Hello all of you. Can anyone identify the year, make and model of the car in the picture? Thank you all for your help.
Hard to tell , but it could be a 50s (1952-1956) Ford or Mercury.
1953 Ford
Yes, it is a 1953 Ford Customline 2 door.
Yep 53 Ford. The chrome on the 1/4 panel is a dead giveaway. Looks like a straight stick with a V8 in it. It’d go like heck.
Story: Now I’ve never owned a Ford myself, but Dad bought a 54 V8 MT with tinted windshield in Sky Haze blue. Mom’s favorite color. We took it to the black hills and up the long incline to Mt. Rushmore. When we got to the top, every other car had to have their hood open to cool their engines off, but not that Ford V8. Never struggled at all with the four of us plus Grandma and luggage.
You guys are amazing. Apparently, the last year for the flat-head V8:
http://www.vanpeltsales.com/FH_web/flathead_specs-90to125late.htm
@insightful–Yes, it was the last year for the flat-head V-8 in the Ford and Mercury line. The Lincoln got an OHV V-8 in 1952. Ford introduced a flat head 6 in 1941. It was replaced by an OHV 6 in 1952. The 6 cylinder engine was only used in Ford cars and trucks. The Mercury never had a 6 until the 1960 Comet was introduced.
Thank you all for your help. It helped tremendously. I knew this crowd would have the answer.
Bing Every old Ford I have owned ran a bit cold. Not a bad thing!
The 1953 Mercury flat head was the “hot” engine back in the day. In the early 60s my older cousin was dragging an H gas 1939 deluxe Ford coupe with a 1953 Mercury V8 and turning high 13s. Not so impressive now but more than OK in the early 1960s.
I had a '50 mercury (239 flathead VB) and I put a '51 Lincoln engine (also a flathead) 337 engine and overdrive in it. It could really “walk the dog”".
@EllyEllis That 337 was originally a truck engine that was re-cammed to give better high end performance for a car. I had boss during my high school days who drove one in his fathers Lincoln when he was a teenager. His dad never knew how fast it would go, but my boss did. He told a lot of great 20 year old stories 45 years ago.
Our state was “dry” in the '50s. His dad owned a movie theater in a small town. They got their movies delivered during the night by a company called Exhibitors Film Delivery or EFD. One day the film they were supposed to show didn’t make it. EFD had already picked up the movie they’d shown the night before to take it to the next theater. My boss was sent 130 miles away, in that Lincoln, to get the film. There was no stated speed limit other than “safe and reasonable”. He made the trip in just under three hours. That included slowing for every little berg that DID have a speed limit, and spending some time getting the film loaded in the trunk. One small town cop tried to catch up with him as he left town, probably because he thought the car looked like a boot legger’s hauler with bad rear springs. Those films were heavy. He said he did a lot of the trip at over 100 MPH. That was on two lane roads and bias ply tires. Those were the days. How’d people live through them?
That 337 engine was fitted to the 1949 Lincoln as a replacement for the V-12 engine that was used by the Lincoln in its previous models. It was a truck engine with a different camshaft. The V-12 engine used by earlier Lincolns had quite a few problems.
In '54 & '55, the new “Y” block OHV V-8’s were nothing special…But in 1956, the 292 “Thunderbird” 4 barrel engine could hold its place on the road…But, alas, the Chevy 283 “Power-Pack” engine, even when saddled with the sorry Power-Glide 2-speed automatic, could stay in front of the Fords…As the '50’s and '60’s unfolded, Ford produced a few, hard to get, high-performance cars while a cheap and easy to obtain 300hp-327 Chevy small-block could handle most Fords…For a Few Dollars More, the 350hp-327 powered Chevy’s ended the argument…When Chrysler joined the party with the 340 Duster and Dart models, both Ford and Chevy had to rethink their performance programs…Of course, the Big Block wars raged on but that’s a different story…A 427 Chevy was still the cheapest, easiest to obtain ride…
Funny how we now expect similar performance out of a 1.4 l turbo four. And get it, with decent gas mileage.