I’m thinking of going ‘old school’ and purchasing a 1950’s car, like say a 1955 Oldsmobile. They look good and like the old people say, they dont make em like they use to.
People who restore them often sell them and I figure I could pick one up in fairly good condition.
But before I do, what should i know before buying one? Will the driving experience be different? How bad is gas milage? Repairs, parts? I dont know much about any of this.
Restoring a car over 50 years old generally takes a lot of loot, time and/or labor. Unless you’re dedicated to the task it might be more than you want to undertake.
Do you mean like buying a fixed-up one for your daily driver?? Oh my gawd, don’t do it! What kind of car are you used to? I don’t have an Olds, I have a 1955 DeSoto, which is similar in size and power. They weigh about 2 tons. A 1955 Oldsmobile will probably feel and handle like a wallowing, overweight pig. It will feel huge and the optional power steering is often likened to driving on glare ice. Without power steering, well, do you work out? These old cars are not anywhere near as safe as new cars. Gas mileage? HAHAHAHA… oh, that’s a good one. I’d guess you’d be doing well to get 10-12 mpg, on level terrain, with a light foot.
A '55 Olds is not going to be as reliable, safe, comfortable, luxurious or easy to take care of as any decent new car. On the other hand, if you’re OK with all the problems, I think they’re fun.
Plus, none of those pesky seatbelts to bother with.
Speaking as the former owner of a 1954 Buick, although I loved the car, I would not do it again, at least not as a daily driver.
The car certainly turned heads, but was a king-hell beast to drive. The ride was pretty good, but the dynamics were utter crap. Unpowered steering in a two-ton vehicle will make parallel parking and low-speed maneuvers a real chore, but if you want to develop arms like tree trunks, here’s your chance. The brakes in any mid-50’s vehicle are absolutely pathetic when compared to current systems. When it comes to handling, you find out quickly that there’s a reason why bias-ply tires have been abandoned in favor of radials.
All sorts of niggling things seem to go wrong all the time with cars from that era, like thermostats for the engine cooling system, or the mechanical linkage to the throttle. Most of this stuff doesn’t cost much to fix once you figure out what’s wrong, but it happens all the fricken’ time. Lastly, although there seem to still be sources for most drivetrain parts, anything you may need to replace relating to the interior and/or body components may be tedious and difficult to find.
As regards safety, these cars date from an era before the requirement for seat belts, and had no significant provisions for protection of the passenger cabin against frontal or side impacts, such as crush zones or a collapsable steering column. Yes, they’re pretty sturdy on low-speed impacts, but hit, or be hit by, anything unforgiving and you’re toast.
I grew up in the late '50s and early '60s, and despite the haze of nostalgia that sweeps over me for the styling of cars from that era, the improvements in safety, vehicle dynamics and reliability since than have been nothing short of spectacular.
I’ve thought about something similar to the OP, but what stops me is thinking about messing with adjusting points, carburetors, and things like that. Cars that old don’t have electronic ignition or fuel injection. You probably won’t get AC either, so if it gets hot where you live summers will be hard. Also rust is a concern if you live where it snows, not only will you have to keep the car running mechanically but you’ll have to do bodywork too.
Not that it couldn’t be fun as a hobby, but I wouldn’t do it unless you have another car to drive and a good amount of time and money to invest.
Another thing to remember is that these cars were not designed to run for hours a day at 70+ mph like many folks do with cars today. A friend of mine bought a 1950-something car and literally wore out the just rebuilt engine in two months of freeway driving.
You need to decide what you want out of the car. Show quality? Daily driver? I restored a couple of mustangs, (a 69 and a 73) and depending on what you want, it can cost you a few thousand, to a few tens of thousands. The paint job on the '69 that I was trying to make show quality was just around $15K. When I had a rod knocking in the 351C in my '73, it took about $6K to get more horsepower (machine work and parts) out of a virgin 351C I found in the newspaper and bought for $150. And don’t even get my started in the transmission work.
