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 This page is my typing from
this 15-page (thought it was
14 but it's 15) letter my Dad
wrote for me to put on here.
A message from Larry:
I owned this car from 1966 to 1976. 1966 was almost 40 years ago and although perhaps some of the finite details may be lost and some of the vivid memories may be just a bit more glorious now than decades ago, because of the unbelievable interest in this car, THE COUPE, I thought you might be interested in my sharing the story of THE COUPE with you.
In March of 1965, fresh out of the Navy I went to work on Mare Island Naval Shipyard Vallejo, Calif. I was assigned to work with a fellow named Rex Phillips. Because of our interest in cars, namely hot rods, Rex and I clicked. A note about Rex. He is not your typical big, burly and bearded "cool papa". The exact opposite. 5' 7", 135 pounds, like me, absolutely unnoticeable. Rex was 10 to 15 years older than me and told me stories like always carrying a one gallon can of Casite on the floorboard under the dash and having the vacuum line to the windshield wiper at the ready. If the police started chasing you, stick the vacuum line in the gallon of Casite, which sucks the Casite into the intake manifold, then to the combustion chamber AND... you got it... World War II smoke screen laying destroyer time behind your car and bye bye Mr. Policeman. That was Rex.
After working side by side with Rex for 9 months or so he casually mentioned about a '40 Ford Coupe that he had that I might be interested in seeing. '40 Coupes never interested me much and a month or so went by and again he brought up this '40 Ford Coupe. Not wanting to hurt his feelings I said, "Sure, how 'bout this weekend?". Rex only lived about 3 miles away and at the agreed upon time I was at his front door. From there we went to, as I recall, an ally and a very old, small, unpainted wooden garage,
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with a large lock on the door. Rex unlocked the lock and opened the door. I looked in and saw nothing. Then I looked down below where my sight-line had been and I saw the top of a car. Looking lower yet I saw a '40 Ford, the likes of which I'd never seen before. That was when THE COUPE came into my life, but THE COUPE was at that time about 12 years old from conception and 8 years old from birth.
The Beginning:
In early 1955 Rex and the Texierra brothers (spelling?) decided to build a Hot Rod. The car would be a '40 Ford coupe. It would be chopped as much as practical then sectioned to bring the over-all appearance back into proportion. It would not be channelled. It would be lowered, the proper way, and supreme roadability was a must. It would be show quality but it would be made to be driven and not necessarily shown. That was the overall concept.
One can only guess over the following 4 years of 3 individuals lives, 12 '40 Ford Coupe bodies, countless bottles of oxygen and acyteline, untold cases of beer, and a string of oaths that would stretch to Mars and back. THE COUPE was born.
The top was chopped 4" and the body sectioned 5". The chop did not go through the rear window (windows). They were left stock height so as not to cut down on rear visibility. Rex said without a headliner the top looked like an orange peel. Some areas had to be lengthened and / or added to and others reduced in size. The top was the hardest part of the chop job.
Rex said the hardest part of the sectioning was the hood. 5" had to be taken out from the overall height of the hood.
The body work continues:
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Starting at the front. Frenched headlights. Parking lights or turn signals? Hmm... Turn signals come later but if there were parking lights they were removed. Of course all body moulding and emblems removed and holes welded shut. I must be careful here because the fellow who bought the car from me, Tom Hiser, owned a body shop in Modesto. I believe he went over the entire body, sanding, refilling, etc. etc. Rex told me that over the course of the 4 years of building the car every type of filler was used. e.g. welding, lead, bondo, plastic filler, etc. So, I can only imagine what Tom found UNDER all that paint - paint - not yet.
Back to body work:
The hood - 4 rows of louvers for a total of 54. The primary purpose of was cooling. More cooling, the hood... In the pictures of the car when it was burgundy you'll notice on each side of the hood, at the back of the hood where it closes onto the rear top of each front fender at the top there is a small section of the hood that is cut out. This was done in an effort to cool the engine compartment.
