Try Hayden Cunningham in Lewisville Texas. He restores birds for a living/hobby and has a warehouse of knowledge as well as parts .

55Birdman  Hickory NC

THe real guru on TBirds is Gil Baumgartner. He is the CTCI Authenticity Chairman and restores TBirds. Go to the CTCI web site, I believe contact info is there. He also has a column in the site, Its called Gil's Garage.

54 Victoria 312;  48 Ford Conv 302, 56 Bird 312
Forever Ford
Midland Park, NJ

    Try Amos Minter out Dallas, Texas way--He's probably the guru for restoring '55-'57 T-birds,justsearch "Amos Minter" on your computer. You see his restorations on Barret-Jackson,Meccum,etc. KID

It is generally agreed that the "All numbers match" thing applies to Scrubs (those cars with bowties) not Fords.  It is my understanding that there are fewer SN's on the components of Ford products and that the key thing for T birds in this regard is that the components put in the car agree with the date code on the data plate as to design.  One of the CTCI clubs has the original FoMoCo buildup sheets for most '56 and '57 Birds. Check to see if they have yours.  There are a lot of other things to consider in building a CTCI senior points car but IMHO they are so specialized that they are of limited interest to the more engine oriented people on this site. 

Doug T

The Highlands, Louisville, Ky.

I thought I remembered from an earlier posting that you were restoring a TBird for a customer. I guess I was wrong?

54 Victoria 312;  48 Ford Conv 302, 56 Bird 312
Forever Ford
Midland Park, NJ

thanks guys, I joined the ctci club yesterday, Brian are you restoring your bird now?

I was wondering, what client would that be?

I have had and still have one or two of these "flappers" for 50's and 60's Fords and have never seen a cast-in part number or even a date code that I recall.

Brian

Cylinder Index = 84

Current Experiment = `57 Tbird, Grand Rapids, Michigan

Go here to get a look, and make sure yours looks like this (hit the down arrow until page 63)

http://www.classicautoparts.com/pdfindex/tbird/TransmissionRadiatorCoolingGasTanksAndRelated.pdf

You looking for numbers for internal engine parts? Nobody examines these.



Get the manual mentioned. and have your client (and you) join CTCI. They have an authenticity blurb that you can follow. These are the items CTCI judging looks for in this catagory.

54 Victoria 312;  48 Ford Conv 302, 56 Bird 312
Forever Ford
Midland Park, NJ