Considering buying a T

MarkA, 15 million! My city has only about 650,000, and spreads out to about twice that, but traffic is nuts and you have to drive a ways to find a nice country road.

I just read “The Lost Man”, by Jane Harper, a very descriptive and interesting novel set in the Outback. Sounds like there might be a gazillon square miles with zero traffic! ;) you might enjoy it.

Good luck in NZ; I have an old US Navy shipmate who retired to the North Island and loves it. I wish I could do that.
 
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700rpm said:
I’ve always been a Model A guy, but this is tempting. The seller says it’s all original, 90% complete, and was running when parked. Been in the family since new. It looks a little rough, but good unrestored T’s are getting hard to find. He’s only asking $1500. What do you guys think?
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700RPM, if you can get them to take $1000 and throw in the squash jump on it! There is a lot of patina with that ride............. :)
 
Like a lot of others, I thought I wanted a Model T to go along with my 2 Model A's. Worst mistake I ever made. I was at an auction and bought an original '24 Tudor, original interior, ran and drove great. The other guy bidding was a rat-rod guy who was going to cut it up. Got it home and replaced all the plate glass windows, new wiring harness, new radiator, new tires, added a set of Rocky Mt brakes, got the license and registration sorted out, cleaned up the interior, etc. Now what ?? Its impossible to drive in city traffic. It terrifies me !! Now it just sits in the garage taking up valuable space. I love looking at it and talking about it but hate driving it. Maybe if I lived in the middle of Nebraska with no one around for miles I would think differently. I'm in it so deep now that I doubt I can get 2/3 investment back.
 
I learned to drive in a T in the mid '50s. The first time I drove in traffic was a Friday night in downtown in the big city, what a white knuckle ride that was. I still enjoy Ts, sold my last one about 2 years ago.
 
We use to live in a small town in Central New York. Country roads everywhere and so were Model T’s and A’s, plus many other antique cars. You could drive them.

There not for everyone. Like an antique airplane or wooden boat. You have to just want to own one.

We live on the shoreline in Connecticut. Lots of back roads, but not the fun driving your car as in a more rural area. To many city drivers.

If you live in the right place? Model T’s are a blast.
 
700rpm said:
I’ve always been a Model A guy, but this is tempting. The seller says it’s all original, 90% complete, and was running when parked. Been in the family since new. It looks a little rough, but good unrestored T’s are getting hard to find. He’s only asking $1500. What do you guys think?
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What the seller said was TRUE 75 years ago. History lesson? It is now a rust pile.
 
RPM, that pile is what is called "yard art." If he gives it to you, drag it home and plant flowers in and around it. Perhaps with a few nice boulders about.

I redid everything in my T, from the headlights back. It had a Ruckstell two speed rearend with 3:1 gearing. I put disk brakes on the rear that I could ride down a steep grade instead of going into low band. They stopped very nicely. I tightened up the steering and aligned the front end, even straightening out the twisted axle with a 6 inch pipe wrench and floor jack on the end of the handle. I drove it on all over the back roads of North Carolina and neighboring states, which there are still plenty of. I felt fairly safe driving it. It would go over 50 mph, although I never drove it that fast on a regular basis.
 
Gene F said:
I like to look at them, and that is about it. Took a spin in one at The Henry Ford. They just are not practical these days. They sure were great in the day............... .
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Gene my first ride in a Model T was at Greenfield Village! It was fun, but at over 6 feet tall I had a horrible time trying to get in and out of the thing.

I do appreciate them, enjoy seeing them, but I will stick to Model A's and early V-8's for antique Fords:)
 
I have an 09 T touring, 28 A rpu and my avatar V8. They are all very different drives, but the T is the lively one. Light as a daisy, go-kart steering, super fast gear shift.
I've had the T 40yrs, must have done 60,000 miles.
Read Farewell my Lovely
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1936/05/16/farewell-my-lovely

The biggest mistake Ford made was not developing the epicyclic gearbox into a 3 or 4 speed, like the brilliant Wilson box. The crash box in the A was a step backwards.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sou...FjAAegQIBRAC&usg=AOvVaw3aV1DLCfdLx3sPf5AWMJze

To drive a T today you do need improved brakes, and someone needs to come up an improved steering box. The late Ralph Rick's used his 1915 as a daily driver; it had Austin Metropolitan 4 wheel hydraulics, 37 V8 steering box and OHV head, cruised freeways at 70mph, but I like to potter country lanes at 20mph with the coils quietly buzzing..
 
I see some comments about faster speeds on the Ts. I have heard that the engines will not stand that for very long. I have heard that the babbit will go away. If not that, then the crankshaft will snap.
 
The crankshaft in a Model T will snap. It happens all the time. A lot of people will tell you that it is caused by the 4th main, the bearing at the end of the transmission, being out of alignment, and they may be right. My personal belief is that it is caused by torsional vibration causing fatigue cracks in the crank. The Model T crankshaft is very spindly and the original pistons are heavy cast iron. This puts the natural frequency within the operating range of the engine. People put aluminum pistons in the engine but not until there have been lots of miles built up with the cast iron pistons.

For gofast Model T's a Model A crank is used with insert bearings. Or a new crank with the same size journals as the Model A and counter balanced. If I remember correctly the journals for a stock Model T crankshaft are only 1 inch in diameter.
 
Ray, somebody is pulling somebody's leg.............


for only a little more dough, you can get a running driving car. Ive seen nice drivers lately for under 5k. Im talking tourings and roadster.........


that is a lawn ornament.
 
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