Another build thread? Yep, my track-style T

[J. Robinson]

Thanks, Don. I never bothered to mention it before, but my body was also twisted slightly. In order to make it fit the frame properly, I had to shim the left rear corner up 1/4 inch. Everything seems to be straight and level now.

The next step, finally, is to fabricate the rear bumper. For this I used my trusty Harbor Freight pipe bender and some 3/4" OD tubing (1/2" black iron pipe). The nice part about this little stuff is it bends without kinking and you don't have to pack it with sand.

The pictures are pretty self-explanatory as to how I did it. The idea here is to accomodate the license plate in the center and surround the '48 Ford taillights on either end. It all fits within the width of the rear of the turtle deck. I won't get back to this to fabricate the mounting brackets until after the weekend; my son and I are going to the Rumblers' Groundhog Gala in Orlando.

Would a real track-T have had taillights and a license plate? In some cases, yes. Back in the late '40's and early '50's when these cars were terrorizing the local short-tracks, a lot of them were flat-towed to the track with a tow bar which necessitated taillights and license. A few, in rural areas, were driven to the track, headlights removed, raced, headlights re-installed, and driven home. Those were truly the good old days...