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Today my friends and I dragged home four cars and a bare Ford cab. The cars have been sitting in a back yard/field for an unknown time. There was a 46-48 Ford, 41ish Olds, 39 Chevy Pickup, and 46-48 P15. I'm torn as to what to do with the Plymouth. The more I looked at it and cleaned it, the better it looked. It definitely has blemishes brought on by tree damage and years of neglect, but appears to be rust free except for some floorpan rrust due to sitting with a few broken windows. The only papers and correspondence I found (several stamped Auto Club- like AAA and receipts) were dated 1951 and 1952. I really wasn't looking for another project, but if the signs pan out to be true, I feel compelled to do what I can to help it live out the life it was never able to see. There are some problems I see right off the bat, and body damage from trees, but with some affection I think I should be able to repair most of the damages. I don't think it's been parked since 52, thats extremely unlikely. I do believe it may have been in a backyard for 40 years or more. My 48 Dodge had been sitting since 1969, and from all appearances the rocker panels and floor on the Plymouth are in much better shape than mine were. I may work toward getting it titled and have it become another in my collection. My Studebaker may end up going to my son when he graduates in order to thin the herd and keep all of mine Mopar. Here are a few pics before I started cleaning it.

I think I see mine, lol

Just an update I chickened out on doing it myself and had a mechanic rebuild it he found lots of crap in the bowl and the needle wasn't seating properly . The good news was the throttle body was good . Thanks once again for all your help.

I read a number of threads on here regarding the rubber trim piece that goes on the bottom of the door or in some cases, attaches to the cab, that serves as a seal for the bottom of the door and the cab. I know that it is different for the various years. I ordered the door seal kit (RW-4855-DS) from dcm for my ‘49 Pilothouse because I need all of the door trim. My door has holes in it where that trim piece is supposed to mount (see pic). The piece they supplied with the kit has no way to mount to my door. The bottom seal in that kit is a tube with a flat piece attached to it (see pics below). I asked dcm about it and they said that in my case, the seal provided was meant to fit in the crease between the rocker sill and the floor. I have seen pictures that show these as two pieces with bolts or screws to separate them. Mine is not like that (see pics). So, I thought of a way to modify the seal provided in the kit to mount to the door using the holes in the door. With sharp scissors and an x-acto knife, I trimmed the excess rubber off the seal and then pushed the wide part of the Y-shaped rubber into the holes with a small flat bladed screwdriver. I like this solution because it doesn’t require using any messy glue. The piece looks pretty good and stays in place, although the door is a little harder to close. Time will tell how well it holds out.

Follow up: I had my brother come over to give me a hand. We loosened the bolts on the lower hinge a half turn and the door moved in and out easily. We ended up moving it maybe a quarter inch. The door was still binding and had to be slammed to close. Fortunately having the extra set of eyes on the problem helped as my brother figured out the issue. The previous owner had installed a dome light in the cab and the plunger style on/off switch was placed in the door jam and it was sticking out so far that it was hitting the leading edge of the door itself. We took that switch out and the door closes nicely. I never liked that dome light anyway as the light always came on when I opened the door to work inside the cab. I had to tape the switch closed so that I didn’t drain the battery when I needed to leave the door open. Because I have the new headliner kit from dcm to install I was going to have to remove the dome light anyway. So…we pulled the dome light out and discovered that it was actually cheap plastic and the hot bulb had melted / burned part of the plastic. It was a fire waiting to happen. All in all a successful hour and a half.

Ice Shield

Yep...that was the problem. The bottom of the fuse socket was corroded, once I found it and took the emory cloth to all of it everything worked as it should. Wish I could of found it before I took it all apart?...mark it up as a learning experience.

Been a while since I updated proper. Been driving the car to work around once a week for the last few months. Slowly getting work done on it. I work a lot, so it is easier for me to refinish or make parts ( on lunch breaks) than it is to have time to install them. Car was seemingly a little sluggish, so I decided to do a tune up. Clean points, check dwell, bump timing a little. Instead... Found that my refreshed distributor had its vacuum can give up, so figured it was easy enough to swap in the '54 IAT I had rebuilt with dual points and a Terrel rebuilt vacuum can. For some reason I hadn't set the point gap on the bench two months ago, so spent some time getting it set. As I was swapping my plug wires over to the new cap, I realized what bad shape they were in. Luckily, the set I had pulled off my '54 engine were in pretty good shape. After a couple cranks, my battery went from full power to totally flat, like a light switch. After blaming the solenoid, starter, switch, I finally realized the battery was to blame. An hour on the charger and it was back to cranking strong. Well for 4-5 starts as I was setting the points. Then back "off" without warning. I figure a fresh battery is in order. While I had the hood up, I finally addressed the terrible placement of the throttle return spring. It had been run to the vacuum advance line, and barely had enough tension to pull the throttle closed. I had an original head bolt (from the '54) that has the screw in tab, so, with no regard for the safety of my headgasket, I swapped it in. Hoping to finish tuning this afternoon.

Safety Flow Ride

1949 Plymouth Special Deluxe pics via imgur https://imgur.com/gallery/7fOzrBo Also, where do yinz get parts? I'll eventually need weather strip, carpet... im not looking for a 100% restoration, gonna keep it kinda ratty but still want it functional. I need a driver's window, I presume the passenger is the same? I could have a Glass shop trace that and make one easy enough. Rear bumper chrome is really bad, flaking and sharp. Source? Found a junkyard in Phoenix but that's quite a drive from Pittsburgh!

When some of us get older...repairs on a car can be difficult to do right. Finding a good thru the firewall coil can be extremely difficult...let alone getting up under the dash to access the armored cable. The owner maybe not be mechanically inclined..who knows. The work on the car was done not right but enough possibly to kept it running... Kudos to the owner keeping it inside and proudly owning it. He's a good guy and owner ...you can tell by reading keith's story. A lucky future for both the 37 DeSoto and owner after meeting Keith!