Has anybody tried this? I wonder if the glue is suitable for insulating spark.
Rich
Richard,
I would guess the glue would be a problem. I would stay away from plywoods all together, if I were going to use wood at all. My friend just installed John Regan's insulation kit and stated that it all went together flawlessly.
The Fun Project kit is the way to go for trouble free touring.
Richard
While I have no data to back it up, I suspect most glues/adhesives would make fine insulators. (JB Weld excepted).
Yellow glue of your joinery is good, epoxy if there are gaps.
I have the plywood coil box kit installed on my T with never a problem, even here in humid Florida.
Just make sure the wood is well dried before applying several coats of varnish, and you should have no problem.
The original coil box wood that I have seen for the metal coil boxes was a wood core with veneer glued to the front and back.
Mark:
You are correct that Ford did make some of their coil box wood parts in what they referred to as the "veneer design". They constantly played with coatings and soakings to try and get the wood to not have leakage issues. They used paraffin soakings and changed the temperature and times of the soak, then they used linseed oil hot at 180-200 for a time and then changed that to boiled linseed oil that when cooled was coated with varnish which they then changed to lacquer. What is most interesting is that the very last thing they did was to make a temporary design to be used until the molds were finished for making the bottom and back out of molded hard rubber. That was in very late 1926. I believe Kim Dobbins actually had a set of these that he found on a coil box. I personally have never viewed that set but I do have the drawings for it and the record of changes. These rubber parts were designated to be first used in Australia so maybe our friends from across the pond may have seen them on very late T's over there. There is no way that varnish or lacquer was going to stick very well to wood that had been soaked in linseed oil so I suspect that since that was one of the last things they tried, it likely gave way to the rubber idea rather easily but then the T never made it to '28 so we never got to see too many of the rubber parts.
I have seen the hard rubber type but they were in a Fordson coil box which looked very much like the 26-27 with different mounts.
Amazing that they used plies and vineers. Obviously they knew there was a problem at least according to John's post. What's funny is the number of experiments he lists which kind of went nowhere.
I'm the friend Jerry Van was talking about that installed John Regan's coil box rebuild kit on my '14 touring. (Obviously, Jerry is too embarrassed to mention in public that he knows me.) The fit of John's kit is flawless. I also installed John's contact kit. Now, those who know me -- that includes you, Jerry, admit it! -- know that I am not at all mechanically inclined. I'm more of an historian. But, if I can install John's kit ANYBODY can! I highly recommend his kit. Just follow the directions to the letter.
Slightly OT but while we're talking about the coil box, I also HIGHLY recommend Brent Mizner's coil rebuilds. Not only is the quality of the rebuilds very good, but Brent's customer service can't be beat. I had one of his rebuilt coils misfiring and called Brent. The fix was a simple matter of tightening the nuts. But, Brent INSISTED on sending me a free newly rebuilt coil!
Thank you all for your comments. Undoubtedly the kit is the best way to go. I am kind of a do-it -your-selfer and using up some leftover wood. I have had good luck with laminating Mahogany for coil boxes but wondered if anybody had used Baltic Birch before. I noticed some small voids in my pieces. One problem I had was measuring for the holes in the metal firewall. The dimensions were odd and so I installed the box without holes and match drilled from the firewall holes. I'm sure the kit holes are right on.
Thanks again for the comments.
You guys are awesome.
Rich
I will let you know how this works.