wayne sheldon
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Posts posted by wayne sheldon
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You sure find some really interesting early stuff John E G!
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16 hours ago, Toyon said:
Am I nuts?
Maybe not any more than a lot of us here? I have restored a few lesser cars that were worse than that! If one has the skills, room, tools, and time and money enough? It could be done in a home-shop setting.
Years ago, I had a 1925 series 80 four door sedan. I loved that car. It was in so much better condition than that when I bought it, but it still took a fair amount of work to sort it out and make it really tour ready. For several years I enjoyed driving it on nickel era club tours, other events, even did display only at a couple low end concourse events. Unfortunately, I had to sell it when we bought our first real home. I would give almost anything to have another one.
That said, I cannot in good conscience encourage someone to attempt such a restoration unless they have sufficient experience with major restorations, and all that they entail.
I WANT someone to restore this car! I would love to know it was being done and done reasonably well. But this is the sort of project that breaks probably 95 percent (or more!) of people that attempt one.
At 70 plus now, I cannot take on another major project car. I still have four project cars I need to try to finish, two of which are nearly as major as is this one, and both are at least as worthy of being done.
For me? I enjoy the challenge, the special satisfaction, every part I restore that nobody else was willing to attempt to do! I have brought several cars that were considered "unrestorable" back to the point of looking good and being ready to tour on a moments notice! (I have never been sure they were ever actually finished?) Most of those cars I drove and enjoyed for several years. I enjoy both the restoration process and the driving the cars once they are ready.
But that is me.
A lot of very smart people on this forum will say it cannot be done, it SHOULD NOT be done. I won't say that. I will again say that most people cannot do it! But only you can answer whether or not you might be able to.
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5 hours ago, JACK M said:
You can call it ugly, but I like it.
I - DID - call it ugly, and it is too new to really interest me, but frankly, I too like it!
It is/was a very important time in history, both world and automotive. A last automobile vestigial of earlier wealth and opportunities being crushed by a war for world domination. The 1929 crash and following depression certainly helped that world political shift along!
This particular car is a touchstone of both world and automotive histories at a crucial turn in time (for humanity).
The "high hat" styling of the car doesn't really blend well with the sleek modern (for 1940!) front end. But somehow to me it gives the car a uniqueness that I find attractive.
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3 hours ago, m-mman said:
Hummmmm……in 1942 Russia had been at war nearly 3 years. Certainly they maintained a consulate in NYC but I highly doubt that a custom built limousine (any make) would have been of interest to them.
A complicated time in Russian history. Stalin was head of the USSR at that time, and forced into war by German invasion. He certainly did not care about the Russian people, but was still trying to feign friendly to the US. I could certainly see them spending good money on an embassy car.
The truth is that Stalin had absolute plans to eventually invade the US, and Germany's attempt to take over the world put an end to them. Think about that for a few minutes?
Interesting car. Ugly no matter how I look at it.
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33 minutes ago, brasscarguy said:
Mine is obvious. I've owned and collected brass cars since I was 14, I'm now 80. However since I have recently purchased another brass t with a very unusual racing engine I am going to change my name here. When I purchased this car it came with a gold guilt framed sign, which fit in with the car, "Dr Gallivan"
My new 1915 T roadster has a Gallivan dual overhead cam model t racing engine with magneto ignition and 2 very large Winfields. This car has been clocked by the Washington State Patrol at 113 miles per hour, no not by me, but the original restorer back in the late 50's. One of 7 made in the mid 20's.
brasscarguy/Dr Gallivan!!
I have known you as "brasscarguy" for so long now, I don't know if I can make that change? (No worries, I'll manage. I also remember that car from back in the 1960s!)
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Don't get me going! Peter G would ban me for sure? But a few things.
My mother was a journalism major, graduated in 1950. Me? School, teachers, and I never got along very well, so although I went to college to learn subjects I wanted to take, I never declared a major or got any degree. Through many of the past thirty years, my mother and I would discuss the sad state of journalism "today".
