48 Chevy Fleetline

[sleazy]

made a little more progress. I have the s10 a-arms modified on one side and hope to complete the other tomorrow. steering and air bags will be next weekend if all goes well.

 

[sleazy]

progress

Well the frame and suspension are built for the most part. I need to weld and primer them. The next tasks will be to narrow the rear end and weld the 14 bolt outer brakes onto the 9 in rear-end and then mount the motor and trans. It all sounds so simple when typed.

 

[Kurtm333]

Arms

I like the idea on the truck arms.[dr mounting bags on them?[S

might have to borrow it someday.

Kurt

 

[sleazy]

The bags will be mounted right above the rearend. I would have put the backs on the arms but it would have taken away any possible space for the exhaust.

 

[Ratrod94]

So I had to gut the interior to get the mouse homes ( and smell) out of the car.If that plan is to expensive I may just cover them with indian blankets. .

[cl Im doing the same thing with my 49 Styleline. i found a perfectly preserved Dead Bird. :O good thing its not summer

 

[sleazy]

Haha, it is amazing the animals and smells that can find their way into a car when it has been sitting around. I had a mouse find its way into my commuter one time and die. I had to tear the dash out to get rid of the smell. It was a rough few days to work!

 

[sleazy]

progress

The rear end is built and the frame is finally a roller. I Should be pulling the turbo diesel out tomorrow. Then I can get the drive train installed. I also couldn't resist setting a fender on to get an idea how she will look.

 

[sleazy]

more pics

pics of rear end set up

 

[earthman]

nice work

 

[sawzall]

Great work, Keep the updates coming.

 

[Dirtyrat]

This is looking really cool, how close to the ground are those rear arms?
Just wondering about scrubline when a tire goes down...

 

[sleazy]

Thanks for the support. The arms are low because I wanted to keep them from coming into the floor of the car. At drive height they are even with the the bottom of the frame so they shouldn't cause an issue. The scrub lines on the front suspension is an issue though. I didn't realize it till I got it all together. I think I'm going to have to make new lower A-arms or run a bigger wheel. I would like to run 20" steel wheels but the cost is a little to much for me right now.

 

[Old Iron]

It's been a while since I've looked in on your build.
This is turning out to be very kool.
I like the way the use of the 8 lugs is turning out too.

 

[Sam_Fear]

I'm going to assume your 48 Chevy has the same fender dimensions as my Olds. If you are planning to lay frame, the biggest tire you will get forced under the rear fender is a 205/65R15 or similar (about 25-1/2" dia.) Even then, that will require notching a 1/2" tub into the body. The front can go a bit bigger. I run 205/75R15 on the front (about 27" dia.) but I think I could go a little bigger still.

I personally don't worry too much about something in the rear dragging if I have a blow out, as long as it won't try to dig in, but anything that hits ground in the front is gonna try to plow and cause steering failure. Those A-arms are bad news I'm afraid. Too bad because they look good.

 

[sleazy]

Big thanks on the tire size info. I don't remember the exact tire size but they measure 26" tall. I hope they will squeeze under there. I am considering making a set of 20" wheels or seeing if chevy or dodge run a 20" steel spare on their 3/4 ton and up trucks. That would take care of my a-arm issue. What do they do on 50's customs with the tall white walls? The car is guaranteed to hit the ground with a flat.

The extra work to make the car 8 lug was well worth it in my opinion and the car will have great stopping power too!

 

[Sam_Fear]

Duh! I just remembered, I took 1" off the bottom of my rockers up to the rocker trim, so you should be able to fit an extra inch of rubber under there. So you could run a 26.5" dia. on the rear and a 28" dia. on the front. Probably a little less if you go bigger rims since the sidewalls wouldn't compress as much.

On page 44 of my Olds build is a fairly good pic of how I cut into the body to get more tire in - the body does actually press on the tire when slammed.
http://ratrodsrule.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6898&page=44

 

[Sam_Fear]

Here is a tire size calculator I used to get an idea what would fit:
http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html

 

[sleazy]

I read your build a while back, great work sam. You dont see many chopped fleetlines ( not sure if yours is classified as fleetline) because the chops are much harder! My dad whats me to chop mine but I am just trying to get a driver first. I wanted to completely remove the rocker up to the door on mine but the extra work would set me back a long ways and would make me run a really short tire. I may end up trying to move the rear fenders up to fit a larger tire but at the same time I haven't decided if im going to cut the fleetlines body up or try to find a coupe of the same era. I really like the coupes. By the way sam, how much clearance to you have at drive height? I set my up for 3 and 1/2". I love the low.

 

[Sam_Fear]

That's where I drive too. Any higher and the rear starts getting stiff, any lower and I start getting paranoid. If I ever decide to section a few inches out of the body, raising the fenders was my plan.

 

[sleazy]

progress

Well spent the 4th of July weekend getting the motor mounted. Then I had to set one of the front fenders on it