Done in a season

Four months to build a hot rod? Oh, come on. Maybe if it’s a team in a workshop but for one bloke in his garage? Can’t be done. Except Carl Powles has done it – and the result was this show-stopping ‘32 Roadster.

Okay, let’s be honest. As you may well be expecting, the preparation took far longer than that. Several years longer as it happens, as I recall first spotting the fibreglass roadster body collecting dust in Carl’s Grimsby workshop what must have been at least 12 years ago. All that parts collecting is key, though, as when the time was right the execution was precise and swift. Very, very swift.

In truth, however, this is a build that was never meant to be. ‘I tend to buy parts when I come across them at the right price,’ Carl confessed. ‘It’s not that I’m a hoarder, it’s a

good way of keeping the cost of a build to a reasonable level, and even if you end up selling on the parts you will never lose out if you buy right in the first place.

‘I must have acquired the rails from John Reid over 15 years ago and it carried on from there. I never planned to actually build the car and I guess I had it in my mind to eventually sell on all the parts and recoup some cash. Then it dawned on me that a finished car would be worth far more than a collection of bits so I’d be better off building the roadster and then selling it. Trouble is, now it’s finished I get such a blast driving the car I don’t want to sell it.’

Carl set to work on the build over Christmas in 2021 and the following April it was finished and on the road. Quite an achievement for anyone, especially somebody doing it in his spare time after work. Since then, despite having two other hot rods available to jump into and enjoy, Carl has clocked up more than 5000 miles in the roadster. Well, he did say it’s a blast to drive.

Pedaling it

The rolling chassis is pretty much standard spec, if there is such a thing when it comes to a hot rod build. Dropped I beam at the front, 8-inch Ford at the rear and a small block Chevy in between.

There is a variation from the expected norm when it comes to the gearbox though. Some of you may already have noticed this hot rod has 3 pedals, a necessity dictated by the 4-speed Muncie Carl fitted.

Was going manual a conscious decision on your part, I asked him. ‘Not really, I just happened to already have the Muncie sat on a shelf. I took it in part payment for a paint job I did years ago.’

Carl also had the small block V8 in stock, well pretty much all of it anyway. He bought the bare 350ci block a few years back, with it already having been bored +10 thou. Carl subsequently built the engine in a deliberately purposeful way. ‘I chose what went into the engine very carefully,’ he explained. ‘It is my idea of how a proper hot rod engine would have been built back in the day.’

Commercial compromise

A few years back, Carl swapped the front grille and headlights on his Elijahs Speed Shop pick-up for commercial units. He didn’t part with the originals though, and they also sat on the shelf when it came time for the roadster build. Similarly, the Moon gauges

This is my idea of how a proper hot rod engine would have been built

Above: The 350ci has been rebored and fi tted with a fast road cam and 327 Fuelie heads. The Ram Horn manifolds are ceramic coated, and Carl only had to reach up on the shelf to lay his hands on the tri-power carb set up Below: The dropped and chromed Magnum I beam hangs from a similarly coated transverse spring and is located by owner-fabricated stainless 4-bars. The shocks are by Pete and Jake, brakes are discs and a Vega box handles the steering

Shelf Life

Carl boxed the American Stamping rails and added front and rear crossmembers to form the basic chassis With the body mounted, the engine was dropped between the rails to determine its placement… …enabling Carl to then fabricate the mounts Carl formed the brake and clutch pedals along with the underfloor mounting assembly for the cylinders

these are an aftermarket brake master cylinder and servo and a Land Rover clutch master cylinder With the basic rails bolted down, the engine mounts were welded into place so too were central crossmembers, fabricated from 20 x 40mm box section steel The engine and gearbox were then bolted into place, along with the front axle and suspension

so too was the pedal assembly. The rear axle was then mocked into position Carl made use of 6mm diameter bar to finish off the end of the exhaust tailpipes… …with the stainless steel system exiting just behind the rear axle

this is located by a home-made stainless triangular 4-bar arrangement. The coilovers with chrome springs happened to be on the shelf in Carl’s workshop

Box section steel was added under the dashboard to provide strength, rigidity and something to hang the heater from That steel box also provides secure fixing for the column drop clasping the Limeworks ’40 Ford steering column The bench seat features a 3/4 inch plywood base covered in foam which Carl sculpted to shape to provide comfort and support

Grille shell and headlights had previously been fitted to Carl’s pick-up, whilst the bonnet top and sides are by Rootleib

The car was stripped down and the bare chassis coated in primer… …then finished off in body colour With the paint dry, final assembly of the detailed rolling chassis could begin

The Ford 8-inch rear axle was cleaned up and painted before being refitted…

…as were the engine block and transmission casing Just needs the body now. Propshaft was made by Dunning and Fairbanks in Leeds

