Katy gets rolling
With the chassis straightened, T becomes a moveable feast again
The vanadium chassis of the Ford Model T is very lightweight but incredibly flexible and strong. It coped well with the virtually non-existent roads from the early part of the last century churned up by years of horses and carts. The proof is that Katy, our example of the breed, had been horrifically abused.
The reason young Henry Ford chose vanadium to use in his steel-alloy chassis was that it was an extraordinarily versatile, ductile and virtually indestructible material. It allowed for reduced weight while increasing tensile strength. When used on the vast scale of Ford production, it was readily available in the US and relatively cheap.
However, this chassis is suspected to have been dragged by hook around a scrapyard in the USA many moons ago, something that caused the chassis to bend (reported in an earlier installation). Now that Katy’s chassis has been straightened, all unwanted holes welded, front crossmember removed, repaired and re-fitted, it was time to give her a lovely gloss black finish and start hanging some parts. The front spring, axle and U-bolts were all fitted with fresh fasteners, restored threads and split-pin holes. All new split pins were fitted throughout.
More clever ideas
The restored handbrake was next to be added, which helped with the holding of the torque tube when installing the rear axle. The rear axle was fitted, firewall brackets installed and then the fuel tank put in its place. Virtually all components on a Ford T chassis are three-point mounted.
The front axle, rear axle, fuel tank and engine all have a triangulated mount to allow extreme flexing of the chassis without anything being over-stressed and breaking. Clever design! Finally the newly restored wheels with tyres were fitted and then – my favourite part of any restoration – wheeling the rolling chassis in and out of the workshop. Cheesy grin guaranteed!