1928 Model T Station Wagon Prototype ?

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Model T Ford Forum: Forum 2013: 1928 Model T Station Wagon Prototype ?
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Jim on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 10:14 am:

I was contacted by someone I know who is trying
to get some additional information on this Model T.

It was represented to the current owner as being
a 1928 Model T station wagon factory prototype.

He bought it in 1997.

The date on the gas tank is 7-18-28 and the serial number on the engine is 276209 with a star before and after the number.

A frame number is being researched.

It is running and driving.

I can get additional images to post.

What do you guys think .... ?


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Ed Baudoux on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 10:27 am:

I think that it is a 1928 Model A.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Royce in Dallas TX on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 10:31 am:

I know it is a Model A. Hard to tell if its a late 28 or 29.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Richard Eagle Ida Fls on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 10:38 am:

Prototype for what? It seems to be a cross between a station wagon and a huckster. The wood doesn't look old enough to be built in the twenties to me. Fun car but I doubt it has any historical significance.
Rich


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Tim Morsher on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 11:24 am:

Jim, There were 2 prototypes built early in 1928. One is still at Edsel Fords estate, Gaukler Point, in Grosse Point Shores, Michigan. I don't think the other prototype has survived, but could be wrong on that. There were 5 model A station wagons built in december of 1928. They were used as sales tools for the Ford shows in early 1929 and sold afterwards. All 5 are amazingly accounted for. ( you hauled one from minnesota to norwalk, ohio ) From time to time another "wanna be" surfaces, and is advertised as such. This one pictured isn't even close. There are some very specific construction details on the first five, that differ from all later production. Hope this is some help.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Mark Gregush Portland Oregon on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 11:51 am:

Model A for sure. It does have the correct filler panels where the door post meets the cowl for a wood body. It looks to be a nice built huckster built on a commercial chassis. The station wagon would have been a 4 door.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Tim Morsher on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 12:04 pm:

Model A station wagons didn't use a filler panel there. I agree that it is a nice looking huckster type vehicle, but definitely not model A production. Kind of a hybrid station wagon/huckster. I wouldn't kick it out of the barn!


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Aaron Griffey, Hayward Ca. on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 12:12 pm:

so somebody bought a model A with a shot body, instead of building a speedster he built that.

Or: coulda been a prototype, but the car has nothing to do with a model T


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Jim on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 02:22 pm:

Thanks for the replies.

Tim, I thought it was a Model A but the present owner is convinced it is a Model T.

Does the engine and or gas tank number have
any significance ?

Could this possibly be a 1928 or 1929 Model A
factory assembled vehicle ?


Jim


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Jim on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 02:31 pm:

Tim,

Here is your gem along with a Porsche ....

One of my favorite shots ... :-)


Jim


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Dan Treace, North FL on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 02:31 pm:

Jim

The A is pictured is a Model A, no T.

Here is a 1928 A Station wagon claimed to original, for sale at Volvo Auto ,

http://volocars.com/1928-ford-model-a-woody-station-wagon-c-3184.htm#sthash.wc27 R7Lj.dpbs

You can see the body difference, the rear doors and no 'flare boards' as on the wood body of the Model A you posted a picture of. That car has a later reproduction body made of wood, but looks nice. That motor number with stars is probably a re-stamp, the correct serial numbers of the A start with the letter A.

List of A engine numbers and years
http://www.fordgarage.com/pages/ABenginenumbers.htm


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Wayne Sheldon, Grass Valley, CA on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 03:03 pm:

In 1907, the Sears Company commissioned the construction of two prototype automobiles for consideration to sell through their catalogs. Five of those two prototypes still exist.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Steve Pitts on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 04:32 pm:

Now that's funny!


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Tim Morsher on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 04:52 pm:

Jim, those numbers are not significant . It just shows the chassis and engine are mid-1928. As Dan's link shows, a number would not be stamped like that. Hard to say from a picture, but the wood doesn't look that old to me. It is not the design of a factory built car, either.
The model A woody club has been very active for over 40 years. It is probably one of the most researched Model A body styles out there. Several companies have made replacement bodies and hardware now for many decades, so unless a car has provenance, you need to know what you are looking at. The first 5 cars have been very well researched and documented for years now, so pretty tough to pass off a fake. I don't understand why people can't love something for what it is, unless they really got "took", and are trying to pass off their mistake .


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Wayne Sheldon, Grass Valley, CA on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 06:17 pm:

Unfortunately, Many people have been really "taken" in this hobby over the years. I have seen several cars built by "great uncle John" who was "cheated out of his royalties by Henry Ford" after building (this/some/a) car in 1897. You can tell Henry Ford copied "great uncle John's" car by all the pieces that look like model T parts (which they are). The car even still has its original 1938 Briggs and Stratton engine in it. They also, by the way, refused to pay royalties. We all know what BS is. Except that these people fully believe what their uncle told them when they were nine years old. One, I later saw in tears after many antique automobile people had told him he had a horse buggy modified in the '30s. Several people did try to tell him gently. After spending much of his life preserving the "family heritage", he wound up with a dozen people standing around the thing pointing out the facts about it. It was really sad.
Unfortunately, I have several cases like this.