The body and associated panels were sprayed in top coat over a white base Front grille is original Henry Ford 1932 sheet metal

This stage of the build came somewhere around 12 weeks after it was first started Originally finished in black, Carl painted the ’40 Ford steering wheel to match the paintwork and interior trimming The roof involved carefully bending five lengths of 3/4 inch diameter conduit pipe… …and, also carefully, fabricating the bracketry to hold them in place

With the frame formed, Carl final welded all the joints…

…and then painted the metal in readiness for it being covered with fabric pipe That job was entrusted to Grahame ‘Whiff’ Smith who, ably aided by his grandson Finn, did a great job The duo even stitched up the side curtains for complete protection from the elements

Above: The ribbed dash insert, an eBay USA purchase, houses the cluster of compromise black-faced Moon gauges. Carl had them in stock and just needed new senders. Not only does the restored Arvin heater look perfectly at home under the dash, it’s also functional, with Carl saying it maybe works too well at times Top right: Forward thinking came to the fore regarding the interior trimming. Carl formed the bench seat early on in the build so Barrie Stemp could trim it, along with the door and kick cards, in white leather at the same time as the car was being built. No waiting for trim at the end of the build, there’s a novelty Above right: With the hood being as easy to remove completely as it is to fold, the topless roadster has cleaner lines than many others. If the forecast’s looking a bit iffy, of course, Carl has the other option

that fill the dash insert were left over from a previous project. Those are, however, a compromise as Carl really wanted whitefaced gauges to match the interior trimming. Beggars can’t be choosers though.

The Arvin heater that sat on the shelf was dusted off, the matrix rebuilt and an electric motor from a Mini heater fitted, with the bonus that the original Arvin fan fitted the shaft on the new motor. Carl prepped and painted the heater casing body colour, while the trim embellishments were re-chromed. Wiring the car was another task undertaken by Carl, the loom being created using an EZ Wiring kit.

Above left: Carl’s ’33 Chevy sedan at the NSRA Pre-’49 weekend in 2005. This is the other car he painted Orange Tangerine Pic: Dave Biggadyke Above centre: The 4-pot Model A roadster pick-up and V8-powered ’33 pick-up pairing we featured in the January ’09 issue Pic: Mike Key Above right: Still in Carl’s garage is the ’33 sedan we featured in the Summer ’18 issue Pic: Steve Sharp Below: The February ’20 issue depicted this ’40 Ford convertible, another car still at Carl’s disposal Pic: Steve Sharp

The So Cal windscreen surround was sourced via the NSRA website with Carl collecting it at the Swap Meet. It wasn’t chrome-plated back then though, and it threw up a hiccup when it came to sourcing a frame for the folding hood. ‘I looked around but nobody was offering a frame to suit that particular screen surround,’ Carl explained. ‘I could have bought one and modified it to fit but then I thought I might as well make one from scratch.

‘I’m really pleased with how it turned out. It does fold, but it’s actually just as easy to remove it completely.’

The wheels and tyres the roadster rolls on were another second-hand buy, on this occasion from Gary Chester. He put them up for grabs when he switched to Torq Thrust rims and black walls on his ex-Russ Pepper ’32 roadster.

Changing base

If you know of Carl’s reputation in the rodding world, it will come as no surprise to find out that he painted the car himself. You may, however, not be expecting to hear that he already had the paint in stock. Well, sort of. ‘It’s a colour I really like, the same as I painted my Chevy sedan many years ago. I had some left over so took the can off the shelf and painted the grille. This time round I sprayed it over a white base and that really makes the colour pop. I bought more paint, mixed the old and new together, and painted the whole car.’

Carl had already told me the roadster is a blast to drive, but I had to press him further on the subject. ‘It’s awesome to drive and goes like a scalded cat. It sounds wicked with it having a manual box.’

Sums that up nicely then. So, what about future plans for the car? ‘Just drive it’ came the succinct reply.

While this was never an intended build, it does go to show what can be achieved with forward planning. Whether there are many others who could achieve it in the same timescale is debatable though. Collecting parts over a number of years as and when they become available does keep the cost down, and it also means there is no big-hit outlay in one go.

The only question now, though, is how bare has the roadster build left the shelves in Carl’s workshop? Chances are we won’t have to wait long to find out…

Right: A rare shot of Carl, who’s well known for building hot rods at a rapid rate then driving them almost non-stop, standing still and not doing anything. We can only surmise he’s planning another build

Below: The paint colour is Peugeot Orange Tangerine, sprayed over a white basecoat instead of the usual grey. The folding hood is trimmed in fawn Double Duck canvas

Thanks Thanks

“Whiff and Finn for the hood trimming, Barry Stemp for the interior and, of course, my wife Mandy”