Topic: Hand tools and hands on.


therunwaybehind    -- 10-25-2020 @ 1:54 PM
  I had a brother-in-law who was a civil servant. He would regale me with tales of how he and his boss bought and used special equipment as long as it wasn't a computer. I looked in the roster of members to see if anyone was in Fallbrook, California. I did find several. Then I looked to see if any members live in Ridgecrest, California. I found one. I have spent time over night in both places

. In terms of actual hardware and squawks, I never dealt with these until I separated from both of my brothers-in-law and moved from California to Florida. I once helped my brother-in-law who moved from Long Beach to Fallbrook to replace the head gasket on a Volvo PV-444. I also replaced both rear axles on a 1964 Austin-Healey Sprite after the brother of a friend of my wife twisted them off spinning the tires in water and then running onto pavement in the gutters common in southern California. He hid the fact and the friend was very angry and pressured my wife to get me to replace the one that did not drive. I discovered the other was twisted 180 degrees after inspecting the carrier. The axles at the time cost $100.00 and were bigger in diameter than 1948 Ford axles. Even Model- T axles included Vanadium in their makeup.

Do all of you a deep 13/16ths socket wrench suitable to remove 14mm Ford spark plugs? Is it the later one with the neoprene sock that prevented breaking the porcelain? How about a short socket 13/16ths and a short extension to remove lug nuts, especially with a torque wrench or breaker bar. Is it a black heavy impact socket? In 1987 I sent all of my hand tools to Nicaragua with the last shipment of surplus medical supplies collected by Nicaragua Medical Relief Committee.

Then I only had my sisters collection and my father's which at one time had been a monkey wrench and a 3/4 weight claw hammer. After my sister bought a Toyota Prius because it had Comfort Control air conditioning and heating like her parents Honda Odyssey I bought some sockets to remove the starting and door lock battery which she found to be a nuisance when it failed at home.

Here as you may have noticed my interest and focus has 1956-1965 as it's resource and a center point hoist with moveable arms off an H shape set of slabs as the access. I also then had bulk products as supplies. Later in 1980 when the mechanics teased me with needs for hard thermo-couple wire when only Teflon coated was available and quarts of TEK and MEK when only 55 gallon drums could be sent I dug deep and came up with the stuff as far as holding it in my desk and putting it on the plane as baggage with transfers. Now, I have zero access to Ford hardware and only deal with books magazines, Google and my own builds of 3D digital models.

I began to meet unmodified Early Ford V-8 again at Don Garlits Museum in Ocala, where my uncle had moved to from New York. The Garlits museum had a black 1942 Mercury convertible and I had my sister take a picture of it. Decades passed before I saw unmodified deuces at the Henry Ford Museum and then a Model B and a deuce at Dick's in San Marcos.

In Troy a local began to bring a maroon 1947 convertible to the bank parking lot after closing that had replaced T-bird's drive inn. I have photos of these cars but want to preserve the privacy of the license plates. Let's see there was a 1947 4 door sedan at the Troy Historic Museum one year. It had been painted light blue with a brush. I tried to explain the hood chrome was reversed side to side and found defensiveness. Later I realized I could have simply told him to sort of grab both left and right in both sides and cross over the arms so each piece was not just on the opposite side but also upside down so the curvature was preserved.

Then in 2010 before a friend gave me a Camera for Christmas I met someone with 1947 Ford Sportsman. The power windows and crank out vent windows were amazing! He had owned it for 60 years after his family had owned it for the first 3 of it's life. I carefully examined the front and rear anti-sway bars and the front torsion bar. Not just 1948? No he assured me. The tubular shocks at all four corners? Likewise! Then the 59 A B letters on the engine heads and the Chandler-Grove 94 assured me I had a genuine original in 1956. I did take one thing away even with no camera, the ridges on the center grille bar go horizontal not vertical. The earlier cars had the vertical.

Later someone assured me the oval stamp with script Ford in my rear bumper was from a 1946 and not a 1948. Ouch! I knew that the three hubcaps with two with red paint and only one with blue represented different years but it was an internet site that said which. Everyone here is so fortunate to have actual cars and lineage in title even without back stories.

This message was edited by therunwaybehind on 10-25-20 @ 2:46 PM


EFV-8 Club Forum : https://www.earlyfordv8.org/forum
Topic: https://www.earlyfordv8.org/forum/viewmessages.cfm?Forum=18&Topic=14273