1939 Chevy coupe

[Beagle]

The name Brodix conjures images of 50 years ago, Dart feels like 30 but I guess it's more like 40.. damn I'm getting old.

[STINEY]

I kinda like the vague 60’s vibe the old covers give off, at least to me. They would go well with the 327 in our ‘56. It currently has cast covers with DART II on them, and it seems a little out of “time” with the rest of the ‘56.

Somehow I can see the Brodix covers on your ‘39 though. Funny isn’t it?

[1946Austin]

grind (or mill) the brodix off?

Is that a joke? Not sure what I'd accomplish by that? Grind it off and end up with a plain $50 pair of valve covers? Like these:

[DanStokes]

Or install them upside down. I tried it on a piece of paper and it looks like Cyrillic - or maybe Martian.

Dan

[SuperBuickGuy]

grind (or mill) the brodix off?

[1946Austin]

Going to have to drill holes for PCV valve and breather. Ordered a pair of baffled grommets from Mr Gasket, to keep things as clean looking as possible. Brodix sells some awfully ugly breather tubes that bolt on, and can't bring myself to use them.
My buddy has had these for 5-6 years, and finally said he couldn't bring himself to punching holes in them. I got no problem with it.

[SuperBuickGuy]

oh yeah, those are at LEAST 20 hp.

[1946Austin]

Got a pair of non period correct valve covers for the '39 Chev. Haven't been happy with the old finned covers, as they're just not that cool. And I found a pair of NOS B&M covers I really wanted, but at $550 on BIN Ebay, I passed.
I located these Brodix valve covers locally for a decent price NIB, so got them for the SBC.



They say "chrome don't go any faster" so maybe as cast will?

[1946Austin]

Checked the trunk lid to see how the bending was going. It's been two days since I started, so wanted to see if I had any results yet. Just pulled it down with light pressure at first as I wanted to see if it bent, and how much it needed. Left it set a couple days, and checked it yesterday. It had bent slightly, but not nearly enough. So cinched it down again, and a little more pressure on the strap. Giving it a couple more days, and maybe by tomorrow the curve will align with the trunk lid opening, and it wont need anymore work on it.
I also need to put some shims between the hinge bolt points on the body to lower that end of the hood, as it's maybe just under 1/8" high there also. Maybe a washer or two between hinge and body will lower it enough to get that edge perfect also.

[1946Austin]

Got the edges where glass overhung trimmed back, and rough ground. Then I used my long boar and coarse sandpaper to get the edge straight again, and rounded it off. Mixed up some Duraglass to fill in the low spots, and roughed that in also. Just needs a tiny bit of thin glazing filler to be ready for primer again.
Did some measuring on my front fenders, and found the passenger side was 1/2" lower than the driver's side. So loosened up all the bolts and put in shims under the front braces to bring it up to match the driver's side.
Began to bend my trunk lid to get rid of the low spot on each side at around 18" from the hinge point. It's fiberglass and those I spoke with said it's best not to try to cut or shape it, since it's less than 3/16" low at this point. So I cut two 20" long 2x4's and stood them on end between the trunk lid and floor. Then attached a ratchet strap across the trunk handle down to each leaf spring, and pulled it tight to bend it. I'll check it each day and add tension, or release it when it matches up to the body along the lid.

[1946Austin]

Once again I started to box up and bring my paint and body filler inside the basement for winter. Once again I got sidetracked on the '39 instead. But I did at least get paint in a box!
It started out pretty cold, but once the sun got up a bit it got very nice out and mid 50's too!! So I decided to pull the hood off the '39 and cut some fiberglass off the sides. I originally cut the sides open, but left the faux trim line that's matching the doors trim line. But the hood was such a fitment issue when I first reworked it that the lines didn't match up. That bugged me, but not much could be done, except not have the trim line. So I marked it out just above the trim line, and used my parting disc to remove it the full length of the hood!
Once I got it cut off I used a flapper disc to smooth the cut edge, and I will seal it with resin later. But cutting that trim off revealed I'd gotten a bit heavy handed when reworking the hood, and that area was only bout 1/8" thick on the driver's side! So I laid the hood upside down outside the shop and ground off all the paint in this area. Then I cut up 6 pieces of woven fiberglass cloth, and fit them to the area. Mixed up a couple oz. of resin, and began brushing and laying down the 6 layers. Left it in the sun to harden, and later I'll trim back the edge to match, and put a little Duraglass over the front side to finish off the repair.
Maybe I'll get that paint put away tomorrow? Or maybe I'll finish up the hood instead? I did get antifreeze checked in all my vehicles today, and added some to the '39 to bring it up just a little better. And got trickle chargers on the coupe and the Austin. And got the water drained from my pressure washer so it wont freeze and crack the pump!

[DanStokes]

Of course it wasn't even considered to keep the old '52 Buick then. But i was a very pretty car and in excellent condition. That and the cheap price were why I bought it then. Today I would love to have that car, and would enjoy seeing what I could do to the old straight 8 to make it perform even better! I'd probably pull the old 3 speed trans and swap in a T5 or other 5 speed trans to make it even more road worthy for freeway cruising. An EFI adapted to a straight 8 with some performance upgrades might also add to it's appeal. All sorts of things I would love to do IF I still owned that car.

We all have 1 (or more) of those!

Dan

[1946Austin]

Of course it wasn't even considered to keep the old '52 Buick then. But i was a very pretty car and in excellent condition. That and the cheap price were why I bought it then. Today I would love to have that car, and would enjoy seeing what I could do to the old straight 8 to make it perform even better! I'd probably pull the old 3 speed trans and swap in a T5 or other 5 speed trans to make it even more road worthy for freeway cruising. An EFI adapted to a straight 8 with some performance upgrades might also add to it's appeal. All sorts of things I would love to do IF I still owned that car.

[DanStokes]

If I was a rich guy I'd love to mess with one of them. But I'll stick with my Mercedes......

Dan

[DanStokes]

I had a '52 Buick Special with straight 8 2dr hdtp back in the late 60's. My sister was going to trade it in on a God awful '57 Chev 4dr sdn Belair, and Ron Tonkin told her they'd give her $25 trade in, so I gave her the $25 and kept it. It was a really nice dark green with a white top, and ran fantastic. The straight 8 had a ton of torque, and fairly decent power too.

They were excellent cars in their day - smooth, quiet, and reasonably responsive. When I started at the Buick dealership in 1963 we still had a few customers with straight 8 cars as their DDs so we maintained them and they gave us little drama.

Dan