'58 (nash) rambler american family project

[mygasser]

consolation prize..... i just bought a box of 20+ 3" stainless steel t304 exhaust bends. ashley wants 3" for his zephyr with the 440 as he intends to get a stroker kit at some point. i was going to stick with 2 1/2" but these bends have changed my plans to 3" now. my headers are stainless so i'd like a stainless system too as dare i say it i'm quite happy to hang on to the nash once it's done. i also want to fit a stroker kit to my fe at some point so the 3" is a good idea i guess.
neil.

[Blue]

I was surprised how much noisier a 3” system is compared to 2 1/2” when the only thing that has changed is the tube size.

[mygasser]

yes mate, i'm expecting that. i'll probably add a pair of resonators near the back to help a bit.
neil.

[mygasser]

the bellhousing is removed again and talking to ash' it occurred to me that if i remove the 'gap bed' bit on my lathe it might be possible to get the bell' in there to take the 5mm off of the back. fingers crossed on that. what i can do though is pull the pump out of the box and shave a bit off of the area the bell' bolts to. between them it should give plenty of clearance for the stock converter. i'll keep you updated.
neil.
ps... yes i bought a rebuild and modify your aod/4r70w/4r75 transmission book. the youtube vid's make pulling the pump look easy so what can possibly go wrong?

[mygasser]

bu66er! the bump out for the starter makes the bellhousing about 1 1/2" to big round to fit my lathe. i've messaged my mate asking how long he'd need the bell' to machine it but not had a reply yet. i'm tempted to bolt the bell' to the box and engine without the converter and continue with mockup. at least we can get the mounts all made up and i'll get the bell sorted when it's blown apart for clean and paint. the 5mm off the bell' won't make a noticeable difference to the mounts so it's probably what i'll do. i can move on that way.
neil.
ps the stainless 3" bends arrived as did the stainless 440 header flanges.

[mygasser]

the new fence is done so back to the car. the new shifter boot is wider than the original so it would cover the gear indicator as is. this means we need a new back plate so today some cad work was required as always. once cut and painted we'll just need a 'box' to mount to the tunnel or even a console as i have seperate front seats now instead of the bench. also some tidying took place (shock horror!) so we could get the spare tyre rimmed up after painting the wheel. the nash is ford/mopar 5 stud which is handy so i just picked one of the 5 that it came with to use.
neil.

[mygasser]

today we made the plate for the shifter and reassembled it all. then i looked at the front spring crossmember to see the easiest way to drop the axle 2" from the chassis. then it dawned on me, why not cut the perch off of the top of the crossmember and reweld it below. so that's what we did and that's that sorted.
neil.

[mygasser]

so.... most 'smaller' milling machines are listed/advertised as a mill/drill. on that basis now my bigger 'commercial' pillar drill is set up i thought why not see if we can use it for milling too. specifically my bellhousing, but if it works other stuff too. so i bought some straight shank milling cutters (4-12mm set of 5) that'll go in the drill's chuck. i've been looking on ebay for adjustable 'bed's) to bolt to the drill's platform but to no avail. then i thought all i need for now is a stiff flat 'something' that'll bolt/screw to the drill platform and we'll experiment from there. looking through my garages of crap i found a lump of 40mm worktop about 3ft x 2ft so that'll do. as i said it's all experimental for now. if i balls up the bellhousing there's one the same on ebay for cheap so the way i see it there's not much to lose. anyway that's the plan.
neil.
ps if anyone has a milling bed/table that adjust left/right and back to front for sale let me know, we may be able to have a deal.

[mygasser]

well my heath robinson milling machine works, with 2mm removed from part of the face. top tip though...... don't get body parts anywhere near the cutter! yes i did and that ended today's fun while milling a chunk from the side of my left thumb too, lol. anyway here's pics of today's, er, results.
neil.

[mygasser]

we have a head gasket job in monday on a v8 pop ute so the nash needs to be steerable to roll it back over the road. so today we knocked up a temporary 'link' piece to join the column and wheel to the splined shaft and uj in the engine bay. got it tacked at the column but found it then wouldn't turn more than a few degrees each way before jamming against something? after climbing up into the car it all became clear, lol. we'd tacked the link bit to the column change tube not the steering column tube. doh! so with that cut off and the column slid through the dash and the bulkhead we tacked it to the link for actual steering. next a curved bit of scrap steel was tacked to the bulkhead to keep the column in the corner of the opening which is big enough to fit the steering box through. the column would've been slopping about like a pr1ck in a shirt sleeve otherwise, lol.
we'll be back to this soon.
neil.

[mygasser]

today so far we've made room over the road for the nash and got it back down on it's wheels. before lowering it i remembered the new halfshafts were just slid into the axle so the wheels could be mocked up. so the wheels were removed followed by the shafts and the rear diff cover. the pin through the planet gears was removed and we fitted the new outer hub seals. the shafts could now be slid in and the 'c' clips fitted into place. then refit the pin, clean, seal and bolt on the diff cover and finally the wheels. later when it cools down a bit we'll Bananarama! over the road ready for the ute to come in.
neil.
ps when the nash is outside i'll take some pics, the front's really high now we've relocated the spring under the crossmember. good job it'll go down a lump when the cast iron big block's sat in the engine bay, lol.

[mygasser]

here's the first pics since the car has gone gasser, lol.
neil.

[mygasser]

back to the nash for a bit. we finished milling the bellhousing, we sped the drill up which helped tremendously. this gave a much smoother finish. there was a little triangle we couldn't access by the starter bulge but it was only 3/4" ish so nipped it off with the grinder. next we pulled the pump out of the box ready to machine that flat too.
neil.

[mygasser]

we made a start on facing the pump in the lathe today. we're in as far as we can go as there's 2 raised sections which i assume have to stay. from here we'll make a box/sleeve to sit it in and mill the rest. we marked where the open centre of the bellhousing is in the 'ribs' of the pump face and the plan is to mill that far so the pump centres not only on it's bolts but also on the bellhousing too. that's the plan anyway.
neil.

[mygasser]

well milling the pump was pretty straightforward today which was nice. then we offered the bellhousing to it and that needed lots more taking off where the 2 'bumps' on the pump are. after an hour-ish of grinding and offering up we got there. there was lots of cheapskate 'engineers blue' (sharpie) used to mark the area before each offer up to see where more needed removing, lol. i'm going to get new pump gaskets/'o' rings before reassembly so there's no leaks, oh and front and back oil seals too while we're there.
neil.