Body Lead Time

[Bob Bidonde]

I seek facts and opinions about the lead time the Ford Motor Company experienced for Briggs and Murray bodies to feed its Model A final assembly lines. Assume that the Ford assembly lines are far reaching ones on the East & West Coasts.

Questions.

1. How many work days on average did it take Briggs and Murray to build a body ready for shipment?

My guess is the body production rate was four days considering one day to process the order, one day to assemble the body in white, one day for painting, and one day for upholstery, pin striping and preparation for shipping.

2. How long on average did it take to transport a body to the Ford Motor Company?

My guess is eight days plant-to-plant by rail. Assuming bodies were shipped by the trainload, one day loading into the train, one day for the railroad to assemble the train, three days train travel, one day for the railroad to reassemble the train as a local to the assembly plant, and one day to offload the body at the Ford assembly plant.

3. How long on average did the body sit at the Ford assembly plant before reaching the body drop on the assembly line?

My guess is seven days from receipt of the body to the body drop. One day to process paperwork and prepare the body for induction onto the storage line, and seven days in storage awaiting the body drop.

4. Allowing for unknowns and rounding off my guesses, I say it is reasonable to assume the average lead time was 30 days from placing the order for the body until the body was dropped onto a frame at a Ford assembly plant.

Application.

Here is how I am applying the lead time to get an idea of when the body of my Victoria may have been built by Murray:

A. The number stamped into the frame of my Victoria indicates that the engine was built on April 8, 1931;

B. That engine was went into a frame within 30 days later, about May 8, 1931;

C. The Murray-built body was made 30 days prior to May 8, 1931, so it is an April body????

What are your thoughts about this?

[BRENT in 10-uh-C]

Bob, I definitely do not know exact answers to your questions however here are a couple thoughts I have. I suspect the "holding" time would be far greater. First off, sales in 1931 were falling so vehicles were not moving out the door. Adding to that, 'Just In Time' delivery is something that was not intentionally practiced back then. Ford would have issued Purchase Orders to the vendors for quantities. I would expect orders to be of 500 or 1,000 units at a time. I would also suspect that these were shipped by rail in one or two shipments. I also know that Ford's trains were used efficiently by making large routes carrying large quantities of product to be warehoused at each of the Branches.

I think the assembly location would greatly affect the engine installation date however on the other times, it would not surprise me if your estimated times don't need to be doubled.

[Kurt in NJ]

I think the time frame depended on the orders, and the location of the body in warehouse, and the year(sales slowed a lot in 31) ---some bodys could sit for a month or more, some would be put together the day they arrived at an assembly plant ---in 28, 29 sales were good, assembly would be quick, in 31 a body could wait for a buyer and then be assembled to a chassis, a lot of xtra engines were made in 30, and some states had a new law(I know NJ did) about inside fuel lines for june 1931 that required the indented firewall type of fuel system--this could have caused bodys or engine/chassis to be moved to other assembly plants to adjust production dates to suit local conditions ---I don't have any supporting documentation, just my thoughts.

some would be damaged slightly in shipment and need rework

[Bob Bidonde]

Thanks for your thoughts.

[Tinbasher]

The story I've hear is that Ford could produce 5 chassis to every body. This was a major hold up, so bodies where produced in house and by suppliers to keep things going. Funny today it takes about 5 times longer to restore the body then the chassis. Some things never change.
The Old Tinbasher

[Bob Bidonde]

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The genesis of the 190A Victoria Coupe is an interesting study, and a significant reason is that this model has a well documented introduction month. What complicates the study is the changeover from the Leather-Back to the Steel-Back body.

Recently I came upon an article about the Murray Body Company which made the Model A 190A bodies for Ford. An engineer from the C. R. Wilson Company, Mr. James Vehko went to work for Murray in 1930. Mr. Vehko invented the deep-draw body dies enabling the manufacture of the Steel-Back Victoria Coupe. His dies went into production at Murray, and my guess is that implementation of those dies was very late in 1930 or early in 1931.

Did you know that the Fords favored the Murray Body Company over Briggs? It's true, and Henry Ford used his financial power and influence to save the Murray Company during the Model A and early Ford V8 production years. The preponderance of the early V8 Ford car bodies were built by Murray.

Briggs on the other hand strayed from Ford and became the premier supplier of Chrysler car bodies.

From known surviving 190A Victoria Coupes (from International Victoria Assn records), the Steel-Back cars having a flat firewall and front seats attached with rods are very scarce. Frame numbers indicate most were assembled by Ford branches in March and April of 1931. This suggests that the bodies for these cars were built by Murray earlier in 1931.

The information about the Model A Victoria in The Ford Model A As Henry Built It is not correct because there are no surviving Biggs built 190A cars, and it was coincidental (not by Ford's design) that a buyer had a choice between a Leather-Back and a Steel-Back body. It's coincidental because of commingling of Leather-Back and Steel-Back bodies at Ford branches during the changeover.

[Marco Tahtaras]

Originally Posted by Bob Bidonde

From known surviving 190A Victoria Coupes (from International Victoria Assn records), the Steel-Back cars having a flat firewall and front seats attached with rods are very scarce. Frame numbers indicate most were assembled by Ford branches in March and April of 1931. This suggests that the bodies for these cars were built by Murray earlier in 1931.

This has been an issue of confusion in the Model A world as long as I can remember. The number on the frame is simply the engine number. The engine number provides the date (through records) when the engine was built, not the car. Obviously the engine had to be built and shipped before it could be dropped into a chassis and the corresponding number stamped onto a frame. There was an inherent lag time which varied considerably.

By 1931 as sales were falling off Ford was slowing vehicle production. Engines were warehoused longer which commonly increased the lag time between when an engine was built and when it found it's way into a car. By mid 1931 a lag time of 3-4 months became VERY common.

A great example of this it Jim Boehmke's '31 Standard Coupe that has been pictured here several times. When he picked up the car it was a nice, unmolested, 'matching numbers' car. The engine / frame number shows the engine build date of April 1, 1931. When Jim called me about his exciting acquisition he said "it's an April '31 Coupe" following the common practice of dating by frame number only.

When I finally got over to his place to see the car I looked it over for details. When I saw that it had an all steel seat carriage and corresponding package tray and rear window, I explained that the car was built no earlier than mid-July 1931. It would have ended there but we found a very clear body stamping on the front floor cross sill. The stamping indicated the body was built at the Richmond, CA branch. It turned out that the Richmond plant began vehicle production August 2, 1931.

This was an eye-opener for Jim who has owned and driven Model A's for 40 years. He learned that his 'April car' was no earlier than August and there was more than four months lag time between engine build and the time it found it's way into his car.

If you revisit the Victoria Association records with this in mind your outlook will change considerably. Also keep in mind that many respondents acquired their cars not knowing the history of what previous owners had done such as repro body tags with made up numbers, engine swaps, etc.