MTFCA Forum

I prefer to use the early term Gow Job, rather than speedster. To me, a Gow is a modified full body car where a speedster tends to have a smaller (or none) homemade body, and sometimes a single seat car.

In another thread, some requested me to post pics. So here goes. Started about three years ago. I am still a long ways away, but its coming around. Shape eye people might have seen a brief write up earlier this year in Hemmings.

The goal is to use only aesthetic parts available from 1935 or older. There will be some more modern parts (specifically in the engine / drivetrain area that will be much newer, but hopefully none of those grow to become viewable out in the open. I am trying to make an as correct pre-war car as I can.

Please let me know if you have any questions, I will list the current state of parts.

'23 Roadster body
'20's frame
T block with A crank and rods, custom pistons
Frontenac "T" model head
SU - HS6 carb
Laural-Roof cam
Semi- pressured oiling
Model A front end and steering
Model A wire wheels (19's will be the final size)
Lowered 5"
Model A trans
T rear axle

Some serious progress Chad.., Looking Good!

Hank

Thanks Hank, your one of the big parts in this also.

A week off home on vacation, even with a messed up back, I made substantial progress this week alone.

Chad, there are much earlier versions of the S U carburetor which would be closer to your aim of using pre 1935 parts. They work in the same way, but are constructed differently, with some brass components. The larger sizes are a little more difficult to come by. Based on the type of air cleaner on your example I would guess it is early 60's. The first Mini Coopers had two such air cleaners. In Australia these were totally inadequate, and were soon replaced with paper element filters enclosed in a single box.
My son has a really early brass bodied SU to use on a speedster he may build, perhaps, one day, when he gets the time!

Allan from down under.

Allan wrote: ↑

Sun Sep 20, 2020 7:52 pm

Chad, there are much earlier versions of the S U carburetor which would be closer to your aim of using pre 1935 parts. They work in the same way, but are constructed differently, with some brass components. The larger sizes are a little more difficult to come by. Based on the type of air cleaner on your example I would guess it is early 60's. The first Mini Coopers had two such air cleaners. In Australia these were totally inadequate, and were soon replaced with paper element filters enclosed in a single box.
My son has a really early brass bodied SU to use on a speedster he may build, perhaps, one day, when he gets the time!

Allan from down under.

Allan, you are totally correct on the carb, it is in fact an early 60's carb. There are a few exceptions I will be making as I have mentioned, however this is one that if you know (most won't), it can stick out a little. And for my budget, this SU fits the needs and looks.

Astute people like yourself that know these will say close enough as the design and looks didn't vary to greatly over the very long production run. Thus why I chose the SU as it could have been had way back when in the time period, just not this exact design / model, and these came at a fair price when they came up for sale.

Are you saying the air cleaner was inadequate because of air flow or filtering capability? They have a cool look to them that I feel I can skate by on the time period.

Chad, You have been busy. Glad to see you posting again .... Looks good...

dobro1956 wrote: ↑

Sun Sep 20, 2020 9:12 pm

Chad, You have been busy. Glad to see you posting again .... Looks good...

Thank You Donnie. Feels good to post some. I have and have not been busy depends on the day, and sometimes the hour. While still younger than some here, I have ambition issues....or may be it's time issues...money issues? Yeah, something like that LOL.

I'm so glad you posted your GOW-job here too! Yeehaw!
Summer sure dragged me down! I hear ya loud and clear.
Or am I waiting for the OT project to "go to town" here...
Itchin' for more Chad.

Chad, those filters were good at keeping birds out, but not much good for dust. I guess dust is not such an issue in England, the home of the Mini's, but it sure is out here. They were small and fitted directly onto the carb, so that made it easy in the confined engine bay on a Mini. The box/paper element replacement necessitated a pair of cast alloy elbows to lift the assembly up onto level and into a larger space.

Different SU carbs of 1.25" up to 2" were used on all sorts of engines with widely differing capacities and number of cylinders. With a huge range of jet tubes and needles, they could be tuned to almost anything.

Allan from down under.

Thank You for the response Allan, I appreciate it.

Yes, not much dust here either. So I am not overly worried about it....however I did have thoughts of making a setup for a real air filter just for such occasions.

A friend of mine had to sell me on the SU, they do have some great benefits and as you said easily adaptable. Pretty simple carb actually. The Fronty has only one intake port, so I wanted to ram as much as I could through there, a good match for CFM seemed to be an HS-6 carb which has a 1-3/4" throttle bore. It might be a little lazy down low, but should scream mid to upper RPM's.

Duey_C wrote: ↑

Mon Sep 21, 2020 1:58 am

I'm so glad you posted your GOW-job here too! Yeehaw!
Summer sure dragged me down! I hear ya loud and clear.
Or am I waiting for the OT project to "go to town" here...
Itchin' for more Chad.

Duey, Thank You. I'm itchin' for more to, I just don't know how fast I can get it done. I have some walls in the project I need to get broken down and done. Sometimes it's just a matter of time, sometimes money, and sometimes It's just a matter of how I want to accomplish them and set forth in doing so.

Waiting patiently for the engine work to have the A-crank and cam/lifters installed, that's going to be a hefty bill. Then it needs to be freighted back to me. Then once it comes back, I need to have the bores opened up for my pistons, and then the rotating assy balanced. Some of the bottom end work was to specialized for my guy to do, and he doesn't pour babbitt. After all that, I can final build the short-block. Then scheme up my oiling system, in the mean time I need to make an oil pan for the A crank. The one shown above is for a stock T crank. So many little things to do.

