Looking for 1928 Briggs Fordor wood plans.

[BRENT in 10-uh-C]

Originally Posted by fiddlybits

I looked around for an ash tree or even an inexpensive source for ash and came up empty. (I could pay $$$ but that was what I was trying to avoid.)

My answer came when I saw an all plastic park bench........

I am in a same dilemma in that I had been buying air-dried Ash at a local sawmill, --usually 500 bd. ft. at a time, but this last time I purchased all they had and got very little 8/4 stuff in the lot. Maple is price prohibitive here, and so I really do not know what wood I am going to substitute.

Below are some pix showing what Ford engineers said to use, and while I am not real keen on using Oak, I am open to suggestions/thoughts...

[1930artdeco]

Ok here is a question for people who have opened up original cars. I see that more than one wood is allowed. Did they substitute different wood pieces while on the line if they ran out? I.e. mismatching wood pieces in a door say maple and birch?

Mike

[bart78]

Look at Keruing. We use it all so for sucker rod. It's a good weather resistant wood.

[bart78]

Keruing is used to floor semi trailers most o the time. It gets real hard.

[Terry,NJ]

For small flat pieces, IU see nothing wrong with using pallet wood. I wouldn't use Oak though. Most car builders stayed away from Oak or used it sparingly. Even today, Morgan still uses Ash. Henry Laminated some pieces, so I assume this is acceptable.
Terry

Originally Posted by fiddlybits

I looked around for an ash tree or even an inexpensive source for ash and came up empty. (I could pay $$$ but that was what I was trying to avoid.)

My answer came when I saw an all plastic park bench........

[bart78]

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Where is the best place to get patterns for all makes of model a's? I could probably make all the parts from our scrap ash. If not there are allways whole boards that we can't use. To make a whole rod. We usually end up selling it for trailer flooring. For a dollar a board foot to get it off the lot.

[BRENT in 10-uh-C]

Originally Posted by Terry,NJ

For small flat pieces, IU see nothing wrong with using pallet wood. I wouldn't use Oak though. Most car builders stayed away from Oak or used it sparingly. Even today, Morgan still uses Ash. Henry Laminated some pieces, so I assume this is acceptable.
Terry

If that is true, why do you suppose Ford authorized it for use in his bodies?

Personally I have been lead to believe oak has an acid that is rough on adjoining sheetmetal however maybe it is OK?.

[Terry,NJ]

I don't know the reason. HF may have authorized it, but seldom used it. I have seen many discussions about the wood in model A s, yet I've never seen any references to Oak actually being present in the car. I myself, have some Walnut in the doors. British builders always stayed away from Oak, but I don't know why. Perhaps it's because Oak has a nasty habit of splintering (shivering) into hundreds of little daggers in an accident. I'm told that in the days of Oak sailing ships, there was a loss of gun crews due to this problem. It was known as shivering the timbers. I'm sorry, this is my best answer and I know it's not the answer you want.
Terry

[bart78]

Oak probably was not used because it does not bend well even when steam is used. I know a guy that makes bows. And he said oak is not good to use. Because it won't bend right. And it splinters.

[BRENT in 10-uh-C]

Originally Posted by bart78

Oak probably was not used because it does not bend well even when steam is used. I know a guy that makes bows. And he said oak is not good to use. Because it won't bend right. And it splinters.

That is interesting, and I don't know what to say about that since most of the brass-era automobiles all used steam bent oak bows, as did the Deluxe Roadster. It sure seems like if oak was not the best, they would have found something different to use back then!! I have always been told Maple was the worst to use but Red & White Oak were the best for steam bending. Find out something new every day.

[bart78]

He uses mostly ash. And even some red cedar.
He said oak is like a bomb. If I oak bow breaks it splinters real bad. He gets wood from us some. Our main problem with ash now. Is most mills don't have enough logs long enough for what we need. All our ash comes out of Indiana. If Henry owned his own forest? He could have used ash. Because it matures faster than oak.