Making wheels

[Steve Jelf]

Contrary to popular opinion in some quarters, some excellent material shows up on FB. I wonder how many can recognize enough details to date this:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqGA92D7B6g

[Norman Kling]

Those poor guys. I wonder if anyone ever got a break? If anyone goofed up it would slow everything down. I understand what they ware doing until they dipped the wheel into the paint. The bearings were already in the hub and I didn't see any way they keep the paint out of the bearings?
Norm

[George House]

Fascinating ! Thanks Steve. Any one of those machines could’ve brought about Workers Compensation insurance

[RGould1910]

Thanks Steve, an informative and entertaining piece.

[Pat Branigan Wisc]

Thanks for sharing.

[Charlie B in N.J.]

Lordy what horrible jobs. I can’t imagine the drudgery. The working conditions. The bosses pushing and pushing constantly.

[Southfork Creek]

Yes, fascinating to watch!! Thanks Steve!!

[CudaMan]

That nipper that cuts off the excess hub bolt length looks especially dangerous to me. :O

[Kerry]

As for Steve's question of dating, well it is hard to tell until the painting and final inspection, but they are round felloe finished wheels, so I'd say at the latest 1917.

[Art M]

The full complement ball bearing assembly makes me think this takes place very early in Henry's production. A full complement bearing is one that has no rolling element separator. This design offers a lot of capacity, but is limited to very low speed.

The film shows there were a lot of production optimizations to be made. In the 1950s and 1960s, I had seen similar production processes.

My childhood neighbor had worked in a Detroit Ford factory prior to WWI. After 3 years of employment, he was drafted then returned to his hometown after the war. He said 3 years was enough for him at the sweat shop. I wish I would have asked him about his years at the Ford plant.

Art Mirtes

[Allan]

Bending 8 felloe sections 8 at a time is impressive. Note that the blanks were set between massive stops to hold them in place. This means the felloes are bent under compression. The outer diameter of the felloe is set by the stops. The inner diameter is reduced under compression. This means no break-out on the outer diameter. The guy in New Zealand who makes lovely wheels uses the same process, albeit, by boiling the timber blanks rather than steaming, and making them one at a time.

Allan from down under.

[bobt]

Do the math. 15 million T's !

[tdump]

Imagine trying to get Americans to work like that now?
1 out of a 100 maybe.
That is amazing team work.
thanks for posting that.
they don't handle the wheels very carefully do they?

[1925 Touring]

Do the math. 15 million T's !

Thats, more or less, 60,000,000 wheels!
720,000,000 spokes!
I know wire wheels it would be different, however I'm sure they had to make replacements for wood spoke wheels....

[Colin Mavins]

So what your saying is find 20 vintage shop machines most likely sitting at the Henry Ford museum Find 40 people with some skills and making new wheels is a snap Great video thanks for posting .

[Erik Johnson]

That movie was most likely filmed in the Ford plant proper but be aware that Ford also had outside wheel suppliers.

Regarding steam bending felloes: Bill Calimer has a similar set up at his wheelworks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9EUfl6kNc4

[Steve Jelf]

Excellent video.

Outside wheel suppliers included Hayes, Kelsey, Firestone, Cleveland, and Pruden. (There was no "Kelsey-Hayes". They were separate companies until 1927, when Model T production ended). Rims were not "cadmium plated" either.

[John Codman]

Hi Steve,
If you say that the wheel rims were not Cadmium plated I believe you. I confess that I have not watched the entire film, but how were the wheels finished? I ask because my T's wheels were painted silver by a previous owner, which I assumed was to simulate the Cad plating. Frankly, I hate the look.

[speedytinc]

Wheels in the film are non-demountable & painted all black(or dark blue) as a unit.
Watch the film completely. Fantastic. Mass production @ its finest.

[Allan]

Cad [cadmium] plating is yellow. The Ford demountable rims were electro plated zinc. Silver metalised paint is a very close match to the original zinc plating.

Allan from down under.

[South Park Zephyr]

That was worth watching
Thank for posting it

[Steve Jelf]

John, silver paint (Oklahoma chrome) is often used on demountable rims to simulate zinc plating (galvanizing). I don't know where the "cad plating" superstition originated. That process was commercially adopted in the thirties after Model T production ended. The wheels shown in the film, no later than 1918, are non-demountable. Those rims were painted body color, like the rest of the wheel.

Non-demountable (1915): Rim painted body color.

Demountable (1923): Rim galvanized.

