I bought a '31 Coupe late last Summer. I can't recall the seller's name on the HAMB, but his name was Lou, and his Wife's name was Mary, so the car has been named "Mary Lou". I think it seems an appropriate name for a Model A. I had promised myself not to do anything with the A until I got some other things finished, one of them being to disassemble, clean, paint and reassemble the T roadster that my son and I built about 12 years ago. That's done, I've gotten a couple other things finished up and final today had a chance to tinker with the A a bit. It took a little fiddling, a trip to the convenience store for a couple gallons of gas (how'd the tank go dry??), finally remembering the car is positive ground to hook up a battery charger, and after a substantial number of choke-on, choke-open cycles, and lots of exercising of the starter she finally came to life, sputtering at first and eventually clearing out all 200 cubic inches, from a near flooded condition, into a steady idle. Well, that only left one thing to do, drive from my shop to my house (about 500 Ft.) hit a good long lick on the A-OOO-GA horn to alert my wife of our arrival and we took Mary Lou out for a very short drive.....2.1 miles. It was a blistering trip, believe-you-me, topping out about 45 MPH, according to a rather risky glance at the speedometer while "at speed". Now it's time to get to work. I have a rough plan for the car which I would guess is a late-40's type style; retaining the 4-banger with mild mods but updating to some sort of overdrive transmission, hydraulic brakes, about a 3-4" drop in front and about 2-3" drop in the rear, and providing I can find a set nearby at a reasonable price, a set of 16" wires. Let the fun begin. Here's a couple photos of Mary Lou back in my shop after her 1st run with me as her curator. Lynn
A high compression head will change your car from a putt putt toy to a driver that will keep up with modern traffic in town. A 84-87 F150 fully synchronized 3 speed with overdrive will get rid of the awful original and make driving a pleasure and you get to keep the torque tube. Then of course Bendix self adjusting brakes will be needed. Skip right past Lockheed brakes and get the good stuff. 12 volts allows you to give and receive jump starts. Tirerack has 195/80R16 Radial tires that are only 1" wider tread and cost less than Model A tires and tubes.
Thanks for the positive replies and the "likes". Today I was looking the car over a bit more assessing the scope of what lies ahead. I've always been curious, since I bought the car, why the hood alignment was so bad. I had feared that the front of the frame was bent to one side. Without a second person to help hold up a long straight edge, or do some diagonal measurements, it looks like the frame is indeed bent toward the passenger side, maybe up to 1/2". I admit I should have looked the car over a bit better before I bought it, but the excitement of buying an A, and having driven hundreds of miles with a trailer and a pocket full of money to look at it, I don't think I was as objective as I should have been. Overall I still do think the car is quite solid but the more I look at it the more warts I see. Had I spent a bit more money I could have started with an older restoration car, but pretty paint can hide a multitude of sins. Oh well, it's mine now and I guess it'll just be a bit more of a project than I originally thought. I'm thinking now it will end up being a frame up build, but at least I'll know a lot more about the finished product when it's done and it will definitely be done more nicely. Lynn
Hello, Mary Lou! You know the rest of the song, right? Most old cars buys have a few surprises, l bet you'll figure it out. Any pics of your T? Enjoy.
Well, good A frames are pretty cheap and since you are probably going to be replacing a great deal of the other chassis components when you go thru it; you could always build up a new chassis while keeping it a driver. Might as well get some fun out of the car as it is while building the new chassis.
