You ever hear that old country song, “All I do is drive
drive drive, try to stay alive”?
That’s about how I
feel nowadays, only it’s , “All I do is weld, weld, weld, try to stay alive”.
Building, instead of buying, my 1932 Ford Roadster replica,
has me married to the welder. The funny thing is, this shouldn’t surprise me. It
is the second car I’ve built from scratch, the first being a replica Lotus 7.
It takes a lot of welding to build a car!
At least, the way I build cars; I hear they use glue
nowadays. Seriously. Isn’t that weird?
“Yes, I’d like a $200,000 dollar supercar glued together.”
I don’t know.
Coming back to the song, what about the lyrics, “try to stay
alive”?
Well, welding introduces you to a number of hazards to life:
- · There’s the hazard of suddenly standing in
knee-high flames. I’ve done this to
myself several times in the last few years.
Note – the old drapes you painted your parts on are not a good protective
barrier for keeping sparks off things; they are highly flammable. - · Apparently, the fumes given off by galvanized
parts, when welded, are poisonous. This
introduces a fun game of, Try Not to Breathe While Welding This Part. I’ve not always won the game. I may be dumber today than I was ten years
ago. - · It can’t just be galvanized fumes that are
bad. Certain paints, rubber bushings, etc. give
off quite the odor when super-heated because I am too lazy to grind the paint
off, or disassemble the part, before welding. - · There’s the hazard posed by red-hot just-welded
parts, and my inability to patiently wait for them to cool. Hot potato is an exciting game when the
potato is 500 degrees. - · Should we also mention the explosive acetylene
gas attached to my torch? - · And no list of welding hazards would be complete
without discussing the hot sparks shot randomly into various parts of your
clothing. It is hard to explain the
cigarette looking burns on your chest to your friends at the pool; no, I wasn’t
tortured by terrorists, I just like to weld.
And to keep complaining about welding, there are no
compliments. No one comes along and
says, “Hey, nice welds.”
Everyone is a welding expert.
Your friend, that has never welded in his
life, will look at your welds and say, “Looks like you could have used a little
more wire.”
That’s a best case scenario.
More likely, they’ll say, “Is it supposed to look like boogers?”
Your friend that knows how to weld, will look at your
project and say, “MIG welding is for kids, you should learn how to (insert the
word “stick”, “TIG” or “gas”) weld that.”
If you post a picture of your welds to social media, the
first commentator will say, “Your welds look like where my dog did his business
after getting sick from eating a pack of crayons.”
The second commentator will then state, “MIG welding is for
morons, you should learn how to (insert the word “stick”, “TIG” or “gas”) weld
that.”
But, it turns out, there is science to it all. Temperature, wire size/speed and the motion
of your gun combine to make great welds.
I don’t know anything about that. If the metal is thicker, I turn the
volts and wire speed up. And for finer,
thinner parts… I do the opposite.
I should probably read a book on it, or something.
But why would anyone be impressed with my welding?
I finish building my thing, and I point and say, “Look, my
things is attached to my other things like it’s supposed to be.”
“Yay”, they think, “…
for building what every car has.”
I’m not building artwork, I’m welding together a Ford, the
world’s most common car.
I’d like to do artwork, but have you seen the cost of
metal?
You look at a horse statue made of metal parts welded
together and think, “How did they do that?”
I look at the same horse and think, “How did they afford
that metal?”
I recently, rather belligerently, asked the metal yard if
they were actually charging me a reduced price for the rusty crud I was pulling
out of their scrap piles. They then
showed me that yes, they were in fact charging me a much-reduced price.
If you want to know a man’s net worth, don’t look at his
truck; you can get financing for a truck even if you just crawled out from
under a rock. Look at the metal a man
welds with; if it is clean new metal, he’s financially well-off.
My metal is very rusty.
I am good at welding up rusty holes in sheet metal. A socio-economic life skill, it seems.
So, what have I welded lately?
I welded together my emergency-brake system, front floor
board, split-wishbone mounts, some frame sub-rail pieces (that go under the cowl), parts of the frame and the front shock system.
For each one of those projects, I thought I did cool things,
that took considerable thought. Each
project was multi-day, and I stood in the shower, staring at the wall, considering
a hundred different things when conceptualizing my approach to the work. The
shower is when the best welding thoughts occur, strangely.
But, when I list those projects, you hear the most basic of
parts that every car has. And rightfully so.
I mean, normally shocks are held on by two bolts. On some cars, you can probably change the
shocks in 3 minutes.
I had to find working, matching, 1930/40s shocks. Then I had to drill holes in my frame at the
right location, considering the arc the front axle would travel when pushing
lever arms attached to a shock body.