Chad,
What is your engine builder charging(roughly) to do the A crank and Cam? Trying to determine if I want to go that route.

Tim

Chad I have bolt on dimple bars if you need to borrow them for the A crank throws. Pretty simple, just heat the areas and hammer down where the voids are.

Hank

Dang Hank...! Did you have a B crank in that thing?

Here is the last A crank I did... I made a block to clamp to the pan, a special hammer to get down in there, and like you said... heat er up and hammer it down! Seems to me it was 3/16” offset in the side wall.... Oh yeah... the 12 point aircraft nuts make a huge difference too

Tim Williams wrote: ↑

Mon Sep 21, 2020 9:22 pm

Chad,
What is your engine builder charging(roughly) to do the A crank and Cam? Trying to determine if I want to go that route.

Tim

I'll just say between 1-2k (don't want to pin anyone down), Shipping was $325 there. I supplied all the parts, Cam, bearing cores, stock A crank that was cleaned and mag'ed, bake and blasted block, A rod cores for rebabbiting, Stipe adjustable cam gear, DMC crank gear, DMC billet main caps and bolts. There is alot of crank work that needs to be done as well as block mods, and then pouring all new babbit.

If I had the extra cash, I would have done the Scat crank as it is already machined to fit. I can (and am) getting two stock A cranks done for 1/2 of a Scat crank. Your mileage may vary.

It has some seriously decent parts in this thing.

Special rods had some beef on them Kevin! I have clearance! LOL!

"So many little things to do." Right there with ya Chad!
Picked up a large brass/bronze cam gear-thrust ring for a single cam, 413, 4 cylinder (OT) I'm dumping $$$ into.
Thank goodness that was done by complete chance, stopping in today.
Ached for it (months) for some more weeks of work/fitting the other associated pieces together. Ahhh...

"...how fast I can get it done" Bah, it will take as long as it takes.

Henry K. Lee wrote: ↑

Mon Sep 21, 2020 9:29 pm

Chad I have bolt on dimple bars if you need to borrow them for the A crank throws. Pretty simple, just heat the areas and hammer down where the voids are.

Hank

Hey Hank,

For the A crank, I'm going to build a Fronty style pan so no worries on the clearance. I am not sure who's this is, but this is what I'll be trying to build.....That's the plan anyhow.

Nice work BTW, I am guessing that is set up for full pressure to rods and mains?

@Kevin Pharis , always nice work from you also. I wish I lived closer to people like you two...I could learn a thing or two.

Kevin Pharis wrote: ↑

Mon Sep 21, 2020 10:18 pm

Oh yeah... the 12 point aircraft nuts make a huge difference too

Kevin, I assume ARP nuts? Thats a good tip, I'll look into getting some. I bought thier studs and thick-ish looking 6-point nuts for the cylinder head.


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Regarding pan dimples- a little trick that seems to help with pan distortion- cut a slit in the side wall just under the thickness of the pan rail at the top of the dimple. I use a small cutoff wheel in a die grinder. Then dimple the side wall and weld the slit closed and grind smooth. This allows the side wall to move out without deforming the gasket surface as much.

Thanks Chad,

loving your project so far. Thankyou for the information on rough cost.

Tim

Chad
This project is neat in so many ways.
Thanks for the update.
Bill

I love it Chad.

A friend of mine is about to give me all the running gear out of his 31 Model A pickup and I'm looking for general ideas for a period gow job. Yours is giving me some great ideas.

Very interesting thread and some great pictures of some very nice work. Just wondering Chad,...the one photo of the front end that shows other than Model A king pins. Is that a Model A front end with later Ford front end brakes, spindles, king pins, etc, etc? Just wondering,.....harold

Very interesting thread and some great pictures of some very nice work. Just wondering Chad,...the one photo of the front end that shows other than Model A king pins. Is that a Model A front end with later Ford front end brakes, spindles, king pins, etc, etc? Just wondering,.....harold

Sorry about the "double post"! Computer very slow to post and fooled me,....didt'n think it posted the first time!

2nighthawks wrote: ↑

Wed Sep 23, 2020 8:39 pm

Very interesting thread and some great pictures of some very nice work. Just wondering Chad,...the one photo of the front end that shows other than Model A king pins. Is that a Model A front end with later Ford front end brakes, spindles, king pins, etc, etc? Just wondering,.....harold

Harold, It is just later style king pins. I have a new set of stock style "A" ones to go on. The entire front axle hub to hub is all "A", just no brakes on it. I wanted the better later steering over the T, that's really the only reason it's there. Plus I "think" the stock "A" axle is an inch lower than a T axle.

just before the cold really set in, i mounted up a body side to see how all of this was coming together.

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Chad. Very nice. Looking forward to see pictures of the pan build

Thanks Mike. But as engine guys, you and I know both know its whats under the hood that matters the most.

What piston are you using with the A crank and rods?

henryford2 wrote: ↑

Wed Dec 09, 2020 9:18 pm

What piston are you using with the A crank and rods?

I posted this above, But these are custom Ross Pistons for use with the Fronty head.

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Thanks, for some odd reason I scrolled right past the first picture. Nice looking project, have fun. Joe

Got my Christmas present today:

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