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The Honolulu Ingredient
Gary Pierce's '29 Ford Coupe
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Photos by Gary
Pierce |
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Above Photo:
In February 2007 Gary Pierce found a '29 Ford coupe
listed on Ebay from Greenville Pa. Won the bid and
had the car hauled home. (Good choice Gary!) |
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By
Michael
Diaz
Honolulu
Streets Magazine.
LOWER BURRELL, PA When Gary
Pierce of PA., visits Hawaii he always looks forward to giving his
cousin Don a hand on whatever hot rod project he happens to be
working on in his shop.
But it was in 2006, after helping Don
on the 8-Ball coupe and driving his well-known yellow model A pickup
around Waikiki that Gary got the bug and decided to build a hot rod
for himself.
There was one drawback though, "I
didn't have a clue how or where to start," said Pierce.
A year later he would prove that
statement to be completely wrong.
In, "February 2007 I found a 1929 Ford
5-window coupe on Ebay. It was located in a town called Greenville,
Pa. which is about 100 miles from where I live. I won the bid and
had the car hauled home."
At that time Pierce was already in the
midst of restoring a '71 Volkswagen Karmann Ghia for his wife Debbie,
and didn't want to have two projects going on during the same time.
So the coupe was put aside until the VW was finished in May of 2009.
"Now I'm ready to start on the coupe!"
Pierce eagerly said.
But first he had to get things in
order for the Model A's construction. So he began building much
needed equipment that every backyard rodder ought to have.
"I had to build a Gantry Crain for my
garage." He said. "Next I built a body dolly for the coupe. After I
got the body off the frame, I made a frame jig."
Once everything was neatly setup, he
went to work on the chassis for his '29.
"I boxed the frame and was getting
started on the front suspension when I ran across a 1950 Ford
Flathead engine."
The owner said all it needed was a
good cleaning and it would fire right up. But after Pierce bought
the motor its condition turned out to be far less than what he
expected.
"I built an engine test stand to make
sure it ran good before I put in the car" Pierce said.
"It didn't!!"
Further inspection turned up all kinds
of things wrong with the engine. Bad crankshaft, bad rings, and to
top it all off, there was no oil pump whatsoever. Sure, all she
needed was a good cleaning and shed fire right up.
"I took it completely apart" said
Pierce.
"Sent the block to DLK Performance &
Machine Shop [in Russellton, PA] where they bead blasted, hot
tanked, magna-fluxed, bored the cylinders, align-bored, resurfaced
the valve seats, and drilled the valve guide bosses. I also bought
most of the parts there and got a lot of good technical advice."
As soon as he got the block back from the machine shop Pierce
carefully assembled the flathead with all new components and put it
back on the engine stand.
"Rigged up the ignition starting
system and fired it up. Now it runs great!! Now I am going back to
the front suspension and continue from there."
Pierce humbly admits that he's gotten
all of his inspiration from his cousin Don Peirce who just happens
to also be the builder of the 8-Ball aka, the Hawaiian Rat Rod coupe
featured throughout Honolulu Streets, and says, "although Don is
6,000 miles away, he plays a major role in this project."
"Practically every move I make, I
consult with him first. If I don't, I usually do it over. Without
him, this project would never have gotten started, let alone ever
get finished!"
From time to time Gary Pierce may modestly ask for advice from his
cousin and confesses that he lacks a degree of confidence in his rod
building abilities. But under it all, when it comes right down to
it, he is the most competent, skilled craftsmen youd ever want to
see in a hot rod builder, brilliantly turning his Pennsylvania born
coupe into the Honolulu Ingredient.
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