New Forum member with 1963 Landau

[6T3BRD]

Finally joined this forum as I have used the information from it to work on my car for quite a while and have always found it to be a great resource whenever I had issues that needed to be resolved. Here are a few pictures of my car as it looks today! I've been the owner of this car since 1994, started really getting it in shape around 2008-10........

[ICON 1956]

She is a beauty ! Welcome to our forum post often, That's a nice 63. Tells us more on what you did to bring her back.

[Aaron65]

I've always liked white landaus with black vinyl roofs...great looking car!

[Gagarin]

Beauty! Very well preserved/done. Always happy to see additional participants and experience.

[6T3BRD]

Here are a few more pictures of my car from the time my brother and I started to work on it after my father passed away. I think it has always been in Arizona (the DSO is 71 which is LA) and that is probably just where the Arizona cars went to when they were sent from Michigan if anyone knows more about this you're welcome to chime in. So the first picture is a scan of a Polaroid from the day I went to pick up the car in Tucson and shows it sitting in front of their house. After that, my father worked on the car for a few years and did things like getting the radiator redone, belts and hoses, water pump and painting the valve covers, intake manifold, and air cleaner. Eventually, he lost interest in getting it done, and although I thought he might work on it again after he retired that didn't happen because he died in 2007 when he was 65...... So, in early 2008 I went to my brother and asked him to help me get the car in a drivable state and so the second picture is what it looked like when we took it outside for the first time in about 10 years. We have what we call "the shop" which consists of 2 buildings on a commercial lot and there is a large space with an aircraft hangar type sliding door where we worked on the car. I took the back bumper off and had that re-chromed and replaced the front right fender before I had it painted. When the back bumper came off I could see that the number "98" was written in grease pencil on the body behind the bumper and since I had the build sheet I knew that was the ROT number off the sheet. I had the paint shop leave that part of the car alone and even though I can't see it with the bumper on I know it's there. After looking at the picture of putting the bumper back on it is pretty amazing that we got it on with all three pieces adjusted in the correct place and it went on the first time, using a blanket and a cardboard box with just two of us! Almost forgot to mention that the build date on the car is Oct. 13, 1962 and I was born Oct 16, 1962.......

[Royce Richmond]

I love your landau it is great.
I have a question for you, in the picture with the rear bumper down could you have left the far in bolts in the brackets and frame rails if you weren't going to repaint the car and just lower the assembly? A friend has a 62 conv. and just wants to disassemble the "Q"s to replace the polished aluminum insert around the lens. seems that would be the best way to get at them.
Thanks Royce

[Alan H. Tast]

I love your landau it is great.
I have a question for you, in the picture with the rear bumper down could you have left the far in bolts in the brackets and frame rails if you weren't going to repaint the car and just lower the assembly? A friend has a 62 conv. and just wants to disassemble the "Q"s to replace the polished aluminum insert around the lens. seems that would be the best way to get at them.
Thanks Royce

Royce, to replace the buckets you've got two options:

1. Drop the bumper to get at the bucket retainers (you don't need to remove the Q's); OR

2. Use an old trick that was posted in the Scoop many years ago - grind off the the two retaining stove bolt heads from inside the bucket, then get J-nuts to attach to the brackets that hold the buckets against the bumper: drill out the square holes for the retaining bolts for new screws with shanks long enough to allow catching the retainer bracket but yet not bottom out against the trunk/taillight recess. Attach the ground wire for '63-style repro buckets to the bumper bracket, splice the wires for the taillight feeds, position the bracket and run the retaining screws down (probably the worst part of the process), then grind down the screw heads inside the bucket when done so that the lens will fit properly.

Replacing the buckets from from the outside of the bumper really needs to be documented for a follow-up article we have in the July-August 2020 Thunderbird Scoop on taillight buckets.

[Royce Richmond]

Alan can the bumper and brackets be rotated down by just removing only one each of the bracket to frame bolts and loosening the other two bracket to frame bolts. Thanks Royce

[Alan H. Tast]

I don't think so - there's enough bracket projecting past the forward-most bolt to keep the bumper from dropping down far enough. Just "bite the bullet" and do the job right - DROP THE BUMPER!!

Unless you try the alternative method for replacing the buckets by grinding off the carriage bolt heads and using J-nuts for reinstallation, all you'll be doing is creating frustration and wasting time by trying to do 1 or 2 steps when you really must take all of them. Been there, done that, have a LOT of new swear words in my vocabulary as a result.

[6T3BRD]

Royce, as the others have noted I just don't think it would be productive to try and just get the bumper off part way to change out the Aluminum tail light buckets in the Q's. It may appear to be a hassle but pulling the bumper is really not that hard and I would caution that whatever you do don't be tempted to remove the Q from the center bumper portion because the bolts that hold the three pieces of the bumper together allow sideways movement until tightened to adjust for the exact width that will make the bumper line up perfectly and pulling it off in one piece and leaving that way ensures that it will fit back on lined up perfectly. As for my car I was reinstalling a bumper that was rechromed as it had the common damage at the weak point where someone backs into something and it hits right at the fuel filler area. It was at this time that I replaced the Aluminum buckets that hold the tail light bulb because mine were dented by someone probably backing into things. I also replaced my red plastic portions of the tail lights at that time with some NOS ones I found on eBay. Basically the only things on the entire back of the car that are untouched original are the chrome inserts fit over the red plastic tail light portion that I did not have rechromed because I thought they were acceptable......