I was able to spend quite a bit of time in the garage working on the '41 this past weekend. Got the rear shock crossmember template made and a basic design drawn up. The rear end housing dropped in perfectly after Dick moved the spring perches. He milled the factory welds flush with the axle tubes so I could knock the perches off with a chisel. Then we positioned them 1/2" farther toward the outside. He also drilled new locating holes in the perches which will locate the housing 1 1/2" to the rear of the car. The repostioning is necessary to keep the tires centered in the wheel well. The original torque tube rear end would pivot and positioned differently than the 57 rear. You can see the milling operation in the pics and the new holes in the spring perch. Directly under the tool bit in picture 2 is a scribe mark on the axle tube. A corresponding mark was made on the perch edge to allow proper positioning of the perches for welding. This assures we maintain the proper pinion angle.
The new axles had come in from Moser Engineering and I bought new brake drums. The 57 axles used the later 5 lug, 4 3/4" wheel pattern while the 41 wheels require 6 lug, 5 1/2" studs. The Moser axles have the 6 lug pattern so the new brake drums needed to be drilled to match. Dick preferred the mill to perform the drilling to maintain a perfect 6 lug pattern.
Once all the drilling and welding was completed, I sandblased the coatings off the brake drums and gave all the parts a nice coat of gloss black paint. The reworked housing fit perfectly.
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