"My $1,000.00 Sports Roadster"
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continued from page 4, "The Florida Connection..."
Over the winter, I purchased cab floor sections from Nicks Tbirds, which he torched out of a parts car, and the back half of a rustfree hardtop which he torched off across the back seat footwell, and split (with torch)down the middle of the trunk. I needed the quarters and the trunk floor. If you take a look back at the picture titled "A True Ragtop", you can see that I needed good Quarters. I went to work removing the floor sheet metal from my restoration car using Blair Spotweld Cutters to cut out each and every spotweld.
I had to do the same thing with the floor sections I got from Nick. Then I put the good sheet metal in place, and welded it to the frame back through the same spotweld holes and grinded them smooth. The welds looked like factory original spotwelds when I was through with them. Next I removed the back half of the restoration car by drilling out the spotwelds where the quarters are attached to the rockers. The rockers extend into the quarters (below the quarter windows) about 16 inches. Then I removed the back half of the car .
I had to remove the sections of the rockers that were still in the quarters I got from Nick in the same manner. I slipped the two back half sections onto the rockers, and braced the door openings to the specified width, and did the same across the width of the car at the door posts and again at the front and back of the trunk opening. These measurements are all in the Thunderbird Shop Manual. I tack welded everything enough so I could get the shell back into the air to square it up underneath, again from the measurements in the shop manual.
When I was satisfied that everything was true, I bagan welding it all together solidly, and ground all of the welds smooth. I had to remove the "bridge" from behind the back seat and switch it with the original convertible bridge, because the coupe and convertible are different. This also was done by cutting out all of the spotwelds on both pieces. The mounting brackets for the convertible deck lid and top lift rams had to be put in from the original car too. Next I was about to start removing the tops of the quarters from the Solon Springs car to place them on my new quarters. The quarter tops on my coupe quarters from Nick had a roof "growing" out of them, which, of course, a convertible doesn't have. I took coupe quarter tops off the restoration car first.
About that time, in the spring of '92, an ad showed up in the Duluth News Tribune for a 1963 Thunderbird Sports Roadster for sale for $3,500.00! I called as soon as I saw the ad, and went and looked at it. It was red, with a black top and black interior. It had a tonneau cover, but hubcapped wheels. I noticed that the tonneau was all moulded fiberglass, no padded headrests, just hard fiberglass painted red. I knew that wasn't original so I asked the owner if he was sure this was a Sports Roadster.
He assured me it was and even showed me the on the title "Sports Roadster". I looked for the door tag, but it was gone. Then I looked at the serial number next to the battery, and the numbers told me it was a standard convertible, not a Sports Roadster". I showed the owner the serial number codes in my shop manual. I ended up buying the car for $1,000.00, and used it for a parts car. It sat inside a dark, damp garage with a dirt floor for ten years, and the bottom of the car, the floors, bottoms of doors, fenders and quarters had rusted badly.
The upper portions, however were very good. The Deck lid, Package Tray, Quarter Tops, Hood, Top Frame, complete Bumpers, Grill, and all the stainless were excellent! It was a real bargain!
Back to Index ......Go to Page 6, "Rest in Peace..."
Thomas G. Maruska
Duluth, Minnesota