Louvers for hood sides

[MP&C]

Cody Walls drove down from Delaware today so we could punch louvers in the hood sides for 35 Chevy he's been working on, see some of his beautiful work here...


http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/t...-chevy.976318/


After using the samples we punched last month, Cody wanted to run one more test sample with larger louvers to check the flow against where the headlight lines up. Here Cody and Kyle wheel a new test sample...





Using the Lennox to punch the louvers, stops were riveted in place.








Clamped to the hood side, we decided on a slightly larger, with more to be added at the rear than the front..





The Driver's hood side takes it's turn...








One down.....





Passenger side....





All finished up...








Can't wait to see these on the car..

[Advanced Design]

Impressive! Was the narrow end free floating as you worked left and right? Thinking yes as the rail at back held everything clamped and square.

Nice work Robert.

[MP&C]

Sorry Doug, missed your question.. Yes, the narrow end was free floating. Kyle managed that while Cody and I were taking care of machine adjustments and coining.


For those that followed the Louver job on the 35 Chevy hood sides, Cody Walls (the builder) and Dave Thomas (the owner) will at the Grand National Roadster Show Jan 29-31. The 35 will be the feature car in The Rodder's Journal booth in building 4, so if you're going be sure to stop by and check out Cody's craftsmanship and attention to detail.. absolutely beautiful car..

TRJ will also have a full feature article in the next issue.

[MP&C]

Punched more louvers last night, this time in 18 gauge polished stainless...





Motion pictures.... Punching...





https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yph2x9Woq8I





Finished....





https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdXGRXDxn8M

[MARTINSR]

That's impressive, you rock!

Brian

[MP&C]

Thanks Brian!



Well Cody posted up some pics today of the muffler "wrap" so I thought I'd add them here as a follow up for those that saw the post of us punching the stainless.





He's using stainless exhaust front to back, with two transverse mounted mufflers behind the rear axle. Since they are tucked up inside the frame rails, a bit of air flow will be provided by the louvers..





Note the "rolled" edge on the exhaust tail pipes. Cody says he isn't a fan of unfinished edges, and this car is loaded with such detail from one end to the other.





Installed, the louvers facing the front should give nice air flow.





We've got another detail to work on with Cody, and it's been a nice change of pace to set the rusty metal aside and help out on his build with the louvers we've done. Thanks for the challenge!

[MP&C]

Cody travelled down today from Milton DE so we could add some bead detail surrounding the louvers on the hood sides.





He used a paper pattern to copy the louver layout from the hood sides, and then added the offset for the bead location.








While he was doing that Kyle and I added the rounded bead detail to the louver panels for the Wheeling Machine, here using a fancy clamp-on guide...





Beaded....





Motion picture of same..


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcPpwUF5yvI


Excess flange is trimmed to the bead edge...





This should give a more finished edge when attached to the cast legs...





Once Cody was done with the layout and transferred it to some 1/2" thick MDF, it was cut out on the fancy vice jigsaw...








The corners were dressed with a 1-1/2" diameter drum sander and all the other edges filed to remove any imperfections that may alter the course of the beading dies. Then a sample of 18 gauge was clamped and run through the dies to insure the corners wanted to play nicely... The dies in the Lennox were changed to the flat upper for a flatter bead profile.

















With that looking good, the MDF guide was located on the hood side, clamped temporarily with some vise grips, and drilled for 8-32 machine screws to secure it in place..





Cody positions the IPhone for the video, using the patent pending Vise Grip phone clamp.





Completed panels...











Video of the process....


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zicnFG7KRLc


One pass was made most of the way through to give a good amount of stretch, and a second pass a slight bit more to add some definition..

[MARTINSR]

Cool stuff.

Brian

[notsolo]

WOW. Thanks for sharing, that's some nice work..Clean, Always inspired to try and do something on my project.

[MP&C]

Thanks guys! Cody got one of the hood sides hung on the car today to check out the new look. I definitely think the bead detail gives the louvers a better, more refined look.. Good call Cody.

[MP&C]

Cody Walls took the Dave Thomas 35 Chevy to Pomona this weekend for the GNRS, the car took 2nd place in it's class and also received a paint award for the 57 Cadillac Biarritz colored finish. Well done Cody!

[MARTINSR]

Pretty damn cool stuff! You do some awesome work!

Brian

[MARTINSR]

I just saw where the car was chosen by a magazine in Austriala as one of the 15 "coolest cars" at the GNRS.



