It was kind of a field trip. One of the guys in the welding/auto-body repair class I'm taking knows Pete (the owner of the Model-A and the shop.) He builds his own blocks and heads. The heads flow 100-cfm more than the current NASCAR motors.
Those cabinets in the last set of photos are full of hardware (nuts/bolts/washers) of all types. Both metric and SAE, grade 5 +, stainless, black oxide etc. and a much better selection than a hardware store.