P5FH100801 - Thunderbird Registry Number 39845
|
39845
P5FH100801
1955
40A - T - C - 20K - S1181
Convertible
This 1955 Thunderbird is part of the not-yet-documented "first 1000" VIN list. The gathering of information about this Thunderbird is of top priority to the Registry. > > > > > > > > > > > > UPDATE March 2017, CR Schulz notified the Registry that he owns this Thunderbird. He says: The car is in Arizona. Carefree Arizona to be exact. Carefree is a far northern suburb of Phoenix. I bought it in September of 2015 from a man who had traded a motorhome for it in February 2015. That guy lived in Buckeye, AZ. The guy that got the motorhome lived in Sun City, AZ. He had the car for sale off and on since 2011. His name is Kent Osterhoudt. I did contact him and he had the car for some time and had brought it to Arizona from Nebraska when he moved to Sun City (not sure when that occurred). I found a State of Oregon temporary registration trip permit dated 6/14/1980 in Osterhoudt's name in the trunk wheel well showing that the car had traveled from Oregon to Nebraska with a temporary tag. That is how I found Mr. Osterhoudt. Before that I have no history and Mr. Osterhoudt had no other information to offer. - - - - - - - - - - -
Mr. Osterhoudt said the car had had a body off restoration. If so they did a pretty poor job. In any case he did have the vehicle painted white and the interior changed to white and black - neither was well done. It appears that there had been some damage to the right front fender at some time. A floating bar grill had replaced the original grill. The front and rear bumperettes had been removed. The rear exhaust ports had been filled (very nicely done too) and the exhaust routed to below the bumper. It was converted to a 12 volt system at some point. - - - - - - - I was not looking to restore the car. I wanted to make the car more driveable to todays standards. So the body and interior changes did not bother me. I have moved the battery to the trunk and rewired the car. I put in place a fuse block. All light are now LED's. An alternator was installed. The whole suspension has been pulled apart and new bushings and bolts installed as well as upper and lower ball joints and new springs and shocks front and rear. Installed larger front sway bar and added rear sway bar. Converted to four wheel disk brakes. Installed Flaming River rack and pinion power steering - still chasing down leaks. Rear end was rebuilt by local company. The dash was pulled and stripped of painted vinyl. Gauges were updated and speedometer plastics were replaced. Dash was painted before reinstallation. - - - - - - -The car has a 3.54 rear end ratio and the car is a Fordomatic. Have not yet changed out the transmission although the plan is to go to a later Ford transmission. The motor is not original. It appears to be a 1962 292. The heads are not original and appear to be from a 1956 or 1957 292. For now I have installed headers, a Mummert intake with a Holley 650 and an aftermarket electronic distributor. The exhaust exits just ahead of the rear wheels. The plan is to build another Y-block using Mummert heads and a hotter cam for a bit more power to go along with the updated transmission.
R
CR Schulz
7/16/2012
3/8/2017
 
292 V-8
Intact
Dearborn
|
