Made the deal to buy this car over a month ago. Finally got to pick it up yesterday. Ive been anxious as a kid at Christmas waiting to get it home. Supposedly has been shoved up in the corner of this three car garage since 1961. That is the last time it was licensed. The motor/trans is long gone, and judging by the hacked up front crossmember and funky front mounts, they were running something besides a flathead. Dont have much history as the prior owner has passed and I bought it from a step son. I'm not sure where I'm going with this project for sure, except that I want to keep it HAMB friendly. I really want to just buff the old black lacquer, get it roadworthy, give it a slight rake, and go back with flathead power and three speed. Then just enjoy the heck out of it. Hope you guys enjoy the pics and Im open to opinions in which direction to go.
Im guessing the prior owner had intentions on restoring it as he had gathered up several parts for it. The best of these items are probably the four NOS fenders. Three of them still in the red oxide and one was painted black at some point. None of them have ever been bolted onto a car.
Wow! What a great score. There is a lesson here. He did the deal a month ago,but didn't post till he had pictures. Well done!
Got everything unloaded today and proceeded to sort through things to try and figure out exactly which way to go with this thing. Blew all the rat turds out and gave it a quick bath. Someone at some point had removed both doors and they were just sitting in the holes wired in. both have had some crappy repairs in the lower hinge area as the right one has been over extended into the cowl. No problem to fix, just gotta get through the brazing mess they used. lol
Not sure what they were thinking on that dash. lol Gauges look to be later ford, someone on here will know for sure. Probably ditch those. Kinda adds to the mystery of the car I guess. Also when I opened up the hood, laying on top of the frame was what appears to be a NOS front crossmember to replaced the hacked one. I guess you could buy those from FoMoCo back in that time frame? Neat just the same.
Awesome find. I would definately keep that black paint, and just clean it up. I like the idea of a a flathead with the 3speed too. Hell, if I were you I'd keep the dash, its a time warp into a kid's mind who wanted to "modernize" his car in the late 50s! I'm excited to see this come together, I hope it gets whitewall bias plies too.
HotRodA, It was just one of those being in the right place right time deal. Was in the local gas station and the owner asked me who could haul a couple cars from Tx to our area. He then proceeds to tell me a friend of his, (who I knew of) had inherited a couple old cars and wanted to bring them home to Mo. He told me one of them was a 39 ford that someone had started to disassemble/work on way back and had not been licensed since 61. I thought that was cool and gave him a couple names and went on my way. My friend took a trailer down and hauled the other car back. Thats when he told me the 39 was a convertible, and that got my attention.
Thanks for all the good words. Yeah, I cant believe it actually came together finally. Now I need to move it from my shop out to my house garage so I wont be working on it during my day job. I got a four month old grandaughter and I want to do this car as minimally as possible so I wont give a rats rear when she climbs right up the side of the fender to get in the rumble seat. Now that should be fun.
I've got to ask about the rumble seat. I didn't realize they had them in those later years. Was that an option or accessory, or what ? Great find for sure. Don
WOW what a find! That dash, red firewall, scoops and a tach...that was someones hot rod. Had an early SBC in it, torched the cross member to clear the fuel pump. Great ol car, I would clean it up as is. Those NOS parts as a score in itself as well...
Great score. A buddy of mine has one he's trying to sell. It's a complete car but disassembled. Aftermarket chassis, 289, c4 combo.
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