PFitz

I agree with Barney. Left and right trunk rack mounts. Paul

Martin, hi. The hood front "slats" were painted black for 1930. Brushed chrome starting in '31. Mid '30 production the factory put out a service bulletin about also painting the grill shell's center bar black. The contrasting center bar chromed is unique to Franklin and not all 30 owners like the look of it all black. Paul

Jeff Moyer, the grandson of the car builder, contacted me about 30 years ago to re-wood the body of the Moyer touring that his grandfather left him. I think he still lives down near Binghamton???? Paul

And the 516 not only covers many early engines, it works over a wide range of compression ratios from the original 4.75 compression of the Series 12B to 7:1 compression ratio of modified sidedraft engines. Paul

They missed a huge one here in central NY State, with over 200 vehicles. Home - Northeast Classic Car Museum Paul

The new numbering system isn't always heat range related. Champion 518 is a 7/8-18 thread for Series 10, 11 A&B, 12A engines. What you want for your Series 13 is Champion 516. It's an 18 mm thread. It works for all Franklin engines starting with the 1928 Series 12B through to '34. Paul

A '33 Pontiac Convertible Coupe that I re-wooded for a Customer in NJ had all wood body framing from the cowl on back. Franklins used wood body framing right up to the end in '34. Trucks and buses even later. I got a call to give an estimate to re-wood a post WWII double decker bus that was sitting in a junk yard in Hempstead Long Island for an advertising company that was hoping to restore it to use for mobile advertising. The body was all sheet steel formed around wood framing. It would have run into the tens of thousands to get all the sheet metal unwrapped from around the wood of the body and all the many window openings to replace it. The deal was cost prohibitive. Paul

I got to drive the finished restoration of the '28 Series 12B Franklin with the new white ash chassis sills shown in my picture on the first page of this thread. With full elliptic springs and the wood chassis, the smoothness of the ride has to be felt to be believed. Even for a car quite light for its size. There is no seat-of-the-pants feel to bumps in the road. Not even at railroad crossings. Just tire noise from crossing the tracks. The closest I've seen to a ride that smooth was driving a friend's 30 Hispano Suiza limo. Except at half the weight of the Hiso, the Franklin had a much lighter and responsive feel. Paul

Close. Franklin called for such "fiber grease" for Spicer driveshaft universal joints to resist spin-out of the grease. Paul

Thanks. Then the question is,.. is it car porn or art ? 😁 Paul

As I mentioned in your other post, just the owner's manual and in the Q,&A section of the Club's website Members Only section. I know because I wrote some of it, along with pictures showing details. Are you a member of the H.H. Franklin Club? If not, you're missing out on a wealth of info that will save you much more than the cost of membership. www.franklincar.org Paul

Even the steel framed Franklins used a lot of wood into the '30s Here is a '31 Dietrich Convertible Speedster body after being re-wooded. For those that don't like naked car bodies, don't look. 😁 Paul

I don't know about all the Ford Model A body styles, but you can buy kits to replace the body's wood framing for some close cars. Paul

Make sure to soak the key's lock barrel and the pot metal mounting thoroughly with WD40 to prevent moisture corrosion. The pot metal of that era is actually quite porous. Moisture gets into the castings causes corrosion, swelling and cracking the parts. Then the key barrel gets jammed, and you can't start the engine without hotwiring it.

Contacts inside sealed switches are not shown in many old car wiring diagrams. It's assumed you won't need to know what's inside because you can't access it anyway. Follow the wires shown is all you need to make it function up to the switch. If the switch is not functioning the factory sells replacements.

Because someone changed your car's starting circuits doesn't make the wiring diagram worthless. If it was still original and after looking under the dash, you'd see the diagram makes sense. For decades many Franklin owners and restoration shops have been using the Franklin wiring diagrams without trouble. In over 40 years working on Franklins full time, I've rewired and fixed dozens with electrical problems. I never found the wiring diagrams lacking. The diagram does show how to get power for the car to function. I think your missing that a lot of the power does not go through the key switch like more modern cars. The key switch only controls the ignition coil, nothing else. And it is a mechanical connection inside the sealed end of the coil. No wires to traced or fix. Just two copper contacts you can't get to without dismantling the coil from its potmetal mounting bracket, which it is not meant to come apart to be "fixable". Same as the foot starter and other switches are sealed and not originally meant to be fixable like the wiring. If you look at the other info in the lights and switch section of the owner's manual, you will gain more understand how it all works. Paul

