It’s not every weekend that one finds the time and opportunity to just be a bloke and pursue his hot rod interests.
I must admit, my 21 year old daughter who grew up in such an environment, rolled her eyes back when I explained what a good weekend I had planned. Well, she did ask.Friday night after work I squeezed in about 5 hours of engine reassembling on the 350 Chev, in preparation to put it back into the coupe for the last time, for a long time, I hope. The motor was getting new bearings and rings and the heads were being prepared to run with LP Gas. I also fitted a new low rev-hi torque camshaft to help out with the high cogs in the new 9″diff. That was Friday night and part of Saturday, before going to a shed warming party at Big Al’s to celebrate his new shed and surrounds being completed at his new house.
Next hot rod activity, was the official low key opening of a new Äuto One” auto parts store. The business is being started by some fellow members and old friends from the West Coast Street Rod Club that I have known for a squillion years. Naturally the opening was well advertised to local hotrodders and a show n shine was held in front of the store. Naturally I took a few happy snaps for the Cyberhotrodders.com Events photo gallery.
The guys and gals had hot dogs, hamburgers and drinks available. Later in the afternoon there was a monster raffle with free tickets and plenty of prizes to around. All in all a great day to catch up with the guys.Engine building, garage warming, checking out hot rods and bench racing…all in one weekend. Why did she roll her eyes for?
Check out the Cyberhotrodder photo gallery here.Eric warren
Filed under: Author Miscellaneous, Cyber Hot Rodders, Events, Hot Rods, General by Eric
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Sunday morning. I feel good and the weather is looking fantastic. I am pumped up to have a great day out with hot rods. The cameras are packed and and the street hack is fueled up.. It is right now that I wish the hot rod was finished.It is about 30 minutes drive to the starting point, a large car park at a shopping centre. I planned to get there early to take some photos as the rods came in and before the crowds gathered. I was early and too late at the same time. Clever huh! There was probably 60 rods and a couple of dozen streetmachines there already.The event is in its third or fourth year and has become extremely popular. It is at a good time of year after the winter lull. The destination is great for parking-up and has attractions to see and food and drink available at the licenced inn. It only costs five bucks to enter, which gives express discounted entry into Yanchep National Park and a shot at the lucky entrant prizes. Why wouldn’t it be popular. They also run 
a raffle with many great prizes.
They try to register all entrants before leaving the car park for the 50 minute cruise. This is where my day hit a low spot. With my five bucks hanging out of my paw, I engaged the registrars to enter the event. “What car have you got?” they enquired. In a muffled voice I replied “street hack”. “Not the VOLVO, no way” was the 
embarrassing retort. Damn, that was the second time in an hour that I really wanted to be back in the coupe. I grabbed my fiver back and tried to disappear into the bright sunlight. It’s no wonder I have not attended many events since I stripped down the Willys.The cruise in my Swedish love machine was slow and steady. (because the traffic was congested!). Once at the destination, I parked in a secluded spot and got busy again with the camera. The lawns in front of the inn were an explosion of colour. I took photos of all the rods and a few of the other vehicles. Have a look here at the Cyber hot rodders Events Gallery for the photographs.My friend and I ana
lyzed the crowd and the dining facilities and decided that an early lunch would be better than a mid afternoon meal, so we ordered and ate early, which gave us plenty of time to socialize, take more photos, see the koalas, take a walk and have coffee at the specialty chocolate shop. OK, so we weakened and bought two sample chocolates. It could have been much worse without a the diet guilt hovering.All in all a great day out even without the Willys coupe.This week I will be ordering the parts require for the coupe’s motor rebuild, then back into the shed again.Seeya Cyber Hot Rodders,Hot rod Eric of Volvo fame.
Filed under: 1937 -1939 Willys, Cyber Hot Rodders, Volvo, Events, Hot Rods, General by Eric
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Last night and today, pulling out the motor, have progressed better than I could have planned.The only change to plan was that I pulled the gearbox out with the motor, instead of leaving it in the chassis. I have raised the front engine mounts in the hot rod to keep the correct motor angle, after lowering the front 
suspension about 6 inches. The gasser look has gone. “Been there done that”, as they say. The motor raising has made the bell housing bolts all but impossible to access, so the box T/H 350 came out too. This was very easy to organise as I spend more time on designing functionality into the chassis rather than showy stuff when building a street driven rod. One day I will get a spare gear box yoke. It will save the normal red lake left under the car after such an operation.
Next the motor and gearbox were separated and the motor placed on the engine stand ready for stripping down. On went the compressor, out came the rattle gun, sockets and a few spanners and the motor was stripped to a bare block in less than two hours, which included having a rewarding beer or two. A lot can happen in a short time in a hot rod’s life. From a driving rod to a stripped down motor in less than 3 hours, when it is meant to be going back together!. What a metamorphosis. Needless to say, it will take longer to get back together after messing with gasket sealing and plastigauge etc. 
The motor has only done about 35,000 kms since last rebuilt, so it came apart very cleanly and with no siezed bits. If only I had remembered to empty the sump before spinning the motorupside down on the stand, it would have been a lot cleaner too. I had the red lake and now I have the black lake too. Well, I haven’t done this for a while!!Seeya Cybers,Eric
Filed under: 1937 -1939 Willys, Hot Rods, General by Eric
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I must admit, my 21 year old daughter who grew up in such an environment, rolled her eyes back when I explained what a good weekend I had planned. Well, she did ask.Friday night after work I squeezed in about 5 hours of engine reassembling on the 350 Chev, in preparation to put it back into the coupe for the last time, for a long time, I hope. The motor was getting new bearings and rings and the heads were being prepared to run with LP Gas. I also fitted a new low rev-hi torque camshaft to help out with the high cogs in the new 9″diff. That was Friday night and part of Saturday, before going to a shed warming party at Big Al’s to celebrate his new shed and surrounds being completed at his new house.
Next hot rod activity, was the official low key opening of a new Äuto One” auto parts store. The business is being started by some fellow members and old friends from the West Coast Street Rod Club that I have known for a squillion years. Naturally the opening was well advertised to local hotrodders and a show n shine was held in front of the store. Naturally I took a few happy snaps for the Cyberhotrodders.com Events photo gallery.
The guys and gals had hot dogs, hamburgers and drinks available. Later in the afternoon there was a monster raffle with free tickets and plenty of prizes to around. All in all a great day to catch up with the guys.Engine building, garage warming, checking out hot rods and bench racing…all in one weekend. Why did she roll her eyes for?
Check out the Cyberhotrodder photo gallery here.Eric warren
