1940 Mercury Convertible - Miracle Mercury

For many folks, after they start on a street rod project, they see it through to the very end. Some others might consider the point they sell the project before it's finished as the very end, but for others it's when they get to drive to the local donut shop or burger joint and sit in a booth and stare out the window at the vehicle they just spent the last six years building.

But there is yet another scenario: one where a hot rodder gets most of the way through a build before realizing there is an easier path to follow. For Mark Jaynes from Beavercreek, Ohio, it came at about the halfway mark while building a '40 Mercury convertible.

As most people who have owned one know, '40 Merc 'verts are fairly rare, as only 9,700 or so of them were built that year. Most owners also have to deal with what they have, making the best of what is sometimes a bad situation. A few years back Jaynes was driving around in a '40 Merc convertible he really liked and, more importantly, had a lot of fun with. He had traded it for a '34 Ford sedan he owned for 17 years and knew the '40 wasn't as nice as it could be, but it was something he didn't have to worry too much about. With its primered decklid and hood contrasting its red body, it only took 5 years before the kidding from his friends shamed him into doing a complete paint job, starting with the removal of the old paint.

But, as Mark tells it, it seemed the paint was the only thing holding the car together. He found it needed floors, lower quarters, inner and outer rockers, inner wheel housings, windshield posts and more. It was so bad he even thought about cutting the body up into three pieces and hauling it away.

Instead, he dove into replacing all of the required body panels, and the work was indeed tedious. About halfway into the redo, the mother of Mark's fianc, who happened to be the editor of a Model A club newsletter in Spokane, Washington, told Mark's fianc about a '40 Merc convertible that was for sale in one of the club newsletters. The car was in Yakima, and had barely survived a garage fire. It seems the paint had been blistered, and a rafter fell and creased a section of the car, but overall it was still in pretty good shape. The fire occured while the car was apart in the garage, with the hood, interior parts, N.O.S. runningboards, and other small pieces stored in another location and its perfect grille hanging on a wall so it wouldn't get damaged. Unfortunately they hung the grille on the fuse box, which is where the fire started, so it was the first item to turn into a puddle of metal.

Since Mark was across the country, he asked his fiance's brother in Washington to check it out and send him some photos. He did, and after hearing the owner wanted $10,000 for the car, Mark bought it and eventually drove across the country with his buddy, Russ Speelman, to get it and bring it home. Even with the searing Mark could tell the new car was much better than the old one but knew only after having the body dipped at American Metal Cleaning in Cincinnati would he know for sure. After the 60-year-old body came back from the stripper it looked like it had just been created by the factory yesterday and, except for the crease across the daisy panel (the section above the trunk lid), Mark couldn't find even a pinhole of rust.

Though the excellent quality of the metal surprised him, Mark now had two '40 Merc convertibles at this point, so he made the decision to finish up the first one and sell it so he could concentrate on the second. But before doing so, he did swap the chassis, as the one under the "fire" car already had a 302/C4 engine-and-trans combo and an 8-inch rearend. He didn't know much about Fords, and his original chassis was setup with a Chevy 350/700-R4 combo, so it was good enough for Mark.