very rare WIW 1909 Franklin roadster

i will have to nail down the year, but i have access to very early Franklin 2 seat roadster body. i believe it to be a 1909. these were soft top cars with a sort of "buggy bonnet" type of top on them. the top bows are not there but the body is buildable and has been standing upright against the barn wall on my dads farm since before i was born. i have no pics yet, but only recently has he considered letting it go. from what i read on the net, the franklins car extremely rare cars, and i was just wondering if anyone might have an idea on its value, it has some rust in the floors but is very usable....

 

There's gonna be a few guys on here who are knowlegable about these cars. Would be neat to find a cheap Franklin ch***is for it, like a ratty sedan, and use your body on it....

 

If it's really a Franklin from that year, it's probably priceless...whatever that means.

a 1907 Fraklin picture from the web



There is a 1910 touring car, at the Franklin museum in Tucson.

 

Franklins used an air-cooled, front-mounted engine. They were never produced in huge quan***ies, and were built through 1934. Something like that needs to be restored and not built as a rod, IMO. It isn't a Model T or something similar that you can still trip over at a swap meet, 90 years later.

http://images.google.com/imgres?img...in&gbv=2&hl=en&sa=G&ei=5gpuSrWnLaXyswOi9o3LDg

 

Can't wait to see pictures...

 

Isn't the Franklin the car which used a wooden ch***is?
They are really interesting and innovative cars for their time.

 

Yes, they used a wooden ch***is in the early cars. Very advanced for their time, actually!

Far as WIW, "priceless" is a good answer. How many have you seen? Like EVERY SINGLE "WIW?" thread, it is worth the price that the buyer and seller agree to. Always.

 

i wish there was more of it here, the barrel hood may be around here somewhere, but i cant guarantee it, dad said the guy he had bought it from was going to rod it at one time, thought he was intending to mount it to a Vw ch***is, thank GOD that didnt happen. the pedals that are in it may or may not be original, as i dont know a thing about it... i will get pics as soon as i possibly can, who knew the old body i played in as a kid was anything of consequence?

 

its going to be at least a couple of days b4 i can get down there to get pics, but i will find this thread and add pics when i have them.

 

do they look like this?

 

Brush also used a wooden ch***is and axle. Lippy

 

if i remember correctly the pedals do have a grid pattern but i was thinking the ones in this car are oval...i will have to look again when i go to get pics.

 

ok, i took pics yesterday, and will download them asap. i could not set it down, as a tree is grown up behind it, so the pics are of it still upright against the wall. one unfortunate bit of news is that someone HAD begun the hot rodding/VW conversion. everything thats done is reversable but i hope they havent ruined the value of the car......the original tub and possibly the original running boards are there and buildable. the changes they have done are... it has 4 bobbed fenders pedistal mounted to the tub, the square pedals pictured above are there...brake and clutch anyway. and what appears to be the original shifter, but also a VW shift stick and they hogged a hole in the panel under the seat to put the shifter shaft through. and they have put a radius in the tail panel to allow the vw exhaust through...like i said, all reversabe, but none the less...it doesnt have the body line behind the seat that the 1910 has, so im going to say its earlier than 1910. i have not been able to find any more pics of earlier roadsters like the one above...but i would say that 05-07 would be reasonable if i had to guess. ill get pics up as soon as possible.

 

Chrome_fins, if the car you have is a Franklin i'd be more inclined to send your pics to the Franklin Club and have someone there give you advice on it's value. These cars are very rare and from what you have described it sounds like the body is intact and very useable. Looking forward to some pics.

I have added some pics of a 1911 Franklin Model D racer i have been seeking info on for sometime now. Enjoy.

 

The B&W picture of the car in my first post is a 1907 car. The 1910 car at the museum is a touring car (has a rear seat) and I don't have a good picture of the overall car.

 

I have seen a lot of rare cars in my lifetime and I have never seen a Franklin of that vintage but only in photos. The only Franklin I have run across was one from the mid twenties and it was a Pe*** Jean Ark Swap Meet.

Do not hot rod it! It is way too rare for anything like that, but if you do a restoration it might take a lifetime to find the parts.

 

oh, i have no intentions of rodding it, this was done in the 60s, dad has had is since 69...leaning against the barn wall. and i dont see myself restoring it, parts would be impossible to find, i would just like to see someone do something with it, museum, or whoever....its not doing anyone any good standing on its nose, rotting against the barn wall. its not a racer like the one posted, it sits very upright, like the one in b&w up there... that is the model that i have, just different year. if that one is an 07, this one may be earlier...same exact body format but like i said, it doesnt have the stamped body lines around the lower part of the seat, and the trunk area on the b&w one looks a little rounded to the rear, this one is more squared and angular. i will do pics when i get off work this evening and i will post them tomorrow when i get to work.

 

I'd say contact the Franklin club http://www.franklincar.org/ and post a "What do I have?" inquire. Don't ask what it's worth but I'd bet you find out real quick. someone may even have some serious and desirable to you trading material.
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The owner of the racer i posted is Ted Davis from Oklahoma City. It might be a good idea to get in touch with him.

 

sounds like an 05 roadster then

 

the trunk is not right on that one, the trunk angles like the b&w pic, but the one pictures looks like the rear end is rounded, this one the rear end is more squared. and im not sure, but i dont think the seat on ours overhangs the body like the 05...its got to be somewhere in between, maybe its on 06, i dunno. ill get pics on by this time tomorrow.

 

hmmm looks like 06 is the same as 05...

 

maybe it is later...he had told me he thought it was on 09....i ***umed it was earlier. i gueess i could see the progression from the 05-06 trunk into thetapered 07 then staying tapered and getting more square by 09. i dunno, the pictures will tell, and someone will hopefully be able to help me identify it. i havent seen anything else on the net that looked like it either.

 

Man .... this l'il sweetie looks intent ...!

Don't think I'd wanna step into her path!

 

1908 franklin:



if it's squared off in the back, I'd be willing to bet it's a 4-5 place touring car with the back seat taken off of it.

 

no, its not a touring car with the rear seat removed. if you take the car pictured above, mine has the exact same profile, but you see underneath the rear fender, where you can see the *** end of the trunk is round, this one has square corners. youll see what i mean when i post the pics.

 

well it looks like around 1910-1911 they moved to the tapered nose instead of the round tube looking deal.

 

i noticed that. it has to be before that, as mine has a flat firewall like these earlier ones, i suppose theres the possibility its not a franklin, but if its not, i dont have a clue what it would be. i have done SO MUCH research on the net looking at early cars to see if i could sleuth out other possibilities, and can find nothing on the internet that looks like it, dad is the only one who knows, and he was told it was a franklin when he got it... i hope its a franklin, considering what im reading on here, but if not, its still something very early 1900s....he is quite sure its a franklin...

 

here's the rear body of the 1910 touring car

 

H. H. Franklin Club, Inc.


http://www.franklincar.org/

They can help.