Patcon

The automatic will limit the abuse transferred to the rear end

I'm not so sure...

Maybe ambient air temperature is contributing. Warm fuel and all...

If it doesn't leak, I would leave it and paint it black

Ford 9" requires a lot of fabrication. Just find an R200 and move on

Doesn't look like it will fit and they look like raised letters. Might be hard to do well...

Why do you not like acid etch?

The diffs are pretty tough and the stockish motors don't make enough power to overly abuse them. They should always have a little bit of movement (lash). 1/32" seems really reasonable. I would put seals in it and run it

Looks like 2L roadsters have the same Pin-ball stud

If you have great spark and you manually added fuel it should run. I find adding fuel can be hit or miss. Liquid fuel is not combustible. I have better success with Ether

The throttle shaft screws are brass and really soft. They are also staked on the other end. The staking has to be ground off to really get them out. which will necessitate new screws for reassembly

You could check movement in the bearings at the output stubs and the input flange. With a dial indicator you could probably check backlash. Spin it by hand and feel for roughness. replacing the seals is probably a good idea

turbo motor

I wasn't suggesting youre missing the plate. I was thinking the dimensions referenced in the other drawing seem to show the plate. I had forgotten this was the early 4 speed. We dont appear to know that your dimensions are incorrect. We have operated on the presumption they are...

Isn't there normally a front bearing cover inside the bell housing? and doesn't the fork ball normally thread into that? That would account for the disparity...

That is a nice drawing

I bought my epoxy from "color chips" https://www.originalcolorchips.com/ Its a high solids product. Buy some spike shoes. I have chips in mine to make it less slippery. Water, oil and especially glass beads make it slick!

That looks like the top of the jet. One is much lower than the other. I don't recall if you have set the floats yet, but if you haven't that is where I would start

The shaft screws are normally staked. It looks like someone got a little carried away staking that one. the shafts bend easily...

Ahhhh, Jim's emporium. I will have to make a pilgrimage one day....

Here is a source but I'm not sure it's who I used https://www.shoplicenseplates.com/ohio-license-plates there is a "26 ZR" plate there that might work if you can register it I believe this is who I used. He annotates which plates are register able or not http://www.scplates.com/for-sale/South-Carolina He covers Fl, Ga, SC, NC & Va

Make sure you know all the specifics In South Carolina they dont allow any vanity plates for year of manufacture plates. Also only certain letters are register able. I can't fully explain but as historic plates get registered they move down the alphabet. When we looked for Codys goon, I almost bought plates that wouldn't have worked. I had to look for a lower letter plate

In the current market I would say that number seems inline with other recent sales. So more than double where it was at but some less than 50k

That could leave a mark!

Paint is really the big hump in a project. The rest can really come together pretty quick.