Hmmmm. I never thought of that approach! That's like having my cake and eating it too (although I never did quite understand the logic of that saying). Not having any use of Mary Lou through what could become an extended period was not a happy thought, so building up a "spare" chassis might be something for me to seriously consider. Thanks! Lynn
Theres quite a bit of info on the Fordbarn about using a hydraulic jack and chain to straighten the frame --in car--Not much downtime when doing that
Thanks! I'll do some looking and searching there. I'm all about not turning something that might be a molehill into a mountain. I appreciate it, manyolcars! Lynn
As work on the A has progressed I keep finding more on the car that I wish I had discovered before I bought it. One of the more recent discoveries is subrails at the rear body mount points that are completely rusted away. So, now it's come to body-off to take care of that as well as re-doing some really shoddy patching of other rusted panels - bottoms of both inner wheel wells and hard telling what else. I'm kicking myself more and more as time goes on for buying the car but it's in my shop now and I don't see turning back. Other mechanical issues have reared their ugly head as well. I had already collected a AA bellhousing to do a planned RTS170 transmission conversion and intended to retain the Model A 4-banger. I had also bought an aftermarket B-style, 5.2:1 compression head, as well as a Model B distributor and carb cores to rebuild. When I got to the rearend and pulled the hubs/drums, I found that the spider gears seem to have excessive backlash as well as rust and pitting on the bearing area of the axle housing where the hub bearing rides. So, with one disappointment after another I've decided to change my build plan to swap the rearend for a later open drive rearend with good brakes, and replace the Model A engine with a 2.5L Chevy S-10 engine and T-5 transmission that I pulled from a donor truck I had originally bought for that purpose. I would have loved to do a more "traditional" build but living in a rural area without the benefit of an active hot rodding community nearby for support, parts chasing would probably drive me crazy and drag out the build to a really long process. I don't plan to do any non-reversible changing just in case I would ever get all of the A driveline sorted and could potentially go back to it, but for now I guess it's headed in a direction that is no longer traditional. BTW...in my frustration of what I consider mis-representation of the car by the seller the name Marylou is no longer applicable. Yes, I should have looked at it more carefully to know what I was getting and now I'm paying the price. Such is life, and it will go on. Lynn
Still a neat car to have. A lot of us , I surmise see the reality warts and abuses when we have a vehicle back home and a new day with a more objective mind.
Since I'm changing direction on the Model A I'm considering different front brake options and some would require using '37 and later front spindles. Those spindles would normally use the thrust bearing under the king pin boss of the axle, but if using Model A king pins that have a substantial flange at the top of the kingpin (trimmed down mech. brake pivot socket) could the later spindles be assembled "Model A style" with the thrust bearing at the top of the axle boss? I'd like to do that if possible to get the extra 1/4-3/8" drop. Put another way, are the earlier (Model A) and later ('37 and up) spindles the same dimensionally in terms of the gap between the king pin boss's and the overall height of the spindles at the king pin? Lynn
No; have to use the later kingpins with the bearing under the axle. The later spindles have a larger opening than the '28-'36 spindles.
I almost had to do a drawing to follow what you're saying, but I think I got it now. In my mind I was thinking the "Model A" assembly also had the thrust bearing within the yoke of the spindle but above the axle, but I now recall it's on top of the spindle king pin boss and retained by the thrust surface of the older kingpin. Thanks. Lynn
I have made some progress, but the idea of using the Model A 4-banger went by the wayside and I dropped referring to the car as "Mary Lou" as I mentioned in post #12. I haven't started a different thread, but since you asked here's a couple current photos of the frame and what I've gotten done in the last few months. I narrowed a 8" Ford rearend and mounted it with a shortened (narrowed?) Model A spring. Built radius rods and brackets and added a crossmember to mount them. The 2.5L Chevy engine and transmission are in place. I ended up using a Borg Warner 4 speed (almost identical to a T-5 but no overdrive) that will work well with the gear ratio of the 8" Ford rearend. Vega steering is installed (to the frame) and a lot of other things, like building a new drag link and tie rod that really don't show as major progress, have been done. Today I'm working on building a mount for brake and clutch pedals and their master cylinders. Other than today's project, much of the other work came during a very productive period of about 10 days. I guess I was in "the zone" and didn't get the distractions that typically come up. Lynn
The Model A is still at about the same point. A friend has had the body at his body shop since about April. I guess I shouldn't have told him it wasn't a big rush and to just fit it in when he could. In the meantime, I've distracted myself with a couple projects that I realize don't really crank my tractor....a '48 Ford Coupe and a 'glass 33 Willys. The '48 Ford Coupe is currently for sale and the Willys will go up for sale shortly. I'm wrapping up making the Willys a roller.....hopefully in the next couple days. Once the shop is cleared I want to get back to working on things for the A. Even before the body comes back there's plenty to do. I look forward to re-gaining my focus. Lynn
I used to see that often, a buddy swears up and down on how good a job he can do and for a good price.... you take it there, after a while you realize that he is painting insurance jobs [money] while your body collects coffee cup rings... good thing that does not include all buddies...
It's taken longer than I had hoped but I can't fault him for putting his business interests and responsibilities first. Much of the time he's been operating a 3-man shop with 2 people. It's not uncommon to see the lights on in his shop well into the evening. It seems there just aren't a lot of qualified body men available and looking for work to fill that last position. In any case....I was pleased that he'd even take the project of doing patch panels, etc.. Having known him (Jim) for nearly 50 years I know he does nice work and when it's done it will have been worth the wait. Lynn
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