Customs Got rid of my Junk and bout a running 1951 Ford

I got rid of a bunch of projects I have been messing with and got a running driving 1951 Ford. It needs a bunch of little things but it runs great. I drove it about 250 miles without issue. Drove most of the way about 65 mph and still had some pedal to spare. My buddy and I had a blast. Car has a Flathead and original automatic transmission. Is it normal for a Flathead to comfortably go 65mph? The best advice I wish I had taken a year ago was save your money and buy the best car you can buy. I still have a 1936 Ford coupe in the garage, but that's a long term project.

I had one question about the tires. The car has P215/70R14 tires on it. The back tires are a little wide for the fenderwell. I'd like to have a little more clearance. What would be a better tires size? Should I use the same size in the Front? I plan on buying Coker tires.

 

Looks like a good daily driver. just add a few personal touches.

 

If you want to stay with 14" radials, I'd at least go to a narrower 75 series, but switching to 15" wheels will give you a much better selection, and the car will look much better with bigger wheels and taller tires, imo.

 

Nice ride ! Good luck with it. I'd switch to 205-75-15 all around. That's what most Shoebox guys do (like me) . No issues at any corner of the car , similar rolling circumference.

 

Congrats - Cool ride - does it have a stock rearend?

 

Not sure on the rearend yet. I will check it out.

 

My choice on my '51 also.

 

Very nice find. Congratulations.
You can look at tire upsizing and downsizing sites on the inter-web for size guidance
An R78 series will cut your width incidentally..

 

I'm shocked that you're able to do those speeds comfortably with a Fordomatic trans AND 14" wheels. Smaller diameter wheels should in theory make the engine turn higher RPM's at speed. I have to wonder if a rearend with a much numerically lower gear ratio has been swapped in.

Neat car though, the Merc grille is a neat touch. Some new tires and some chromed bumpers would really do wonders for it.

 

Congrats!...........looks like you got a custom hood to fix, blow up on you or someone else?
I have had a little hidden secondary "just in case" safety chain on em before

 

Wheel diameter means nothing the actual height of the tire is what does example a 215/75/14 is 26.7" high a 205/70/15 is 26.3" height. here's a handy chart you may want to save. https://tiresize.com/height-chart/

 

Your present 215/70/14 has a section width of 8.70" 25.90" height my recommendation in Coker would be a 750 X 14 tire which is a narrower section width of 7.65" and a height of 27.06"this would give you more wheel well clearance and would in effect lower gear ratio for better lower RPM cruising. NOTICE this difference in section width gains you a full inch.

 

It appears to me that your tire rubbing problem may be more related to the "reversed" style wheels than to tire size. The stock Ford wheels of that era are only 5" wide and have no offset to the outside. My experience with the couple of Shoeboxes I owned was that they have rather narrow rear wheel housings and wheel width and offset were important factors to avoid tire rubbing when maneuvering caused body lean, such as sloped driveways, etc.,

You may be able to improve your situation with a narrower cross section tire, but I doubt that will provide more than a fraction of an inch (1/4", 3/8", 1/2") per side, at best. Careful selection of wheels is an important consideration.

Ray

 

I agree with Hnstray, those wheels are probably your biggest problem. I had a set of 15x7 chrome smoothies with 4.125" backspace that my buddy wanted but couldn't use on his '51 Ford. Looks like your wheels have even less backspace than mine did. I think you need a 15"x5" stock style wheel with 215 wide (or narrower) tires and you'll be set.

 

Thanks for all the advice. I believe the wheels are the problem as well. It sucks because I like they way they look, but I want to make it right.

Yeah it has a custom smashed hood. After I drove 200+miles to pick it up at a car lot, they told me they forgot to latch the hood and it blew up when they took it to go get gas. The price got a lot cheaper after that. I have a half gallon of the paint so I'm going to try and fix it or buy another hood.

I like the grille, but it looks unfinished to me. I'm thinking it needs some metal shaped to fill in some of the areas around it. What do you guys think?

 

Hopefully you can fix that one because it looks like its gonna be some work to customize another one to fit even if you buy another one...... good luck on it!

 

And '51 hoods are rare because the '49 and '50 guys use them when eliminating the center bullet grille.

 

Looking good. Hope to see you cruizin around town in it.