Then, I rosette welded flanged nuts backwards into those drilled holes
to provide a strong threaded hole in the frame.
I changed the oil in my ancient shocks. I found “dogbone” links that
would provide the right connections to my axle.
I conceptualized and welded mounts on top of my axle perches that would
connect to my dogbones and be strong enough to handle five hundred pounds
pushing and pulling on them for many years (hopefully).
That’s why my shocks took all day, instead of three minutes.
And, to make things worse, my choice of shocks is controversial. Many will not appreciate them. They are an old technology, that most hot rodders disposed of.
But, that’s why I like them; they are the old technology.
Plus, I have them on my MGA and I’ve found that lever arm shocks work better than their reputation. Lever arm shocks can be adjusted,
either by tension or by oil viscosity.
But, yes, they are also the same shock that is connected to
the large doors in your old Jr. High’s Gymnasium… so, not exactly supercar
material.
Anyways, all my little projects are like that. My emergency-brake
and floor board work together, utilizing a 1930’s Ford ebrake handle to operate
in the same location as the real 1932 Ford.
My floor board covers my modern T5, accommodates my ebrake, but also utilizes the original ford threaded holes in my real ford firewall and sub-frame parts.
I ran the ebrake lines in a figure eight, which allowed me to exit the
rear wheels under the frame’s arch, instead of farther forward where the cable
would be more likely to hit the frame under heavy suspension compression; also,
my figure eight allowed me to keep the Mustang ebrake cable whole, so there’s
no fraying of a spliced together cable.
My split-wishbone mounts place the wishbones under the frame,
again where the frame archs, giving me more suspension, and sucking the wishbones
under the car, alluding to the original wishbone’s center mounting location, as
well as allowing my front wheels more room to turn before they hit them.
I also welded mounts that should be strong
for lateral, as well as front-to-back motion of the axle.
Next, I get to route and weld the exhaust!
I tried.
I tried so hard to make my welding projects sound
interesting.
There is a comment space provided below to write, “MIG
welding is for morons, you should learn how to (insert the word “stick”, “TIG”
or “gas”) weld that.”
On other car fronts, my MGA has been a great car this
spring/summer. I took it
autocrossing. I’ve taken my wife on a
date. I’ve taken my kiddos for cruises
and to many Saturday morning Cars and Coffees.
The MGA has been eerily trouble free. It’s comfortable and nice to
drive. If I was a wise man, I probably
wouldn’t be building another car.
But, I’m not sure there are cooler cars than the 1932 Ford
Roadster. There are other equally cool
cars, but not cooler. So much history, wrapped up in one car type.
I have found some nice parts recently. Someone nearby sold me a really nice seat, at
a great price, which I’m stoked for. Probably the best deal I’ve gotten on the
entire car. I thought for sure I’d be
stuck with a junkyard minivan seat, because upholstery is another of those
finer things in life, apparently (based on the prices I was seeing).
I also found some cool 1950s 16” Mercury wheels, two different sets of hubcaps, beauty rings, freshly wired old heater (with defrost) and a steering wheel, at an estate sale.
And I found some cool Mercury finned brake drums, although I think I’ll hold onto those and make them a later project since they’ll require different hubs, bearings, brakes, brake line pressure valve, etc. It’s a thousand dollars I don’t want to spend right now to make these finned drums work.
I did make a recent parts buying mistake. I bought an under-seat floor pan on social
media. When it arrived, I realized that
it was mostly held together by the protective tar coating it, and a gorilla had
cut it in half with a bottle opener.
There’s this weird 1932 Ford parts culture on social media,
where guys charge a bazillion dollars for their old terrible cast-off parts
that they didn’t/couldn’t use. I’d say
that I don’t understand why, but then I buy things like that under-seat pan and
understand perfectly why. Because morons
like me buy them.
My ’32 Ford social media purchases haven’t all been bad, but
I would say, be very wary of the social media ‘32 Ford parts scene; it is
hit-or-miss; the misses being large and the hits being marginal.
Then there’s the things you should have bought, but didn’t. This Spring, a friend asked if I wanted to go in halves on a pipe bender. I thought, “I’ve never used a pipe bender, I can’t imagine I’m going to need to”, so I declined to invest. I’ve now spent the same amount of money buying pre-bent exhaust tubing. I also tried to make the tool, using my hydraulic press and met only failure.
Well, that’s what I’ve been up to. Welding.
And that’s what I will be up to.
If you need me, or would like to get it in touch, I’ll be in the middle
of that cloud of noxious fumes emanating from my scorching hot garage,
presumably welding; if I’m not welding, I’m either passed out from the fumes,
or hopping around from sparks in my clothing.
Or, I might be staring absently into space in the shower, considering my
approach to the next welding project.
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