The windshield rubber was a 1951 Ford, so that (with great care) the stainless steel inset strip from the '51 Ford coupe be reformed and used to enhance a more "luxiourous" look. Along with the '51 Ford windshield rubber and stainless steel inset, the '51 ford stainless steel center piece was also used but of course it had to be "chopped" to be the right height. The door handle on the driver's side was removed. No secret push spot or hidden button, but don't lock the windwing - push on the windwing, reach in, pull interior door handle - door opens. The door handle on the passenger side was left on the car so there would be no confusion on the part of the passenger, usually a pretty girl, as to how to get into the car.
The rear fenders were welded to the body and the trunk welded shut. So the entire back of the car was "one piece". The tail lights the builders chose... hmm early Chrysler corporation of some sort. I later replaced
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them, well had them replaced, with '62 Vette ones by the "premier" body shop (in my opinion) in Napa, California - "Burnseds". The rear bumper - early 50's Chrysler Corporation, must have been solid nickel, polished - indestructible and wrapped around the sides of the rear fenders for maximum rear end protection. Oh, the front bumper was 1939 Lincoln Zepher, a real beauty I thought. Wow, I think we're done with the body but I'm sure I missed say probably 6 months of work.
The Interior:
The first thing that jumped out at me was the beautiful color of the dash. The name of the color was "opal violet", a silver base with violet lacquer. Rex said it was a Harley-Davidson color.
Oops, back to the body. The gasoline filler tube was reformed so it no longer came through the rear fender with an externally showing cap. The filler tube was under the upper part of the rear fender cut-out so to put gas in the car. I (only I) reached between the top of the tire and behind the fender to remove the gas cap and carefully place the filler nozzle in the tube. Piece of cake but be careful. Also the radio antenna. Kind of like in the mid-60's - The electric operated up and down telescoping antennas. IN the front fender was a small hole filled with a rubber grommet. The base section of the antenna filled the hole. Raise or lower 2nd & 3rd section manually or even push button section down through grommet so only minimum was showing. Pretty slick, huh? Back to the interior. The "gage cluster" included the speedometer, oil pressure, AMP, fuel and water temp gauges. All were in perfect working order. If there was not a working stock radio in THE COUPE when I bought it, I had a stock working '40 Ford radio in it in short order. No fancy amplified stereo system, just a nice sounding radio. A working clock also, in the glove box door, not electric, wind-up, remember, like a wind-up watch. If I recall it, it would run about 36 hours before it needed to be wound-up again. The interior
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window mouldings, front , door, rear side windows and rear window were only partially completed or still had to be "chopped" to fit the windows. This was completed by Burnseds Body Shop by the owner, Ray.
Moving back through the interior. The next striking "object". The chromed, reformed, long "shifter" coming out of the "top shift" '39 Ford gearbox (with 25 tooth - not 26 tooth) Zephyr gears. Atop the long chrome shifter which was above the top of the dash was a canary yellow cue ball (with a red dot) which indentified it as being an ivory cue ball. The seats. The stock seat was way too high because of the chop and section. What Rex and the Texierra Brothers chose were rear seats from a Willy's Jeep (or Jeepster). The drivers seat was like an early VW bug "bucket" seat. The passenger seat was a "double" wide copy of the driver's seat.