Since the coil end with the key lock is a sealed unit without any wires inside it, Franklin did not need to show it. You can see that it is sealed in the owner's manual illustration I mentioned. It's the same as they don't need to show the metal-to-metal contacts inside the other switches. The only electrical gauge is the ammeter and that shows all the wires connected to its two terminals. It even shows what wires go to which terminal for correct gauge polarity. None of the gauges has its own light like modern gauges. The gauge lights are just two bulbs stuck into the back side of the gauge cluster that light up the inside of the cluster and thus the light is reflected off white paper inside the glass (where you can't see it) onto the gauge faces. Both bulbs get their power from a contact on the head light switch, which shows in the diagram. Both bulbs ground through their bulb sockets to the cluster then to the dash and then the steering column and to the frame back to the battery. The third and center gauge cluster light is just a light that shines down on the key lock from a slot in the underside of the Franklin emblem above the key lock. It is a 3 volt bulb and wired in series with the 3 volt bulb of the tail light to let the driver know the taillight is burned out. I don't rewire them that way because the 3 volt bulbs are very rare, dim, and hardly visible at night thus risking an accident. Paul

That water pump is on the oil burner. 😁 Paul

The back half of the owner's manual has a lot of the info you need to maintain and repair the car. Included in the engine section is how to check the cam timing by easily removing the number one cylinder's valve cover and using a feeler gauge. If you are a Franklin Club member you can buy a print copy through the Club or download a free copy from the Members Only section of the website. Franklin Club paid members can get the password from the webmaster. Also, in that Members Only section there is a Q&A section, with an index, to 15 years of questions and answers to just about every problem you may come up with. Paul

You can't see the ignition switch on the wiring diagram because it is on the other end of the coil from the wire terminals. See the illustration of the coil and lock on page 903 of your owner's manual. If your car still has the ignition coil as part of the key lock, the potmetal casting that holds the lock and coil can develop cracks, swell, and jam the lock. I've had that happen to a few customer's cars, including one it happened to at a car show. I've converted a few by removing the choke and spark cables that hold the pot metal casting and coil to the gauge cluster. Get a regular 6 volt coil and mounting bracket from Autoparts store, or Amazon, and mount it on the inside of the firewall above the gas pedal as Franklin did starting with all 1931 on to end of production. I use a marine key ignition switch from Jamestown Distributors and make a spacer washer to hold the new key switch in the gauge cluster hole left by the old switch. Then just wire it in. The marine switches also come with a key-start position so that they can be used with a 6 volt starter solenoid for anyone that has the foot starter switch go bad. Paul

I haven't seen inside a '34 in many years, but I don't remember seeing any headliner that was not like the broadcloth of earlier closed Franklins. The Series 19 are listed as broadcloth upholstery and likely used a light-colored lightweight broadcloth headliner to match. All the headliners I've seen were the lightweight broadcloth, even with leather interiors of oxfords and speedsters. Paul

Hi, Lee The original starter switch was a tall foot type starter switch mounted through the toe board to the right of the gas pedal. That is what is shown in the manual wiring schematic. When the switch went bad sometimes it was replaced with a 6 volt solenoid, and either a push button on the dash or the potmetal ignition switch coil combo, which also would go bad, was replaced with a regular ignition key switch that has a start position wired to the solenoid. Paul

Many Franklins use light-weight wool broad cloth for the headliner. That is what I've used from Hirsch. Auto Upholstery Fabrics, Heavy Weight Auto Upholstery - HirschAuto.com Paul

One of my favorites, too. Charles Lindburgh had a '30 Convertible Speedster and Capt. Frank Hawks, another aviation pioneer, had a '31 Convertible Speedster. Wife has a '32 Speedster Sedan. Paul

And if you intend on driving it and you don't know if the engine is original or rebuilt, it's always a good idea to drop the oil pan, remove a few bearing caps and see if the babbitt is in good condition. No cracks, missing pieces, burned or heat smeared, or sparkly-looking because the babbitt has lost some of its softer alloy and it has become brittle. That way you can also make sure the engine is not gunked-up with sludge from years of using non-detergent oil. I've seen them filled to the top of the oil pump housing pickup with mayonnaise-like sludge and the brass pump screening was rotted away. Paul