before and after..

[Old Iron]

We're never owners what we are is custodians/caretakers of them.

 

[gene49]

Reviving another old thread.
My first real old rod.
Picked it up in a stone quarry, drug it home, built a car, and drove it 66,000 miles, built a truck, sold the car. Hit the road in May 1995. At home, just before leaving. Have no other pictures of it.

 

[mikec4193]

Reviving another old thread.
My first real old rod.
Picked it up in a stone quarry, drug it home, built a car, and drove it 66,000 miles, built a truck, sold the car. Hit the road in May 1995. At home, just before leaving. Have no other pictures of it.

Kinda sounds like you drove the wheels off of it for sure...any idea if the ole hot rod is still alive and kicking?

MikeC

 

[gene49]

Mike,
I sold the car in Iowa sometime around 2001 or 2002, and about a year later I saw it on ebay. I have no idea what happened to it or where it might be these days. It was flat black with multicolored flames on it when I sold it. It was a rat rod before its time, honestly, I would be surprised if it was still around.

It sure served our purpose, and I got enough out of it to fund the "new" truck, which was already on the road.

 

[gene49]

I have a different one. I needed a new work truck (not the truck that replaced the 35 above).
My son grew up with Dad having hot rods. When he was 14, he decided he wanted a cool truck. We were out at a local junk yard and he saw the cool truck he wanted. A 1950 Dodge 2 ton, sitting on top of a pile of tires. Pic 1 & 2) I warned him that was a very big project, but you know kids... We brought home the cab and front frame. Pic 3) I had a mid 70s Dodge pickup that had a decent frame. His grandpa sandblasted the frame, and my son painted it with a brush. We got as far as setting the cab on the painted frame, but then the project overwhelmed him, a lot.
I found him a a project that was much easier, and bought it for him, and took the 50 truck in exchange. We got the new project running so he could drive it to school his senior year. (I don't have pictures of it).
The 50 was sitting in my shop, I already had a 2 wheel drive truck (the one that did replace the 35) so I really didn't need 2 old trucks. What I needed was a 4x4, my old one was in really bad shape, and I used it to plow the snow off the driveway. Then I stumbled by a 4x4 short box Dodge with rusted out sheet metal, and a rebuilt transmission and a running 360 Dodge motor for really cheap. I found a new home for the 50 cab & front sheet metal.
The project had to move fast, I was going to move my shop and the new place was smaller. I knew from the 2wd frame, the motor and the firewall wanted to be in the same place, and time really didn't allow for all the mess of cutting the firewall. I would lift the cab up high enough for the motor to set under the angled part of the floor, about 4" above the frame. That made the progress really fast. Extend the cab mounts up, brace the cab floor, bolt it together. Throw in a pair of bucket seats, extend the steering column shaft & brake lines to mount the booster on the firewall, and within a couple month, a running and moving truck. The modify the rusty front fenders to look OK, bolt the front panel on, make the headlights work. All that was left was a bed. A few sheets of 18 gauge and a borrowed metal break and I had bed sides. Bolt on fenders, weld in a sheet of 11 gauge for the floor and a quick tube framed and expanded metal tailgate, odds and ends, brush on some red oxide primmer and I had a functioning truck. I took the snow plow of my old truck and bolted it to the 50. Over the years it got some body work, and cheap Farm & Fleet oil based paint. A few patches along the way.
I got 12 years of hard service out of Big Blue before it got totaled when some cell phone lady turned left in front of me. The last pic is Big Blue bringing home my 48 Plymouth. about a month later it got killed.

 

[lowbudget50]

Big transformation!!

 

[MercuryMac]

Here's something a little different. The first picture is of my 730 JD in about 1976. The second, in '77, is of the poor little John Deere pulling a 510 JD baler. I had the pictures mixed together in my memories, so I parked the same tractor pulling a 510 baler in the same place on the lawn 47 years later.

 

[redidbull]

I have a different one. I needed a new work truck (not the truck that replaced the 35 above).
My son grew up with Dad having hot rods. When he was 14, he decided he wanted a cool truck. We were out at a local junk yard and he saw the cool truck he wanted. A 1950 Dodge 2 ton, sitting on top of a pile of tires. Pic 1 & 2) I warned him that was a very big project, but you know kids... We brought home the cab and front frame. Pic 3) I had a mid 70s Dodge pickup that had a decent frame. His grandpa sandblasted the frame, and my son painted it with a brush. We got as far as setting the cab on the painted frame, but then the project overwhelmed him, a lot.
I found him a a project that was much easier, and bought it for him, and took the 50 truck in exchange. We got the new project running so he could drive it to school his senior year. (I don't have pictures of it).
The 50 was sitting in my shop, I already had a 2 wheel drive truck (the one that did replace the 35) so I really didn't need 2 old trucks. What I needed was a 4x4, my old one was in really bad shape, and I used it to plow the snow off the driveway. Then I stumbled by a 4x4 short box Dodge with rusted out sheet metal, and a rebuilt transmission and a running 360 Dodge motor for really cheap. I found a new home for the 50 cab & front sheet metal.
The project had to move fast, I was going to move my shop and the new place was smaller. I knew from the 2wd frame, the motor and the firewall wanted to be in the same place, and time really didn't allow for all the mess of cutting the firewall. I would lift the cab up high enough for the motor to set under the angled part of the floor, about 4" above the frame. That made the progress really fast. Extend the cab mounts up, brace the cab floor, bolt it together. Throw in a pair of bucket seats, extend the steering column shaft & brake lines to mount the booster on the firewall, and within a couple month, a running and moving truck. The modify the rusty front fenders to look OK, bolt the front panel on, make the headlights work. All that was left was a bed. A few sheets of 18 gauge and a borrowed metal break and I had bed sides. Bolt on fenders, weld in a sheet of 11 gauge for the floor and a quick tube framed and expanded metal tailgate, odds and ends, brush on some red oxide primmer and I had a functioning truck. I took the snow plow of my old truck and bolted it to the 50. Over the years it got some body work, and cheap Farm & Fleet oil based paint. A few patches along the way.
I got 12 years of hard service out of Big Blue before it got totaled when some cell phone lady turned left in front of me. The last pic is Big Blue bringing home my 48 Plymouth. about a month later it got kill

