1957 rebuild

[jcovingtonjr]

I'm looking for any help I can get.  I have a four door 57 Fairlane with a continental kit, which I wish to restore.  The body is not bad, has a few rust areas, floorpans need replacing, and I wish to repaint it just like it came from the factory.  I'm open to all suggestions, as I have never undertaken such a project.  Does anyone have suggestions or recommendations.  Thank you in advance for any and all help.
JC

[Lou]

Start by taking a lot of pictures of everything, and as you disassemble the car to restore it take close up pictures of what your about to disassemble.

[Fairlane500Ron]

Hello
I don't think I have ever seen or heard of a 57 Town sedan
(4DR) with a cont. kit ??
Got a picture you could post?

Good luck with the restoration
Ron

[Lou]

1957 Fairlane town Victoria with Conie kit
http://www.1957ford.com/asp/gallery.aspx?catmstrid=1&catdetid=3

1957 Fairlane town sedan Conie kit added after pis taken
http://www.1957ford.com/asp/gallery.aspx?catmstrid=1&catdetid=4

[JimNolan]

jcovingtojr,
     When restoring your car think about what you want it to be after it's done. Can you be happy with a cosmetic coverup of problems or does it need to be right in your mind even if you can't see the problems areas. When it's all said and done it's up to you what you can be happy with. It takes just as long to do a good cosmetic cover-up than it does to fix it right. Every piece of metal that could probabley be bad on your car would cost about $2500 to replace. The trouble is it takes another 10K to have someone weld it in and repaint if you can't do it yourself.
    The point I'm trying to make is don't do anything that you won't be happy with later just because you can't afford it now. I wish I'd done a little at a time as I could afford it and drove my car around in primer until I had it done completely. At least I wouldn't be driving a 20K car with 50K invested in it if I'd done it that way. But, that little car brought me and my wife a lot of enjoyment displaying and driving a great cover-up job. Jim

[Ford Blue blood]

What Jim said and then some.  Books, books, books and more books.  Get the factory books for the car,  The electrical, body and seam and the repair manual.  Read as much as you can about restoring car, the principles are the same irrespect of make, and get as much as you can from books on the basics of painting, body work and metal work.  After all the research is done start your project.  Think about what has to be done and write it down is steps.  Many a project has been abandoned because the owner became overwhelmed.  It is just a bunch of little jobs, if you have them on the wall layered on top of each other and pull one job at a time by and by the car will be finished.

Join a car club, stay with us on the boards, all work to help you throught the issues, the ups and the downs that are sure to come along.