I have new yard art!

[3acresandatruck]

which I had to send away for and it just arrove this mornin', havin' been brought all the way down here to Jefferson County, Missouri from up Iowa-way... And here she is, my new 1955 Plymouth Belvedere 2-door hardtop.

Let this be a lesson, never browse the 'cars for sale' ads on the internet, lest you find yourself reasoning that you should buy this car; they're not making any more '55 Plymouths and this one's a sweetie, by golly. So ya email the dude, and the next thing you know, he's delivering this baby over the holiday weekend, right to your door (only $40 extra). A waste of money, to be sure, but what the hell. The government seems intent on making my money worthless with its fiscal policies; I might as well convert a little cash to a car that I have no use for. I just always liked these, and the price seemed right, and besides, I'm a little crazy. And nobody around here cares if I have an old car in my yard...an old pickup truck would fit in better, but this'll do.

So anyway, the headlight eyebrows only have surface rust (a real plus on this model) and, amazingly, the rockers are solid on both sides. The floors are solid, but the interior is shot and the driver's door window is broken out (but the trim that attaches to the glass is inside the car). There's no engine, no transmission, no radiator, no steering, no brakes, and it has the wrong pedal cluster (it has a clutch pedal assembly, but it was originally equipped with a Powerflite, as evidenced by the trunk script and the shifter sticking out of the dashboard). So, now I have to rearrange all the iron out in the garage, so I can fit the newest member of the family in. I feel like a kid on Christmas morning.

[treis]

Put some work into that and it might be a piece of shit in a year or two.

[Dinsdale]

Man, I really like old cars.
But you got me there.

[NinetyWt]

Awww! I love it! You must paint it mint green and white.

Also, props for finding one with all the glass intact!

[elelle]

I love it, 3Acres! Nice Autumnal color scheme there, too. What are your plans for it?

[3acresandatruck]

Originally Posted by elelle

What are your plans for it?

"Plan!? There ain't no plan!" quoth Pig Killer.

Well, I was just out under the car, measuring some stuff and looking things over. Really just some idle musings here... I have to check some figures out, but it looks like a differential from a 67-76(or so) A-body will fit. So, right now I'm thinking new body mounts, brake lines, fuel lines, clean the tank, a newer differential, a recent 360 (better) or 318 (cheaper) with a Torqueflite, driveshaft, and later-model disc brakes up front if there's a way to adapt them to the old kingpin IFS. It has an old single master cylinder, but the mount looks just like the 4-bolt mounts they used on Chrysler dual master cylinders until the lightweight 2-bolt master cylinders came out (and one of those can be mounted with an adapter). I'm going to talk to a friend of mine about the best way to go on the steering: all the parts are there, but I'm not fond of the old solid steering shaft. I know Borgeson makes a collapsible steering shaft, so I'll look into that. The core support needs to be pulled and welded up and I think all new springs would be a good idea, but the frame is fine. Somewhere I've got the name of a guy who sells late-model gas shocks adapted for these cars, and I'm looking through my files and emails.

I need to get a hammer and dolly set and see if I can pound out some of the dings. If it goes well, I'll look into getting a MIG welder to try to patch a couple small rips in the body. It has a better bumper that it did when I looked at the photos (the guy I bought it from gave me a nicer one), and the splash apron I thought was missing turned out to be under the front seat frame. I have to see if I can find my old glass guy for the driver's window, but he's probably long retired now, so we'll see how that goes. He did a beautiful job on some replacement window glass for me before. Mint green?!? NinetyWt, that's just gross. I was thinking Kelly green and white...but it will be nice to just get some epoxy primer on it for now. We'll refer to the current paintjob as Harlequin, just to pretend to having some class. It looks like all the stainless is here; there's a bunch of pieces missing from the body that were in the trunk.

Overall, it would just be fun to get it running. I never had any intention of restoring it at all, that's why I bought a nice crusty car...I think they call this a "rusto-rod". It's far enough gone that I don't feel any guilt about hacking away on it, but there's enough there for me to work with, given my very limited abilities.

Or maybe it'll just be a planter...

[elelle]

So excellent, I knew you must have good gear plans! I shared your photos with my Hon, and he saw what you saw too, that you "might could" get that up and running.

Unfortunately, it got him thinking of our old cars of yore: a 61 Galaxie with a 352 Big Block and manual steering, which helped us move to Mississippi, and a 59 Ranchero pickup, beautiful two-tone turquoise and white,, redone clutch pedal assembly held in place with a vise grip, with a 3 speed Hurst shifter on the floor withurst shifter on the floor. The Ranchero is the dream that never was, a damn wonder to ride in; the expanse of view by the wide windshield , roar of a big engine,(Hon could not afford to repair the exhaust system) .... it's making me cry in my can of Stag to remember to have sold it due to moving.


I hope you get ample time to work on your car, and, if not, those dinosaur car bones are exquisite remnant yard art. For full effect though, a good goat is necessary to perch on top with their good defiant nature. Been there too.

BTW, do you know the music of the Bottlerockets, from Festus?

[NinetyWt]

Originally Posted by 3acresandatruck

Mint green?!? NinetyWt, that's just gross.

Hmph!

How about Pompano Peach?

Turquoise?

