On the road to LA

I left this morning at 8:30. A perfect roadster day, temp was 66 degrees. A sweatshirt was all I needed. The drive went well. A little south of Cold Springs, on highway 23, I was following a big truck, we were meeting another big truck, when a canadian goose and her little ones decided to cross the highway....bad timing. Both trucks hit some of them, feathers and guts everywhere, I ducked and kept going. I arrived in Pierre, SD, my stopping place for the night about 5 PM, took a little longer than planned because of a long visit with a guy at a gas station in some little no name town, nice visit and I had no real schedule. I arrived at the Super 8 motel where I had reservations. I checked in, received my room key....guess what room number....232. How cool is that?? There is a Mexican place next door, so that will be dinner, won't even have to drive anywhere. That's it for today, not much excitment, thats a good thing

B400 done for now

Saturday we have a garage tour scheduled to arrive here. We are expecting somewhere around 70 to 75 people. So today was clean the shop day and mock up some more on the B400. Since I am leaving next week for the summer trips, the work on the B400 will be on hold pretty much untill September, at least my work. The body will go to Ben at Custom Stuff by Neu for the body work and paint on Tuesday. By the time I come home she should be all pretty in satin blue. I think I will call her "Blue Suede Deuce" As you can see in the pictures, the radiator, grille shell and headlights are in postion as are the tail lights and rear license plate. The body has the tank and filler cap and the seat and dash, just to give it a look. All that will come back off before the body leaves on Tuesday. Tomorow I need to mop the house garage floor and give the Deuce Garage a quick spruce job. I will post some pics from the tour on Sunday night. Check back soon.

Getting for the TopLess Tour 2012

Next Thursday is day one of the TopLess Tour 2012 Edition. I plan to change the gas gauge sending unit before I go, otherwise I think it is ready to go. My Dad and Granddad owned and operated a truck lines called Live Wire transfer. This was in the late 40's. When I was building the RPU I had thought of having lettered on it "Live Wire Transfer", at the time I could not decide where to do it. The other night I woke up with a neat thought. Letter the name on the side cowl blisters. I called Cliff Anderson of Stripesnpipes in the cities and he agreed to do it today at my friend Ed Belgrgens house/garage. So this morning I was off to Richfield. It is to rain the next few days and like I said I am leaving on Thursday, so today was the day. The sky looked bad here and I did hit some rain in Elk River but when I got to Ed's house it was dry and sunny.Cliff showed up right on time and went right to work. At noon Ed and I went to lunch at the Frenchman's with all the other Acme Speed Shop guys. Thats always a fun time. When we returned Cliff was done. While at lunch I ran into Twin City Roadster member Jack McNearney. We discussed agin about meeting up in Denver to drive onto LA together. That will be great, all my other "hook ups" went sour. I am excited about driving with Jack. Check out the picture of the blister with the new lettering....I really like it. Cliff is a great artist. It will be neat to have the name on the car when I go to my hometown in Nebraska next week. I doubt if many or even any people will "get" the name, But I will know what it means. I will be posting each night of the trip, as long as I can get internet service, feel free to post comments on the blog, I like to read them, but never enough of them. Hey Gary and Al, I'm talking to you too. LOL Dale................"

a cold wet day in a roadster is better than any day at work"

Some good progress today

This morning I rolled the body outside and fired up the sandblaster. I had chemically stripped the body before but left the door jambs, edges, belt line and window frames. Those areas still had the old black paint that was put on who knows when. When I finished the body I set it up on the firewall so I could do the same to the bottom. When that was done I shot it with DP90 epoxy primer, that will keep it dry and rust free. When the primer had dried I sprayed Lizard Skin on the bottom of the floor. That will help with sound and most of all heat. Since this car will have rubber mats instead of carpet the insulation will be on the botto

m side of the floor. Wally from Walts Rod and Custom called to let me know the quick change rear that he was doing for me was done. I had painted all the pieces before I took it to him. He put in the new ring gear and pinon, all the bearings, seals, set the back lash and all. It is pretty much like new now. Looks good too. Next I need to remove 4 or 5 leaves from the rear spring then I can bolt on the backing plates, add the hubs, wheels and get the chassis up on all four wheels. The next step will be mating the 5 speed to the flathead and drop it in, add the firewall, radiator, grille shell and the headlight bar with lights..will be looking good soon.

Sad Day in the Hot Rod World

Dave Bell passed away Saturday night. In case you live under a rock, Dave Bell is the BEST automotive artist that ever lived. He drew the Henry Hirise cartoon in Street Rodder magazine for the last 40 years. His art work was on many many T shirts ( I have a couple of dozen), show posters and ads. I was honored to have the 46 Chevy in one of his cartoons in 1995 and just a few months back, Dec 2011, he drew my likeness, with my pony tail blowing back, in the roadster, in the LA Roadster edition cartoon in Street Rodder. I got to spend one whloe day with him in the fall of 1994....what a fun day. We ran errands, visited some other car guys, looked at his art work, I bought a couple, toured his studio, lots of fun that day. His wake was held yesterday. The Nystroms and us drove to St Paul in the rods. We drove the 46 delivery. There were many hot rods and customs in the laot, lots of people, most wearing "Bell" T shirts as I was too. I took the framed cartoon that he drew and sent me, complete with a message and signature. There were easels in the viewing room to place our artwork on, that was nice. There were about 50 or so on display, really cool. At 7 PM, Wings Callahan mc'd a memorial to Dave, he read several letters from hot rod celebs that could not be there, then opened the floor to any one that wanted to speak. There were many great stories about the good times. I thought about telling about my day with him and his big yellow cat that jumped up on my shoulders and then sat on top of my head in his studio. I did not wany to offend Dave that day so just let the cat set there. I did not tel the story, fearing I would get choked up during the tale. It was a beautiful warm day, a sad day but a great send off for a great guy. He will be missed!!

May 2, 2012

The new gear set arrived from Speedway, got their last one in stock. It looks a little nicer than the one I had. LOL I got new rear hub bearings and seals, rear axle bearings and outer seals, gaskets. I hope to have some help and get this all assembled in the next week. I also got the frame in color and painted the firewall a very pretty milk shake cream. It looks really good with the blue frame. Both are done in semi gloss. The dash and garnish moldings need about one more shot of k38 primer and a final sand, then they will be ready for paint. The rear axle bells,drums, backing plates and wish bones have been painted black. The frame has the brake lines reinstalled and the shocks installed. I hope to have the front end attached to the frame in the next couple of days. The front wheels have been painted a gloss black. Lots of little things done this past couple of weeks. Something has changed on this site, I cannot figure out how to post photos.......hopefully I can figure this out soon!!