Taylormade

I think the price is top dollar for that car, but I do agree the coupes are one sharp looking automobile. I am a Dodge guy and watch EBay all the time. The prices for these coupes seem to range between 18 and 35 grand (American dollars) depending on condition and location. If you're in for the long haul and enjoy working on your car as well as driving it, you may want to just spring for it and enjoy the ride. I found my first car (the actual car) after 43 years and bought it back. By the time it's restored, I'll have more in it than it will ever be worth, but I don't care - I'm enjoying every minute of having my 32 DL back - even if it is a sedan. I'm not an expert on the 33 model - did they have overdrive as a factory option? You may want to check and see if it is the original motor and trans before you agree on a price. Some pictures would be nice - hint, hint.

My restoration of Daphne has suddenly gone high tech! I just got these photos from my metal guy Ed Thomas as he and a friend figured out how to make the running broads for the old DL. They were originally made from one piece of metal folded multiple times into the running board. Ed discovered this was no easy task to reproduce. He went over to his buddy Jimmy Hervatin's shop in Warrenton, Missouri and they hauled out the CNC equipment and ended up making custom designed brakes to form the boards. Here's Jimmy at the computer getting things set up to make the end pieces. Here's the laser cutter at work cutting various end pieces and supports. Once the small stuff was out of the way Ed said they " used four different breaks, a beadroller, and a Pullmax machine with new custom tooling to final crimp the seams. Over 30 operations to finish one flat panel not counting all the brace work and mounting tabs. You might say this is a little bit of an advanced metal break project." Here's Jimmy with the almost finished piece - one more bend to go.. I'm picking the running boards, battery boxes, tool box and exhaust brace on Monday.

Not in love with the color or the upholstery, but a nice car. It will be interesting to see if it sells and for what price.

It appears the repo inner pieces lack the slight ridge visible on your original part. That is a bit disappointing.

The originals on my car were long gone - replaced by simple square aluminum pieces - so I can't compare thickness of the original. These are quite substantial, I must say.

The photos are less than perfect, but I didn't want to completely unwrap them until I was ready to use them. You get all four pieces for each running board. This is the outer trim and seems to match what I've seen on the original cars. This is the inner piece, a simpler shape that also appears accurate. I didn't shoot the end pieces. Everything came well packaged in a PVC plastic tube with wooden ends screwed in place. The parts will need some polishing, but I'm very satisfied with the purchase.

I bought a set for my 32 Dodge DL. Arrived within a week of my order and they look good. I just bought them on March 2 of this year, left a message at the number you listed and he returned my call within a day or two. Maybe he's on vacation or out of town at the moment.

Maybe, but I bet he puts the same price up if he relists it.

Looks like a spring cover, leather or canvas wrapped around the spring to hold lube and keep dirt out. Nice car, but unrealistically priced. A nice 24 DB roadster just sold on the Bay for $9,000. The touring needed more work. There was nice touring -restored - in the Dodge Brothers Club magazine want ads for $12,500. This car is worth around ten grand at best.

Okay, I surrender. I agree with ever post above, no matter what was said, and will never complain again. Must be the cold weather that's turning me into an old grump. Sorry, I have to leave my computer now and chase those neighbor kids off my front lawn, the little...

Thanks for the kind post, Rusty. I guess you believe every car dealer is a crook, every businessman a cheat, every restoration shop an overpriced scam and every filmmaker produces nothing but fake garbage. We recently returned from Africa after a six week shoot documenting the devastation of AIDS on the continent. I'm very proud of the work we did there. I'm also proud of the work I did on the PBS Nova series, including a two hour show on building the first cable suspension bridge across the Mississippi. I filmed scenes in a steel shaft eighty feet down in the river and shot from the top of a 380 foot bridge tower. I have no intention of changing professions and have enjoyed almost every minute of my 43 year career. The technical people on these car shows do good work, sometimes they are not responsible for what a director or producer does with the footage. I have quit shoots were I've felt the production was heading in the wrong direction. I don't know what you do for a living, but I certainly would not waste my time denigrating it in a personal attack, nor would I want to.