[Allan]

Zinc plating is NOT galvanising. True galvanising involves dipping clean steel into a bath of molten Zinc. This results in a coating up to 1mm thick, which provides long lasting protection against corrosion. Zinc plating is an electro plating process in which an even coat of zinc is applied to clean steel. This coating can be as thin as .0002" It is a smooth, even coating which does provide some protection from corrosion, but it is nowhere near as effective or as long lived as hot dip galvanising. Just ask Steve Jelf why he buys pails old stock roofing nails instead of new stuff. The old stuff is hot dip galvanised, not like the electro plated modern equivalent.
You get what you pay for with the two processes. Hot dip galvanising of T rims is costly. You have then to clean up any rough spots/pimples in the finish before mounting tyres, but you will have rims you are not likely to ever have to return to down the track. Electro plated zinc rims are much cheaper.They are beautifully smooth and uniform in colour, but the lack of depth in the coating will mean rust will start sooner rather than later, and you may well have to have them replated down the line.

Allan from down under.

[John Codman]

Thanks for answering my questions, guys.

Edit: I have completed watching the film. Thanks for the posting. As you watch, remember that film of that era was shot at 16 frames per second. Those projectors are for the most part gone. Modern film is shot and played back at 24 frames per second. When you watch 16 fps film at 24 fps, the film is playing one third faster then it was shot. The work at Ford was at a brutal pace; employee turnover was huge as the workers for the most part couldn't take the speed for long.

[Steve Jelf]

The change in film speed from 16 fps to 24 fps came with the introduction of a sound track along the edge of the film. The extra speed improved the sound quality considerably. That's why for decades the standard phonograph speed was 78 rpm, or even 80 rpm. It took that long for engineers to improve fidelity enough to allow 33⅓ rpm recordings.

[John Codman]

When I was a child, my maternal grandmother lived with us. She was healthy except for macular degeneration and glaucoma. In those days there wasn't much that they could do for it. She had loved reading, but could not see well enough to read a book. My mother found a service that loaned out huge (18 inch) records that played at 16 2/3 RPM. This was good enough for voice, but would not have worked well for music. As I recall, these monster records were recorded on one side only. There was enough capacity that IIRC most books were on two or three discs. I'm not sure if this is off-topic, but if it is I apologize.

[John Codman]

Those poor guys. I wonder if anyone ever got a break? If anyone goofed up it would slow everything down. I understand what they ware doing until they dipped the wheel into the paint. The bearings were already in the hub and I didn't see any way they keep the paint out of the bearings?
Norm

I suspect that the bearings had been greased and the paint just ran off. Another possibility is that the device that lifts the wheel into the vat of paint blows air at a low pressure into the wheel hub, not allowing paint to enter the hub.

[Rich Eagle]

I am thinking the mechanism that turns the wheel has close fit, top and bottom, that seals the paint out. Maybe air pressure too. It looks as though there is no paint on threads or in bearing.

Do you suppose the spinning dries the paint enough that the wheel can be lifted out or are the gloves just ouching between the rim flanges?
I will say that the steam bending took me "down the rabbit hole" for a few hours. Eriks link was followed by links to steam bending wood bows. I wish that info had been there years ago when I Bent my Bus bows. Mine have served me well for 30 some years, but the method of bending was not what it

Fabricating is so much fun, but the videos like these are great.
Thanks
Rich

[DHort]

My rear axle and driveshaft have what looks like yellow paint as a primer. Could that have been Cadmium?

[Allan]

Dave, it could only be cadmium if you don't believe Steve was correct in stating commercial cadmium plating was developed in the 1930's

Allan from down under.

[Steve Jelf]

From Wiki:

After the industrial scale production of cadmium started in the 1930s and 1940s, the major application of cadmium was the coating of iron and steel to prevent corrosion; in 1944, 62% and in 1956, 59% of the cadmium in the United States was used for plating.[7][25] In 1956, 24% of the cadmium in the United States was used for a second application in red, orange and yellow pigments from sulfides and selenides of cadmium.[25]

Dave, I suspect the "primer" you found was from a later (non-original) paint job.

[Atomic Amish]

Did anyone else notice at about the 1:50 mark the last fellowe he puts in gets misloaded?

Fascinating film, Steve! Thanks for sharing it.

v/r,
jason

[Russ_Furstnow]

Relating to Steve's question about the date of the film, I noticed that the front hubs were the "machined" hubs that were used on 1915 and 1916 Fords. The threads for the hub cap are shorter than the early front hubs, so it is safe to say that this film was made around 1916 or possibly 1917. Also, as we restore our Fords, many of us take a great deal of time sanding and filling the wood spokes and felloes so as to get a beautiful, smooth finish. I think it would be more "correct" to just paint the wood and leave all the wood grain and imperfections. (Does "Original Smith" have any comments?) I hope this helps, Russ Furstnow

[Jerry VanOoteghem]

My rear axle and driveshaft have what looks like yellow paint as a primer. Could that have been Cadmium?

Zinc chromate primer.