While I always appreciate people sharing links to interesting articles about our collector and historic automobiles? I rarely ever follow any link with the "msn" in its address! Way too many of them have been so poorly written, often so incorrect, that number one they are pointless, and number two they are often so egregiously in error that they have no value whatsoever, not even as entertainment!
How anybody could in any way be proud of writing such garbage is beyond me!
On 2/11/2024 at 1:00 PM, DFeeney said:The great arrogance of the present is to forget the intelligence of the past.
DF, I have said similar things hundreds of times myself, but never quite so eloquently. I may need to memorize that line and quote it myself. Any permission needed or credit to give?
On 2/11/2024 at 9:07 AM, Gunsmoke said:Good journalism should never leave the reader to do the work.
So much of this poor journalism goes on today, including within the major cable media, where half truths are dressed up as truth, false information dressed up as facts, and gullible audiences often are left to accept fiction as fact. So sad.
Truer words were never said.
The survival of civilization is wholly dependent upon language and communication! One should wonder about anyone that thinks a breakdown in language is acceptable.
On to much more interesting things! That Napier is incredible! Floor sweepings or not. The sad fact of early racing cars is that most did not last long without major changes, engine swaps, or being wrecked. With a few exceptions like Locomobile "Old 16", very few truly original racing cars actually survive intact. The vast majority of significant racing cars were "on-off" cars to begin with. Rebuilding them from a few remnants is a massive undertaking as so much of it has to be made from scratch.
I love a car like this one is said to be, resurrected from a few original major parts to as close to original as can be reasonably done.
I myself have resurrected a few model T speedsters or racing cars from what I willingly accept the term "floor sweepings", I used as many original era speedster and racing car pieces as I could. I made them close to era correct in general design, materials, and methods as I could. I still have a couple project piles of era pieces that maybe I can resurrect another one or two? How else can one really enjoy the feel of racing of that era? How else can many people be able to see such cars in action?
Bringing back era racing cars is a subject I could go on about for hours!
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Some years ago, a good friend had a specific marque (I won't at this time mention the well known marque) one-off custom built 1915 roadster fully restored (at great expense!). After completion, I went to see the car back in their private collection. I don't recall the wheelbase, but for 1915 it was huge! Especially for a roadster! We were talking about the car, and they were curious, so I was elected to sit in the driver's seat, while they took a tape measure and measured the distance from the tip of my nose to the back of the Motometer! Sitting naturally in the driver's seat, it was exactly nine feet from the tip of my nose to the back of the Motometer!
That is more than the wheelbase (only 100 inch) of my 1915 model T runabout?
What a great view from sitting in that big roadster looking out the long hood to see that Motometer so far away.
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16 hours ago, Leif in Calif said:
what's with the yellow headlights?
Can't be sure without looking up close. There were some after-market headlamp lenses sold in the 1920s that were yellow, but I don't think these are those.
Most likely, just the silver on the reflectors has tarnished badly. I have seen a lot of them tarnished to about that color, although usually in headlamps that have broken lenses. Quite often, if a headlamp has been kept closed and indoors out of the elements, the reflectors even after nearly a hundred years will be still fairly shiny! But I have seen exceptions over the years. If the headlamp is supposed to have some sort of gasket between the lens and the reflector, but that gasket is missing or has shrunk so much that most of it has slid out of place, sometimes the reflector can tarnish badly. Certain corrosive chemicals can become airborne, and even if a headlamp is closed up, a small amount of those chemicals can do a lot of damage to the silvering. Most headlamps that era had drains and/or small ventilation holes to let condensation or rain water out. Given enough time, those small holes can "breath" enough air out and in to allow some amount of silver corrosion.
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The 1913 touring car has a flaw in the design that left them with weak sills not adequately supporting the back of the touring car body. The problem began showing up early in the 1913 production, so Ford rushed "fixes" which sort of worked, and had dealers call all buyers they could to "fix" them for no cost to the customer. That is sometimes considered one of the first automobile recalls!
