The ’46 Ford

Herb and Carole’s ute. Two years, and the part most people will never see is the part that took the longest — this one didn’t get a chassis repaired, it got a chassis built.

A 1946 Ford ute is eighty years old. Nothing under it was designed for the way anyone drives now, and there is a point in a build like this where you stop patching what’s there and start again properly. That’s the call that was made here, and it’s the reason the job ran from the middle of 2024 through to last month.

The chassis

The frame was fabricated here from scratch — not a repair, not a section let into an original rail. It runs an independent front end with disc brakes where the car originally had a beam axle and drums, and the crossmembers and mounts were all made to suit.

It went out of the booth in gloss black, which is the only honest way to finish something that’s going to spend its life being looked at from underneath by people who know what they’re looking at.

Back to bare metal

The cab came apart and went back to bare steel before anything else happened, then straight into epoxy primer so it stayed that way. There’s no shortcut version of this on a car of this age — whatever is left in the metal will find its way back through the paint eventually, and the only question is how long it takes.

With the shell sealed, the front guards and grille went back on for fit-up, gaps set in primer, before the body and the rear tray went through the booth in surfacer.

The tray

The deck is recycled Australian Jarrah. It’s a dense, dark hardwood that suits the age of the truck far better than anything off a shelf, and being recycled it already has a bit of history in it — which is rather the point on a car like this.

Where it’s at

It’s in deep purple and all but finished — final details only. Against all the black underneath it, the colour does what it’s supposed to do on an old Ford: it looks like somebody chose it, rather than like nobody could decide.

Under the bonnet is a Boss 260 V8, backed by a four-speed and a Ford nine-inch. Inside, it’s a full custom interior on Dakota Digital instruments — so it reads like a 1946 Ford and drives like something you’d actually take a distance.