1931 Model A Ford

1931 Model A Ford 2-door sedan and Cabriolet coupe, click picture to enlarge.

How many of you people still driving today remember being able to adjust the "spark advance" from the steering column? That's like setting the ignition points closer or wider even while you're driving down the road in order to get more power or to save gas. Well, we did that on these old Model A cars and it was just as normal as mashing the gas pedal to go faster is to us today. As I have said before the Model A was the car that my generation grew up with so it is very familiar to many of us. It was said about the old Model A that if you had a screwdriver and a pair of pliers and a roll of baling wire and just a little bit of mechanical aptitude that you fix about anything that might go wrong with it. That was more true than it was not true.

The Model A was,in effect, the transition from the very successful older Model T Fords with the old hand cranked starting where you put a crank handle that was shaped like a bent steel rod that had two bends in it, and a pin through the end of it that engaed with a notch in a pulley on the end of the crankshaft. When the handle was turned by hand it turned the motor enough to get it started. This way of cranking the old Model T was nicknamed as the "arm breaker" because if you did not remove the crank handle quickly as the engine fired up the handle would be engaged with the engine and would fly around and hit you if you still had hold of it. As I said the Model A was a transition from the Model T to the newer, more powerful V-8 cars that came along later. The Model A had a 200.5 cid, 40 hp four cylinder engine and a 3 speed floor mounted gearshift. It had expanding shoe and drum brakes on all four wheels and safety glass in the windows which was the first time that safety glass was used in cars. Some style changes in the 1931 Model A included a new radiator shell and running boards with single piece splash aprons. The two door sedan shown here was the most popular of the model A's and the Cabriolet Coupe was next to it. The sedan sold for $490 and the voupe for $430.