So the other day, a friend of mine tells me he is looking to unload a stalled project he has. A 1953 Merc more door. Solid floors, no rust to be found anywhere, doors close better than my o/t caddy. It has been stripped of the flatty and trans. Previous owner also set the car up for a sbc/700r combo, which I have laying around in the garage. Here are a couple of pics of the car as I got it...
For now, my plan is to get here up and running. I am setting the drivetrain in tomorrow. Next step is to rewire the car. I already have a wiring kit from an old project I didn't need it for. After that the seats need some covers. Bare springs ****! I am hoping to get the merc on the road and driving within the next two months... We shal see.
Looks really solid. Drop in the SBC, seat covers, carpet and stereo. Buff the paint and chrome and it's a nice driver. If you put it up for sale, it would make a dependable (SBC), reasonable entry level cruise night vehicle for a family guy (4 dr.) on a budget looking to participate in the hobby.
Thanks for kind words guys. I got the motor and trans in this morning. Heading to the junkyard to look for a different drivers exhaust manifold. The rear dump and the steering box were fighting for the same space. Exhaust lost so I'm looking to find a ramhorn to replace it. Gonna start on the wiring later today as well. I will post some pictures of the progress later today
Car looks really nice, and the fact that you already have the drivetrain/wiring makes this sound like a really sweet deal. Can't beat that. Have fun!
Nice car, Jeff. We had one like it in the late 50's & early 60's as a family car. V-8, 3sp w/OD. Ours was dark green.
ok. Got some more work done. Less than I wanted, but still some done. I decided to use a turbo350 instead of the 700r just because I know the history of the 350. It was in a running car two weeks ago. The 700r has been sitting for at least 6 years now. First problem: thans mount is now in the wrong spot for the th350. Easy fix was to use a 1/4 inch plate to get the ****** mount and the crossmember to mate up. Problem solved. Next problem I ran into: with the trans in the correct spot and at the correct height, the hei distributor cap is hitting the firewall. Oh well, it's just gonna be a driver so out comes the bfh and a couple of wacks and instant clearance. The motor is raised up in the frame so the oil pan clears the steering. I guess my buddy was planning on running a points distributor. So, the motor and ****** are now at home in their new frame. Now to move on to the next problem. The sbc I am using had a "long" water pump on it. That and the fan were too long and wanted to share the same space as the radiator. Seem easy to fix. Threw on an older "short" water pump. A friend also gave me a fancy aluminum crank pulley. Water pump and crank pulleys lined up great. Now the Alternator doesn't. Oh well. Time to scroung up some different alternator brackets. Struck out finding a drivers side exhaust manifold at the junkyard today. The '70's motor I have had a rear dump manifold and that wont work because of the merc's rear steering. Easy fix for it will be scrounging up a ramhorn manifold. Then the fun began. I stareted to remove the old wiring. Thought it would be easy, boy was I wrong. Spent the better part of 4 hours today getting the wiring out of the engine bay and under the dash. All I can say is scary stuff. Old cotton braided wire with the braiding completely gone in most areas. Fire waiting to happen. So, cars wiring is out and ready for new wiring to go in. Gonna start that tomorrow.
First pic is the short pump and the new crank pulley. You can see how high my friend raised the motor so the oil pan will clear the steering. Second pic is all the parts not going back on the car. Third pic is most of the old wiring. Fourth pic shows how close the distributor was to the firewall before I raised the trans into it correct spot. Camera's battery died so didn't get a pic of the firewall area after I "clearanced" it.
Got some more done on the merc this past weekend. Wiring is almost done. Still need to mount the alternator. Found a set of ram horn manifolds that clear everything. Still more to do but making progress...
Here are some bad pictures... Ram horn manifold has tons of space on the drivers side. Wire everywhere... Found a good spot to mount the fuse panel.
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