Cody Walls of Traditional Metalcraft in Milton, Delaware received huge attention after finishing his custom two-tone green, straight six-powered ’59 Chevy wagon a few years ago which has recently landed on Aussie shores with its new Canberra owner. One of his latest achievements is this stunning 1935 Chevy coupe, built for Dave and Deana Thomas. It’s powered by an immaculate Corvette small-block mill screwed together by Davis Race Engines and the beautiful paint colour was laid on by Richard and Brandon Glymph. Their work was enough to earn the car an Outstanding Paint award at the show, alongside a Second In Class.

https://www.streetmachine.com.au/eve...-roadster-show

Brian

[MP&C]

Awesome! Thanks for the heads up Brian! And to clarify, we helped out with doing some louvers and bead detail. Cody Walls did all the hard work....

[MP&C]

Yesterday I rode up to York PA for the final day of the Street Rod Nationals.. I went to see the Dave Thomas 35 Chevy in person, now that is was all painted in it's full glory.





Front and back:








While I was there, Dave (the owner) got called up to the winners circle, the car received a Pro's Pick award..





Just look at the fit, finish, gaps, panel alignment, etc. Cody Walls really hit a home run with this build.
































Pictures don't do it justice. I think the next show they're taking it to will be GoodGuys Columbus, if any of you are local there be sure to check it out!!

[MP&C]

Had a visitor in the shop yesterday, collaborating with Cody Walls of Traditional Metalcraft (Milton, DE) on adding some louvers to an Austin Healey project he has in his shop. We got the bonnet done yesterday, and I had to modify my radius fixture for the boot as it had too much crown to simply louver while flat. So that is yet to come.





Time lapse:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0zjX58BDgM








Modifying our radius fixture for louvering the boot:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_0rl50XxzM


Here's pictures of the project car in Cody's shop for reference. Photo credit Traditional Metalcraft. Follow the progress on his build @eastcoastchanneljob on IG or Traditional Metalcraft on FB. This car is sporting a Honda S2000 drivetrain, should be a handful..

[mongocanfly]

Impressive as usual Robert...great work on the 35...hadn't seen this before..

[nsb29]

Worked for a guy for more than 15 years who did mostly Austin Healey’s and jaguars The Healey’s have the worst panel fit of any car I’ve ever worked on. A lot of them over the years were cut up and small block Chevys put in them. Sometimes they were restorable other times they were used for donor’s

[MP&C]

Originally Posted by nsb29

Worked for a guy for more than 15 years who did mostly Austin Healey’s and jaguars The Healey’s have the worst panel fit of any car I’ve ever worked on. A lot of them over the years were cut up and small block Chevys put in them. Sometimes they were restorable other times they were used for donor’s

Cody actually ordered replacement door skins for this car, which fit so poorly that he fabricated them himself.

[nsb29]

Originally Posted by MP&C

Cody actually ordered replacement door skins for this car, which fit so poorly that he fabricated them himself.

I can believe that! Every on complains about the fit of the after market parts on these trucks lol they never worked on a Healey

[Chevys4life]

Wow...........that 35 is a beautiful car. The total craftsmanship is spot on and definitely a show winner. That body is straight as an arrow.

Nice detail and workmanship guys!!!

[MP&C]

Cody had set the hood (bonnet) on the Austin Healey to get a look see on the louvers....





…..and this past Tuesday he came back to the shop so we could finish up the louvers in the trunk lid (boot). I must say this was the most involved and challenging louver job we have done so far. The trunk lid has a lot of crown, and with a 6” rise in the center, we needed to use the rotation fixture ala Mini Cooper wheel hub. We added to this a hinge mechanism to allow rotation up and down. The limits of the machine's throat height and high crown also meant we'd have to punch half the louvers from back end first, then rotate the lid and tooling and approach the rest from the front end. Now given the extreme flex/twist that the .050 aluminum is prone to, we needed to make sure the cut pattern would be parallel to the last set at the point we rotated from front to back. This required some "gusset" straps clamped in place to limit the twist.





Before this was added, any twist of the panel would change the outer limits of the cut +/- 1/4". Here's the wheel hub arrangement along with the hinges for up and down adjustment. We needed adjustments along 3 different axis to be able keep all the louvers running true and parallel.








….and we're off....





At this point we were 4 hours in to measuring, clamping, test run (drag the cutter against the panel to scribe the location), rotate 180 front to back, and test the pattern again, just to get to where we could start cutting. …..and another 4 hours to go before we finished. All told, with the time Vince and I spent Saturday working out clamping methods and other details, the layout was approx 4 times that of what it took to do the actual cutting.











….and the time lapse video of the process..


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMmm...ature=youtu.be








Yesterday Cody sent me pictures of the trunk lid installed.. These louvers really change the attitude of the car... Badass....

[nsb29]

I need to show the guy I used to work for Cody’s car he’s such a purist he’d have a heart attack LOL but I think it’s cool it adds a lot to the car

[MP&C]

Yeah, don't forget to mention the S2000 drivetrain

[mongocanfly]

Holy WOW..!!...the craftsmanship yall put into every project is unreal.....