When I was in elementary school, around 4th or 5th grade, my parents bought a 1950 Mercury sedan. My dad was a butcher (meat cutter) all his life and he and my mother worked hard for everything they had. I have fond memories of being picked up from school in the Merc when my dad had a day off during the week! We had many antique cars throughout the years but the merc was the one that stuck around. When I was around 10 or 11 years old a friend of my dad's offered to repaint the Mercury and at the time they decided to make it a "mild custom." They "nosed" and "decked" it and I remember dad being very proud of the fact that his pal used lead for the bodywork rather than plastic fillers. His pal was and older gentleman and did things the way they did in the 50's when he first started customizing cars. The old Merc spent most of its time in the garage over the years and was only taken out a few times a year for the occasional jaunt around the neighborhood. My parents essentially "gave" the car to me for my high school graduation (1991) but it remained in their garage as I went to college, met my wife, bought our first house, etcetera... Well, dad passed away in 2006 and while my mom is still going strong we have recently collectively decided to downsize her living arrangements and selling the house so the Merc has finally made it out of its resting place of the last at least 20 years ( if memory serves me correctly?) My wife and I bought a place out in the country a couple of years ago with room for the Mercury (and of course all the other vehicles we've acquired over the last 19 years together!) So, I'm starting this thread to chronicle the journey back to the road for the old Mercury that I am referring to as The Heirloom Merc. I will do my best to keep things up to date with the progress. Here are a few pics the day we dragged her out... And after a quick rinse at its new home... I should mention at this point (back in late April of this year) the car has not run in 25 years and I have no idea where the keys are . In preparation for the move I finally got our garage cleaned out and stuff moved down to the shop building. So we pushed her into one of the bays and I've been picking at it here and there. Anyway, there's more to come as time will allow! Thanks for looking.
Will follow along & am looking forward to watching it get back on the road! Have you plans to keep it as is?
Dude. You and your family rule ! Very keen on your Mercury, 4 doors, unchopped and all. Hope your smile stays bigger from here on out. Quite the heirloom piece ... yes.
Wow cool history on that Merc. Get it running and enjoy it with your family. Oh don't change a thing either.
Well keys are easy enough and even if they weren't who else can brag about having a car that they have had pretty much all their life. Nice old car and better story. As the life of a car goes it could not have had a better life or been with better people.
Thanks for all the nice comments! I feel very fortunate to have the car and now have a place to keep it parked close by. My wife and I bought a small 5 acre farm(ette) about 2-1/2 years ago with a nice detached garage and a block dairy barn that I have converted to my workshop. Everything happens for a reason I guess! Here's the barn/shop. So, the plan at this point is to get it running/ driving reliably (original Merc flathead and Overdrive trans) and then probably just some lowering, tires etc. I really like the Bill Busch Merc that I found on the Kustomrama website. I'd like to find out more about it but it is definitely the look I'm after. It appears to be a Barris built car. Oh, and I found the keys...
So, after I located the keys and bought a new 6 volt battery I pulled the plugs and put a squirt of oil down each cylinder and besides to give her a bump hoping she wasn't stuck and to my surprise she turned over! The gas in the tank had long ago turned to varnish and the lines were all plugged so I pulled everything apart and blew some compressed air through them and finally got them cleared out. I also pulled the carb apart and cleaned it up as it was all gummed up as well. These things sure are funky! So with the fuel finally flowing I tried to start it again and...nothing. I spent the next few weeks chasing electrical gremlins. Since I don't really know what I'm doing I normally would just replace everything from the get go like points , cap, condenser, coil, wires. For some reason I decided to try to work with what was there? That was a frustrating decision and I had to walk away a few times scratching my head.
So this is fun. The car sat on these brand new (now 30 years old) radials. They were all flat and pumped right up when we pulled the car out of the garage. Well a couple of weeks after having it home I went out in the garage to find this...kablooey! I'm glad I wasn't out there when it popped because I would have pooped my pantaloons!
It seems many of our children and grandchildren have lost contact with their family history or quite frankly have no foundation or memory of where they came from. Great story so keep it the way you remember it and you will treasure it forever. Your dad is smiling down on you and it sounds like he has instilled great values. Good luck with the rebuild.
Congrat on getting the Merc to your place and that dairy barn/shop is awesome! The mild Custom routine will be perfect for the car and keeps Dad's ideals in the plan. Kustomrama and Rickster's site is a great spot to see pics of classic Custom Mercs for ideas.
I'm on it like white on rice (as the old man used to say!) I also got a set of these for the front... Sombreros are my favorite caps on a custom (cliché as it may be!)
I'm not sure at what CFM the old Teapot was rated? I did a quick google search but didn't see anything right off the bat. Aren't these the carbs that are sometimes referred to as the "towering infernos?"
The tea pot or towering inferno carbs were used on 52-mid fifties fords and mercs. That is a back draft carb. It was also used on some international truck engines. You can use a Rochester 2g carb from a 283 on that intake as well. It mounts backwards and everything will hook right up. It must be a small base carb and you will need to open the bores in the intake slightly like with a die grinder. I will be running one on my Canadian merc aluminum intake on my 49 8cm in my 46 ford. If you have any questions, please feel free to PM me directly. Matt
That's good to know! I was actually wondering about that bolt pattern. It looked awfully close and I'm much more familiar (relatively) with the 2Gs from working on my pickup. Is there any advantage with the 2G over the stock carb?
great story, will be following this one for sure...great choice on tires ! Lost my dad in 2013, he had a XK150 Jag convertible, and 1957 Chevy short box Stepside 1/2 ton when I was young. Both cars had great memories of driving to and from the Air Base here... Good luck with the Merc !
Great story, great car! I'm south of K.C. Look forward to seeing you around in that Merc someday soon.
Excellent car. Nice to see another Merc being worked on. I have my dad's 52 but it is in far worse shape than yours. But its a runner and thats the main thing for now. Mine has the true "teapot"" carb and I have heard that while the Rochester 2GC will fit the engine, it will not allow the loadamatic distributor to work as it was designed to. So I am sticking with original equipment.