The Upholstery:
When I bought the car there was only bare bones stock upholstery. I chose Burgundy Tuck and Roll with two white rows down both the middle of the driver's and passenger's seats and these white rows followed onto the "package shelf" which was also Tuck and Roll. The tops of the seats were at the same height as the front top lip of the package shelf with about 5 inches of clearance from the backs of the tops of the seats to the front lip of the package shelf. The tubular framework of the seats I had chromed. The seats where "pinned" to the floor via brackets only in the front so they could both lift at the back and the drivers seat like modern bucket seats would fold in half. I've gone into this detailed description because THE COUPE had a secret. Remember, the trunk was welded shut & moulded. What happened to the area behind the back seats Hmmm... an angle-iron framework was formed and bolted to the floor for the purpose of laying a piece of 5/8" plywood
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on it. This I did. Next a thin mattress "pad", a couple of burgundy sheets and a burgundy comforter. Not quite done. Install burgundy tuck & roll on inside of fenders (walls) and bottom of trunk (ceiling) and , well, I don't think Huge Heffner could have done better. (heh heh)
Pfeww... Engine, Drivetrain, Suspension, Running Gear, etc.:
Wheels:
Stock 16" (hope I'm right) were replaced by 15". I remember Rex saying that he just missed a set of 14" rims with the correct bolt pattern and I think he said they were Graham (a car long forgotten). Tires: Back then not a lot to choose from. Radials were just starting to make an appearance. Front tires (and brakes) are the most important and I chose (brand new?) in America, the Pirelli Cinturado radial speed-rated to 135MPH. The rear tires were a bit of a challenge as all of us old enough to remember know the '32-'39 top shift 3-speed stick Ford gearbox with '32-'48 gears left a lot to be desired when it came to strength. The rear tires were 7:10/15's cheapy recaps with straight-cut highway tread so when one got a "little heavy" on the throttle off the line, the excess torque was released through rear tire spin rather than "another blown cluster".
Brakes:
Front - 1951 Lincoln (full floating) Rear - stock '40 Ford anchor bolt. With those Lincoln brakes on the front THE COUPE stopped. Did it ever. In 196(8)? when Volvo came out with 4 wheel disc brakes they bragged their cars stopped 60MPH - 0 in 5 seconds. I felt THE COUPE did that good so I took it out and on my third try I achieved a 60MPH stop in 5 seconds. By the way from 100 MPH+ there was no brake fade down to 0MPH.
The Suspension:
Was it Lady Luck or were Rex & the Texierra Brothers geniuses?
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Here is where I go over my head so If I am wrong bear with me. 1940 Fords have wishbone suspension? They say there is nothing better for handling. There is a 9 leaf cross "buggy" spring in the front and a 7-leaf cross "buggy" spring in the rear. Both front and rear springs had 2 leaves added then were de-arched and retempered. The de-arching lowered the car. The front axle was a 3" dropped front axle. Longer shackles had to be used on the rear. The car appeared illegally low and although would not clear a standing 12 ounce beer can, the only item that would touch the ground if all tires were flat was the grease nipple on the tie-rod end on the driver's side right by the tire. NOthing dragged and the suspension only one time tried to bottom out and that was on a 35MPH-180-degree horseshoe corner on the Santa Cruz mountains , 5 feet from the rear bumper of a 1962 Ferrari Farina Convertible at 80MPH in the fast lane. UNDER that condition, 3 times, it bottomed out ever so slightly. Only the '40 Ford pickup trucks had a front sway bar and one of these was on the front of THE COUPE. I had a rears sway bar fabricated from a seat of "'Gold' Seal" Traction Master "bars". That rear sway bar worked so well it tore loose from the frame, tearing a chunk of the frame out with it, so the frame in that section was boxed and that problem was solved. I had a favorite short section of road which had 3 turns, one posted at 25MPH and the other two and 35MPH. I would consistently slip through the second two turns at 70MPH. This was flat road and the corners were not banked, two land road with about a 10" paved shoulder. In 1970 or 1971 my close friend John Ankunding bought an ex-CHP 1968 Dodge. To demonstrate to me it's handling ability, it just happened he chose this same section of road and a speed of 70MPH. It handled slightly better but not
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a whole lot better all things considered. Yes, there were tube shocks all around but for some reason I didn't put any consideration into them.
