CONSTRUCTING A JEWEL BOX

Greetings!

I've been doing a bit of traveling lately and now it's time to bear down on Gary's '51 Chevy coupe. I emptied the trunk and scuffed it with a Scotchbrite pad in preparation for painting. As I did I noticed that the rounded bottom of the spare tire well had been cut out and patched with a chunk of flat steel, riveted in place. This will never do. Gary is going to have a local upholsterer finish the trunk, but I'd better weld in a new spare tire well. The entire car is remarkably rust free, but this area can catch moisture in the small drain hole in the bottom of the wheel well and begin to rust. A new well is offered by The Truck and Car Shop (Visit them here) for $45 or so. Some of the reproduction parts on Gary's coupe are from this California group. We'd better get what we can from them before the entire west coast falls off into the Pacific.

I found this nifty, American-made tachometer in my modest treasure vault recently and thought it would fit the theme we've got going on very well. Normally, these would mount on the steering column with a huge hose clamp. That's not going to happen in this case because the coupe is not sporting a new, chrome plated, double throw-down tilt column and I don't want to mess it up. It would be almost as poor taste as putting an Obama/Biden sticker on the bumper. Gary and his boys already installed an original, working clock in the stock location on the dash, so that option is taken. I'll just be looking around. If any of you have any suggestions, don't hesitate to suggest. I had the guys at NAPA rebuild it so it'll work just fine. I'm sure Jason and Gary are going to need this to get the shift points just right with that 4 speed manual trans.

I took the air cleaner to the spray booth to lay down some deep black gloss paint. I'd already set it up to house a couple of the EFI sensors inside (see what I mean here) and now it was time to get it looking like new. 

The temperature was just under 70 degrees but I added an extra bit of mid-temperature reducer to the clear topcoat. I had to spray very carefully to avoid getting a run in the paint, especially since there were nooks and crannys that had to be evenly coated. Things went my way and the gloss was superb. I took the time to add a red circle on the top of the air cleaner lid, but after it dried I didn't like the way it looked and sanded it off and painted it black again. I've got an idea for a nice looking air cleaner nut that will perk things up amid all that black, stay tuned. 

If you'll notice in the picture with the red circle air cleaner on the engine, I've temporarily installed the new, aluminum radiator to check the fit. The stock radiator failed the flow test and Walker Radiator in Yakima Washington told me that it would cost Gary about $530 to replace it. I bought the new one for around $400 with shipping. I chose this one because it replicated the shape of the original radiator instead of the flat, fabricated look of so many other aftermarket units. Also, the manufacturer bragged on the flow characteristics and convinced me that it would do the job with the larger engine in the small engine bay. I took the radiator to the family shop and polished the top tank on the buffing wheel. It came with a rough polish but it was obviously in need of the finishing touches. It fits so snugly that it probably has less than 1/2" of clearance between the water pump pulley and the radiator. Not to worry, I'll be using two 10" electric fans on the front of the radiator pushing the air, instead of on the engine side, pulling.

In the picture of the engine with the all-black air cleaner lid you can see the rusty battery platform on the passenger, inner fender panel. I don't want the battery here (I'm sure the owner will agree with my good taste & reasoning), I want it closer to the firewall instead, as shown in the picture where I'm holding the ball-milled, aluminum battery for illustration. I cut the rivets out of the stock battery platform and got rid of it. I plan to run a cold air intake tube from each of the dual snorkels on the air cleaner to the screened inlet on both sides of the radiator core support. I want these fender panels to have the same attractive finish as the firewall when I'm done. The engine bay is the setting and the engine is the jewel for this worthy hot rod. Thanks for looking!

Doug