 

[redidbull]

What a great story. Had a guy blow a stop sign a while back and luckily I was able to stop. Pretty sure he was on the phone too. Jim

 

[zzrodder]

Rear tire came apart at 75 mph on the I5 in Wa. I was following JoAnn in the Herc, got showered with chunks! She didn't freak out, brought it to a stop, fortunately a wide shoulder in that spot. BFG tires, year 2000 date, they looked good and had no lumps or flat spots but you just can't see what is going on inside....
Cars can be fixed but I'm so thankful she is Ok.

 

[Flipper_1938]

Damn! That sucks! Glad it safely came to a stop. I bet there was some serious puckering taking place.

 

[bob w]

A close call. Sure glad it's only bent metal.

 

[lowbudget50]

Dang, that still stinks about the car, but glad you all are ok!!!

 

[smallfoot]

Thankful everybody is ok!

 

[Flipper_1938]

My wife got to work this morning to find this. An 18 wheeler got hit by a car where the driver fell asleep...and the 18 wheeler left the roadway. It hit a tree right before it punched a hole in the building.

 

[soltz]

Bad day to be on the road

 

[forbigpicture]

Dang, ZZ...so glad everyone is ok...

 

[zzrodder]

Now for something really freaky, 2 days after the incident with JoAnns T, I was trailering the Hercules home and the same thing happened to the right rear trailer tire, pranged the fender too....
Getting new tires this week before taking it to the show in Radium Hot Springs, B.C.
Time to take a look at the age of your tires, the tire shops are not really jerking you around when they refuse to re-mount any tires over 6 years old....
Even more evidence about bad tires - the day before the Model T tire let go, we took JoAnns 74 C10 to the tire shop and had new BFGs put on all round. It had been sitting a few years and after a drive on the highway, it was really shaking - 3 of the BFG tires on it were lumpy, I was afraid of them coming apart - and that's exactly what happened on the T. They were year 2004 manufacture. I think it would really extend their life if it was up on blocks when sitting for a long period, but no tire lasts forever.

 

[05snopro440]

Now for something really freaky, 2 days after the incident with JoAnns T, I was trailering the Hercules home and the same thing happened to the right rear trailer tire, pranged the fender too....
Getting new tires this week before taking it to the show in Radium Hot Springs, B.C.
Time to take a look at the age of your tires, the tire shops are not really jerking you around when they refuse to re-mount any tires over 6 years old....
Even more evidence about bad tires - the day before the Model T tire let go, we took JoAnns 74 C10 to the tire shop and had new BFGs put on all round. It had been sitting a few years and after a drive on the highway, it was really shaking - 3 of the BFG tires on it were lumpy, I was afraid of them coming apart - and that's exactly what happened on the T. They were year 2004 manufacture. I think it would really extend their life if it was up on blocks when sitting for a long period, but no tire lasts forever.
View attachment 182503View attachment 182501View attachment 182502

Darn that's scary! I'm glad nobody was injured.

From what I've researched about tire failures, having the load off the tire likely won't make a significant difference. Tire age and storage temperature are reportedly the biggest factors to their degradation. Reason being that the materials used in the manufacturing process break down over time, allowing the tread to separate from the inner belts as you saw on the T and trailer tire. While sitting does impart load in one spot on a tire, the highest forces are imparted when it's travelling down the road and if it's regularly stored in higher temperatures and/or direct sun, the degradation (breakdown) of the chemicals can occur faster. It's not brand specific either, but you're more likely to see it in products like Radial T/A's which are most often used on vehicles which aren't daily drivers.

I've got some old tires on some of my junk, thanks for the reminder.

Have fun in Radium! I won't be there this year, it would have been good to see you. Hopefully you can share some pictures!

 

[gene49]

I will not run tires that are over 8 years old on anything I want to drive. I've seen way too many tires close to 10 years old come apart, some were on cars that were just parked a few minutes before! A flat tire can sure ruin your day, but a tire that is coming apart can mess up a car pretty bad pretty fast.
I had a mid 70s car that had a rear tire come apart at 60 mph, no warning at all. By the time i got the car stopped (which was pretty fast), it had nearly destroyed the rear inner fender (had it nearly ripped out of the car!) and the tire killed the outer rear quarter on the car too. Was a pretty decent car before that, nearly no rust. I ended up junking the car.

Check the date codes on your tires, if they are past 8 years old, do yourself a huge favor, replace the tires. The cost to replace all the tires may well be less then the cost to repair the car after one tire self destructs.