Rear-end was stock-gearing - 3.78. The transmission I've already mentioned. The engine - when purchased, 1953 Studebaker (239?) cubic inch V8 with "accelerator" cam and Oldsmobile sidedraft carb. I would keep up with the stock 289 Mustangs with C-4 Auto and 2 or 4 BBL. Next came an R-4 Avanti with 2-4BBLs but without the dual Paxton superchargers. If I recall correctly the engine was redlined at 8,500RPM. Rear axle key - ways became vee'd in a short time and caged roller bearings that the cluster gear in the transmission wore out at an alarming rate, about every 2 months. Top speed of the Avanti was guaranteed by Studebaker to be 145MPH with this engine. I ran the car though "my own" measured mile (flying mile) and it computed out to 142MPH. With both the small Studebaker V8 and the Avanti, the car kept it's most down attitude - that is the front end of the car never floated at ANY speed or situation. Oh, of course it was a "closed" drive shaft but U-Joints were Lincoln as was the steering gear box and I think the steering column because it had a "modern" turn signal arm and the steering wheel was clear burgundy uncracked plastic and the center on the steering wheel to which the horn ring was attached said Lincoln V-12. Subsequently I discovered Volkswagon Bug back-up lights in chrome housings fit inbetween the horizontal bars of the Lincoln front bumper so they were installed and wired to the turn signal apparatus and although it took some doing (a separate bulb had to be added) the '62 Vette taillights had turn signals also.
After years of searching for burgundy fuzzy dice, my wife and I spotted a stuffed animal with long fuzzy burgundy "fur" and with a little sewing we had burgundy fuzzy dice to finish off the interior.
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The Avanti engine was fun, it was, well... after 3 engine rebuilds because of spun bearings I started looking for what I thought I really wanted for an engine. A tough, bullet-proof Flathead V8. The problem was finding an uncracked block at such a late date. Eleven blocks later, 3 of which I had magnafluxed I had an uncracked Flathead block from a 1953 Ford "Vicky". Next I visited 3 of the locals who had raced Flatheads at the local dirt track oval speedway and had converted to OHV V8's and bought them out when it came to all their Flathead speed parts. Next I called a fellow named "Bing" who in the "old days" raced his Flathead dragster against another Flathead dragster belonging to Tommy Imor (spelling). Bing at that time owned his own speed shop in Santa Rosa, California and at the time was building Chrysler hemi's for drag boats. I simply introduced myself over the phone and without saying what kind of engine simply said I had a good block and a bunch of speed parts and I'd like him to build me an engine. Bing said sure, bring it on over. I loaded it into a trailer and drove the 35 miles to Bing's. When he looked over the side of the trailer and saw Flathead, he grinned from ear to ear. Said he hadn't seen one in years. He pointed to 3 separate storage sheds and said each one was full of Flathead speed parts. Next came the details of how big, how much power, etc. etc. I said mild, he said wild and I said not street driveable and he guaranteed it would be. He won and he was right. I understand from this web site that although the Flathead was replaced by a Buick V8 (?) that Flathead is on display and still runs fine, a living tribute to Bing's ability to build a bullet-proof, full load Flathead. For those younger than 60 years old the following will have no meaning but for Flathead fans here it goes. Bored .120 to .276 inches. Jahns pistons, Grant rings. Weiand (oops sorry my spelling & his writing aren't meshing) 3 pot intake w/3 stromberg 97's. 9.0 to 1 compression (more than that will flatten the
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crank). Offy heads. Mallory dual point centrifugal advance with Mallory Coil. 11" flywheel and clutch. Sand casting taken out of the intake ports of the block. Completely balanced and crank counter balanced. Camshaft-Isky 400 Junior - the next to the wildest (of 9 or 10 cams available if I remember correctly) Idle speed on this cam per specs is 35MPH but it was street driveable, barely. Evenflo headers. That "little" engine pulled that 2800 pound car through the 1/4 mile in the low 15s, same as the Avanti. After I started experimenting with the velocity stacks made from seamless aluminum welding rod cans it pulled 0-100 MPH with no flat spots. Just a steady strong consistent pull all the way. Low 15s, remember when the GTO's came out? My friend had one. It was a rare GTO, stock, factory, 3 deuce 4 speed that could get into the 14s. That "little" flathead was keeping up with some of the best, stoplight to stoplight, and the young kids then not only didn't recognize the sound of it, but didn't know what they were looking at when I "popped" the hood.
