Been quite awhile since I’ve been on here. Was at scrapyard today dropping off junk cars. They were about to crush this 55 so I made a deal with yard to save car dropped off the car I had for crushing instead. Fairly solid and complete. Not quite sure what I’m going to do with it,just could not watch it get crushed! Has no title. I may part it if anybody needs anything?
Perfect solid floors and sheet metal. Little rust in hood lip. Can’t get hood open. Latch is stuck Traded 2 crush cars for the Buick. Got this 64 mercury out of same yard a month ago.
Just got hood open. Has a bad spring which made it difficult. Complicated hood spring for sure!!!!! Put some decent rubber on it. Motor turns by hand . New plug wires,plugs, fuel pump
Back in the late 60's/early 70's I had a total of 13 '55's. My favorite was a 2dr. hdtp. Special. Stick from the factory with 3.90 rear gears. 1st. upgrade was a 4bbl. from a Century. Then dual exhaust. That little 264 could run with most of the best of them back then. Of course the 5 bolt top cover trans. had glass gears inside so I went through a lot of parts. Found a 6 bolt top cover trans. out of a '56 Century. Trans. breakage was now a thing of the past. Found a '59 Electra sitting in a guys driveway. It even ran. Drove it home, 10 miles, with 4 flat tires. Pulled the engine, which was in remarkable good condition & just freshened it up. Thought it was gonna be difficult to install but was basically a bolt-in. Hard part was finding a 401 manual flywheel. Made up a Pilot bushing. Played with the 3 on the tree shifting rods & was able to get that all to work. Made headers next. Bought a pair for a '65GS. Cut them in the right spot & welded in 6" extensions on both sides. Came across a wrecked '65Riv. GS & took off ALL the 2x4 stuff parts & pieces. Rebuilt carbs. etc. Car was FAST!!! So upgraded brakes from a '63 Riv. front & rear. Even without power brakes the car NOW stopped. Now back to breaking trans. again. It's a vicious cycle, but fun. Tom T.
put LOTS if white lithium grease on all the moving parts of the hood hinges, springs and latch. Keep working it SLOWLY and CAREFULLY up and down. Add grease until it works smooth. Always open and close the hood with two hands , one hand on each front corner. Rusty springs and heavy hands will fold the hood in half, SLOWLY and CAREFULLY up and down, with TWO hands
FYI ; That's an early '55 engine. The difference in early and late '55 is the valley pan and valve covers, Early ; one oil filler in the valley pan Late : one oil filler on each valve cover (total of two oil fillers)
That's a really nice car you saved. You should try to sell it before parting it out. Even as a 4 door, that's too solid looking to just crush or part out.
I had three '55s. Two were Specials with the 264 and the third was a Century ragtop with a Dynaflow. I did the same kind of stuff on the 264s, and with a four barrel and dual exhausts they would surprise you in the quarter. A lot of folks who assumed that it was a stock Dynaflow Special got a good look at my taillights. As Tom said the five-bolt standard shifters had glass gears (I love the phrase that Tom used). The first Special went through seven of the small gearboxes before I found the Big one out of a "56 special. I never broke that one; it's a bolt-in. but I'll bet it would be difficult to find one today. As to the car in the first photo, it appears that there is a lot of salvageable chrome and sheet metal on that one. A four-door sedan is not the most desirable body style, but it might be worth a cleanup and a paint job. I don't think I would get going on a full restoration as it would cost just as much to restore the four-door as it would to restore a more desirable body style.
