Skyline Drivetrain And Suspension In 1948 Studebaker

[stilettoman]

After 30 years as a rotorhead, I have finally seen the light and am now a Skyline believer. Of course there are almost no Skylines here in Seattle, but a few engine conversions, mostly RB25. Some of you may have seen photos of my 1984 RX-7/RB20DET conversion, which is detailed here:

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/3936025/1984-mazda-rx-7/

I have purchased a second R32 front clip, this one with 57,000 km on it, a 1990 model, also with RB20DET and 5 speed. I also purchased a pretty nice 1948 Studebaker Champion Starlight coupe, which is the one with the unique wraparound rear window. Stock motor is a 170 cu inch straight six flathead, 80 hp, straight rear axle, dual A-frames with transverse leaf spring in the front and Might-as-well-drag-your-foot drum brakes. The dash and interior are really nicely redone, body and paint presentable, and I plan to replace EVERYTHING ELSE.

Week 1 - started 16 September, built a steel bulkhead behind the seats, thinking it would be more fire resistant than the cardboard, and installed an Infiniti J30 (Nissan Leopard) fuel tank in the trunk. This has the appropriate immersed fuel pump for the fuel injection. The old fuel tank and rear axle/leaf springs were removed, superficial rust removed from the body underside and a R33 rear suspension was installed. The ride height is 1 inch lower than the stock Studebaker. During this week we also stripped the front end of the car and stripped all the parts from the R32 front clip.

[Chris Rogers]

Subscribed. This looks good. I had a customer with a 51 Hudson that insisted own keeping it stock. I like yours better.

[Miguelone]

Wow, that Torana GTR is something but this is Something!

[stilettoman]

Week 2 - Removed the original engine and trans, pressure washed the front end of the car. The R32 front clip was trimmed approximately to size, then mounted and leveled on a rolling table with ride height adjusted to the table top (same procedure used on the rear suspension).

The body was raised to the appropriate matching height, and a whole day was spent trimming the clip to fit the body. The clip was welded to the firewall, with bolted plates attaching the Skyline frame rails to the Studebaker frame. This allows the frame to be removed from the firewall back. Filler pieces were fabricated and welded on the outside, and similarly on the inside of the engine compartment. To ensure adequate strength and stiffness, the engineering was done using the TLAR method (That Looks About Right).

The engine and tranny were installed and a rear trans mount was fabricated. The fenders (wings, mud guards? Never can decide if I am speaking American, English or Australian) were installed and front end parts trimmed and fitted. The Skyline inner structure and lower frame rails were shortened, Skyline radiator and intercooler were mounted. The intercooler just fits into the protruding center portion of the grille. The 47-49 Champions have very short front end, but weigh only 2700 pounds. The Commander version has a longer nose, but is several hundred pounds heavier.

Edited October 9, 2013 by stilettoman

[Chris Rogers]

What are you doing for a steering rack? 240 sx?

[stilettoman]

We are indeed using a 240SX rack. The J30 rack is too wide, and uses different style hydraulic fittings. I am sure there is a logical reason for that - Nissan, like all automobile companies, has too many engineers with not enough to do. The 240 rack just bolts in, requires lenghtening the steering shaft about 2 inches. We are using the Skyline steering column, required moving the tilt mechanism and mount bracket forward to fit the Studebaker dash. I am using a steering wheel from a 1978 Mazda Cosmo coupe, fits right onto the Skyline shaft splines. This is a 15 inch wheel. The Studebaker wheel is 17 inches, seems a bit much with the power steering.

The J30 fuel tank quantity sensor has nominal resistance values of about 5 ohms full and 80 ohms empty. Can someone tell me what the comparable values are for the R32 ?

I am thinking of doing surgery on the Skyline instrument cluster and possibly adapting the tachometer movement into the case of the Studebaker clock. There is a small window at the bottom of the Skyline tach, but no writing in the window. What is that for ?

[Chris Rogers]

240sx and R32 are similar racks. Obviously the 32 item is not going to work in your case hence the s13 rack choice.

Fuel tank resistance seems right. I would have to check mine.

Window in tach is for the digital clock if it was there. Should also be a smaller hole for the set clock rod.

[stilettoman]

The Studebaker firewall is not designed to carry the loads from hanging pedals, so we reinforced it with a piece of 1/8 inch plate, tied to the firewall diagonal brace. The steering shaft was lengthened about thee inches, and the 240 rack just bolted in.

A friend gave me the exhaust system from an almost new Audi S4 turbo, all stainless with dual path silencers. The control valves were computer controlled and vacuum operated. I will control the valves with a cable. The presilencer is neatly dished out to fit under the driveshaft. We used the Infiniti J30 rear sway bar because it has the double hunps for dual exhaust. We had some stainless tubing from previous jobs, so all I had to buy was a cat and two chrome tips. Sean always uses a cat on street systems, as he says it gives the most effective silencing with the least back pressure.

After the supports were installed, we had too much side-to-side movement, so we installed a lateral strut, sort of a Panhard bar for the exhaust. The only thing I had handy that was the right length was an old RX-7 hatch strut. There is a rule at my shop - every project must use a few RX-7 parts or I will never get rid of all this junk. I have seen Sean build some difficult exhausts, and a couple that were impossible. This one was easy. The last photo shows a large-tube header he made for a Chevelle with a big block.

[Chris Rogers]

That looks well done. Keep em coming.

[Chris Rogers]

I see an auto box. If its the Nissan one that came with the cut you will need the controller in the right kick panel as that runs the box.