I agree, but Leno is a lot funnier than Rawlings and his honest love for cars comes through in every frame. I guess we all should be happy Discovery/Velocity is around so we can get our fix of car talk. It's just that this episode was so outrageously fake it set my teeth on edge. One man's opinion, that's all. I have been doing a detailed video of the restoration of my 32 Dodge DL. Nothing dramatic, except possibly my expression when the latest bill arrives. I plan to show the process, warts and all -costs, setbacks, success, and, hopefully, the finished car. It will be interesting to see if anybody cares to watch any of it when I finish. I did it mostly for myself to document the restoration - it's amazing what you can forget a year or two down the road. I've done about 80 percent of the restoration myself and have learned invaluable information from this site and others that I'd like to share with as many like-minded car nuts as possible. The other 20 percent was above my pay grade, but I was just editing a section on how some of the bottom sheetmetal was replaced on the body and I was amazed at how much of it I had forgotten since it was done last year. I ended up being glued to my own video. Ah, self aggrandizement at its best.

Don't get me wrong, I was interested to see if they could update the 71 with a modern Chrysler drivetrain. But then they proceeded to do exactly the opposite and drop the engine in around common aftermarket parts. The show would have been just as entertaining without all the fake "moments." Chasing Classic Cars is much more enjoyable and you get to see some really interesting cars. I guess my idea of entertainment is different from others, and that's fine - you only have to turn the channel to make your opinion known. "Nobody in their right mind would watch the actual real life, day to day, proceedings in a real body shop....... :eek:" Maybe not an everyday body shop, but I would watch a detailed segment on bodywork, engine rebuilding or other restoration activities all day long. Building and restoration threads on this site are popular, and the more detailed they are, the better people seem to like them. I want and need the little details as I'm no expert and need all the help I can get. I realize no network is going to air a hard core restoration show, but at least shows like Overhauling and Wheeler Dealers give you some info on how the cars are really built.

Okay, since I am in the business as a professional video director/writer/cameraman, I don't want this to come off as sour grapes. I am not naive enough to believe we never compress time, fudge a few facts or put things out of order to make things more watchable and dramatic, but the opening episode of Fast and Loud this season left me with my jaw dropped to the floor. While there is obviously a lot of phony bluster and BS on this show, it's usually somewhat watchable, but in this opening episode we are asked to believe the following... Richard Rawlings just happens to attend an auction and just happens to find a 1971 Dodge Challenger RT Scat Pack with non-matching numbers. He pays 42 grand for it, even though it has a bad clutch and a loose steering box. He, of course, drives it and rips up the lawn doing a wheelie on the grass of the auction site. It's unclear why he bought the car, something about "always wanting one because of the decal on the back window." Cut to Richard's shop, where he pulls up in a prototype 2015 Challenger with a new 392 Hemi that he claims Chrysler just happened to loan him for 15 days to do "anything he wants to it." He shows it to buddy Aaron and says that once he gives it back, Chrysler is going to crush it "because they have to, or something." Aaron glances over at the 71 conveniently parked just behind the new Challenger. "Hey," he says, "I have an idea, lets swap all the mechanicals for the new Challenger into the old one." Richard, is of course, agast, and the usual argument ensues, with Aaron prevailing and both cars being rolled into the shop to be torn apart. One crew member mentions something about getting permission from Chrysler to do this, but Richard blows him off and claims if they don't know about this it will be better. Ah, that wild rebel Richard Rawlings! He figures this revolutionary swap may make the 71 worth upwards of 150 grand. Immediately things go south as the transmission is too long on the new car - BUT! - Aaron just happens to have a shorter transmission conveniently "on the shelf" that will work perfectly. Oh, and the K-member on the new car doesn't work on the 71 -but wait! - "Luckily" Aaron claims, "MagnaForce just started making a bolt in conversion to drop the new Hemi into the 71." Gee, what a coincidence. Apparently, MagnaForce thought of this novel idea even before Aaron. They also discover that none of the suspension parts from the prototype will work in the 71, so they buy already available off the shelf performance parts to finish the job. So, basically, what we have is an engine swap using readily available parts. At this point, I turned the show off. This was so obviously a scripted, well planned conversion job designed to work with suppliers free parts. I'm sure Chrysler knew nothing about Richard tearing apart their prototype to steal the engine - and I have a bridge in Brooklyn for sale if you're interested. I didn't even bother to watch the end where I'm sure the Chrysler rep shows up and faints or something before Richard shows him the new improved 71 and all is right with the world. I'm somewhat amazed that Chrysler would be a party to this fraud, despite the free advertising. It's gotten to the point where about 10 to 20 percent of these shows is about cars, with the rest being lame comedy bits or shop arguments. Thank God for my DVR and a quick moving thumb where I can skip over the crap and commercials and watch what little is offered about working on cars.