Ford also rushed a design change to correct the real problem. For this reason, the touring cars began getting the 1914 style bodies about July of 1913, and both 1913 and 1914 style touring car bodies were being assembled into cars through July and August. Interesting to note, that during those few months, a fair number of cars got a "mix" of year/style/model details. 1913 style touring cars might have a 1914 style windshield while down the line a 1914 style touring car might have a 1913 windshield!
With the exception of those anomalous how ever many? Looking at the windshield hinge is often the quickest way to identify whether a car in a photograph is a 1913 or 1914.
The runabouts as in this car for sale, however, were not affected by the weak design of the touring car sills. With no back seat to carry people, there was no urgent need to make the body change for the upcoming year. Researchers and knowledgeable owners I have spoken with seem to not be sure just when the change was made to the 1914 style with the rounded bottom doors. The general informed opinion seems to be that the runabouts changed quite a bit later than did the touring cars, likely September or October of 1913. One highly respected brass era T expert who has spent many days researching at the Benson Ford Archives said that at least a few 1913 style runabouts left the factory as late as December of 1913. The engine of this car is said to be November of 1913. So it could possibly have either the earlier or later style body.
And of course, timelines for Canadian production may have been different, although most of the general details remained close to USA built cars at that time.
I sure wish the pictures of this car were a lot better. Lots of details just don't show in the pictures. I can't even tell if the turtle deck is a correct era or not? It would be nice to know if it is a Canadian production car or not?
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13 hours ago, Matt Harwood said:
Is a 54-year-old photo old enough to be "period?" Because a 1970 Superbird in the snow with tire chains is just plain awesome.
It may not technically belong in the "Prewar" period photos section? And there is in fact a "Postwar" period photos section where it may be more appropriate? (Which I rarely look in myself!) However, it is a wonderful photo, and interesting to me. One of the arrogant entitled children of doctors and lawyers that I was forced to share my high school experience with had one of those "Superbird"s and drove it to school during my (and his) senior year. I very much preferred my 1929 Reo coupe that I sometimes drove to school!
No complaints from me.
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12 hours ago, Leif in Calif said:
, Moe hair interior,
I wish I had a picture of Moe Howard to share?
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I notice the AR brake and probably truck transmission. If it still has the AR clutch and other special early AR parts, they may have been worth the price themselves!
The great thing about it is that such doodle bugs have a following these days, Facebook pages, clubs and all! One could remove the AR parts and replace them with common later pieces and still keep the doodle bug as what it is.
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3 hours ago, rocketraider said:
If I said what I really think about what these pandering demagogues are trying to do I'd probably get banned from the Forums.
Suffice to say that we, as AACA types, have a vested interest in preserving history and should take affront at any attempt to destroy or rewrite it. Learn from it and move on.
This forum is one of the few places left in the world that I find any pleasure in spending a bit of time with like-minded intelligent people. So I have mixed feelings about the hard line on NO politics. I certainly understand it. To a point I completely agree with it? But some things in our pathetic world today cross a line and something needs to be said! And this is one of those things.
Frankly, I have been wondering when this was going to happen. The writing has been on the wall for over ten years now. This particular monument hasn't been around long enough to have a historic standing deep enough to survive the current state of affairs. But what comes next? Mount Rushmore? The Washington Monument? The Lincoln Memorial?
If the moderators want to delete my reply? They have my permission. I just hope they do not put me on restriction again. I don't think I could handle it right now.
History MATTERS! And if it doesn't? Neither do our cars, or us.
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3 hours ago, pkhammer said:
I'm happy that a nice guy won the auction and the parts will enable another car to live on.
A lot of money for what is there, but a lot of worse things could have happened instead.
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On 2/7/2024 at 4:22 PM, lump said:
they gave him a good-natured nickname after a Red Skelton drunk character, "Willy Lump-Lump." The nickname stuck, but eventually was shortened to just "Lump."
As a really longtime fan of Red Skelton, I will attach a special consideration to your postings! Just for that association.
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Fantastic! A friend in Idaho has one of these he did an incredible restoration of many years ago. It is still one of his favorite tour cars!
