If you are still looking for a shift collar for you 56 Merc I have an NOS one that I am willing to sell for $75. Contact me if you are interested.
@56MercMan , let me just say that the day you finish your project mama needs a steak and lobster dinner.
Late to the party, look at channel Y619 and Y620. Restoration Specialties has them, CR Laurance, Metro Glass and others. One is hard-back and rigid, the other soft-backed and flexible. You should be able to match up dimensions from the descriptions. RS may be able to tell you exactly what you need, start with them 1st. They come in 6' long pieces, so measure up what you have as not to waste much. I think I wound up with 6" of the rigid leftover. On the rigid, on my car they wound up being 31.25" long for each door, this ties the vent window into the door. I cut it in a vise with plywood to keep it from collapsing, I used a razor hobby saw to cut it. I had to mill some slots in it to match the OG ones and drill new holes. I pop-riveted them into place with flat-head rivets.
Late response... Sorry. I mounted LED trailer lights inside so it is brighter then the halogens: Hope the pic is allowed To mount the lens I actually put some clear silicone to hold them on
Picture of inside my light: Lit up on car. Night running and brake lights. LED on right Stock on the left.
I didn’t even think to use an existing led unit under the lenses. From your pics, it appears to be very effective. I’m glad I have not started on my overly complicated light array I designed!
I have used simple replacement LED bulbs and have not been happy with them. Eventually the socket connection seems to not work well. So that is why I wanted to wire in some LED's on this one. I have a simple plug like a stock light and they are brighter which will hopefully help others see me.
My first thought was to use led replacement bulbs in the brake/running and back-up sockets, but they didn’t appear very bright. I was going to solder together an array of led lights for more brightness. But, the trailer lights look perfect and are already wired for turn, brake and running light functions!
I found out why I lost oil pressure: https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/sbf-302-oil-pressure-help.1242266/page-2#post-14465796 While I was getting dirty I figured I would try and dress it up a little. New valve covers. I tried finding some old Cal Customs but was striking out. The ones I could afford flew out the door before I could grab them and the ones that I could get cost WAY too much:
Took her for her first drive after oil pressure fix and new valve covers. SHort trip to pick the kids up from school. Oil pressure held hi and no noises. I did notice some leaking coolant. I think it is coming from that stupid thermostat housing. Will do a little more digging but she is running again so I can go back to working on luxury stuff like windows, lights and maybe more body work. Fix the small rust spot on my new hood and get that on it.
Does anyone have any tips and tricks to get these gaps smaller and more uniform? I have the bolts slightly tight allowing me to move it around but it is either good on one side and bad on 2 or bad on all. I tried loosening the fender and moving it around also.
^^^^ Welcome to the world of 1956 assembly. Mallets and rubber hammers. Sorry to say these are not new Hondas or Volvos and Kendig is not assembling your car at $100+ per hour. Just do the best you can and paint it a dark color.
Adjust the hood for best fit at the cowl, then adjust the fenders. You'll need some body shims (U-shaped washers) for the fenders along with tweaking the inner fenders. It's an exercise in patience....
Thank you Steve. Still playing with it but got closer tonight. I believe I need to slot some holes a little at the very front of the car as the fenders are sucked in as much as I can and the gap still gets larger towards the front.
Keep in mind that it's sometimes better to use shims rather than move an attaching part and possibly mis-align some other part.
Hey everyone. Been a little since posting BUT I am still working away. I am working on the roof. Trying to get the metal straight so I can put some color on it (Need a little color to keep me motivated). In doing that plenty of side things come up like having to fix my air compressor so I cna spray and such. I have another ? for you all. Around the holes in the roof where you bolt down the stainless trim... What do I use to keep water out? Would you recommend butyl? As an update: I re ran the fuel line from the tank as I think I was getting vapor lock. I got a set of 4 hub caps for a 56 so I am happy about that. Got some rubber parts so I can start sealing the doors and such The holes I am looking to keep water out of: The stainless trim has a stud and I add a nut from inside the car. There was some sort of putty on it before.
