Old husband's tales

BILL WILLIAMSON

BILL WILLIAMSON

Well-known member
Hopefully, I didn't offend the ladies with my thread on Old Wive's Tales and fixes.
Let's try for Old Husband's Tales and fixes. Also tell us about your WILDEST or MOST ingenious fix, in order to get your Model A back home.
 
One year after a delightful day at the Sharon, WI Model A Day, my wife and I were headed home when the accelerator spring broke. The immediate effect was the pedal while not to the metal was definately to the wood and we were moving out wide open. I was able to catch the accelerator pedal with the edge of the sole of my shoe and was able to slow down.

After finding a place to pull over to the side of the road I pondered just how to get safely home. Changing an accelerator spring at the side of the road is not the simplest of tasks even if you happen to have a spare spring with you. I didn't!

I knew I could make the car go faster with out the spring but how to slow it down. I found I was standing on the answer. I looked down at my shoes and saw the shoe laces. I removed one, firmly tied one end around the accelerator pedal and the other end to the gear shift (that was to prevent me from dropping it).

I found that has I put foot pressure on the accelerator pedal and pulled up on the shoe lace I had execellent contro of my speed.

I guess you could say I got home "On a shoe string and a prayer". ;)
 
Back in the early 70's I drove my 30 Roadster between Schenectady NY and Burlington VT almost monthy to see my girlfriend (wife now). All of a sudden she started running real rough. One of the spark plug copper strips was gone. Only thing I had was some clothes with coat hangers. Cut a piece of a hanger, then I wrapped one end on the distributor and the other on the spark plug and twisted as tight as I could and ran the whole weekend purring like a kitten!
 
When I was in high school several of my friends and my Dad had planned a fishing trio. Got all the gear loaded in Dad's 29 Town Sedan and no start. Lifted the hood to see someone had "borrowed" distributor cap, rotor, coil wire and plug cooper strips. Dad had a spare rotor but no cap or wires. I thought our trip was bust, but dad took a piece of wood, notched it at each end to hold the distributor cap clips, wrapped a piece of bailing wire around it, ran that to the coil and fashioned plug wires from more bailing wire. Car ran fine and it was so much fun to watch the fire show at night that we left it that way for some time.
 
I wouldn't say what I did was ingenious but read on....years back; I had just purchased my first Model A, a Closed Cab pickup. It was beat up and in need of major work but I got it running...kinda! I took my boys ages 8 and 4, three of their friends and my wife for their first ride out to the end of the gravel road. The kids were piled in the back with our English Springer. My wife was in the cab with me. We were only going out to the end of the gravel road as we did not want to be in traffic with the kids in back. We were on the way back when it started backfiring and died about 1/3 mile from my garage. What to do? My wife was raised in the city...no chance she could safely pull me back with another vehicle. So I did the only thing I could do… I jumped out and pretended to sound excited about the opportunity to push it back. I convinced them all that it would be fun. I steered with an arm through the driver’s window while pushing. My wife and the five kids were pushing at the rear. The Springer was reaching over the tailgate and caught my wife right across the lips with a sloppy lick eliciting a scream of surprise. I think that was the first time I had seen my wife spit and she did so multilpe times. She didn’t think it was funny but I couldn’t help it...How do you not laugh when that happens? I got everyone back on task when my oldest son voiced the first complaint and the rest of them soon joined in. It was nonstop...even my wife voiced a few. With all the whining it seemed like a much greater distance than 1/3 mile. It took 3 years to restore the pickup and another two years to eliminate the skeptical looks I got from them when I asked if they wanted to go for a ride.
 
Back about 1968 I bought a '30 A Pickup, fashioned from an old sedan. This was my college car. I had it out one weekend, coasting down a hill in third, doing about 50 mph when I heard a loud explosion and the car came to a stop. I had thrown a fan blade, and fortunately, it missed the radiator and just hit the engine hood, just below the hinge. I did get it started , but it was too much to ask of the Ford to run with an unbalanced fan. So I broke the other side off the fan, leaving just the pulley and limped home a couple miles at a time, stopping to let it cool a bit before the next hop, but made it home.

