Brad in Germany
Well-known member
In a different post, someone noticed the turn signals on my car (the crome vertical things under the driver side rear view mirror in this photo).
They are original era trafficators. All road vehicles in Germany (Denmark and several other European countries) in the 1930's were required to have them. They served as turn signals.
When they are turned on, the arm swings up via an electric solinoid mechanism. The light in the orange lens then lights up (and blinks if attacked to a blinker relay).
On the German built Model A's, they were installed on the car bodies at the factory prior to the bodies being assembled on the chassis (trafficators circled in red in the below original Germany assembly line photo):
The trafficators were not Ford made parts and were never listed in any of the parts books (at least not in any of the many original parts books that I have looked through) nor in the German Ford Service Bulletins. There are many different types that were used (or available as required accessories). The most common ones were made by Scintilla (Made in Switzerland). Pictured below is a complete NOS set. Note that the trafficators are made for a specific side of the car. The difference can be seen in the screw heads or bolts that hold the body together. The toggle switch was mounted over the center bolt on the dash rail:
There were even versions with Ford scripts on the orange lenses and/or a Ford script on the trafficator body. Two different versions are shown below:
Fordially,
Brad in Germany
They are original era trafficators. All road vehicles in Germany (Denmark and several other European countries) in the 1930's were required to have them. They served as turn signals.
When they are turned on, the arm swings up via an electric solinoid mechanism. The light in the orange lens then lights up (and blinks if attacked to a blinker relay).
On the German built Model A's, they were installed on the car bodies at the factory prior to the bodies being assembled on the chassis (trafficators circled in red in the below original Germany assembly line photo):
The trafficators were not Ford made parts and were never listed in any of the parts books (at least not in any of the many original parts books that I have looked through) nor in the German Ford Service Bulletins. There are many different types that were used (or available as required accessories). The most common ones were made by Scintilla (Made in Switzerland). Pictured below is a complete NOS set. Note that the trafficators are made for a specific side of the car. The difference can be seen in the screw heads or bolts that hold the body together. The toggle switch was mounted over the center bolt on the dash rail:
There were even versions with Ford scripts on the orange lenses and/or a Ford script on the trafficator body. Two different versions are shown below:
Fordially,
Brad in Germany