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Headlamps are universal sealed beam replacement lamps sold in the 1940s and 1950s. They would fit most cars from the early 1920s into the early 1930s that were still being used as daily driver cars. Used to see a lot of model A Fords with them!
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6 hours ago, Dave Mellor NJ said:
I thought the brass was only in early 16 and they went to black at some point. They used to have a lot of 16s with brass rads but they weren't correct but they're worth more. you could tell by the 50-50 or 60-40 windshield
A common misconception that persists to this day caused by faulty memories that were relied on in the early days of this hobby. Much of what was "believed" in the 1950s well into the 1970s was incorrect. Serious research didn't begin until the late 1960s. Numerous books and various guides were published before then that contained a great many errors. Serious researchers (including myself!) are still debating on many details and the timelines surrounding them. Hundreds of researchers (I wish included me?) have spent thousands of hours searching through Ford's archives! They have found mountains of important information! Unfortunately, even those records are sometimes wrong.
There are records of changes that have never happened, dated records that for whatever reason were written either before (planning stages) they happened, or "corrected" later and the dates given are wrong. There are also many things that were planned on, written into sales literature but then production delays of some sort would prevent them from happening (like wire wheels being standard equipment on 1926/'27 sedans!).
Ford, like most automakers, usually made a model year change about August to October of most years bringing out the next year's model. However, production delays had the 1915 open cars not going into real production until January of 1915! I generally refuse to debate the "model year" of model Ts built between August and December as too many people are passionately crazy one way or another!
Fact is, that there are at least FOUR different years to be considered. "Model" year, "calendar" year, "style" year, and "fiscal" year. Each of those varies from one year to the next, and for about a third of all model Ts ever built, more than one of those "years" may apply. And there is in fact, a fifth "year" that may apply? The year the car was first sold. And a sixth year, the year given on its registration? Shall we continue?
Ford in the early days was so busy building a brave new world that they never made really clean changes from one year to the next. Six months after the 1914 "model" year ended, Ford was still build 1914 "style" open cars! For about four months (part of December 1914 till nearly the end of April 1915, Ford was building both 1914 style and 1915 style open cars in the same factories!
Arguably, the 1915 "model" year was replaced by the 1916 "model" year somewhere around October of 1915. Although, running changes of numerous details had been made during the entire year! Changes continued to be made through some of the 1916 model year. The change to the 1917 model year was a bit cleaner. While there was some crossover while both styles were being built, that particular crossover time was fairly short (in the Fall of 1916 where it basically belonged).
The slightly taller painted black shell covered radiator that defined the 1917 model year came and stayed without much trouble. From a practical standpoint, if it was from that timeframe, and it had the earlier style brass radiator? It was a 1916 "model". If it had the new stylish taller black painted radiator shell? It was and is a 1917 "model".
The folding windshield was mentioned. THAT change actually occurred in stages during the 1917 model year! Early 1917s can often be spotted in era photographs because they had the 1915/'16 style windshield with the even folding hinges! If the photo detail is good enough? One can sometimes make out the mounting brackets. The 1915/'16 windshield brackets were riveted onto the frame and bolted onto the cowl. The first few months of 1917 MODEL/STYLE cars, mostly built in late CALENDAR 1916 and into January of 1917 had the same windshield, brackets, and mountings as the 1915s and 1916s. Somewhere early in CALENDAR 1917, the mounting brackets were changed, and they were held to the windshield frame by two round head slotted screws instead of two rivets! However for another month or more, the hinges were still even folding! Then the hinges were changed so that the hinge pin was held higher above the lower glass causing the offset folding windshield frame which continued through "model" year 1922 on USA built open cars. Canadian built model Ts had a major windshield change about 1920 making them different than the USA built Ts, Canadian built Ts had slanted windshields with two folding panes instead of one, as well as one-man tops beginning about 1920. The uneven folding windshield gave somewhat better ventilation in warmer weather as well as affording a bit more protection for the driver and passengers when the windshield was folded back.
A whole book could be written about the string of changes in Model Ts through the "model" years 1914 through 1917!
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Billy K, Great story! And appropriate for this thread.