The UPSIDE of old cars is IFFF you are mechanically inclined and have the time and the space/place and the inclination to tinker to fix them or keep them running you can do it with simple tools and just a little know how. A good how to book will go a long way.
The one caveat is some old cars are notoriously badly designed, though I would guess MOST are not. You’d have to check with some real experts to find out which is which in your particular case of interest.
The old ones are built like brick shithouses, so if you treat them right they will run/last forever.
But, you gotta treat em right and give em TLC for that to happen.
And to be honest, even an el cheapo modern car is so much more comfortable, safer, and easier to drive than an oldy but goody.
Gas milage, in the big scheme of things, may not be a big deal if you drive shorter distances in traffic…make some worst case assumptions about gas milage and run the numbers.
I’ve got a 25+ year old car I am fixing up to drive again. A new car of similiar size would probably get 10 mpg better on average. But cheaper insurance and no car payment will buy a fair amount of gas to make up for it…
Another upside of an older car is there’s usually plenty of room to work under the hood. You can even sit with your legs in there on many older cars.
My daily driver is a 67 Plymouth Valiant Signet. I love this car. It’s got manual steering and drum brakes, but you get used to them pretty quick. Parallel parking blows, but it can be done. Once you are off and running it’s not a problem.
There is a big difference between my ride (the White Shadow) and a 50s car, I should think, though. Those Valiants are one of the world’s most reliable cars. Plus the guy I bought it from replaced a lot of the parts, AND most parts I might need I can still get. Not sure how that would work 50s-styley.
All that said, I am sure you could find yourself the right 50s model, something reliable and not super esoteric. Plus, the joy and pride factor are large. I say to myself ‘I love this car’ every time I get behind the wheel.
I have driven it up the hill to the top of the Sierras. It gets the same gas mileage and hits the same top speed as it did when it was new. As it stands, there is no reason why I won’t keep driving this car for as long as I wish to.
I spent 1500 on it, have spent another 1000+ in parts and repairs. My mechanic, the guy I bought it from, tunes it up for me every six months, but I could do it myself. It needs a new front end, but I can buy all the parts for that from Year One and me and my mechanic can do the work. He’s got a buddy who has a rebuilt version of the engine I have who will sell it if we want to swap it out. All this for much less than what new cars cost today.
Did I say I love my car? Go for it man!
My 2 previous daily drivers were a 64 Olds F-85 and a 64 Ford Falcon.
Owning and driving old cars is fun, cool, and (relatively) cheap. They are also monster ridiculous insanely dangerous. Rigid steering columns, non-padded dashes, outdated suspension and handling, inferior brakes, no seatbelts… the list goes on. They really don’t make them like they used to!
Maintenance of an older car must be done often, but is quite easy if you have the right tools. An engine analyzer, book of matches, and timing light and you’re set as far as monthly maintenance goes. Parts (at least for mid-60’s GM cars…) are dirt cheap because they reused them over and over again for 2 decades. A manual choke saves lots of headaches, IMHO.
As for mileage, it depends! A 170ci straight six with a teeny single barrel carb might get 30MPG. That 455ci with the big ass intake and tri-carb setup? Might be getting into GPM territory 
I never drove or knew anyone with a mid-50’s car. Too damn dangerous for daily driving among my groups opinion.
Learning to drive with manual steering and brakes takes some getting used to, big time. After that, drive safe and post pictures man!
Just to repeat:
If you have never had such a beast, are less than 50, are not a serious mechanic/machinist (those old parts are going to run out sometime!), DON’T EVEN THINK IT!
Ever pour starter fluid down a carb? Really know what a carb even IS? Drum brakes do not handle anything like modern disc (or even modern drums), the points, plugs, capacitor (if present) need replacing at least twice a year.
Notice the huge steering wheels in those old beasties? It’s called “leverage”, as in trying to turn two huge, fat tires positioned under a a 1000+ lb engine.
