Projects '59 Ford Custom 300 Trunk Pan Ideas

Long time lurker, first time posting in forever.

I saved a '59 Ford Custom 300 from a salvage yard recently and I'm evaluating trunk pan replacement ideas...Most of the trunk above the gas tank and the spare tire wheel well is rusted out...I see my only option as dropping in patch panels of 18ga and s***ching it up with no spare tub. Anyone have a better idea?
The issue is the new fuel tank that sits just under that area...I'd like to address the trunk while the old tank is out and before the new tank goes in.
As you can tell from the Death at Dashboard, this one will be a chore on the unseen areas...Sweet Patina though!

 

This isn't rocket science here, and there is no reason as to why you should need to lose your spare tire well either. You will be limited by your own skill level and your access to tooling, but generally speaking "where there is a will, there is a way" holds true. I don't know of any replacement trunk pans for the 59 Ford available, but you could certainly put together something very nice and what would be considered a high-quality repair with sheet 18G steel, cut and welded together and into the car.

 

just a thought here: find a spare tire well from a newer car to marry into the patch panel. Maybe will provide the best of both: less fabrication and more function.

 

Why not get a repro steel Chevy trunk pan & adapt it to your car?

Use a tape measure & look at what's available.

No one will know but you.

 

You might check here:
https://restorationpartssource.com/store/Galaxie_1959_1959_Sheet_Metal_and_Body_Parts.htm

 

If that project needs everything it looks like it needs I hope you have a large bank roll to get started with. Unless your just dying to work several years, learn as you go and hope you end up with something of any quality think long and hard about what your getting ready to dive into. 59 is a one year ******* body style, everything is hard to find for them. On the other hand you don't see many real nice ones so you may end up with something that really stands out, of course it's going to be several Years from now. If you have to pay the going rate for a paint job and upholstery I think I can put you into this Cream Puff for less and drive it tomorrow. If you have Motor/Trans and Brakes to do you'll be saving money. Screw patina and get out the Wax. At the same time I'm glad someone is willing to salvage the spoils.
What this 59 needs is a Watson style panel job a set of Astro Supremes and a new address.

 

I appreciate the candid response. Just short of finding a salvage car with a trunk pan intact I'm resolved to using cardboard pattern and making 18ga patches. Just trying not to re-invent the wheel if another member had a different (easier) way of thinking than I do! Thanks to AVater and Just Gary for the ideas, will definitely consider them!
Pist-n-Broke, I'm in it for the long haul and first things first it needs to be a running driving cruiser...I can dig the Watson paint job and Astro Supremes but that's years down the road, if at all. This ride spoke to me at the salvage yard and I'm willing to save her for a nickel at a time, over time. You are absolutely correct in that you don't see many nice ones and that alone is reason enough to put the time and $$ into her. I'm used to the "*******" body style as my '66 Galaxie 500 is the same way! Thanks for all the input, many thanks!!!

 

I get it. Quite often the journey is more important than the destination. I have a 57 Ford Vert I did a hand built trunk floor in. I really made a small job of it and used a piece of 3/4" x 1" channel in the right place to hang the tank on. Works well. It's been 15 years back and no one made a repair piece then. I probably wouldn't have bought it anyway. For me it wasn't a big deal. I didn't put a spare tire well in it by choice. This car I pulled the frame rails together so I could get a healthy tire under it and a tire well in it looked stupid that far inboard.

 

Great first post, let us know how you do it. And......as you know, we love pictures. Welcome!

 

Check out EMS Automotive. While they don't list 59 panels specifically, they do have the wheel well and some generic floor pan parts, as well as some 57-58 trunk parts. High quality and nice folks.

 

Check the Omaha Nebraska craigslist. There is a rear clip for $350. From a retractable. Somebody post a link.

 

Man, your instrument panel is really bugging me for some reason!

 

Check out Owens Salvage in Texas, I know he has a bunch of '59 Fords he sells parts from. He's also a member here.
http://owenssalvage.com/

This is my car when I got it in 2014.

 

I would evaluate the whole car. Hopefully you have a garage and storage. Good indoor storage for parts big and small is the main thing as plenty of cars have been built in the yard/driveway over the years. The trick is, is to keep at it. Go in steps....accomplish something and move on to the next. Don't try to do it all at once.

