The entire firewall is machined from a billet. Notice the openings cut in the hood side, in preparation for fitting the precisely contoured vent doors.
Ironworks Speed and Kustom Use The Latest Tech When Making Custom Parts
By Ron Covell – Photography by the Author & Rodger Lee
Videographer Rodger Lee – Artwork By e. Black Design
As work nears completion on Greg Heinrich’s cutting-edge 1935 Chevy Coupe, we wanted to show how some of the outstanding details were handled. (In previous months, Modern Rodding has brought you chassis and sheet metal work.) Ironworks Speed and Kustom has made a commitment to use the latest technology to design and build these parts. In most cases, the portion of the car where the parts will fit is scanned, so when the parts are designed in CAD they will fit precisely. Once the CAD model is completed, a plastic part is printed and then this part is checked for fit and appearance before machining the final part from billet aluminum. Opportunities for improvement often become apparent after the printed part is made, and frequently parts go through several revisions before the design is finalized.
- Advertisement -
The finished look is getting closer to reality. Thanks to Eric Black of e. Black Design we have a good idea of what our finished goal will look like.
Innumerable details were fabricated using this procedure, and the combined effect is stunning. Our photos show the bucket seats, articulated hood vent doors, running boards and their mounting brackets, the rear underbody valance panel, the hood top bracing, front inner fender panel, and the dashboard, but this is just the tip of the iceberg. Some other components made in this way are the firewall, transmission tunnel, bell housing cover and toeboards, the pedal assembly, the hinged windshield frame, and the inner bezels for all the windows. We could go on, but you get the idea that no expense was spared to bring the styling, fit, and finish on this car to an extreme level.
Most of what you see in this photo was designed in CAD, checked by printing a plastic part, tweaked as needed, and then CNC machined from billet aluminum.
Manufacturing parts in this way brings a new level of precision to the building process, and when you look at the deeply sculpted louvers on the front inner fender panels and the rear valance panel you can imagine how challenging it would be to fabricate these parts from sheet metal. The process worked so well that many of the Chevrolet original parts were replaced by parts machined from billet, too. MR
In this close-up shot of the seat frame you can see the superb quality of finish achieved by precision machining.The inner portions of the seat frames will be covered with foam and upholstery, but even these hidden areas are beautifully finished.Webbing is placed under the foam cushion in the seat bottom for OEM-style comfort.The entire firewall is machined from a billet. Notice the openings cut in the hood side, in preparation for fitting the precisely contoured vent doors.The hood vent door assembly is shown here in preparation for being bonded to the steel hood side.Here you can see how perfectly the machined aluminum components follow the contours of the hood side and the intricacy of the hinges and brackets for the linkage that moves all the doors in unison.Here’s the completed hood side with the vent doors in place.The beautiful running boards are machined from billet aluminum, too. Note how perfectly they follow the shape of the body and the fenders.This CAD drawing shows the individual components the running boards are constructed from.The underside of the running boards is finished just as beautifully as the top.These are the brackets for the running boards, which mount them securely to the chassis.This is a preliminary CAD drawing for the valence panel that fits under the tail of the body.You can see here how the individual components of the valence panel are fitted together.This is the completed rear valance panel, resting upside down on a bench. Shapes this intricate would be extremely challenging to make from sheet metal.The valence panel is being fitted into place here. As you can see, it will fit like a glove since the body was precisely scanned before the part was designed.This is the rough layout of the robust bracing for the hood top.Here you can see how the simplified rectangular cross sections of the brace have been relieved, creating an elegant I-beam shape. This reduces the weight and gives it an outstanding appearance.Note the uniform gap between the brace and the hood top. The hood latches are integrated into the design, too.A printed plastic inner fender panel is being checked for size and fitment. It’s always a good idea to do these checks before committing to machining a part from the billet.These are the billet aluminum inner fender panels in preparation for being fitted to the car.Here’s a CAD rendering of the dash instrument cluster. Many versions of this were modeled before making the final decision.The instrument cluster, glove box doors, and the switch panel are machined from billet aluminum, and the larger dash panel is a printed part used for checking the fit of all the components before it is machined.