Safety? Ha! The 1955 Ford (one of the first cars I drove) was a breakthrough in safety - because it had a padded dashboard. No belts, the seats were still bolted to the frame (know exactly what a car frame is?), thus transferring all impact in a crash to the seat - causing it and you to become separated. You and the dash, however, got real close.
The only real safety feature of those cars was safety glass - you never thought of glass as a safety feature, huh? My first car (1929 Ford) had plate glass, IIIRC.
See if you can find a copy of the owner’s manual for something of that era - it will be a real giggle.
Nonetheless, I did recommend a 50’s car to a young woman i worked with in 1999 - but it was a 1955-56 Thunderbird. She wanted a 356 Porsche. Either would have been good as a fun ride - AND they would be worth more today than she would have paid in 1999.
Your Olds (my folks had an Olds of the era - i think it actually was a '55) will not do so well.
Just to add to my previous post:
As someone who was involved in a wreck (and a few fender benders) in the 64 Oldsmobile, I have a few comments.
I had seat belts in the front seat, lap belts only. In the low speed fender benders, the car was an absolute tank. I never had a dent or barely a scratch, even when a conversion van backed itself 1/4 of the way into me! (Tip: If you want to parallel park in a conversion van without back windows, at least invest in a couple of replacement junker side mirrors. And pay attention to blaring horn behind you. And keep it slow, fer God’s sake.)
When the guy t-boned me after running a red light, however, the damage was amazing. He hit me in the rear door and quarter panel, and we spun. A lot. If my passenger had been in the back seat instead of the front, she would have taken much of the impact of the 40mph hit by a 2 ton hunk of steel. The back door was more than halfway into the back seat, and the car looked like it was punched in half from the back. The frame twisted and cracked the windows, and my arm bent the steering wheel when it spun hard right.
We came out of it okay, but it could have been very, very ugly had the impact been just a foot earlier.
Of course, this happened right after I put on 2 new tires, upgraded the ignition, rebuilt the carburetor, tuned the damned thing up, and generally had it running better than it did when new.
Yeah, wrenches, screwdrivers, timing gun… (I just googled “timing gun price” - it doesn’t look good). Um, y’all DO know what those are, right? 
Here’s your issues which you will need to worry about:
1.) Buying an “off-brand” make/model (i.e. one that’s not presently popular with collectors) will make parts sourcing difficult, if not impossible, with some cars.
2.) Brakes. Forget the issue about older brakes not working as well asmodern ones, that’s minor. The real issue is that they’re single cylinder, rather than dual cylinder like on a modern car. You have a wheel cylinder or a brake line go out on you, and you’ll have nothing to stop with. Nothing. The “emergency brake,” is, in fact, called a “Parking Brake” and in an “Oh shit!” situation will probably fail, or be less than effective in stopping the car in the desired distance.
3.) No seatbelts. It was fairly common for people to have the steering wheel shatter on them in a crash and wind up getting speared by the steering column (if they didn’t go through the windshield first).
4.) Points, condensor, and carbs. These can be hard and/or expensive to get, and generally not too many 20 year old mechanics know how to work on them.
5.) Vacuum “powered” wipers. Depending upon the demands being placed on the engine, you may or may not have functioning wipers. Odds are when you need them, you won’t.
However, there are solutions to these problems. For the “off brand” cars, you will have to do your research, but many of your mechanical parts can be sourced from other vehicles. You can’t expect the clerk at the store to know that the starter used on a DeSoto is the same as on a Plymouth. Join a car club for that make. Talk to the guys in the club, they’ll know what parts interchange, where you can find them, and where you can find parts for those that don’t. (Start with Hemmings Motor News and Google. They’re your friends.)
There are conversion kits to add a dual master cylinder to your car (some of them will even give you power brakes). While purists might scream at what you’re doing, screw it. With the car being a daily driver, its not going to be a pristine trailer queen, and as such will not retain its value like an all points winner at Pebble Beach. It will, however, do more to turn heads and spark interest in old cars than their baby which is only seen at car shows. If you want to get fancy, you can put completely modern brakes (discs or drums) on your car, but this is pricey and can involve completely swapping out things like the front suspension or rear axle.
