I been looking at paint scheme pictures and I’m a really ****er for shiny metal. What’s the story with the trim above the windows? also where the chrome headlight bezels come from? thanks!
Are you talking about the stainless on the drip rails? When I had my bumpers, grille and all the small parts re-chromed I could have had the headlight bezels done at the same time.
Yes that’s exactly what I’m talking about. The stainless trim on the drip rail You say they chrome the entire thing and then just sanded the outside and painted?
I looked all over for replacement stainless for my drip rails without success. I had pried the old stuff off with a screwdriver and ruined it. I have a parts car that had good stainless so I found out how to remove it correctly and used it. Not perfect, but better than nothing. What I was saying is the headlight bezels can be chromed, just like the bumpers, if the paint is removed. I've seen cars with all the interior metal trim chromed which is pretty cool.
The cars pictured above not only have stainless trim on the drip rails but also have a wide band of stainless above that, I’m not sure about the Mercurys but some of the ‘56 Ford hardtops didn’t have the wider band above the drip rails.
That wider band seems to cover the drip rail. Those are what I’m interested in. What did they come on?
I was under the impression that this is a stock 56 Mercury hardtop stainless roof trim. Was also like what was on 56 Fairlane Victoria hardtops. Not sure if 55's were different or not as I thought the 56 tops were lower. Is this like what you were looking for on this car? If so, it is stock. Mark https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/1956-mercury-monterey-pictures.713685/
Oh ok, my medalist is missing these pieces. But idk if that’s normal for a medalist or if the medalist didn’t have these.
The Medalist was a lower trim level than the Montclair and Monterey so it would not have had the stainless above the drip rails.
The best answer I can give is "probably". The gl*** is the same for both vehicles so that suggests the roof is also the same, in which case the Ford trim also fits Mercury.
The '56 Ford and Mercury hardtop roofs for all models were the same and shared trim, so if you have a '56 hardtop it will fit. '55 was the year you had to pay attention. Mercury used two hardtop roofs; the lower lines used the 'tall' top (also used on all '55 Ford hardtops except for the Crown Vic). The new Montclaire model used the 'chopped' top (as did the Crown), and these shared almost no trim with the tall version. Basically none of the sedans used this wider trim with one outlier; the '55 Montclaire 4dr sedan had this style trim, but didn't offer a 2dr sedan in that model so I can't say if that would fit those. They didn't make a lot of these either, so finding the parts would probably be tough. The sedans and 'tall' hardtops shared the same windshields (and maybe rear gl*** too), the chopped ones and convertibles used the shorter gl***. One other interesting thing I noticed. I've seen a fair number of the lower-line '55 merc hardtops with the chopped top. Hard to say if the owners are just confused about which model they have, or possibly Mercury discontinued the tall top mid-year.
I have a '55 Monterey hardtop built in April of that year. It has the tall roof and no stainless above the drip rails. One thing I ran into is that nobody supplies the rubber seal for the vent window division bar; only the shorter seal for the Montclair/Crown Vic is available.
If the roofs are shared as in the same exact. Yes would prob fit. I found clips for these on Dennis carpenter. Mine is 57 and has these trims too. If you don't have them originally you have to drill holes for the clips. Holes in the roof cause leaks and rust. Bummer. if you have a tall windshield means you have a tall roof. So they probably don't fit.
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