There is always the raging argument on 'glass vs steel (except in the Corvette circles, there it is 2 chains or 3 and do they all have to be gold?). Tupperware vs real steel. Some get pretty twisted about it. I was jut reading this today and wondered how things might be viewed differently in the "steel is real" crowd if WWII had not broken out just as this product was starting to make itself known. Thoughts? http://www.forgottenfiberglass.com/...c-bodies-for-cars-popular-science-march-1941/
Well, I'd venture to say, that if WWII hadn't broken out, there would have been a lot more steel cars to supply the Hot Rod masses. If you remember, a lot of older cars got crushed and melted for the war effort. Plus, the auto plants would have been building cars, instead of tanks, planes and ships. And then there are the population numbers. Roughly 400,000 Americans, civilian and military, were killed during the war years. 60 million world wide, Those figures would have been a game changer.
Fiberglass is considerably more time-consuming to manufacture, not including any additional bracing needed. When GM built the first Corvettes, they used fiberglass as it was marginally cheaper to use given the original anticipated low production numbers involved. When sales took off, GM gave serious thought to converting the 'Vette to conventional steel bodies, but was overruled by marketing as the fiberglass bodies had become identified with the Corvette and it was felt that the use of the 'exotic' material added to the cars image. GM spent a lot of money over the years 'engineering' around fiberglass's shortcomings in the 'Vette, not always successfully.
If cars were all made from composites, we would have a massive environmental disaster when trying to dispose of the bodies. This happened with the Trabant. Give me good old recyclable steel any day. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duroplast Disposal[edit] Similar to fiberglass, Duroplast has limited possibilities for efficient disposal. As discarded Trabants began to fill junkyards, disposing of the bodies inspired creative solutions. One of these was developed by a Berlin biotechnology company, who experimented with a bacterium that would consume the body in 20 days.[2][3] Urban legends, depicted in the movie Black Cat White Cat and described in a song by the Serbian band Atheist Rap, described recycling Duroplast by feeding the cars to pigs, sheep and other farm animals. In the late 1990s, the same Zwickau plant that manufactured the Trabant developed a solution for Duroplast disposal. After removing the glass, engine, and steel frame, the Duroplast shell is shredded and used as an aggregate in cement blocks for pavement construction. This was featured in an episode of the program Scientific American Frontiers on the American PBS TV channel.[1]
GM made 2 corvetts from metal in 1957 they were magnesium, i saw them run at Sebring in 1957, a friend that had retired from GM research was one of the ones that wheeled the corvetts, google 1957 SS CORVETT, he helped me build a car from pix i drew in 1957, will be finished in couple weeks, i'm amazed at how it has turned out, only took 26 years.
That is really cool, and even cooler that he helped you build one. Let's see some pictures of your steel clad hot rod. Hell, start up a thread about it.
Well... that settles the debate about wether Henry Ford would approve of fiberglass cars. Now I can build one guilt free. Great read. Thanks
The plastics Ford was experimented with were soybean or other plant based, technically should be biodegradable. They have the historic soybean lab at greenfield village where the research took place Sent from my SGH-T399 using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
I can just imagine some "head" trying to grind up a hemp car and attempting to smoke it! Guess Henry would have included a bag of chocolate chip cookies as standard equipment.
Glad that LM14 posted this, This was general knowledge in Ford History. Ever the innovative idea, plastics have revolutionized most all things that we use daily. A good point of reference can be found in a Traditional Holiday Movie “It’s a Wonderful Life!” Sam Wainwright tries to get George Bailey to invest in his family’s company, that companies specialty was “Plastics”. Two of this industry’s pioneers were Dick Williams AMBR winner and Poly-Form body/parts Mfg. The other-Dee Wescott. Wescott’s Auto Restyling. They both educated me and so many others on the benefits of glass. The above information was passsed on to me then as well as the date 1932 when DuPont actually dabbled in Polymer Component Experimentation as did Owens-Corning Fiberglass in the same decade. At one point, The DuPont’s had a great investment in General Motors, so it only s natural that a product produced by them would end up on a complete automotive product. Ford was in there as well as the top on my 55 T-Bird has been glass since the day it rolled out of the factory. Great Read Guys!
Yep, a great read for sure. Thanks LM ! That's the point right, "Now I can build one guilt free." If - If frogs had wings they wouldn't bump their ass on the ground every time they tried to fly. If - WWII didn't break out when it did, or not at all,,, A whole lot of stuff will be very very different.
Most cars now are mostly plastic, fiberglass, or some kind of composite material, with some steel structure. They may not rust like the old ones did, but they will sure crack and break up all over, and fly to pieces in a wreck. Plastics and composites have a place, but I prefer my rides to be mostly US steel.
I have seen a pic of henry ford with a hammer about to hit a '40 sedan trunk lid, he dared other car makers to do the same with their car... his was made from soy beans .
. I have a 2002 T-Bird, I can say that the hood, fenders, decklid and top are polyester resin derived, that’s another Ford product.... but I still like it as it’s a bookend to my 55. View attachment 3669803 “The times, they were a changing”
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