You can also add seatbelts to the car. Again, the purists will scream, and the mount points might not hold as well as those on a modern car, but its better than nothing.
Points and condensors can all be replaced with a modern aftermarket kit to give you an electronic set up. Some of them simply drop into your existing distributor, and others will require a full swap. Purists will scream, but screw 'em. While they’re digging through the dusty shelves of an abandoned looking parts store for some leftover stock, or scouring the intarwebs for parts, you can be driving your car. Some carbs can be retrofitted with a throttle body system, so you won’t even have to spend time looking for carb parts. (Or making replacement carb gaskets by hand.) Purists probably won’t even know you’ve done it if you don’t take off the air cleaner.
The vacuum motor wipers can be replaced by electric motors fairly easily. Some cars even have retrofit units which bolt up using existing hardware and give you things like variable speed control, while looking completely stock.
As for modern “creature comforts” its all a question of what you want and how much you’re willing pay. There’s lots of mounting set ups so that you can install a modern radio and speakers in such a way that they’re not easy to see (or steal) and you won’t have to perform major surgery to install the units. You want AC? Vintage Air make kits which will fit (and look good) in near every make and model. The same is true of things like power windows, locks, and even remote starting (the last one can be a little tricky depending upon your car, same is true with cruise control). Anti-lock brakes and airbags? Unless you’re made of money, you can forget about those, but everything else is out there.
Another thing you’ll need to know about is if the car has a 6V or 12V electrical system. If its got a 6V system, you’ll want to switch to a 12V setup. You can buy rewound generators that’ll put out 12V. You’ll need a different voltage regulator, starter (you can get a rewound one), bulbs, and you’ll need to either put resistors (someone makes a dedicated kit for this, so you don’t have to spend all day down at Radio Shack trying to figure out which ones will work and how to wire them up) on your gauges or replace them with 12V gauges. (My advice? Get the resistors.)
Then he got shafted on the rebuild. Speed limits in the 1950s were the same as they are today, and interstates were around (the concept of the “suburb” and “long commute” started in the 1950s). Modern lubricating oils, filters, and gasoline are all vastly superior to what they had in the 1950s, so there’s no excuse for a recently rebuilt engine to go south on you, unless it was a botched job. Sure, you won’t be able to go 100K+ without an overhaul on the engine like you can on a modern car, but 50K or so? Yeah. They can do it. Especially if everything like the gaskets and bearings are made from modern materials.
Ya know how they say
“They don’t build them like they used to?”
If you become familiar with how they used to build them and how they build them today, you will say “Thank God!”
You realize that for many people reading this thread, the first question won’t be “what’s a DeSoto?” but “what’s a Plymouth?”
As the owner of a 43 year old, daily driven pickup truck, here’s my $0.02:
Parts. Hard to get sometimes. I recently had to modify to a floor shift when my shift arm snapped off of the steering column. The steering wheel cup that I bought from an NOS place was too short by 0.125". I spent $90.00 for a part that I cannot use.
Service. Many places only service vehicles going back to the mid 80’s. I used to take my truck to Oil Stop, but had to quit when the personnel there wanted to know “how many liters” my engine was.
Repairs. Costly. On the one hand, my transmission lasted for over 40 years. Then it finally went out; a complete re-build was $2,700.00. I recently noticed a leaky rear wheel cylinder. $1,593.53 for all new brakes. These prices were mostly for labor, not parts. I’ve had to replace the carberatour(sp?), timing gear and regulator, but I did those repairs myself. Be advised, if a system goes out it will usually have to be completely replaced.
It took me 15 years to find a replacement manual regulator assembly (window crank with arm) for the driver side door. My truck has a DSO number, which means that it was not sold off of a lot by a Dealer, but purchased straight from the factory.
Not trying to discourage anyone from buying an older vehicle (not only is mine a daily driver, but it was recently featured in a movie!); just relating my own experiences.
YMMV.