I owned an old Norton motorcycle years ago, and as my rapidly fading memory struggles I think I did buy a set of Whitworth wrenches for it at the time. These must be what's left of that purchase.

I was going through some of my late father's stuff the other day and discovered a box of old tools. I suspect some of these are from the days of his youth when he and his brothers owned a 23 Model T touring. The Taylor Boys - Tom, Dick (my dad) and Harry, along with older brother Don and my mother's brother Bill, once drove that old Ford around the boarders of Michigan - from Detroit, across the southern boarder, around the Lakes, the UP and back down to Detroit. That would have been around 1934, when my dad was 14, and he did much of the driving! What a summer that must have been. He said they often had to stop and do odd jobs to make some money for gas and that they usually slept under the stars unless some kindly folk offered the use of their barn. So, are some of these tools Ford, or am I dreaming (I'm not a Ford guy)? This main batch is Stamped FAIRMOUNT CLEVE. Next up are two wrenches that I'm sure are not Ford - They are stamped KING DICK (I kid you not) and the sizes are stamped 3/4 AIF or maybe 3/4 A/F. The last batch is an odd lot, the large one stamped Dunlap one one side and Forged In The USA on the other. The other two say Made In The USA. There were also old pliers, several small tire irons, an old air pump and a bead breaker. Maybe I'll make up a faux tool kit for my 32 Dodge.

The engine paint on my 32 DL was a gray-green also. There was a nice sample on the top of the bellhousing that escaped the elements and the sun. It looks close to your color, maybe not quite as green, but it's hard to tell from photographs as the color temperature of the light can cause the photo to be off-color. Did you have your engine paint mixed, or was it from a rattle can? Either way, it looks great. I'm just getting ready to clean and paint my engine and I hope it turns out half as good!

Correct, I missed that in my rush to be a know-it-all.

I'd say with over 11 thousand views lots of us are following your thread, Barry. I know I am and learn something new every time. Sometimes I hesitate to respond because simply saying "thanks" over and over again seems a bit lame. I find this and your other assembly threads both fascinating and informative, even if my project is a lowly 32 Dodge, I get lots of useful information. RT

16 thousand. Of course, I see these "sold" cars come back up for auction again very often, so who knows for sure.

For those in the dark about 32bizcoupe's post above, I have managed to misplace the shock plates off my DL. how the heck I could lose something that big and heavy is beyond me, but I've been searching for the last week, laying out all the frame parts that still need to be restored, and they have not shown up. Since they are flat 11 gauge steel they will be easy to make and 32bizcoupe kindly provided a photo and dimensions after I sent him a PM. I'm sure as soon as I finish making them, the originals will turn up - as they always seem to in situations like this. This all coincided with an embarrassing incident with my rebuilt engine. With the weather finally warming up, I got ready to clean the block and prep it for paint. I figured I'd give it a spin or two with the hand crank to make sure nothing had happened to my fresh engine over the winter. I found it was locked solid. Naturally panic ensued. Nothing would make that newly turned crank move. Ready to march into the house and have a heated discussion with my rebuilder over the phone, I calmed down enough to check out things one more time. That was when I noticed the unsecured bolts that hold on the flywheel had moved when I rolled the engine into the sunshine on my hand-built cart. They'd moved just enough to jam against a ridge on the block. I popped the bolts back into place and she turned over just fine. Auto restoration by yours truly, the amateur. Ain't it grand!

