yeah, Dave, the master cylinder does have double sided outlets. Shouldn't be that big a deal. I am going to have to cut off the brake pedal they sent since I got the big block firewall. I think I'll take that to a welding shop though. I don't want to risk my brakes & life on my being a novice welder...lol...

I am going with a Lokar shifter. I'll consider the E-brake handle as well.

The welder I'm getting is the Lincoln HD 3200 Weldpak which is the SP-135T or something like that, with all the gauges, hoses, gun, etc....I actually bought it new on Ebay for $352 plus $60s/h. The same package sells at home depot for $459 plus tax. I think I ended up saving close to $100 that way....It's supposed to be here tomorrow. I'm excited to check it out.

Still need to get my taxes finished.....argh!!!

Later,
Randy

[randyr]

Hey Dave,
Where did you get all your braided steel lines (trans, fuel, etc)?

Randy

[Irelands child]

Hey Dave,
Where did you get all your braided steel lines (trans, fuel, etc)?

Randy

Randy,
Most of the pieces came from Summit - they are a combination of Earl's, Russell(Edelbrock), and Aeroquip. Then they were self made up and I have the scars on my finger tips to prove it !! Every line is either SS or SS braided(except for the AC - they are just too expensive that way). The vacuum lines were only clamped in place with AN appearing covers.

Trans lines can be also bought from an outfit called Gotta Show but are a lot more expensive then home made. The brake lines and fittings were from Pure Choice with the exception of the braided flex hoses. Russells appear to be the only DOT approved hose vendor that I could find and NY can be difficult here.

A couple of suppliers have some pretty good instruction sheets if you have never done AN lines - it's an interesting and sometimes painfull process, to say the least.

[randyr]

Randy,
Most of the pieces came from Summit - they are a combination of Earl's, Russell(Edelbrock), and Aeroquip. Then they were self made up and I have the scars on my finger tips to prove it !! Every line is either SS or SS braided(except for the AC - they are just too expensive that way). The vacuum lines were only clamped in place with AN appearing covers.

Trans lines can be also bought from an outfit called Gotta Show but are a lot more expensive then home made. The brake lines and fittings were from Pure Choice with the exception of the braided flex hoses. Russells appear to be the only DOT approved hose vendor that I could find and NY can be difficult here.

A couple of suppliers have some pretty good instruction sheets if you have never done AN lines - it's an interesting and sometimes painfull process, to say the least.

Yeah, I could probably use a tutorial on working with AN lines, etc. and the braided stuff can be challenging, too. My only experience with the stuff has been cutting a Lokar throttle cable to length. I found it hard to get a clean cut without all the fraying. Wrapping tape around the area to be cut was helpful but maybe I didn't wrap it tight enough. At any rate, it looks pretty cool in the pics.

[randyr]

Ok, here's a better link to look at the disc brake kit from Steel Tech Solutions which the guy sells on ebay for $499...
http://steeltechsolutions.com/RDBINSTRWORKPAGE.html

Still no word on whether ebay or paypal is going to have any effect on the other deadbeat seller who has my money! Argh!

[Irelands child]

Randy
Not bad looking plus a pretty good write up by the seller. There is really nothing mystical about rear discs - as long as you have a good bracket and a rotor that fits and all lines up. I still suggest a search on the GM integral e brake tho to get a handle on their effectiveness. Or doesn't CA care?

Keep chasing PayPal - they are supposed to "guarantee" up to $2000 if I have read my account right.

[thesals]

yes they do garauntee it..... but you know how any financial agency is..... they'll take your money all day long, but they make it very difficult to get any money

[Irelands child]

yes they do garauntee it..... but you know how any financial agency is..... they'll take your money all day long, but they make it very difficult to get any money

Which is why I suggested to Randy to give them 2-3 e mail chances then do the "litigation test" by suggesting that a lawyer might speed things along.

[randyr]

Which is why I suggested to Randy to give them 2-3 e mail chances then do the "litigation test" by suggesting that a lawyer might speed things along.

Of course, the big "hitch" here is that you have to report the problem to Paypal within 45 days of the payment. I didn't know that and I think it was 47 or 48 days. They may have me on a technicality but I'm waiting to hear back from them. I was continuing to trust that the seller was telling me the truth about the snowstorms & his father being in ICU, etc. Shoot me for trying to take somebody at their word!! Geez!

Ebay said they are trying to contact the seller but can't really do much since the actual sale, even though it was sparked by an ebay auction, actually occurred apart from ebay. They suggested contacting the police in the area as well and agreed to cooperate fully with them. They won't give me any personal information about the seller though.

We'll see what happens. In the meantime, I don't have rear discs.....but then I don't have the engine in the car either, so brakes aren't the biggest problem right now! LOL!

I will check out the effectiveness of the GM Caddy ebrake. You'd think if they were using this on the big Caddies, it must be pretty good....or at least it would work fine on a 2800lb Ford, right?

Happy Easter to you guys!!!
Later,
Randy

[Irelands child]

Randy,
You can use this as the search phrase in Google or Yahoo - "Problems With GM Emergency Brakes". This will bring up 659,000 hits to look at. This is a pretty good one to read: http://classicbroncos.com/reardiscs.shtml . It looks like GM has mega problems with the later vehicles and with the earlier cars, rust, wear and adjustment are the culprits.

Have a good hoppin' weekend.

[randyr]

Hey Dave,
Here's a question for ya.....I finally fired up my new welder yesterday....yeah, I know, what took so long, right? Just been too busy with other stuff....anyway, it came with a hand-held eye protector. I haven't bought a welding helmet yet cause I'm too cheap and looking for a great deal...LOL...in the meantime, will the goggles from my acetelene welder work for mig welding?
Will give more of an update on the car after while. Thanks.
Randy