55 President comes home

[Mike Sal]

Brought home another fixer upper yesterday. A good friend was thinning the herd & offered me a President State Sedan, in White over Yellow. If I can ever figure out how to post a picture, I'll throw some up. It's a well appointed car: power windows, steering, & brakes. Push button radio, rear speaker & fog lights. After replacing the condenser, it runs like a top. Shows 53,000 miles & appears to be close to accurate considering the conditon. It appears the car came from near Springfield,IL

Unfortunately, to make it a nice car, absolutely everything would need to be touched. The drivers front fender has a lot of rust, but I have a NOS one for it. The passenger side front fender is bad at the back. All of the upholstery & door panels are water stained.

So....the parts chasing starts all over again.....& I'm not even done with the '66 yet.....

Mike Sal

[Mike Sal]

Hmmm....maybe with my own reply I can post a pic....

[Tom Bredehoft]

Yours looks a lot better than mine did when it came home. Yours is the second generation '55, with the w rap around windshield, those front fenders were a 6 month thing, only used on that sedan. feel fortunate that you have them.

[Mike Sal]

The brakes had been re-done on this car a little over 3 years ago, but it appears that they by-passed the hydrovac & hill holder. Will know more when I've had a chance to get under it.

I think I plan to patch it up just enough to make a driver out of it. That way further improvements can be made a little at a time as parts pop up. Theres a few rust holes in the perimeter around the trunk where the gasket goes & in the bottoms of both B pillars & a little in the rockers. That appears to be the worst of it. We'll see.....
Mike Sal

[BobPalma]

Nice looking car, Mike! Loaded up, too. Congrats. BP

[Bullet]

Even has tinted windows. Wow.

Mark

[jclary]

Looks like it might have one of those "Draw-a-matic" lighters under the clock. (My '51 Land Cruiser has one) And does it have the rare power windows? I see what looks like a door handle, but no window crank.

[Mike Sal]

Ya, a fellow member had lubricated the windows while he was doing some other service work to the car before I bought it. All the windows run up & down really well (& fast too). The lighter is missing from the dash (I haven't looked in the glove box yet....funny how I forgot to do that....). The left rear door window does have a crack in it. I wonder how hard it'll be to get a replacement tinted glass?

I shudder to think what the interior is going to cost.....What are some good options for that funky "fabric" type carpet?
Mike Sal

[warrlaw1]

I have a couple of replated parking light surrounds, cheap. Early eBay purchase that "said' they would fit a C/K, but you know the rest....

[Mike Sal]

Ya, I need to "remember" all the stuff that fits sedans rather than C/K's. My problem is I've forgotten all that stuff....darned ole'heimers desease.....

All the rest of you guys who bought those "oh ya, sure it'll fit a coupe" parts, let me know what ya got! I can keep a secret.
Mike Sal

[Mike Sal]

Warrlaw....sent you a note regarding those surrounds
Mike Sal

[62champ]

Hmmm - original upholstery on the rear seat and electric windows as well...

[Mike Sal]

Upholstery....ya I'm really sad about the interior. it's all intact, but it's all really badly water stained. I'll doubt if it will come clean, but I'll try. I have to pull the covers off to replace the foam padding that has turned hard and crumbly. I had to do the same to my '56 president.
Mike Sal

[Mike Sal]

I think it's cool that it's a '55 car & the body number is 5555.
Mike Sal

[gordr]

If the upholstery fabric is still sound, and not rotten, I wonder if you could dye it to hide the water stains? Might be OK for a "driver-grade" car.