Low and dirty 33 chevy master sedan 4 door

DozerII · Sep 10, 2017

Wow very nice work right there.[cl[P[P

bob w · Sep 10, 2017

The body has a unique but pleasing to the eye shape. How are you bending the 1" by 1" tubing?

joedoh · Sep 10, 2017

love love love the rear hatch! [cl and the curvy metalwork in the back, makes it less munsterish (which is great!)

serrata · Sep 10, 2017

Thanks everyone!

For the 1x1 tubing, I bought a cheap hydraulic pipe bender. For the more severe bends, it wasn't working out well, so I made relief cuts and welded.

Willowbilly3 · Sep 10, 2017

serrata said:
I have soooooo much grinding to do.
Nothing like itchy fiberglass in the forearms from the grinding discs on the 9" angle grinder before going to bed...

I am amazed at how good of job you are doing with a cheap flux core welder.
I would still guess grinders get used more in my shop than anything else. I have at least 5 or 6 with different things so I never have to switch. I like those flap wheels but darn they are expensive.

Sunnybeach · Sep 10, 2017

I like it!

As previously mentioned, you are doing great work with flux core. My recommendation is to move to the bottle (c25 that is) when you can. Much easier, prettier, and stronger welds. As a side benefit you don't have to breathe all that flux wire smoke. Save the flux core for really rusty metal or outdoor work.

endicott_jb · Sep 11, 2017

Sunnybeach said:
I like it!

As previously mentioned, you are doing great work with flux core. My recommendation is to move to the bottle (c25 that is) when you can. Much easier, prettier, and stronger welds. As a side benefit you don't have to breathe all that flux wire smoke. Save the flux core for really rusty metal or outdoor work.

Actually, you will have a stronger weld with flux cored. The flux helps pull any impurities out of the metal, burn in a bit hotter, and give you a stronger weld. Gas is suggested for welding metal 1/8" and thinner. Flux cored wires are almost all designated as a e71T-GS . E, meaning electrode, 71 is 71000 tensile strength, t as tubular, and the GS is for gasless or self shielding. There are others out there that use gas also, known as dual shield, but those have a different designation. Most of your solid wires are going to be an e70s-#. Solid wires will typically only have a 60k or 70k tensile strength. But all that is going deeper into welding than what's needed here. What solid wire with a shielding gas does is allow for an easier and cleaner weld on thin materials. But he is doing a fine job with what he has.

serrata · Sep 11, 2017

I've been thinking the entire time that my welding skills are horrible, despite staring at youtube welding videos for a while. But I've been working almost always on rusted out sheetmetal that keeps blowing through. Very frustrating.

Now I'm a bit farther along, working on the frame and the welds look SOOO much better and they are easier to do. I actually understand what "penetration" in a weld means now that I'm not blasting through 18ga, 84 year old, pitted mild steel.

Welding is the fun part, even though it's a $99 HF welding machine with almost no settings. Grinding and cutting is the miserable work with these basic tools I have.

I'll post more of my progress later today.

Hurricane Irma cleanup will be filling my afternoon.

endicott_jb · Sep 11, 2017

Seeing as you're using a 120v HF flux cored wire feed welder(that's what I taught myself to weld with about 10 years ago) make sure you bevel the edges of everything before you weld it. Then, go back and fish plate every weld. The last thing you want is to be driving down the road, hit a big bump, and split your frame in two. Also, if you have to do a multipass, make sure that you get all of the slag out before you make another pass. An extra 5 minutes of prep can save you hours of cleanup.

Skip · Sep 11, 2017

endicott_jb said:
Seeing as you're using a 120v HF flux cored wire feed welder(that's what I taught myself to weld with about 10 years ago) make sure you bevel the edges of everything before you weld it. Then, go back and fish plate every weld. The last thing you want is to be driving down the road, hit a big bump, and split your frame in two. Also, if you have to do a multipass, make sure that you get all of the slag out before you make another pass. An extra 5 minutes of prep can save you hours of cleanup.

Even more if the cleanup is scattered over a couple 100 yards of highway.

Do some test welds and then try to break them before you start building a frame.

Like your ideas. Wishing you success. Be safe.

serrata · Sep 11, 2017

Started on the frame layout. I'll beef it up as I go.
I want the frame to lay on the ground when airbags are deflated completely.
Large kick-up in the rear.
There will also need to be a large kick-up in the front to reach over the front axle.