I was an art major and noticed the dent and huge paint chip on the hood looked sorta like an angel, so I pained the bare metal with an angel and thats how she remained until I sold her. I believe the truck was shipped to Hawaii, can't say for sure.
 
lesbliss said:
When I was in high school several of my friends and my Dad had planned a fishing trio. Got all the gear loaded in Dad's 29 Town Sedan and no start. Lifted the hood to see someone had "borrowed" distributor cap, rotor, coil wire and plug cooper strips. Dad had a spare rotor but no cap or wires. I thought our trip was bust, but dad took a piece of wood, notched it at each end to hold the distributor cap clips, wrapped a piece of bailing wire around it, ran that to the coil and fashioned plug wires from more bailing wire. Car ran fine and it was so much fun to watch the fire show at night that we left it that way for some time.
Click to expand...

I read this twice. How cool.

Paul
 
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Originally Posted by lesbliss Dad had a spare rotor but no cap or wires. I thought our trip was bust, but dad took a piece of wood, notched it at each end to hold the distributor cap clips, wrapped a piece of bailing wire around it, ran that to the coil and fashioned plug wires from more bailing wire. Car ran fine and it was so much fun to watch the fire show at night that we left it that way for some time.

I read it a couple of times too. I'm still trying to figure out how it worked. I believe you, I just can't understand it.
Jon
 
Dave's story about getting the kids excited about pushing the dead pickup reminded me about the time I was helping my uncle fix his combine in South Dakota. He had a large tray of spare bolts, nuts, and washers setting on top of the hopper, and he bumped it sending the hardware all over the grass. My cousin's 5 year old boy and 7 year old daughter were standing there and I immediately said "OK, lets have a contest to see who can pick up the most pieces". The two kids were excited to jump in and try to be the winner. No one counted pieces, but as soon as all the hardware was back in the tray Amber said "that was fun, let's do it again".
 
JBR said:
I read it a couple of times too. I'm still trying to figure out how it worked. I believe you, I just can't understand it.
Jon
Click to expand...

I get it. Picture the distributor with the top cap off. The piece of wood must be something narrow like a popsicle stick, running across the top, between the two clips that hold down the cap. It will cross over the rotor in the center. With some shaping and notching of the wood, the clips for holding the cap will secure the wood.

Normally, the coil wire attaches to the top of the cap and the power passes thru the cap to an electrode that touches the top center of the rotor. What they did to replace that function is to wrap a wire around the stick in the center so the wire coils touch the top center of the rotor (like the electrode on the bottom of the cap did), and then run the other end to the coil to act like the missing coil wire. Very simple and elegant.
 
I'm not trying to start an argument, just understand. He said, "the rotor was gone. His dad carved apiece of wood and ran a piece of bailing wire around it. Ran that to the coil and fashioned more wire into spark plug wires."

If you have a piece of wire connected to the coil with 4 spark plug wires fastened to it, wouldn't each plug fire every time the coil discharged and at the same time?

Would it run that way?
 
He said "dad had a spare rotor" so there was a rotor used in the setup. Only the top cap was gone not the entire distributor body, so the setup described is possible. With the dissy body intact, you can fashion 4 more pieces of wire to act as spark plug wires, in place of the usual metal strips.
 
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Dave / Franklin MA said:
He said "dad had a spare rotor" so there was a rotor used in the setup. Only the top cap was gone not the entire distributor body, so the setup described is possible. With the dissy body intact, you can fashion 4 more pieces of wire to act as spark plug wires, in place of the usual metal strips.
Click to expand...

Sounds right to me. Herm.
 
It isn't nearly as difficult to imagine as it would have been to build. One thing you all are forgetting, the old timers were artists with a pocket knife. Dad used to whittle us all sorts of toys or tools that he needed at the time. If you'll take a dist cap and look at it, it is very possible with a little ingenuity to make one. Good story!
 
Sorry, I missed the part about the spare rotor. It was awful early. Thanks for pointing that out.
Jon
 
Dave / Franklin MA said:
I get it. Picture the distributor with the top cap off. The piece of wood must be something narrow like a popsicle stick, running across the top, between the two clips that hold down the cap. It will cross over the rotor in the center. With some shaping and notching of the wood, the clips for holding the cap will secure the wood.

Normally, the coil wire attaches to the top of the cap and the power passes thru the cap to an electrode that touches the top center of the rotor. What they did to replace that function is to wrap a wire around the stick in the center so the wire coils touch the top center of the rotor (like the electrode on the bottom of the cap did), and then run the other end to the coil to act like the missing coil wire. Very simple and elegant.
Click to expand...

Thank you for describing it as you did! I could picture it so clear in my head after reading this.
:)
 
I'd love to see someone duplicate that setup. Would that be cool or what??

Actually this would be a Great Project for some of you"Barners" and there should almost be a Prize for the "FIRST TO POST" kinda thing . :p:p
 
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