[Leroy Peterson]

unique build, to say the least. looking good so far, hope it doesnt decrease the value of the Studebaker

[stilettoman]

"I see an auto box. If its the Nissan one that came with the cut you will need the controller in the right kick panel as that runs the box."

I have no idea what you are referring to, never heard of anything called an auto box. We have the complete front clip and we plan to use almost all of the wiring except for items we don't have in the car - electric windows, mirrors, door locks, etc. There is a small metal electronic module that is apparently called a "body control module", which seems to be connected to many things in the car, mostly stuff we don't plan to use.

We don't plan to make any changes to the engine wiring harness, except as necessary to connect with the Studebaker wiring. We removed the ignition switch from the steering column and will mount it in the dash as per original Studebaker. The original starter switch was on the floor, operated by pushing the clutch pedal all the way down.

As for the value of the Studebaker, I have said all along that the top price I would get if I ever sold it would most likely be from a Nissan enthusiast rather than a Studebaker guy, but I could be wrong about that. If it is not worth al least four times what the stock Studebaker was worth, I would be very disappointed. Speaking of valuable Studebakers, one is being built in California that will be worth a lot more than mine:

[Chris Rogers]

Automatic gearbox. If you are using the one from the cut there is a computer that will need to be carried over as the engine computer does not control the transmission only the engine.

Make more sense?

[azathoth]

This build looks fantastic. Subscribed Very unique project.

[stilettoman]

The Skyline 5 speed is several inches longer than the original Studebaker trans, and the shifter comes up under the bench seat. I ended up moving the seat back 3 inches from the original seat track mounting, but I have to allow for about 4 inches of travel forward if someone shorter wants to drive it. Consequently, I modified the seat frame and built an offset shift lever. I drilled out some spot welds and removed a panel from the Skyline floor tunnel that provided mounting for the rubber boot on the shifter. A little reforming and that panel fits perfectly. I will sew up a leather or vinyl piece for the shifter boot.

I am also working on the Skyline steering column, trying to make it look more suitable for this old car. The photos shows the steering column, a Mazda Cosmo steering wheel, a small stainless bowl , a stainless thermos bottle and the original Studebaker column shift lever. You can probably see where I am going with those parts. I am looking at various turn signal/light switches before I put it all together.

[GH05T]

interested

[Dose Pipe Sutututu]

Wow, just amazing.

[stilettoman]

Stopped working on the Studebaker and spent several months getting everyone else's projects finished and out of my shop. Now the Studebaker is completely disassembled and I am working on the body - a few rust patches and lots of little dents and dings to smooth out , hope to be painting by the end of August. Meanwhile, my fabricator Sean has been working on the chassis. We got the frame and a few other pieces powdercoated, but the rear suspension subframe and most of the links had rubber bushings that would not tolerate the heat, so they were just blasted and I painted them. The frame was placed upside down for assembly of the rear suspension. The photos show the chassis with the rear suspension and exhaust. This is a stock R33 rear suspension except for the coilover shocks/springs.

[stilettoman]

As you can see from the previous posts, we decided at the beginning to do all the fabrication and welding before we started stripping and refinishing the body and components. I think it will look pretty respectable when we are finished. When we started, it seemed the bottom of the body had superficial rust, but when we got it clean, we found that we were mostly looking at red oxide primer put on by the factory. The only rust was the trunk floor, and we just fabricated a new floor, rolled in a few beads for stiffening and added some hat section stiffeners. The entire body underside, wheel wells, trunk interior and firewall were cleaned and coated with epoxy primer. The firewall and engine bay were painted with a silver grey urethane paint and clear coat. The underbody and wheel wells were coated with a clear textured urethane bedliner material, tinted with the same silver grey paint to match.

The chassis was rolled into place and the rubber/fabric shims were fitted between the body and chassis. The forward end of the frame rails bolt up to matching plates welded to the Skyline lower frame rails just ahead of the firewall. The front suspension and steering rack were installed and we had the car back on its wheels after a long time sitting on blocks.

[stilettoman]

I think some of the people on this forum might like to see the details of how we built our intake plenum. We wanted something that seemed appropriate for the classic period of this car, and preferably, something different from what everyone else does. Sean suggested using an old style cast aluminum V8 valve cover, as it would be the right size and have about the right volume. I immediately discovered that I could get one with the Studebaker name cast in.

Reading on some of the blogs, I found that the Big Boys, building the very high power super cars, and some of the more sophisticated after market suppliers, are using velocity stacks inside the plenums of their turbo systems. The designers say the purpose of the tubes is to get the intake up off the floor of the plenum for improved flow, and they recommend staggering the tube length so they are not all drawing from the same level in the plenum. Well, you can buy velocity stacks, but they are not cheap, and not necessarily the right size. In my materials rack I have aluminum extrusions and tubes that I have had since before most of you were born, and I found a piece of very soft aluminum tubing with the inside diameter EXACTLY the same as the runners in the lower manifold of the RB20. I am pretty sure it was for 707 fuel line, complete with a Boeing part number and early 70s date. Sean made some dies in the lathe and I pressed the flares and trimmed them to length. The bottom plate is heavy aluminum, because Sean has tapped holes for the idle air controller, the cold start valve, and several vacuum fittings which are mounted under the plenum to get them out of sight and clean up the overall apperarance.

The throttle body flange was cut off the original plenum and welded to the forward end of the Studebaker valve cover. The cover was then welded to the bottom plate. I have painted it with body color, and eventually the cam covers and brake booster will also be the same color. I just looks like maroon in normal lighting, but it really has a dazzling sparkle when the sunlight hits it. The manufacturer calls it "Sparkling Merlot Pearl", which is a good description.