When I purchased my '36 coupe in 1952 from the original owner the odometer showed 51k and it was dead stock. The original owner had purchased a new '52 Ford and had intentions of selling the '36 to a junk yard, mainly because of the mechanical brakes.
Think about this: All American vehicles built from 1940 on have hydraulic brakes. Is this because someone in the government owned stock in the hydraulic brake company's or was it for safety reasons?
In my case, I told the owner of the '36 that I would convert the brakes on the '36 to hydraulic using a '41 as the supply for parts, he sold me the '36 for $125.
I lived in Idaho at the time, traffic was light and the car stopped very well. In 1956 I moved to Los Angeles, CA, the '36 was my daily transportation to and from work, which on some days required a commute of over a hundred miles. In 1962 I did some major work on the '36, one of which was converting the brakes to '42-48 with '39 drums and the stock wheels. The later model brakes were a big improvement over the '39-41 style.
In reality, the original Ford mechanical brakes did a good job, however, that was 'then' when traffic was light and 45 mph was the normal highway speed.
Traffic now almost travels at the speed of light, residential speeds are very commonly 40 mph or higher, traffic conditions can change in the wink of an eye. I changed the brakes and suspension on my '39 convertible coupe to disk and rack-pinion, during the nine years I have had the car operational I have had two occasions when I had to do a panic stop because of some jerk flying through traffic on a residential street. My modern brakes and suspension help me avoid a major accident.
