Originally Posted by Ramona Byrd
My Dad's old 1939 Ford. It had a crooked iron crank that most
of the time had to be inserted into the front of the car and turned
around. It flew faster one day and broke my father's arm!!
But it would go through desert sand, steep hills, was a real work
horse. Dear old Dad wrecked it in the Yosemite hills one dark night,
years later sister and I found it and took off one of the big headlights
on one fender.
People do not realize that the electric starter was still an option until 1941 for Ford. The deluxe had them but if you bought the standard (it usually had the last years deluxe grille in them) it was an option. The oil filter was always an option on the flat heads until 1953 for Ford also.
Funny thing is most of my hot rods were 4 speed cars and the motors I built for them usually killed starters (12.5:1 compression) so for the longest time I would make sure to park my car on hills and places that I could coast a bit and pop the clutch to start it. When we would get tired of trying to find hills or pushing them I would go put a starter on it.
Billy