Chopped, doorless hacksaw-skyliner bathtub would be nice in matt colour. 


Hyvinkää, FI

Nate, the 56 has a real frame and is not like the of the car as cars of today. I did a little googling and not one of the cars I read about that have a box frame that were converted have had any windshield issues. And most no X frame. A lot of convertibles might see some flex when jacked up to change a tire even with the beefed up stock X frame convertible frames. If it is going to be a driver I doubt you will see anything going wrong except a rain drop or two. As for cheap mustang convertibles without a frame to start with I would put my money in the 56 as being a stronger convertible. Here in the rust belt you know what I am talking about. I could tell you about the 49 or 50ish Cheby that a friend of mine and me when we were about 14 we cut the top off with a hatchet and hand hack saw then drove it around a field making ramps from dirt to see if we could get it on two wheels like they did at the Rockford speedway. No sissy seat belts or alcohol back then either. As you can tell I am not a purist in any sense of the word, I do respect cars that are true rare collectible cars being trailer queens but I think I am realistic. If my bird was a "E or F" code maybe I would have thought different about the way it has progressed for the 50 years that I have owned it, but buying it when I was 16 and driving it back then in the snow it was transportation and a cool car.

  Vic Correnti

Brian B, I am a very lucky young man.  I'm 35 years old and my grandfather is still with me and of sound mind (I had breakfast with him this morning in fact!).   I understand your sentimentality because my relationship with my grandfather is one of my most prized possessions realizing few people ever get to experience an adult relationship with a grandparent.  This car was never his (he never drove it) he purchased it for my aunt to use for college in the 60's and my uncle drove it for a time in high school in the 70's (hence the terrible rust).  Although I'm happy my grandpa gave me the car, he did not give it to me to preserve or because it had great sentimental meaning.  He simply wanted it out of his shed as he was considering selling his farm.  He tried selling it and nobody wanted the rusty four door so he gave it to me to get rid of it since he knew I liked cars.  

Nate - Madison, Wisconsin

 

56 Ford Customline Sedan

 

Nate
     I am with Vic, its your car, make it enjoyable.  A few years back on "overhaulin" they took a 53-54 ford 4 door and made it a convert, they did use hard top doors (2) and had a donor car but I dont remember how much frame work they did. Might look for the episode for reference.

Gary Ryan San Antonio.TX.

This started life as a 4 door, the episode is "overhaulin sema radical roadster" Could not find it for free, but it is for sale on Amazon.

Gary Ryan San Antonio.TX.

It would be interesting to see what frame mods were made. Being for SEMA you would think they made it safe. Chuck

Y's guys rule!
Looking for McCullouch VS57 brackets and parts. Also looking for 28 Chrysler series 72 parts. And early Hemi parts.

MoonShadow, 292 w/McCulloch, 28 Chrysler Roadster, 354 Hemi)
Manchester, New Hampshire

Put a power sun roof in it then you will have a mini convertible without all of the work  LOL   Carl

WOW!!!  WOW WOW....how beautiful.  I love what they did with the windshield, looks terrific.  My willingness to forgo doors should take a good chunk of the work out of it.  I will definitely look for the episode, I'm very curious about that windshield (and of course the frame mods required). THANKS GARY so much for sharing, I now have new dream material

Nate - Madison, Wisconsin

 

56 Ford Customline Sedan

 

I now ee the 54 had a straight windshield....I thought that was a custom modification 

Nate - Madison, Wisconsin

 

56 Ford Customline Sedan

 

Well, I just watched the episode (Season 5 episode 7 $1.99 on Amazon don't tell my boss I'm at work) and if they reinforced the frame they sure didn't show it or talk about it.   They mentioned reinforcing the body and talked about how important the roof was to structural integrity, so possibly they did enough body mods to make the body stiff enough, but they did not elaborate any more on this and I couldn't see any major/obvious body bracing with the shots in the episode??  they did tack weld a square tube structure inside the body of the car while they made all the modifications, but this was eventually removed. Also they stretched the frame on this car and they did tack-weld square tubing across the frame during the frame modifications to maintain squareness, but they cut that tubing off later. Unfortunately they did not show them lowering the body on the chassis, that would've given a clear shot of any frame mods.

Nate - Madison, Wisconsin

 

56 Ford Customline Sedan