Chassis - Chapter 2: Page 1 (May 2001)

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. . . no, not drinking too much and/or climbing marquee poles: we mean mocking parts up and admiring our handywork!

Hmmmmm . .As soon as the basic chassis was ready, we wheeled the jig outside, and sat the body and bed on the chassis. The bed was sat on a couple of 2" timber planks, as per original, and the grille shell and bonnet (hood) carefully balanced on the front. Hmmm, should this bit be in the 'Bodywork' section? Too late. Anyway, this is not the look we are going for, although it does look kinda good like this - a set of steelies and wide whitewalls, anyone?

Mmmmmm . .One thing we've learnt over time is that you can never have too many photos of a project. It's especially important when you're stripping parts down - how ever good your memory, it always helps to have something to refer to when putting it all back together.
And when you're planning changes, a bit of cutting-and-pasting, and you can see what changes you want to make.

Ah!As we said earlier - you were paying attention, weren't you - we have been drawing the chassis up using a cheap CAD program. We had started the first chassis by drawing it up, based on the street rod plans we had been given. Some of the body mounting hole locations were moved (we found some differences when we had checked against an original chassis), and the rear modified to take the '40 Ford spring.
This drawing was then copied and modified for the pickup's chassis plans - in the pic you can see the front raised 3", and the kick up at the rear. A rectangular subframe will be used at the rear, with the bed mounted directly to it, although we haven't decided what rear suspension to use, so there isn't a crossmember yet.

We now know what shape it's going to be, so it's time for more sawing and welding . . .

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