Strange Engine Number

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Model T Ford Forum: Forum 2013: Strange Engine Number
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Stan Howe Helena, Montana on Monday, August 26, 2013 - 02:02 pm:

I'm doing some work on my web site getting ready to sell some TT Trucks and cabs and ran in to this engine number that is different than anything I've seen before. Anybody know what it is? The truck is a 26 or 7. This truck came out of northeastern Montana close to the Canadian border but I don't think it has anything to do with that. Maybe a replacement block that was marked by a dealer????? I never looked at the number until I got home from a recent trip to my ranch where I took the pictures.




Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Ed in California on Monday, August 26, 2013 - 09:34 pm:

I know that Eastern Montana Forestry Service used the EM abbreviation, just a shot in the dark.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Jack Daron - Brownsburg IN on Monday, August 26, 2013 - 11:01 pm:

If you look real close at picture,you can tell there is a faint serial number there. Some sand paper and chalk should help. Can't do a thing for your big number. Neat find.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Thomas Mullin on Tuesday, August 27, 2013 - 12:49 am:

It looks like the "8" is upside down.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Hap Tucker in Sumter SC on Tuesday, August 27, 2013 - 06:41 am:

Stan,

I think that someone other than Ford stamped that number. Jack's comment about checking to see if there is an original number below that might add some clues.

Respectfully submitted,

Hap l9l5 cut off


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Jim Patrick on Tuesday, August 27, 2013 - 10:57 am:

I barely see it jack. There are ways that detectives use to bring up numbers on firearms that have been filed off. Seems that in the stamping process the compressed steel deep below the stamping still retains the imprint of the stamp, even after attempts have been made to obliterate the number. Any old law enforcement agents out there who can advise Stan on this process? Jim Patrick


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Jack Putnam, Bluffton, Ohio on Tuesday, August 27, 2013 - 12:16 pm:

If you carefully remove the surface rust and treat it with a few drops of nitric acid you will be able to see the original number. Safety first, eye and skin protection is very necessary. Nitric acid is dangerous and needs to be treated accordingly.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Skip Anderson on Tuesday, August 27, 2013 - 12:25 pm:

Try some liquid dye penetrant. Welding supply houses can help you, it is used to check for cracks etc. in welded pipe. Just a thought. Good luck


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Stan Howe Helena, Montana on Tuesday, August 27, 2013 - 01:44 pm:

Thanks, I don't really care what the original number is, I just was wondering about the re-stamp and what it means. I'm willing to bet that Ed is right. I never knew that about the Forestry Service stamping their own numbers.

This truck has remnants of old orange paint along with some lime green on it and I'll bet it was an old Montana Forest Service truck. I had thought it was probably a highway department truck with the orange on it, maybe they inherited it from the Forest Service.

It's a pretty cool old truck. I have it stored out at my ranch in eastern Montana along with some cabs and a Formatruck, some TT Ruckstells, etc. I'm afraid some scrapper is going to pull in there and load the stuff all up and haul it in for scrap since it is pretty much an abandoned place as far as buildings or anyone living there. I talked to one scrapper in June who told me he had hauled in 7,000 tons of scrap from farms in northern Montana in the last year. I don't know what scrap price is lately but I don't want this stuff to end up there.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By David Chantrell - Adelaide, Australia on Tuesday, August 27, 2013 - 05:33 pm:

Probably a replacement block that came from the factory unstamped. It looks like to me whoever in the past rebuilt the motor used their own numbering and stamping.

Many 'T's here have turned up with no stamping at all. When the blocks were replaced some of the "Bush Mechanics" here didn't even bother to re-stamp the engine number.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Jerome Hoffman, Hays KS on Tuesday, August 27, 2013 - 10:50 pm:

My 1989 Chevy S-10 I got as surplus from the feds, Can't remember if it was the weed guy or the grasshopper guy who had it here in town before they closed his operation down in about 1994, but I do know that the gov bought it right from GM, the vin has a G as a first letter and I believe that means it went to the government.


Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Mike Garrison_Rice Minnesota on Tuesday, August 27, 2013 - 11:20 pm:

Liquid Dye Penetrant has to have a void in the material such as a crack or seam in order to work. Unless the original Stamp has left a void for the penetrant to "seep" into it won't work. Dye pen is used on a clean piece of product that should be degreased first. Then the penetrant is sprayed on the surface where the voids are suspected to be. After allowing the penetrant to seep into the void for anywhere from 2 to 30 minutes the surface is once again degreased in order to keep the developer to work properly. Then the developer is sprayed on and it allows the penetrant to seep back out of the crack into the white developer and the void appears. Unless the stamped numbers are capable of allowing the penetrant to seep into them and isn't wiped back out of the numbers when cleaning the part, dye penetrant testing won't work. At best dye penetrant would be a really poor way of checking for the old serial number. If in fact number stamping leaves some form of imprint even after milling, filing or grinding it off about the only way of making it out might be with a microscope. And, what would you be looking for? Perhaps compressed micro-structure from the stamping. And how deep would these indications go beneath the bottom of the stamped numbers? Perhaps micro-fractures would be generated when stamping. However with the malleability of cast product I would suspect the micro-fracturing would be hard to achieve. And if micro-deformation did occur at a micro-structure level one would still need a darn good microscope to see it. I'm one to believe once the numbers were milled completely off a block you'd be "hard pressed" to see them. I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself from making a pun. :-)


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