Rewooding a "T" 1925 Coupe

R

racemo

Member
Hi guys,
I finally have collected enough wood to start construction of the framing for reassembling the body. I will start by laying the sill rails on the surface plate, spaced and aliegned. I once heard that the assmbly of the wood should start from the rear and fit up moving to the front of the car.

FYI, all the panels are off ready to go back on. The wood is just individual pieces with a lot of photos of how it came apart.

What are some of your recommendations?
 
I would think it would be from the front back? Fire wall, cowl, A pillars, header, doors, B pillars. The side panels would have been put on after the wood frame was assembled. The body has to flex so no glue unless it it a repair to a piece of wood, screws only. By time all the sheet metal is on it will be stiff enough.
 
Build it like a house, from the foundation up.

Fit the lower sills to the chassis frame for a square build, and then add the uprights from front to back, framing the body as you go.
 

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To: redmodelt-tmodelman,
Guys, I respect your responses and it makes good logic, front to rear. Yes, no glue, that too makes good sense.

Thanks a bunch.
 
Racemo,

I hate to be the guy who disagrees with everybody else but no glue in the joints is a decision that you'll come to regret, quickly... If it weren't necessary Ford wouldn't have used it in the first place. The problem was that they used an animal hyde-based glue which deteriorated over time leaving loose joints, which resulted in all kinds of nifty body problems. Today we have much better two part epoxies (T-88 is the brand we use for wood body assembly) which should last much longer. Having said that, I guess it goes without saying that you should be positive everything is square and fits together properly without glue first. ;)

You're correct that the sills should be laid out and squared up first because that's the foundation for everything else. Some folks build their bodies on the actual frame of the car, but we've found it much easier to use a wooden dolly. You can lay out the sills, square them up, clamp everything down so it can't move and then build the rest of the body from there. As long as you leveled the sills before you clamped them down and you don't move the dolly there shouldn't be any problems building the body this way.

Attached are some photos of a Briggs-built 32 Plymouth body that we're just about to finish up. Granted it's not a Model T but the work involved in building the body is the same as your coupe.


Deron

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A question for Dishady??
At what point do you glue everything up? I concur that glue woud be good, but figured that you needed to shift and shim the wood a little to get the sheet metal to fit? (I have never rewooded an entire body but want to) Your pictures and jig are a great information source but I don't see the metal being fitted. You go from a very nice wood frame to a painted wood frame. Should I figure you fit the metal in there sometime, then dissassemble and glue everything. You are 100% correct that today's glues are much better. Any experience with Wet Epoxy?
Thank you.
 
The only glue used to assemble a Model T wood framed body were if two pieces of wood were joined together to make one piece of wood. The joints were screwed together without glue so they could flex.
 
Mighty fine wood working and excellent pictures.These photos, as said many times, are worth 10,000 words on how to frame a body.

Thanks...
 
redmodelt said:
The only glue used to assemble a Model T wood framed body were if two pieces of wood were joined together to make one piece of wood. The joints were screwed together without glue so they could flex.
Click to expand...

Your idea of allowing the wood frame to flex makes sense. Especially when you say in your first post " the sheet metal is on it will be stiff enough." the ability to flex would be important in order to get the sheet metal to assemble without distorting it. Unless you can put that wood frame together to be an absolutely exact fit I don't think you should glue it. JMHO.
 
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