By the way, I had a great uncle (Charlie) like that. However, even at the age of less than nine, I knew he didn't really "walked right up and kicked the Kaiser in the shins" during WWI. He must have told me that story a dozen times, and was very insistent that he did. He was a soldier in Europe for the duration.
Drive carefully, and enjoy, W2


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Chuck Hoffman - Gold Country of Calif. on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 06:20 pm:

A Model T is a Model T and a Model A is a Model A.
Never the twain shall meet.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Larry Bohlen, Severn MD on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 08:13 pm:

Wayne, maybe uncle Charlie did kick William in the shins ....metaphorically.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Mike Walker, NW AR on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 08:26 pm:

"It is running and driving.

I can get additional images to post."

Jim -- It's a Model A on the outside, as everyone else has said. You probably know enough about Model A's and T's to determine what it is underneath. Since it's running and driving, does one mash the left pedal to engage low gear, or does he put the floor-shift tranny in low and let out on the clutch? Does it have a Model A engine under the hood, or a Model T? Are the rear end and front axle Model A's, or Model T's?

A few pics of those components should convince everyone (even the owner) what type of Ford the car is, in case there is any more doubt.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Mark Gregush Portland Oregon on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 08:47 pm:

The Model A serial number does indeed have a star stamped in front and behind the serial number.
*A1234567* I don't have a star key so that the best I can do.
The AA means it is a truck engine with a little better clutch.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Steve Jelf, Parkerfield KS on Wednesday, May 29, 2013 - 09:09 pm:

About twenty-five years ago when I was working at the local museum, a fellow came in looking for information on the house where he lived, the home of the famous Judge Parker, the Hanging Judge. Well, Judge Parker sat in Fort Smith Arkansas, hundreds of miles away, not Arkansas City, Kansas. The house in question was the home of a local JP known as Judge Vaughn. I knew this because Judge Vaughn's daughter was the second wife of my grandmother's brother. People often take a little nugget of fool's gold, in the form of a word or phrase, and follow it off into a Fantasyland of misinformation. Thus does a Ford Model A become a Ford Model T, with a special and elevated place in history.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By kep on Thursday, May 30, 2013 - 02:13 am:

In regard to the story above, Why does that guy think he wasted is life preserving a modified horse buggy? That horsebuggy with an engine sounds like it would be fun.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Wayne Sheldon, Grass Valley, CA on Friday, May 31, 2013 - 06:59 pm:

Kep,
I was just a kid at the time, and did not tell him what others did because I knew he would not have believed me. Preserving the contraption was a fine thing to do. And could have been a very good thing to do. If he had understood what it was. He truly believed that Ford owed his family millions of dollars in unpaid royalties because his uncle had "in fact" invented the automobile. It was his families great legacy! That legacy had become the main purpose in his life! I knew (even at the age of 17) in an instant what it was when I first saw it. I felt very sorry for the man. It was later when I went back by that I saw and heard other people telling him what it really was. At first he was offended and angry. Everyone was denying his family their rightful place in history.
I learned a little about human frailties that day. How one could become consumed by an innocent family fable. Again, sadly, he is not the only person I have met to be affected that way. He was the worst case I have seen.

Larry B,
I actually asked uncle Charlie if that was what he meant. He told me "Oh, no. My buddies and I were marching through Germany and found ourselves near Berlin. So we marched on over, and I walked right up to him and kicked him in the shins!" Even when I was nine, I didn't believe him. But I liked hearing it. Except for that story, he wouldn't talk about the war much. However, he was fun to listen to.
Drive carefully, and enjoy, W2


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Jim on Friday, May 31, 2013 - 09:23 pm:

Thanks to all who posted useful information
regarding what this wagon might really be .... :-)





Jim


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By jonathan blake lansford on Monday, July 08, 2013 - 09:32 am:

hello mike my name is jonathan and I just like to hear the horn on the car if so send me the sound of the horn here is my email johnboy1251@yahoo.com


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Mike Walker, NW AR on Monday, July 08, 2013 - 10:14 am:

Jonathan -- I see by your profile that you're in Jonesboro. There are some Arkansas Tin Lizzie club members in that area who might be able to help you. One is Michael Nowlin, who teaches auto mechanics at ASU. You might give him a call.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Larry Smith on Monday, July 08, 2013 - 10:37 am:

If the guy is calling this vehicle a Model T, I wouldn't believe any thing else he says!


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Erik Johnson on Monday, July 08, 2013 - 11:02 am:

Klaxon and Sparton horns. Some of these horns are out of adjustment and need some maintenance and/or fine tuning, etc.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2q4CyO1GOb0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2nRiSpFYVs

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxJl21B3AhI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zYC3n4yfuY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEh1ocTvcPY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dqc6yRIHiW0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Hz5urV9T_o

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kX7Nb5Uz4a8


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Steve Jelf, Parkerfield KS on Monday, July 08, 2013 - 11:37 am:

Here's a Stewart horn:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHZCpzrsdEA


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Ken Todd on Monday, July 08, 2013 - 12:04 pm:

Here's a pic of a Model A station wagon I looked at but didn't buy, somewhere around 1960.

Model A stn wgn


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Bill Everett on Monday, July 08, 2013 - 01:37 pm:

Jonathan, you're practically a neighbor. Our work takes us all over northeast Arkansas; our customers are aerial applicators (cropdusters) and fertilizer dealers.


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