New World Datsuns...

just my 2 cents but stick with a Chevy motor. Reason is, I met my neighbor that was into old Fords when I lived (83) in Idaho Falls. Noticed that he ran Chevy small blocks. Ask him why and he's answer was. When the club is out cruising on long trips, it's much easier to fine chevy parts when one breaks down then Ford parts, plus Ford guys are hoarders and want to much for the parts.

He is a member of the S.E. Idaho Hotrod Association so was his bro and they had Hot rodded a lot of old Fords and ran Chevy motors in all of them.
I'll never forget his last name, it was Littleford.

anyways, I agree with Lou. engine #1 and trans #2 but what ever you pick, the 35 is going to look saweet when you get done.

510freak wrote:And the tri power to boot

Diagonal Tri-PowerTM

The manifold is an early '80s Corvette Crossfire injection piece. The top plate is just aluminum plate. If I open up the ports and weld up the EGR base it should flow okay. Those 2GCs can flow 350cfm each. Waaay more than enough on any smallblock. I may never actually run it -- just a thought.

Ni10 wrote:just my 2 cents but stick with a Chevy motor. Reason is, I met my neighbor that was into old Fords when I lived (83) in Idaho Falls. Noticed that he ran Chevy small blocks. Ask him why and he's answer was. When the club is out cruising on long trips, it's much easier to fine chevy parts when one breaks down then Ford parts, plus Ford guys are hoarders and want to much for the parts.

More good points.

I just hope it turns out like what I have built in my head. 14 years is a long time to think about a build.

DRIVEN wrote: Diagonal Tri-PowerTM

The manifold is an early '80s Corvette Crossfire injection piece. The top plate is just aluminum plate. If I open up the ports and weld up the EGR base it should flow okay. Those 2GCs can flow 350cfm each. Waaay more than enough on any smallblock. I may never actually run it -- just a thought.

Noticed it was different,was scratching my head thinking..
Thats a awesome idea

I would keep the 283 myself, that was a nice first ride.

Thanks, Wayno. We traveled a lot of miles together.

Took about 6 hours to get from here...

...to here...

...to here...

...and finally here.

Seemed like a million rivets to grind/cut/drill/hammer. Probably really only about 50 though. Once I finally got it apart, I found the rust wasn't as bad as I suspected. There's an inner rail that curves into the X and and an outer rail that wraps around it. In areas that have cross members it's 3 layers thick. Plenty of places for dirt and moisture to work over the course of 80 years. Now, to find someone local to sandblast the rails. Tomorrow I'll order up some chassis goodies.

Motor mounts showed up in the mail today. Full length boxing plates are in transit and should be here Monday. X-rail kit ships next week and front suspension kit is about 3-4 weeks out.

awww #$%# yes !!! I love watching this DRIVEN !!!!

Not much to see for a while. Just sitting here waiting for the mailman with a dumb grin on my face. I think I found a guy to do my sand blasting though.

There is one thing that I have found in life, at least my life, if I make something really nice, I don't drive it anymore, and therefore it's not the same, I made my 521 kingcab as a driver, and that is what it is, it's got all sorts of scratches all over it, but now I don't even think about the paint anymore, I just drive it.
I don't have any before photos of my chevy truck, but I used to drive it every day, then I did this to it.

It has not been out of the garage in a year and a half now.
I cannot complain a lot though, it is the reason I have a Datsun truck, the Datsun replaced my chevy as the work truck when gas went over $3.00 a gallon.
I thought I would just put this observation here of my life, do you want a driver, or something that you pull out for a cruz the gut day a few times a year.

Nice! That looks a lot like my buddy Greg's '52. He runs the 283 in it that I had in my truck previously.

I don't really plan to drive it regularly. Pretty much a summertime cruiser. Hopefully it'll turn out nice enough that I will be paranoid about it .

DRIVEN wrote:Nice! That looks a lot like my buddy Greg's '52. He runs the 283 in it that I had in my truck previously.

I don't really plan to drive it regularly. Pretty much a summertime cruiser. Hopefully it'll turn out nice enough that I will be paranoid about it .

I suppose if I had more room, it likely would be driven a lot more, but since it is buried, I just cannot find the time to pull it out of the garage.
I have a 2 car garage, it has 3 cars in it.

That was a killer first car, you get noticed in something like that, that can be good and bad though.

Driven, Back to engine/trans choices for a minute. Seems as though the SBC is the motor of choice regardless of which one of your many that you choose. But on the transmission decision, Would it be possible to set up your X-member in a position that would accommodate either, maybe even mock them both in there and build the cross member for each while they are easy to get to and fabricate. This would make it a super easy swap later down the road if you second guess your original decision.

Can't wait to see the progress on this.

This is a photo of the Xrail kit I have on order. Mine should he here in a couple weeks.

The transmission crossmember portion has the ability to be welded in at any position. Actually, it's mounting ears can be placed anywhere. So your idea makes a lot of sense. By having 2 positions I could use one for the A833/Muncie/Saginaw/T10/TH350/200-4R and another position for T-5/TH400/700R4. I would need 2 drivelines though since the T-5 is a bit longer. Not a big deal. The biggest difference is really the position of the shifter. The T-5 is centered and forward, much like the original old Ford transmission. All the other manual transmissions have an external shifter that is further back and to the left. It's pretty close to the seat and right up next to your leg. Actually, when I wrecked it, the shifter I had got bent over at a 45* angle as I got tossed out the passenger door. These cabs are kinda cramped. Either way, I have a few months to settle on one so I may take your advice and just set it up to go either way.

Setting the frame up for both allows the swap later to be much easier. Sure it would need a different length driveline, but that is easy to do later.

For the shift hole, what about running a removable transmission cover plate that you could put the hole wherever you wanted. I'm thinking a cover plate similar to the cover for a 620. A cover like that might also make shift linkage adjustments on those external linkages easier?

The cover plate isn't an issue. Main concern was aesthetics and comfort. I really prefer the T-5's placement but the A833 has the better gearing.

Since there's not much else to update I'll just post a couple pics of new items. The front suspension kit and X-rails are still not here but the Boxing plates and motor mounts showed up a couple weeks ago.

Can't wait to see the progress once your xrails get there. Love seeing fabrication

Nice,are the boxing rails part of a kit?

They are an 8 piece laser cut kit -- 4 per rail for easier shipping. They claim their kit is the best fitting on the market and patterned from NOS Ford rails. The quality looks very nice. Haven't laid them out on a rail yet.