Yes! I used it around the backside of all of the trim fasteners on my ‘55 Mercury. In fact, it’s fantastic for plugging up rust holes on my off topic Olds station wagon!
Hey Everyone. Been a while but still plugging away on dads Merc. I found out my vapor lock issue was not vapor lock. My coil at some point burst and leaked its oil out. It would work fine for a little while then overheat (I think) and stop working. I would sit on the side of the road for a while and it would cool down and run again. New coil and have had no issues since. I was able to find that issue as I was sitting on the side of the road I saw some oil under my intake. Spent a lot of time on getting the car lowered after a trip to the grocery store and they gave me some extra bags. Never dealt with them before so a lot of trial and error to get where I am now. Got a factory driver side mirror that needs a little work but got it really cheap. So I can replace this plastic one and put it in the correct spot. Looking into drop spindles now but I have the Performance Online disc brake kit on it already so not sure what would work with that and options very slim. Wondering if buying stock spindles and making my own would be an option. We have built offroad spindles in the past. I am trying not to cut the frame up so that is why I want spindles instead of just cutting the coil bucket more to allow the suspension to set down.
Fabricated dropped spindles for mid 50’s Fords and Mercs were avaliable. Here is an ad from Albert Drake’s “A 1950’s Rod & Custom Builder’s Wish Book”. Here’s a drawing of a dropped spindle from “Hot Rod Magazine Custom Library - Custom Car Wheels and Lowering”. (It’s one of the Petersen Spotlite little mags) I would liked to have used dropped spindles on my ‘55 Mercury. I intially used the one inch blocks to lower the spring pocket on the lower control arm. That gave me about 2.5” lowering on the front. I recently changed the front springs to Aerostar springs and removed the blocks. I don’t have any miles on the car since the swap as I’m still sorting out the power steering. Hopefully, I will have about a 3” lowering in the front to match the 3” block lowering in the rear when I finally get back on the road. On a side note - the ‘61-‘63 Thunderbird spindles look like they could work as lowering spindles for mid 50’s Fords/Mercs. Of course, that would be a very labor intensive experiment to see if they would work only to find they won’t!
Stance looks great! My Ford is just sitting on Aerostar springs in the front and Posies 3” dropped springs with 2” blocks in the rear and sits similar.
How is your ride? Right now at the lowest it is sitting on the stops. If yours rides at that height normally I would assume you are bottoming out frequently. No? Or did you modify the stops so you had more up travel?
This is the advice I give everybody just starting out. Spend a little more for your first project car so that it's running and driving so you can enjoy it while working on it. It's easy to lose interest or get discouraged when all you ever see is a pile of parts. Marketplace is full of them.
yup. I was in my teens when I took it apart originally. Learned that lesson and try and pass it on to my kids and their friends. Keep it drivable so you can get some enjoyment or you will be quick to burn out.
I cut the rubber bumpers in half in the front and do occasionally bottom them out, but not very often. I think I put the Aerostar springs in about 10 years ago or so and have driven on them for 30k miles or so. They probably settled an inch since I put them in. And, the rear is maybe too low to be honest. I'm debating either going to 1" blocks or putting some helper bags or something on it. I love the look, but it is too close to the bumpers and bottoms out regularly. I did just have 2" blocks for the past 14 years, and just put the Posies springs in. I was hoping to lose the blocks all together, but it wouldn't even be as low as the stock springs and the 2" blocks when my goal was some lower going to the Posies.
Small victory: The spring on my hood safety latch broke. Could not find it for sale anywhere. Someone linked me to one guy selling them for $65... For a little spring so I looked up videos on how to make a torsion spring. Bought some spring steel and bent up my own. Nailed it on the first try: Installed it and it works great... Just need to weld a little washer over the end of the rod it sits on. I ground off the mushrooom end to be able to pull it. A couple tacs of the welder will hold it all back together and still allow the rod to float like stock.
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