Handling - go power, stopping power, looks, it had it all. It also had no air circulation in the interior. Like a Ferrari. At 80degrees outside it was 100 degrees inside (temperature). The cowl vent had been moulded and welded shut. It was the one thing Rex said they regretted doing. Reversing both windwings helped. The head radiating off the headers and dual mufflers tucked all the way up under the frame virtually right under your feet added to the heat. It was wonderful in cool weather. We lagged the mufflers in asbestos cloth to try to alleviate the problem, but still it was a challenge to look "cool" on a hot day. That was the only problem I can remember with the car.
The paint, forgot the paint. This is what Rex told me. He said the 3 of them started painting with refrigerator white. They painted for 8 hours non-stop, round and round and round the car passing the spray gun
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from one to the other. At the end of 8 hours they stopped. The car was white. Next came the burgundy 1955 or was it 1956 Chevy Burgundy metallic lacquer with double the normal amount of silver metallic and an equal amount of gold metallic. This gave the car a brighter color in bright sunlight and a rich burgundy in subdued light. He said they sprayed for 24 hours non-stop. The depth of the paint was incredible. No clear coat. I waxed it once a week with classic car wax. Everywhere I went everybody had to touch the car. It would be covered with fingerprints by the end of the weekend. Classic car wax was the only was that didn't show the fingerprints.
Notes: Rex said that when they were building THE COUPE apparently in the small garage (?) where I first saw the car, the neighborhood kids would peer in to see how things were progressing and referred to the garage as "The Hot Rod Factory".
In 1968 I drove THE COUPE from Napa (my home) California, to Cleveland Ohio. My wife's (girlfriend's) mother at the time thought it a good idea to separate us for a while. Was she surprised when I and THE COUPE arrived. This was July 26th(?) 1968. My first stop was to be Wendover, Nevada, primarily because that was the day before the annual speed trials for Bonneville were to begin. I felt I might see some really great cars if I stopped there. It's about 700 miles to Wendover from Napa, so when I arrived I was beat. I was also mobbed or let's say the CAR WAS. Those whose cars I had hoped to see were beyond belief, or so it seemed at seeing a car like THE COUPE, let alone seeing it just drive in, under it's own power, rather than on a trailer, and of course I just had to let the engine stay idling, knowing that these
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guys, the ages they were, knew like I did what sound was coming from under the hood and then just knew their ears couldn't be hearing right but when I popped the hood and there it was, a beloved Flathead V8, well, things like that make it all worthwhile I suppose.
I had the car for 10 years and never put a dent or scratch in it. Apparently Tom and ___ have also been equally good to the car and I'm so glad to know it's still alive. All of your interest certainly proves to me what a truly special car this was, is, and hopefully will continue to be. Although it may be a relic from the past it certainly stands as a testimonial to the ingenuity of our generation, our love of the automobile, and the good memories we all share of that era.
Notes: Most of those who saw THE COUPE had no idea what kind of car it was. The most common guess was that it was a CORD, but once I saw a Mercedes-Benz of that era and from the back it looked very similar.
Notes: I have THE COUPE to thank for my wife of 36 years. I believe it was the conduit for our initial introduction by a friend at the local drive-in.
Notes: Concerning Ray Burnsed, owner of Burnseds Body Shop, the man who personally did the final finish work on the window frames and installed the '62 Vette taillights. I have a picture of me when I was 6 years old, sitting on Santa's knee at the local Elks Club Christmas party. Funny thing what a striking resemblance Santa Claus has to Ray.
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Notes: THE COUPE was very roadable AND ran fine when I bought it but lots of mechanical finish work had to be done. For 2 years the routine was to carry a small pocket note book and write down every mechanical defect that occurred Friday night, Saturday and Sunday. Monday afternoon after work the car went into the local shop, called Maires Garage. There Ted and Phil would go over my notes and make repairs / modifications. Thursday afternoon I would pick the car up, wax it and get it ready for the weekend. Without the patience, dedication and knowledge of those two master mechanics THE COUPE would probably not "be alive" today.
Notes: Bing built the flathead with such tight clearance that the electrodes of the spark plugs could not extend out the bottom of the spark plug holes in the head into the combustion chamber. Just 1/8 inch or perhaps less of the electrode into the combustion chamber and the top of the piston would hit the electrode.
