1949 Ford - Sweet Lemonade

While most adults can remember a simpler time back when they were kids, only a few will remember those times as the genesis for a lifelong addiction to hot rods. And though many guys who are into rodding today can relate to that type of upbringing, it is a little more rare when a female can recount similar stories.

Connie Russell is one such woman, and before she met her hot rodding other half, her father had instilled in her what would become a lifelong admiration of cars. In fact, she said, "Our fathers were hauling us around car shows in little red wagons before we could say Studebaker." Before they were married, Connie and Mike grew up in different states, but then met, married, and settled in Mooresville, North Carolina, before they began to discover they both had many car stories to tell each other.

A few years back, Mike found out that Connie still had one of the cars from her dad's collection of seven vehicles. What's more, it was a '49 Ford sedan-the first of Ford Motor Company's postwar slab-side designs. Connie's father had bought the car in 1983 from its original owner who had kept it locked in a barn in Pennsylvania. Her dad had begun to disassemble the car for restoration but passed away before he could finish the job. The car sat for 16 years before Connie's mother decided it would make a great second wedding anniversary present for her daughter and new husband.

Mike and Connie continued the work her father had started, tearing the car down to the frame and starting pretty much from square one. As it turned out, there was very little rust with which to contend, and Mike determined the best way to begin would be to add a new front clip from Fatman Fabrications, which would allow for a new independent front suspension system as well as disc brakes and mounting points for the new crate engine.

The work was mostly done in Mike and Connie's two-car home garage, though Mike's job as a fabricator at a local race car shop allowed for some chassis work to be completed there. With the Fatman front clip in place, Mike also installed dropped spindles (2-inch), 12-inch drilled and slotted front disc brakes (with calipers from PBR) from Master Power Brakes, and a Flaming River power rack-and-pinion setup. Out back, an 8-inch rear (3.00:1) went in, as did a pair of drum brakes and a set of 3-inch-drop leaf springs. The frame was smoothed out and then painted before adding the wheels-Nitto-wrapped Billet Specialties 17s and 18s-to make it a roller.

Though adding a Chevy drivetrain to a classic Ford might upset some purists, the low cost and availability of a GM Performance Parts crate engine made it an easy choice for Mike and Connie. The engine went in backed to a TH350 transmission, which was outfitted with a B&M Shift Improving Kit. Other engine items included a radiator from U.S. Radiator, 2.5-inch ceramic-coated exhaust with Dynomax mufflers, and an MSD ignition system equipped with Taylor wires.

But while all of the undercarriage work was necessary to bring the car up to today's standards, you wouldn't normally have to do much to the body to make it a clean hot rod-they're that good looking 50 years after it came off Ford's drawing board. But Connie and Mike decided to tune some of the exterior features of the '49 to make it truly unique. The changes are subtle enough that even folks who are into '49 Fords may not pick up on everything that was done.

Under the shaved and peaked hood, sections of the inner fenderwells have been reshaped to cover some of the front suspension pickup points. The serial number stamped into the middle of the firewall-a large, 3/4-inch-tall set of numbers and letters-was left in its stock location to make the car look as factory as possible. But how many people would notice the front wheel opening was opened up 2 inches rearward to more closely match the rear wheel opening?

Mike also performed some kustom tricks-frenched headlights, shaved decklid and door handles, flush-mounted gas lid door, and removal of the rear vent windows in favor of one-piece panes from Vintage Glass-on the body before he prepped and painted the car, a 2000 Volvo purple, in his home garage. Once done, reassembly began with stock bumpers (but attached with '34 Ford bolts) rechromed by Tri-City Plating. The Glenn Marion Ford Garage in Grain Valley, Missouri, capably handled other chroming, such as the grille and other pieces for the car. For a truly custom piece, Mike had Clay Cook create a pair of "Forty-Nine" emblems from aluminum, which were attached to each of the forward fenders. Another custom aluminum trim piece (CNC'd by Tom Ferrell) accents the decklid where the original license plate light was mounted, as the car's current plate is mounted under the trunk and flips down into view when the car is started.

If you've never looked inside a '49 Ford, then know they are cavernous. Even when they rolled off Ford's assembly line with big bench seats way back when, they were big inside. But when you strip everything out and install a pair of form-fitting bucket seats up front, then it begins to look like the interior of a concert hall!

Mike and Connie took advantage of the space and contracted about the only outside work done on the car: the interior. She and Mike found a pair of bucket seats (they think they may be out of a late-model Nissan) for $25 at a local auto swap meet and took the seats and a design concept Connie had to Chuck Hanna, who runs Hot Rod Interiors in Mooresville, North Carolina. The dash was redesigned to have its peak taper off to a flat section in front of the driver, and a Stewart Warner gauge panel was turned upside down and mounted forward of the steering wheel. From there, Auto Meter gauges were installed with the help of a Haywire 21-circuit wiring harness. The dash was also blended in the middle to create a center console to which the Hot Rod Air climate controls and vents were mounted, along with a Sony stereo head unit.

Dynamat sound-deadening material was installed on the floor sections before a sand-colored wool carpet was laid out. The buckets were stripped of their stock material and Chuck stitched them up with a two-tone sand and cream pattern using a synthetic leather. The headliner was also done in the same cream material, and the door panels, also done in two-tone, feature a flush-mounted flap that opens to the inside section of the doors that can hold maps, a fire extinguisher, etc. Juliano's three-point seatbelts were also installed and, as a capper, a polished aluminum Billet Specialties steering wheel bolts to a color-coded ididit steering column.

Since completion, the Russells have traveled more than 5,000 miles in their new ride, visiting many rod runs throughout the South, picking up some cool awards along the way, and they even revisited that garage in Pennsylvania where they originally got the car. But back when they first pulled the '49 out of that garage, Connie's mom kept worrying that she had given the young couple a lemon, asking over and over, "Do you think it's too far gone to save it?" Well, as everyone knows, when life gives you a lemon, you make lemonade, and Mike and Connie Russell have proof as to how sweet that lemonade can be!