Hi folks, I hope I'm posting in the correct location... My brother is building a '39 Ford Tudor period hot rod, and has pulled the original engine to install a hotted up Mercury Flathead. The issue we're running into is that the engine mount locations for the Mercury engine are about 1-3/4" wider than the mounts on the frame. Surely someone sells adapter brackets for this, right? We can't find and adapters that are for Flathead swaps, only SBF and SBC swaps. Thanks in advance.
Either you don’t have a 59AB, or your car originally had a 60 in it? Th water pumps on a ‘39 engine are exactly the same as a 59AB.
easy to build your own mounts or buy used ones to install. As Alchemy says, You will not find an adapter. Time to get the welder out.
Yes, the original engine was a 60hp, so that must be the difference. So if we are able to find used 85hp brackets, that should do the trick?
I think the 60 used some extensions from the front crossmember? I seem to think you can remove those extensions and the 85 will fit right into the holes on top of the crossmember. Don’t forget the 85 horse trans to match.
Yep, it does have the extension brackets on the crossmember. I just removed them and measured the distance of the holes on the crossmember, and it is the same distance as our 59AB... Looks like it may be as simple as that. We do have an 85hp trans, too. We'll hopefully be test fitting everything later today or tomorrow.
To confirm.....just cut the rivets on the V8-60 front mounting pads and remove them. The 85-95 hp mounting holes will be exposed beneath. No custom brackets are needed.
Yep, that's what we have found. Nice easy solution. Next up will be bolting our 85hp engine to our 85hp trans and test fitting in the chassis. We had to use the trans mount from the original 60hp trans, which may or may not work since the engine will now be moved forward. Are the trans mounts the same on the 60hp and 85hp transmissions? I suspect they may be slightly different and we'll have to source one.
Update: The 59AB and 85hp trans dropped right into place once we removed the engine mount brackets used for the 60hp configuration. Easiest win ever. Thanks all for the helping hand. Much appreciated.
Is that good or bad? Frankly, I'm clueless when it comes to Flathead stuff. I'm taking a week off from my own frame off resto project ('66 GTO) to help my brother with his '39 Ford hot rod project. It's being built to be a replica of our dad's first car which he hot rodded in the sixties. My brother said the donor Mercury 59AB block is from '47, but again, I'm out of my element with this stuff.
Those heads are just fine. But due to the distributor location of the later block you will encounter some space issues to install the radiator fan.
There's late water pumps on it too. Those might make for some fit problems if all the other front stuff isn't changed to late as well. The stock fan on a 39 is off the front of the crank for a Deluxe. Where do you guys plan on mounting your fan? If you use those water pumps make sure the little bulge opening on the top is blocked off with a plug. They are supposed to connect to a matching port in the later block, which isn't there on the 59A blocks.
I think you would need 8BA head gaskets. I think they have smaller water holes in the front to force water to the rear of the block. I dont know of any way of determining this without pulling the heads. Lots smarter people than me on here. Maybe they can advise you. Good luck.
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