Tom asked me the following question and to keep from hijacking the previous thread I am reposting it here:

Out of curiousity, is your SW Town Sedan a Briggs or a Murray? And where is the gas valve? My SW Murray has the valve on the teardrop firewall under the hood. I've seen SW Briggs with the valve still under the tank. I've always been curious whether all the Briggs were set up that way. I've seen other differences, the Briggs seem to have the pocket on the back of the seat versus the back door pockets. Thanks and apologies for talking about As in a T group.

1. Do I ever give short answers?
2. As you read this please think about the T bodies and what if any features or markings we could discover about them to help us tell which manufacture produced which body – including Ford.
3. My 1931 Slant Windshield Townsedan “Bessie.” I don’t know yet which body maker produced her. The body tag is NOT on the cowl so that easy answer is not available. The 1928-early 1931 Fordor and Townsedan bodies were made by both Briggs and Murray body buildiers. They were interchangeable on the Ford chassis – i.e. fenders, hood, etc. but the parts such as doors, body panels, etc. did NOT interchange. The Briggs bodies were characterized by window frames that were straight at the top while the Murray manufactured bodies had a gentle curver in the top of their window frames. But for the 1931 Slant Wwindshield cars, Ford specified that Briggs, Murray and Ford bodies would have interchangeable doors, panels, inerior, etc. So for those cars the body manufacture tag is the easiest way to tell. Vince Falter has an excellent explanation of what to look for to tell the difference at: http://idisk.mac.com/forever4/Public/pages/murraybriggs.htm
As a summary if a 1931 SW body has the “D-nut plates” they actually are shaped with a flat side and a rounded side and look like a “D.” it is either a Briggs or Ford manufactured Slant Windshield body. If it has the square nuts held in place by the body metal around it, then it was a Murray produced body. So how could you tell if it was a Ford or a Briggs body if the body tag was missing? If there were holes for the body tag – it was a Briggs and if no holes for a body tag (under the patent plate on the firewall) it would have been a Ford produced body. Vince has some excellent photos that clearly show the Briggs “D-shaped nuts” and the Murray square nuts. It also shows the Briggs Manufacturing Corporation logo which was a capital “B” with an “M” in the top part and a “C” in the bottom part of the “B.”
4. The location of the tank valve was NOT a function of who produced the body but rather when the body was produced. Ford switched to the gas shut off valve on the outside of the firewall sometime around May 1931. As with Model Ts – that change over would not be simultaneous at all assembly plants etc. and they would not have thrown away a Fordor body that showed up a week after the change – it would have been installed as it would have arrived with the old style tank already installed and only the gas pipe from the fire wall to the carb was different. So the early 1931 SW and other Fords had the flat firewall and the gas shut off on the inside while the May and later switched to the indented firewall and shut off on the firewall. Note, there were some cars produced where Ford clear “restamped the earlier flat firewall and made it into an indented firewall. He didn’t throw any usable part away. On my 1931 – it has the recessed firewall and the gas shut off on the engine side of the firewall.
4. You asked about the upholstery. That is covered nicely in the book “The Ford Model A as Henry Built It.” By Les Henry. Currently I don’t know which box my copy is located in. Someone else may have a copy and look it up and chime in or you could post that question on the ahooga.com forum and they could answer it easily. From memory –(that will get me in trouble!) I believe that having the pocket or not having the pocket was more a function of time than from who manufactured the body. And if the car had the large pocket on the back seat it did not have the pockets on the door panels. But that is from memory – so I could easily have it wrong.
5. And I hope that we can find some similar differences between the body manufactures for the T Fords. Wadsworth and Fisher Centerdoors for example. Also, who manufactured the Fordors for Ford? I don’t recall reading that anywhere. It is clearly stated which companies made the early Ford bodies – often included on the shipping document. But for the Model T Fordors I don’t recall reading who made them or the other later closed car bodies. Lots still to discover. But I wonder if one company used one style of nut plate and another company used a different style as was the case between Murray and Briggs and the 1931 Slant Windshield cars.

Hap Tucker 1915 Model T Touring cut off and made into a pickup truck and 1907 Model S Runabout, Sumter SC

Thanks for your observations Hap,

"The Model A as Henry Built it" was authored by three gents. I've had the pleasure of meeting two of them. Ed Francis and George DeAngelis. George is the man who reproduced the quadricycle. Ed worked at Ford and headed the materials department at Chassis division. I got Ed to sign my copy of his book before he passed on. My 31 is a Murray produced body. It has D-nuts and a few caged nuts on it. I always thought that Briggs and Murray were the only producers of the Fordor. It was a Briggs that I saw that had the valve under the tank instead of under the hood. By your reckoning, it must have been very early. It had the pouch on the seat and no door pockets.

Tom,

Does your 1931 Slant Windshield have the original body manufacture tag on it? And if so please share a photo when you have a chance.

I went back and reread Vince Falter's article. After rereading it, it appears that the Murray also had some D-nuts but a lot of the caged square nuts. I wonder if the Briggs or Ford bodies ever had the caged square nuts or if they used only the D-nuts?

Sometimes when we think we know what Henry did we later discover some examples that don't fit our original "Theory." Sort of like the earth is flat and you will fall off if you sail too far from land. People initially didn't come back -- so it "proved the theory." But then later people started coming back after they sailed to "the new world" and folks had to update the theory to match the reality.

Hap Tucker 1915 Model T Touring cut off and made into a pickup truck and 1907 Model S Runabout, Sumter SC

Hap,
Yes, My sedan had the original firewall tag when I bought it. I ended up replacing it with a new reproduction tag but I kept the old one. I'll have to do some digging to find it.