From the photos the rockers look really good. the firewall looks good from the snippet of the dash.
Cars tend to rust out under moist carpet and trunk mats. I would pull the seats just to see the status of the floor.
A simple bead roller may be a tool to consider. You want good structure and braces. Most of the floor and trunk pans are sheet. The structure is in the braces and body mounts ....those areas. You want equal or better than factory structure. If the car were to roll over you want it to remain in one piece. IE....not separate from the frame.
It's a neat old car.

 

There are 2 body mounts in the trunk, that structure is critical to the strength of the car.

 

A great thing is....
It's a full frame car!
If this was a "unibody car". Well, if it was a unibody it would be best to take it back to the yard.
These (full frame cars) are easier to repair especially in this day and time.

 

I appreciate the info, had never seen EMS automotive before....would have helped when I owned my '59 and '57 F100s!

 

I love Fitzee's channel...inspires me to tackle this type of job every time I watch! I'm about 2.5 hrs from Wellington so this is looking more feasible as I need a few other parts I dont want to buy new!

 

Appreciate the kind words, it's definitely a labor of love! I do have the garage/storage so that will def help. You are correct about the floor pans...windshield rubber has large cracks and let water get in. Fronts will def need replaced and the rears only have a small spot. I will def look into a bead roller and a sheet of 18 ga!

 

If you buy a Eastwood or Harbor Freight bead roller, you will have to reinforce it before you can do any beads. There are lots of information on the web about what guys have done to strengthen them. Nothing some time and more steel can't fix.

 

The trunk floor in my 59 Edsel was toast , it would have been easier to cut out the whole floor and replace with sheet steel but i decided to replicate the original
I dont have access to bead rollers or presses so had to do by hand piece by piece , fist of all i took templates before cutting out the rot
For the main centre section i transferred the template onto 3/8 steel plate and cut out the shape then made a 3/8 male stamp , i screwed the main plate to thick ply to stop it moving then stamped the shape
The repair sections for the shock mounts i used an old brake disc for female and a large socket for male stamp , once i got the shape started i the angled the socket to get correct shape, i did find the body mountings under were rotten so took templates and remade them
When all the welding was done i then sealed all the joints with lead

 

Excellent work sir, that is quite impressive! Thanks for sharing your experience and knowledge..this really breaks it down to what look like easy steps...I admit I was completely overwhelmed when I first saw my trunk (actually the driveway too, thru the trunk).

 

Funny yours has gone in the same places as my Edsel although it looks better on the photos around the shock mounts , i ended up doing all the rear U sections for the body mounts
Despite being cousins the pressings on yours look simpler than the Edsel, mine drove me mad as i was up against it to get the car ready for our family holiday / show event , also had to get my old travel trailer ready too , good luck with yours do it a bit at a time and dont get too overwhelmed
Cheers
Dave

 

I’ve had the inexpensive….no… make that cheap…sheet metal brake, English wheel, and bead roller from HF for years, but never had the time to really use them until late last summer. I spent maybe four weeks, a couple of hours at a time, teaching myself how to work metal with those tools. My skill set will never be even close to what some of the pros , or even amateurs here have, but I am amazed how sheet metal forms using those tools and a little logic and ****ysis.

That spare tire well is certainly doable with those tools after a little practice. You will probably make some s**** along the way, and nobody will mistake it for factory, but the car you have is well suited for a project.

 

Braces actually look really decent compared to some Ive see lately.

 

Thanks for the encouragement...I always forget it's OK to make a little s**** along the way while learning...it seems the window of time to work on projects causes things like this to "have to go right" to make progress and that's not necessarily the case!

 

This looks really good! It's much better than I expected. Heck most of it is still wearing the factory paint. This has rusted from the inside out out.
Be happy this really promising.
You can "quilt" that.
There's enough there you can save the top part of that wheel tub. It should be fairly easy to find the bottom part of a wheel tub.
Some of the concourse guys may poo-poo this but I would just cut out the rotten to good metal... and lap in patch pieces. Most of that is still there. Mostly you'll be replacing the flat areas.
How I would do this would be about a 1/4" lap with the patch pieces drilled (spot welds) over the parent metal. I would spot the patches in on the lap, then spot it around the edge until solid....maybe not as good as **** welds or a whole new piece...for car that's going to be garaged and not driven in bad weather or on the salt, it's probably only going to last 75-100 years.

 

I used a Mustang gas tank that serves as floor and turned sideways so I still have a spare tire well