I also threw dome rattle can anodized red on there to see what it would look like. Also playing with colors on the side moldings.

serrata · Sep 11, 2017

Still catching up with the story. We're almost to present day.

Got a donor. Father passed away and I got his truck. 1999 F350 crew cab long bed dually 4wd. 7.3L turbo diesel automatic. 200k miles.

I really struggled for a while deciding if I should keep the truck as is and get it running well again or if I should use it as a donor and make use of the drivetrain.[S

The latter won out. The wife hates trucks and she didn't want it in the driveway anymore.

Stupid pics keep uploading as rotated...
Anyway, this truck is insanely large. I never really thought of it that big until I tried to fit it in my garage and started tearing it down.
I had to remove the bed and the rear section of the frame just to get the garage door to clear the front bumper.
I can't leave anything ugly in the driveway since my HOA will have a cow.

I felt really small next to this thing. The frame sat above waist level. It was stock height. Crazy.

This was the point that I started asking myself, "What the heck are you doing? You are in way over your head. You have never built a car. You are not a mechanic. The most you've ever done to a car is change an alternator, starter, or swap out a few sensors."

My stupidity won out. I kept going. I taped and labeled all the parts I took off. I threw out as much as I could. The garage was really full of parts from this beast.

Out came the dash after a couple hours of fighting with finding clips and bolts that were holding the thing in from weird angles and positions.

Took off the doors, carefully removing wire harnesses, etc. I'll need those window motors, channels, and door lock mechanisms later.

Oh my god. The A/C unit is HUGE on this thing. It's the size of a small Honda.
There are 2 halves: Inside the cab and inside the engine bay.

There is no way I'm going to fit it in the 33 Chevy to reuse it. Well, I'll figure that out later. Label all the pieces and put it in the pile of parts.

Oh, I kept the whole system sealed, which made this completely insanely difficult to remove. No hoses were removed, except the heater hoses. The A/C compressor had to be removed from the engine and the A/C radiator was bundled with the compressor, condenser and other sealed parts. What a PITA.

Dash is finally cleared out after a LOT of effort and stress. Am I going to be able to get this motor to start again later?

From several youtube channels on the 7.3, the consensus is that this motor is tough as a coffin nail and is difficult to kill. Good. It'll need it after me.
[

serrata · Sep 13, 2017

Further stripping down of the cab.

Completely naked F350. Cover your eyes!

Lifted the motor/trans/xfer case.
Removed motor/trans mounts.
Set engine down between frame rails.

Pulled the F350 frame out of the way, started cutting it up.
Laid in the new frame and roughly aligned the axles and engine...

serrata · Sep 13, 2017

Up to current day!

So, I've started putting in cross-members and I bought the hardware bar ends for the front an rear 4 link suspension.

Here is the start of the cross-members...

Transmission cross-member was fun to put together. I made a removable center section. I made it so that it can only be put in one way, so you can't mess it up.

Need some opinions and advice here...
I'm trying to figure out the best configuration for the rear triangulated 4 link.

I plan on about 12" of travel total, from laying on the ground at the lowest. Typical ride height would be in between those.

Here are 2 options I laid out. What would be the best for my use case?(or maybe some hybrid variant...)

Option A: Double-triangulated

Option B: Single triangulated (parallel lowers)

What do you guys think I should do here?

endicott_jb · Sep 14, 2017

Go with single triangulated but instead of having the two upper bars attach towards the outside of the axle, have them attach near the pumpkin. If you have it the other way it will still want to wander thus completely foregoing the reason for a triangulated 4 link. If need be, look at 1970s and 80s muscle cars. A lot of them had 4 link coil set ups.

serrata · Sep 15, 2017

If I move the upper axle mounts, there isn't mush of an angle for the uppers. Should the upper front mounts go outwards instead of inwards? In which case, I probably need to mount them a bit higher than the frame at those points.

serrata · Sep 15, 2017

Also, the pumpkin for this f350 is really huge and offset.

serrata · Dec 18, 2017

Worked on the 4-link arms for the front an rear. Started rear first.

serrata · Dec 18, 2017

Worked on motor mounts

Then worked on front suspension 4 link arms and attachment tabs...

Dropped body on top and fab'd body mounts (6 of them). I liked the ones from the truck. Unfortunately, all 6 had different size bolts: width and bolt head and length. Weird.