Although Burnbaum and Roberts list cylinders for 32 Dodges, when you call them it turns out they only have the correct cylinder for the rear brakes. The front cylinders are different - slightly larger and with a different bolt pattern. I don't know about the 33 model, it may not be the same. Why they list them the way they do mystifies me, why not just list what they have correctly?

I used to be about two hours away from my sheetmetal/body guy, Ed Thomas in Columbia, Missouri. Since my wife and I retired and moved, we are now about 3-1/2 hours away. Ed kindly sent me pictures of our current project - a new battery box, new tailpipe bracket and new tool box. He is working on my new running boards today, and I hope to have a picture of those soon. Ed had patterns for the battery box and tool box, there was still enough left of the old ones to see how they were made. Here is a shot of two new battery boxes, two new tailpipe hangers, the new tool box and the remains of the old one behind it. Ed explained how he made the bottom of the battery box: The battery box form works like sandwich with the sheet of metal in between the two pieces of wood. The lower has a 1 3/8 slot milled to receive the metal downward. The upper one has a 3/4 inch slot center-lined with the lower one so that the upper piece of 3/4 inch tooling with the proper radius for the center of the X bead, can be fed down by the Pullmax to form the X in the bottom of the battery box. This stuff is way beyond my pay grade, but, thanks to Ed, Daphne will look about as original as I can make her.

I'm having to give up on the carb. Heating up the casting worked but also revealed several rust holes in the bottom of the float bowl once i cleaned everything up. Another hole had opened up in the side of the float bowl. Also, two of the threaded holes in the top casting had been repaired with Heli-coils sometime in the past before Phil and I owned the car and they stripped right out when I removed the screws. I also discovered that this is the wrong carb for the car, it's actual application is for a early forties Chevy or GMC C.E.O. truck. It always worked fine back in the sixties when I was driving her, but it is incorrect for the car. Now it will just serve as a parts source. I have located the correct carb for the car and bought it. Since I needed to buy close to two hundred dollars in parts to try and fix the old one, I guess the three hundred buck price tag was acceptable. Pardon me while I cry myself to sleep.

Jon's advice on removing the Step -up Valve may prevent future carb rebuilders from making the mistake I did. Someone had already torn up the top of the valve and my attempts to turn it with a large blade screwdriver really messed the top of the valve up. Here is the valve before I really tore it up. It simply wouldn't come out, so my advice is - if you get to this part and it won't turn, do not force it. Following Jon's advice, I put the lower casting in the oven at 500 degrees for about half an hour. Then I removed it and played a MAP torch over the bottom of the casting in the area where the valve was located for a few minutes and then let the casting cool down naturally until it reached room temperature. Do not quench the casting.. Jon told me that I would need patience, and he was right. The first attempt did nothing and the valve still would not turn. So, I went through the process again. This time the valve turned easily. It might even take three tries on some castings, but it will work. Patience -something I have very little of. Unfortunately, in my case, I buggered up the valve pretty badly. Aside from tearing up the top, my attempt at turning the valve with a pair of needle-nose vice grips scarred the sides of the valve pretty badly. The valve comes apart with the bottom cap screwing off the valve to expose the spring and a tiny ball bearing which is not in the photos because it kept rolling away. Jon says the spring will be damaged by the heat, so don't reuse it. So, I'm calling Jon tomorrow to order a complete rebuild kit and the top half of the valve - which is going to set me back in the range of $115. So don't make the mistake I did - go gently and use the heating method, not brute force, and save yourself a bundle.