WTF build thread...

-

Henchman

Well-Known Member
Joined
Mar 4, 2020
Messages
84
Reaction score
109
Location
83617
I’m not sure where this is going to go yet but the sky is the limit...

my brother in law builds show winning 150k+ show cars and I own a machine shop/ fabrication shop and built race cars for Rod Millen for a decade.

I want to keep the body stock with all the factory trim, twin turbo 408, 5 speed manual trans, pro-touring style car. He’s wanting smooth, hidden everything show car style...

let’s see where this goes.

the victim in this debacle is a 1965 Plymouth valiant convertible. It’s a factory 3 on the tree, slant 6 car that my fiancé and I enjoyed the hell out of cruising last summer. Now it’s time for the timid frail rust bucket to become a true road warrior worthy of trophy’s in both aesthetics and performance!

And it begins here-

9AF79A0E-8403-476B-ACCB-C2A87AE82131.jpeg


7CFA6F7A-6B0F-4E6C-8327-75B8B17C7E81.jpeg
 
I picked up a Ford 9” last night... I know “8.75 is better” but We have a brand new 3.73 posi in the garage for the 9”. I have two pair of qa1 coilovers so the rear is going 4 link of course.
I purchased CPP 13” front discs and 12” rear with a billet master, chrome booster and built in proportioning valve (which the brother in law wants to hide under the dash) because “I don’t have anything on my firewalls”

I picked up a 1972 360 donor block from a low mileage class c motorhome and am in the process of disassembling.

for ***** and giggles I shoved some 19” BBS magnesium centerlocks with nitto 555 tires under the front tonight and it looked ridiculously awesome!
I was planning 17x7 up front and 18x9.5 out back because the valiant is a relatively small vehicle but the 19’s look so awesome I’m rethinking my wheel choice...

the goal is a mellow, quiet, smooth driving 500hp rear wheel horsepower car.
The speed limit here in Idaho is 80 some places and I want to cruise the freeway in the summer and hear nothing but wind. A true pleasure to drive.

We are currently building a large shop on our land and until it’s done, machine work will be done at the shop I rent but the build is beginning in the garage. It was 36 tonight while I was working so I threw some logs in the wood burner. It was nice and toasty!

this is going to be a fun build and an extremely fun car to drive. I look forward to building a car with my brother in law and hopefully there will be many more to come!

sorry but I have to...

Heimlich Hotrods
Barker Machine LLC
Blitzkrieg Motorwerks

stay tuned for who knows what...

36CC358F-D101-4EE7-8B81-4CC447F5B107.jpeg


521B863C-AA9B-40FB-A11A-EF9ED3D3D296.jpeg


C30A7ED5-61D8-4357-B1F9-F9F2A592B3BC.jpeg


26ED8931-60BB-4191-94A0-6807E8B3D3C2.jpeg


761C9B22-F43E-44C2-A9D0-38668CFF0C77.jpeg


8400A878-B730-4F90-B657-4D399271DF6D.jpeg


5891408B-854F-4B61-A4C6-B15963AB0D19.jpeg
 
Last edited:
I'm thinking you need something like an Art Morrison chassis for all the good stuff you have.. A wolf in sheep's clothing. I'll be watching.
 
I'm thinking you need something like an Art Morrison chassis for all the good stuff you have.. A wolf in sheep's clothing. I'll be watching.
My brother in law builds his own art Morrison style chassis from scratch that are completely smoothed, blended, powder coated, chromed and polished with ridiculous and meticulous attention to detail.
I build tube chassis off road race vehicles, rally cars, autocross cars.

I’ve always been a VW guy. I still have the remnants of my first car, a 1964 VW notchback.

Attached is a picture of that project I started before I started my business, full tube chassis VW notchback. The plan is for it to get a Porsche 6 speed with drive shaft and front differential, all wheel drive, tubular a-arm, pushrod suspension.
The engine has a scat flanged crank, pauter rods, ported superflow heads. I plan to centrifugal supercharge it on methanol. My machine shop took off and that project went on the back burner but once we are fully up and running here, I hope to begin progress on it again.

Between the two of us, I’m not sure what will become of the valiant.
I’m interested to see what we come up with myself...
Thank you for your message!
May you and your family have a very merry Christmas!

Earle

2A41030C-6522-4B0D-BC28-36E021D953C7.jpeg


DD2D9088-2F91-4017-B549-B36CA488170D.jpeg


E32BF6CD-D699-41FB-ADCC-DABE41AD6830.jpeg
 
Last edited:
This is the 56 Chevy my brother in law recently built, it won many awards and was invited to a prestigious award ceremony where only 12 vehicles are chosen a year and it was showcased front and center. He built the frame from scratch and did all the fabrication and metal work to modernize the windows. He builds the engines, one off power anything and everything, interior bucks, everything but paint and the interior sewing. He’s a great painter but the show cars are painted by a world renowned painter who happens to be a family friend.
 
My brother in law builds his own art Morrison style chassis from scratch that are completely smoothed, blended, powder coated, chromed and polished with ridiculous and meticulous attention to detail.
I build tube chassis off road race vehicles, rally cars, autocross cars.

I’ve always been a VW guy. I still have the remnants of my first car, a 1964 VW notchback.

Attached is a picture of that project I started before I started my business, full tube chassis VW notchback. The plan is for it to get a Porsche 6 speed with drive shaft and front differential, all wheel drive, tubular a-arm, pushrod suspension.
The engine has a scat flanged crank, pauter rods, ported superflow heads. I plan to centrifugal supercharge it on methanol. My machine shop took off and that project went on the back burner but once we are fully up and running here, I hope to begin progress on it again.