Notes: The headliner was burgundy with white piping. One day in just the right light I noticed what appeared to be hundreds, if not thousands of speckles on the burgundy. Momentarily I panicked then realized what they were... The fine mist emitted when one pulls the tab on a can of beer. I don't recall ever trying to remove these "invisible" speckles.
Notes: As I mentioned the chromed shifter was very high AND had a cue ball for a shifter knob. Remember the shifting pattern - how down and toward you, 2nd up & to the right, 3rd down and to the right. As it turned out, the relationship between the height of the seats s and the position of the cue ball as you shifted into third gear, (end of hand-written page 13) and the young lady's left kneecap (remember mini-skirts) who said "can I ride in your car?", were aligned so flawlessly that as the shifter locked into 3rd gear the cue ball was about 1/2" away and 1/2" higher than her kneecap. The cue ball of COURSE was polished to a high luster and ones hand could easily slip off the cue ball with just a little care.
Notes: Gasoline at that time was "inexpensive". Premium was .37(9) a gallon. My monthly gasoline bill averaged $100.00 a month. I drove it, and drove it and drove it some more. I never tired of it and it never got old.
Note: Those few who think they might remember seeing it would have probably seen it in Vallejo, Napa, Santa Cruz (on the cruising strip, Beach Street), San Jose (on the cruising strip off Alameda) or just about anywhere in Northern or Central California. A couple trips to Los Angeles, Hollywood, Burbank area, San Diego, Tijuana, Reno, Nevada, and Lake Tahoe and a couple side trips to Utah and down into New Mexico, as well as the trip on Interstate 80 to Cleveland, Ohio.
Note: Rod and Custom magazine did an article on it in mid 1967 or 1968 as I recall. In the article was a picture of Rex and myself easily reaching across the top of the car shaking hands.
Notes: I seldom talk of THE COUPE. You can see why (Daddy wrote this on 14 pages ... just kept going & going Mom said) ... later and haven't really touched most of the individual memories of girls, races and events, stored apparently forever. I suppose if I bored you, you didn't read this far... Larry.
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A special "Thanks" to my daughter who created this web site in an effort to find her daddy's COUPE.
Diana - I left something out that needs to be fitted in at the appropriate place.
Rex and the two Texierra Brothers worked four years to complete THE COUPE, to the point it was to when I bought it in 1966. They worked on it from 1955 to 1959. Rex said they drove it only for one year and then it was put in storage until I bought it in 1966. Why the didn't continue to drive it was never mentioned.
Something else to add in the body work section: The "rain gutters" on each side of the roof at the outer edges were removed and where they were was reformed with an ever so slight "lip" so that the rain would still go to the rear. Also the upper rear corners of each door were rounded, rather than the stock square cut, and appropriately shaped rounded pieces of metal were welded to the body to fill in the gap left by rounding the door corners.
Diana - Lots of "run on" sentences etc etc. ie; lots of grammar & sentence structure errors. Modify to make sense or to be more grammatically correct as desired.
start Diana's Notes:
Haha, well, I edited as LITTLE as possible. Just fixed spelling errors as I found them, though I'm sure I missed some.
I PURPOSEFULLY Left certain things (as in oh back to the body, oh one more thing about ___) as he remembered them. Sure it would be "professional" or whatever to have all the memories in the "right" places... BUT would not be true to reality. He remembers things in a certain order and that is that. I think it's neat to see things how we really remember them, not all edited and perfect, but really real. There's a LOT to remember for 10 years. I bet if he had a microphone instead of a pen, he'd talk til he fell asleep (haha!) instead of writing til his hand wouldn't write anymore in one sitting! Anyway, I really wanted to leave it just as it was remembered. So please pardon any thing that wasn't remembered in the right order *wink*, I like it just the way it is :) *smiles* just like he talks face to face. (Well, he DID write to me to edit "as desired") haha! I desire it just as it is (look up!) just like the hours... and hours... and hours... of stories at the kitchen table. I love you, Daddy :)
PS. Please don't take the words without asking, they mean the world to me. Thanks :) Diana
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