Door lock tail piece

[gasman826]

60 year old grease...maybe.  There is also a little crank linkage going through the door just under the inside lock button that might need a little lube.  After cleaning and rebuilding the door hinges, window crank and linkages, and door latches, everything works so much easier and nicer...much less effort.

[hiball3985]

X2, I lubed the hell out of everything I get to, everything is so smooth now.. My inside door handle wasn't returning and I thought the spring was broke but after spraying with WD40 and working it it finally loosen up and started working..

[Tom S]

Tom, give me some time and I'll go thru my ebay history and see if I can find out who I got them from.

Rich, Don't worry about it, I kinda got my mind set on sometime making one.  Will be all steel so it will be "Guaranteed not to rust, bust or collect dust!". 

As for the the door lock knobs not pulling back up I started to get suspicious about another posability. Turned out I was sorta right. The lock knobs that the car came with were these skinny no-knob things. I know couldn't pull up the passenger side. Maybe could on the other side. Anyway, there was some anti-rattle electrical tape wrapped around the knob's stems that stuck up just above the door trim when unlocked.  Seemed like I good idea so I did the same thing with these skull head things. A bit thicker too.
Push the knob down & the high tech anti-rattle device (aka tape) disappears below the trim.
Took one knob off & I can just barely get hold of the threaded stem & pull it up. Duh!
See it bunched up there?
Sometimes ya just gotta laugh.

[hiball3985]

Ford had a better idea 

[Tom S]

Ran across this ad a few days ago with a good pic of the door locks with the tail piece lever arms still attached. It shows the position of the the lever arms with the locks in the neutral,(unlocked), position  where they need to be when putting the locks back into the doors.
Ad was here, bottom of the page.
https://www.ebay.com/sch/m.html?_odkw=1957+ford&_ssn=mostlyford&_osacat=0&_from=R40&_trksid=m570.l1313&_nkw=1957+ford&_sacat=0
You can see that if you put the locks in the wrong door they will be upside down.

[Ford Blue blood]

I have resolved the "hard to lock" issue by cleaning the latch mechanism with brake cleaner and lubing with graphite lock lube, the spray can type.

[Tom S]

Maybe I wasn't as clear as I should have been about my lock knobs not pulling back up. The electrical tape that was put on the hard plastic aftermarket knobs so they wouldn't rattle was hanging up & bunching up under the door window trim when I pushed them down.
When I changed the knobs I think I put the tape on a bit thicker than it had been & just made things worse.

[Tom S]

Tom, give me some time and I'll go thru my ebay history and see if I can find out who I got them from. Seems I remember he was speciali8zing in lock components.

Rich, Don't worry about it, I kinda got my mind set on sometime making one.

It aint pretty, & don't have to be, but it works.  Still gotta tack weld the nut & lever to the 1/4" bolt/shaft.

[hiball3985]

Thats just awesome, well done

[RICH MUISE]

nicely done, Tom! Keep us posted when you get it installed.

[Tom S]

Thanks, Jim & Rich.  It's a pretty minor accomplishment but does eliminate one of the niggling irritants. There's some much bigger things I need/want to do to the car.  Was somewhat easier to do than it first appeared as there was no need for a lathe.  Lucky that I could pull the one from the ragged '58 to model it.
Payin' Dennis Carpenter 43 bucks for such a simple little thing just kinda goes against my grain & I'm sure we all get more satisfaction by doing things ourselves. Now have dimensions & pix if someone else want's to make one.

Keep us posted when you get it installed.

I don't think you guys need to see my arc welded spot welds!  Get's kinda sloppy sometimes.  Came out ok though. Didn't burn the thing up.
I had tested it out in the '58 & it worked good but wanted to test it in the '57 before I tacked the parts in place. And you guys had talked about ones that didn't fit that maybe should have.
It worked real good & was very easy to turn the key.  Didn't put the lock retainer clip in for the test runs.  I had made the shaft & the 1/8" thick lever arm a bit longer than the one I modeled it on.  Thought that might help to get the parts in place.  Tacked stuff together, put it in & pushed in the lock retainer clip.  Now it was harder to turn the key & that's not good.
Hmm...  I think I know the problem & the little camera confirmed it. Very easy to fix that & it all works great now.

[hiball3985]

Glad it was an easy fix of the lever. I hope I never have to work on the doors again much better things to do with my time. Just trying to reach all the lube points drove me crazy

[Tom S]

Glad it was an easy fix of the lever. I hope I never have to work on the doors again much better things to do with my time. Just trying to reach all the lube points drove me crazy

I didn't lube a damn thing!
I'm gonna hafta pull those door cars off yet again so I can swap on the door handles from the raggedy '58. Their chrome is a bit better. The driver's side handle on the '57 has some slight pitting & the passenger's side has been hit slightly with somebody's sander. 
Apparently you have to move the door latch in order to get the rear screw for the handle out.  Can't even get a little short  phillip's head insert straight into that screw.  Not sure how much else inside the door I have to move or remove to get that latch out of the way.      

[hiball3985]

Maybe I'm not understanding but the last thing I did was tighten the door handle screw, my driver side was loose. There is a small hole in the inner door skin that you can put the screw driver through, I didn't have to remove anything..

[RICH MUISE]

What Jim said........you need a LONG screwdriver for the front screw. The rearward screw is in the door jamb, just above the level of the door latch. It may be hidden by the door seal.? (I don't have my door seals on yet, lol)