[3acresandatruck]

Great pictures, NinetyWt! You really have a thing for those 50's pastel paints, don't you? Both of those Plymouths look a lot nicer than mine.

elelle, you need this car. I never heard of the Bottlerockets, though I'm fairly close to Festus. I don't get out much, except to go grocery or hardware shopping, heh. Y'know, I once had a '59 Galaxy - mostly the same as your Ranchero. (That car was lime green and white.) It had a 352 in it, but the block was cracked and I couldn't drive it more than a few miles and I'd have to put water in it. Yes, when I was young, I was even dumber than I am today. Vice grips holding the clutch pedal? I had a 1960 Chevy Biscayne with a piece of rebar sticking through the floor to shift with. Since the rebar was attached to the transmission, bypassing the normal linkage, the shift pattern was reversed. Primer for paint, an old bedsheet covered the front seat, a radio ducttaped under the dash with a power lead cobbled over to the fusebox, and man, I was cruisin'!!

[panache45]

Damn, I'm old enough to remember when that car was new!

[criminey.jicket]

Originally Posted by elelle

For full effect though, a good goat is necessary to perch on top with their good defiant nature.

*snort* *phweeheehee*

3acres, Hunter green beats Kelly green, IMH(Unsolicited)O. If you're leaning towards a more saturated color then my first vote would be Ooooh; my second vote would be Aaaah.

Sounds like you're either going to be kept out of trouble for the next while, or in a bit of it.

[El_Kabong]

Having once gone through a period where a '54 Buick was my primary ride, I sympathize completely.

But you realize that now you need to change your handle to 3acresanda55Plymouth, right?

[El_Kabong]

Oh, and mine looked pretty much like the one in the top pic.

[NinetyWt]

Originally Posted by 3acresandatruck

Y'know, I once had a '59 Galaxy - mostly the same as your Ranchero. (That car was lime green and white.)

I had a 1964 Galaxie (turquoise though) which a friend sold me for $1 once when I was broke. (I later sold it back to her for $1). IIRC it had a 390 in it with a 4-bbl carb. Only problem was, the brakes weren't so good. Just for the record, it's not a good idea to go 100+ mph in a nearly two-ton vehicle with bad brakes.

[3acresandatruck]

Originally Posted by El_Kabong

Having once gone through a period where a '54 Buick was my primary ride, I sympathize completely.

But you realize that now you need to change your handle to 3acresanda55Plymouth, right?

Oh no...the truck's still here. I wasn't even shopping for a car; I just saw this in an ad and bought it. I wasn't kidding when I said there wasn't any plan. It was there, the price was right, delivery was fast and cheap...how could I go wrong?

Criminy, criminey, you might be right about the greens..and hunter green would match my apron!

Here are a few more pictures of my new toy. First, some doo-dads: Powerflite! (mighty proud of our automatic transmission, aren't we now?. A Belvedere, the top of the Plymouth lineup in 1955. Coming at you, the hood announces that underneath once lived a V8 (I haven't decoded the numbers yet; the engine's long gone, but once upon a time it would have been a 240 or a 260 cubic inch V8, with 157, 167, or 177 horsepower). Inside, we see the fairly intact original dashboard, the remains of the front seat*, and-oops!-nothing left of the back seat.

For those that like such things, check out the vintage kingpin IFS (this is the left side). And last, the goofy, happy owner and his latest score.

*Yes, that's the driver's door window sitting there, shattered, but that metal trim on the glass: hot damn, that's the part that's hard to replace. It's not real obivous in the photos, but the windshield is cracked. Sometimes that will pass inspection, sometimes it won't, but I emailed a couple of guys to see if they've heard of a guy in Springfield or somewhere who has lots of old Mopar windshields.

[Kalhoun]

Awesome project car. I would rejuvinate the original color scheme. It'll be gawgeeous!

[elelle]

Originally Posted by 3acresandatruck

I had a 1960 Chevy Biscayne with a piece of rebar sticking through the floor to shift with. Since the rebar was attached to the transmission, bypassing the normal linkage, the shift pattern was reversed.

That's pretty amazing! Did you put anything on the rebar to make it more grip-friendly? My fave car from the Young, cheap, and stupid days was my 63 Dodge Dart, with Push Button Transmission. You know that's got to be a bad idea, especially 20 years later on a car you bought for $200, with the front end post-accident, no grille, just a gaping maw twisted grin on the front end.

When pushing the buttons to shift, the poor thing would CLUNK-N-GROAN, and fall into gear, mostly. It also had a bad habit of stalling out at intersections, but could be started again by throwing up the heavy hood, jamming a screwdriver between the starter connections, slam the hood back down and wave at the irritated drivers waiting before getting back behind the wheel of that sweet little death trap.

I loved that car, though, and was glad that , when I had to sell it, actually found the original owner who had wrecked it, and she bought it out of nostalgia and mercy. I hope it's at a final resting place somewhere in a backyard.

That Starlite you linked to : Glad it's there in St. Louis, if it were closer it would be too too tempting....

And, The Bottle Rockets, they are right down the road from you, and won't disappoint if you go see them. Relating to this thread, they have a great song, "1000 Car", that's pretty astute, for those not equpped with solutions like rebar and screwdriver jumpstarts.

Enjoy your car, 3Acres, love the fact that all the chrome pronouncements are intact and shiny, even if the actual goods are long gone yond.