Friday, November 10, 2017

Please take a seat....

When it comes down to is, there really isn't a lot of room in the cab of a Model A.  I needed some seats that were thin and didn't have a bunch of padding but I din't want bomber seats since everyone seemingly uses them.  I had some theater seats that could have worked but I was concerned that they would have been too rat roddy...if that is even a term.

Luckily, I stumbled across a set of Austin Healy Bugeye seats.  They had the adjustable tracks on them and the backs flipped forward for storage purposes.  Believe it or not, they were actually comfortable as well.


They needed to be build up off of the floor a bit, so I had to make some mounts.  This also allowed the driver's seat to clear the battery with sufficient room.  I kept the front of the passenger seat open for storage.



I plan on adding a bit of cushion to the base and a small pad for the back.  I really like these seats.  I did make some templates for future projects in case I needed to make a couple.




Wednesday, November 8, 2017

Model A Steering Box Redo

One of the many aspects that can make a car not enjoyable to drive is loose steering.  And as you can imagine, the stock steering box on the model A was fairly worn out.  Since I had to modify the box anyway, I figured a complete rebuild was necessary...

I wanted to move the box onto the top off the frame.  Normally, the box is mounted on the inside and the sector sticks through.



After a bit of measuring, some CAD work and several 3d printed prototypes, I finally settled on a mount the I liked.




The mount clamps onto the the steering box so the original mounting flange ad to be machined off.  While I had thee part in the lathe, it was a good time to do the needle roller bearing upgrade.




After several test fits, there was a bit of trimming required...



Also, I felt that the column was too long, so, 1-1/2" had to come off.



After everything was reassembled, I made the top clamp and bolted it up.  The pitman arm needed a bit of "tweeking" to clear but other than that, it worked great.