28/29 vs 30/31 front cross member

28 Special Coupe

28 Special Coupe

Member
A few weeks ago I started a thread about my fan blade coming within 1/8" of hitting the upper neck of my new Brassworks radiator. There were several good suggestions from you folks, one of which was to check and make sure my front engine mount is adjusted properly. Well, yesterday evening I had one of our local Model A experts over to take a look. Much to my suprise, he quickly pointed out that the front cross member on my '28 Coupe was replaced at some point in time with a '30-'31 cross member. Well everything suddenly became clear as to why I had such low fan clearance. Obviously my radiator is sitting too low. So my question is, what is the difference in the height of the radiator mounting pads on the '29-'29 and the '30-'31 cross members? Just by eyeballing it, I'm guessing it's about 1/4". Anybody know for sure?

On an interesting related note...My friend did some digging in the Ford Service Bulletins and found that in October of 1929 Ford started using the '30-'31 cross member on '29 vehicles. To compensate for the difference in mounting pad height, they specified that two additional shims (Part# A-8126R) needed to be used in conjunction with the normal mounting pad on each side of the radiator. Longer bolts were also required. The logical conclusion to me is that the added height of the two shims equals the difference in height of the two cross members. Do any of you know anything about those shims, specifically the dimensions of them?

Thanks for your help.
Steve
 
I had the same issue with my 28 special coupe. Took almost a couple years to find a decent front cross member to replace the 30-31 that we found installed. When I did locate one, I found four that same week. You can probably make do with using additional radiator pads (rubber) sold by most part houses to get the rad up a bit but you'll need to watch your hood line as everything you do to the rad will show up at the fit of the hood to the cowl. I am not sure of the total difference in hieght between the two but I am sure it wasn't much.
 
I have what looks like a 30-31 front cross member on my 29 frame also it has the hole for the over flow tube? I will check the numbers But going by memory it was Aug 29 looks original The frame was under my 29 standard coupe.
 
Steve Plucker said:
You also might want to check out my website and review the frame article I did for MAFCA a few years ago.

Pluck
Click to expand...

Thanks, Steve. I checked out your frame study and was blown away by the amount of detail. Since my engine number is August 1928, I concluded from your article that the radiator mounting pads were about 1/8" below the side frames.

One thing I found interesting is that in all of the included photos the radiator mounting holes appeared round. Mine are elongated, parallel to the crossmember. Is that correct? Also, were the holes located in the same location for all four years, or did Ford ever change that? I might have missed that, but I didn't notice any changes noted in the frame study.

I guess the best long term solution is to find a correct cross member for my frame, but for now I'm going to just adjust my radiator mounting with shims accordingly.
 
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