Between the two of us, I’m not sure what will become of the valiant.
I’m interested to see what we come up with myself...
Thank you for your message!
May you and your family have a very merry Christmas!

Earle

View attachment 1715652447

View attachment 1715652448

View attachment 1715652449
Some very cool stuff there. Yup ...can’t wait to see it’s progress.
 
looking forward to your build!

BTW...love the VW notch!!
 
Earle, remember it's YOUR car.Build what "you" want.
I made that mistake with a well known SoCal builder when he was just starting out.He was into show cars and I was into Usable street and race cars.Even though we worked together physically on the cars, I ended up with a few cars that I really didn't care for because I let him build his way.
They were soon sold but cost me allot of money.We parted ways soon after. Since then I do my own thing and have fun as a hobbyist.
 
I’m not sure where this is going to go yet but the sky is the limit...

my brother in law builds show winning 150k+ show cars and I own a machine shop/ fabrication shop and built race cars for Rod Millen for a decade.

I want to keep the body stock with all the factory trim, twin turbo 408, 5 speed manual trans, pro-touring style car. He’s wanting smooth, hidden everything show car style...

let’s see where this goes.

the victim in this debacle is a 1965 Plymouth valiant convertible. It’s a factory 3 on the tree, slant 6 car that my fiancé and I enjoyed the hell out of cruising last summer. Now it’s time for the timid frail rust bucket to become a true road warrior worthy of trophy’s in both aesthetics and performance!

And it begins here-

View attachment 1715652399

View attachment 1715652400

How do you get the top to seal around that flagpole?
 
I look forward to seeing what you do with it. I'm glad you're an experienced chassis guy, cause a 500HP small block would ring that early A convertible unibody like a dishrag! :eek: I'm typically not a fan of big wheels and rubber band tires on old cars, but I gotta say I really like the look of the one you mocked up!
 
Some very cool stuff there. Yup ...can’t wait to see it’s progress.
The dart in your avatar looks really nice.
My father had a 67 dart GT when I was a kid, it was metallic green with white interior. He put Rally wheels on it. It was a really cool car.
 
Earle, remember it's YOUR car.Build what "you" want.
I made that mistake with a well known SoCal builder when he was just starting out.He was into show cars and I was into Usable street and race cars.Even though we worked together physically on the cars, I ended up with a few cars that I really didn't care for because I let him build his way.
They were soon sold but cost me allot of money.We parted ways soon after. Since then I do my own thing and have fun as a hobbyist.

thanks for the concern but I’ve known my brother in law since high school and we both have built some incredible stuff. We are on the same page for the most part and I’m sure together we are going to build some ridiculously awesome stuff. I will take suggestions but like you said, it’s my car and it will be done the way I like it.
 
Theres a guy in Australia building mid engine Audi V8 setups with aluminum plate welded frames with beetle bodies on top. Frigging things are beasts.
 
I look forward to seeing what you do with it. I'm glad you're an experienced chassis guy, cause a 500HP small block would ring that early A convertible unibody like a dishrag! :eek: I'm typically not a fan of big wheels and rubber band tires on old cars, but I gotta say I really like the look of the one you mocked up!

thank you, I had a different wheel choice in mind completely but after so many positive comments from friends and family, I might have to run with the BBS center locks for now. Those are $6000 wheels given to me by Rod Millen. We built a 500hp all wheel drive Toyota celica for the Detroit auto show and these are the wheels that were on that car.

I like performance. When the VW scene was running 4.5” Fuchs wheels with 105 temporary tires in the front in the early 90’s, I stuffed the biggest tires I could possibly fit front and rear of my 1964 notchback. I had 205/50-15’s out back and 195/50-15’s up front.
The car handled like it was on rails.
I ran a 7:10 in the 1/8th mile with that car, pretty impressive for a broke high school kid building an engine in his grandpas garage.
High HP cars were far and few back then.
We used to love taking money from the rich kids in their 5.0 mustangs and the shark looking Camaro’s and corvettes with a chip and exhaust!

The “rubber band” looking tires on the BBS’s are not really that “rubber band” looking in person, they look like high performance autocross or road course tires.

pro touring came out and I’ve loved the performance and aesthetics associated with that scene ever since.

you can drag race a road race car but try road racing a drag race car...

pics are senior year, 1993

45A32CC9-9B0F-4D86-BB59-5B54E823B1F0.jpeg


1B9AC5BB-1B48-489E-8E87-B9E0CEDA5311.jpeg


I used an early VW bus nose cone and built my own solid engine mounts that raised the engine and transaxle up to eliminate the positive camber that’s inherent with lowing a swing axle car giving a full tire foot print on the asphalt.
Nobody was making these type of modifications back then, now it’s commonplace on drag VW’s...
 
Last edited:
I dont think I have ever seen a 64 VW notchback. Only the sloped backs, karman ghias, beetles, and various buses.
 
I played in the VW scene for awhile, but your Notch is awesome. Very cool cars!!
They are fun!
They are not like building real cars, they are more like building a full size revell model!

building high performance engines is a lot more tedious than slapping together V8 iron though...
 
I dont think I have ever seen a 64 VW notchback. Only the sloped backs, karman ghias, beetles, and various buses.
They were never officially imported by Volkswagen. All of them that are in the states were brought in by private owners and a few limited private businesses that imported them for sales.
they are quite rare.
My father was into VW’s and v8 cars as well and would take me to shows and drags when I was young. I saw the notchback and fell in love. I told myself one day I’d own one and at 17 y/o I bought this one. All stock, blue, a nice Earl schieb paint job over tons of rust and bondo.
I spent the next year replacing rust and crashed panels and building a hot engine with a close ratio trans.
I’m 46 now and still own it.
 
-
Back
Top