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Don't confuse the "cable cars" with "electric trolley cars". San Francisco has BOTH!
Electric trolley cars are basically a bus or sometimes even an open delivery truck that may run on the street itself or on a train type track either in the street or separate from the street. They may be powered by batteries carried on the trolley, or from an electrical cable carefully placed and maintained especially for their use. Most of them are powered by special power cables which may be strung overhead or might be underground, or even in part or whole the tracks themselves (rare due to safety issues). Some electrical trollies may still use a main power overhead cable and well grounded rails for partial return path. (I think a lot of them are still that way?)
"Cable cars" use a miles long continuous steel cable underground that is continuously moving in a single direction (very long numerous loops!) which the cable car grabs onto to be pulled along with the underground cable. The basic design dates back to the 19th century in cities built upon mountains (small to sometimes very large mountains?).
The wonderful idea behind the design is that it is actually fairly energy efficient! Although the cable has to pull each and every cable car up every covered hill, at the same time, another car is going down that or another hill on the same miles long line. So while some cars are fighting gravity, other cars are being pulled by gravity to offset the power demands! Once the system is powered up and going at its designed speed, the amount of energy to keep it moving is not as much as one might expect.
The design was originally proposed in the 19th century because trollies were originally pulled by horses. Cities like San Francisco on major hills had a lot of problems with horses collapsing and often dying pulling the trollies uphill, or brakes failing going downhill! Accidents were very common, causing a lot of expensive damages and even deaths of passengers or pedestrians.
As long as the cables were well maintained, once the cable car was locked onto the cable and running along, accidents or brake failures were rare.
San Francisco is credited with being first, however at one time a couple dozen cities around the USA and even the world also ran cable car lines similar to Sn Francisco's.
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Says LaSalle. Minor point.
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"Early" history of the automobile is filled with bad ideas! And this is clearly one of them. Talk about impractical? The only place that car can go is where the poles and wires are preinstalled for the car's use. A mile of poles and wires would cost nearly as much as the car itself, and the wire strands would have to be pulled a lot tighter and straighter than that if there was to be any hope of the electrical contacts carriage to follow the car pulled simply by another electric wire.
I think I will go back to my giant clock spring motorcar. At least that can go anywhere it wants to, and I can just wind it up again wherever it stops. Of course the half a block driving distance is still a bit annoying.
Maybe compressed air?
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5 hours ago, Matt Harwood said:
Another victim of someone with good intentions who bit off a lot more than he could chew.
Also known as "I'm gonna get to it."
Okay, I admit it. I am a rotten person, and a bad son. I loved my dad and had a great deal of respect for him in many ways. Behind his back, among a few of my friends, I often called my dad a "gonna-do".
He always had so many great ideas, and plans for so many things. But he always wanted to do everything in some "perfect" way. In reality, he almost always put things off until he never did them. So many things, he couldn't do it perfectly now, so he never did it ever, but for years and years he was always "gonna do" it. He ended up making such a mess of everything that when he died, I, my mother and my brother had about thirty days to dispose of about three quarters of his massive collection of cars, radios, clocks, none of which were done, along with mess of the family business he left behind.
There were always hundreds of things he was "gonna do" that never got done.
As long as I can remember, he wanted to restore a few antique automobiles. He fixed up a couple older pickups which he used for work. But an antique automobile restoration? Never one. Including my two unfinished model Ts now? I think I have restored about a dozen. None of them were perfect. But I enjoyed every one of them! And most of them were nice enough that I could take them almost anywhere and park next to almost anything and not be ashamed of how my car looked.
I know my limitations, and a show car is not in the cards for me.
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America's First Car to Exceed 100 MPH Is Headed to Auction
in General Discussion
Posted
"Recreations" can be an interesting, and sometimes heated, debate. Like the more recent recreation of the "Beast of Turin" racing car, well done and basically accurate recreations allow us and millions of other people to see, hear, and feel the awesome power of a bygone era! Without them, such displays would be virtually impossible. As long as we can be clear about what is and what is not original or recreation? I am all for them. As long as a serious effort is made to do them properly.