Nominal's Wooden (Wood knot) Car

[Nominal]

Well, I've had this thing for a bit over a year now.

It's a 1951 Ford Country Squire. 

It came on TM, being sold by the importer. Apparently it had been parked in a field in Pennsylvania for some time. It got no bids on TM but was offered for a fairly cheap fixed price. After chatting to the seller and getting some bad advice on here I bought it. AT that point it was in Blenheim. The seller shifted to a some sort of skid at Strait Shipping, then I had it collected from there and delivered.

It's in pretty sad shape. The old wood is missing, it is rusty, and god knows when the flathead last ran.

Rust flagged at the border unsurprisingly.

 

 

[Nominal]

This is the good side. Hinges are still attached.

 

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This is the not so good side. Door hinges pulled out of the A-pillar. 

 

Rough plan is to fix the drivers door pillar and at least some of the sill structure.

Then do the passenger side the same.

Then, um, everything else?

[Nominal]

I have had a VIN assigned for the woodie so it's properly recorded in LANDATA for the future. I also had the local Repair Certifier come down and take a look before I did anything. He confirmed that it's OK to go ahead and start work replacing the rot myself. He's since passed this project on to the new owner of the shop. so I'll have to get him down for a look sometime soon too.

After that I felt it was OK to do a little dismantling. Removed the hood (floppy) and some of the grille bits and the drivers side guard for access to the A-pillar.

Also had a go at replicating the front under-floor support. It was hard going in 16g, I made the sides separately using the nibble to fold the bend over as a flange then welding sections into the base. Turned out 'OK' but might end up making it again now I've had a practice run.

 

 

[Nominal]

 

I got offered a 1951 Ford body shell for 'free' if I removed it from the rolling chassis.

I was in pretty haggard shape, and past any restoration. Unfortunately the front panel were long gone. Apparently it had been in a field near Levin for quite a while.

Anyway, paid some $$ to have it delivered from Levin.

 

And attacked it with a sabre saw....

 

 

Main things collected where a much better set of door hinges, the rusty one in front is from the woodies and is pretty rooted.

 

And this RHS A-pillar cut. I plan to graft this into the woodie shell as the existing one is pretty much missing.

 

 

 

[Nominal]

I was going to keep this rear section for a 'one day' (/never) couch build but after advertising the seats on FB, @Cbomb came down and took most of the 4-door parts away.

 

 

The rest of the shell went to scrap, although I heard later that some local whanau cherry picked some bits to be used in an art project of some sort.

 

Also, the owner of the chassis needed some cash after buying too many motorcycles, so I ended up buying it so it's still sitting in the driveway. It's RHD, but might be useful for some parts or to use as a temporary body support (although I suspect the woodie chassis may be different in some way)

 

[Nominal]

Next area of attach was the A-pillar on the drivers side.

 

Cut out the upper hinge side for a start

 

There is a reinforcing plate inside that carries the threaded plates for the hinge so replicated that.

 

And welded it into the pillar, after cutting some more rust out.

 

New bit for this side

[Nominal]

 

Welded in place and cleaned up

Bolted my 'bracing' back into place to check fit. This is a bit speculative as the pillar wasn't all that solid when I started. Best guess until I can get the door back on.

 

Made a cover patch for the hinge side and tacked it in

Welded that in then made this 'door simulator' using a couple of the old junk hinge parts and a hunk of Holden (IIRC) driveshaft so give me some idea of where the lower hinge mounts should go

[Nominal]

So, this car needs a lot of wood.

Henry Ford bought ~300,000 acres of timber land in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and built a town, sawmill and hydro plant. The wood was used in Model T's and later Ford cars right up to the end of real Woodie production in 1951. Here's a history snippet:

 

After WWII station wagon building resumed at Iron Mountain and all of the Ford and Mercury staAfter ttion wagons and Sportsmen convert­ibles were built here. The station wagons were four-door and lasted until the new 1949 model which was only available as a two-door. With the introduction of the "New Generation" Ford, the amount of timber used in the station wagons was cut around 85 percent. No structural wood was required as the wagon bodies were steel structured with mahogany-skinned panel work and maple framing.

Mercury also used the same body for their wagon but the doors were cleverly restyled to flow into the wider front sheet metal of the Mercury. The new design was the work of E.T. "Bob" Gregorie and his team at Ford.

The steel body structures were built in Detroit and then shipped by rail to Iron Mountain. Here the wood panels were installed and the bodies were painted. The work required a lot of hand assembly to make the doors and side panels fit cleanly.

The panels for these New-Generation wagons were as­sembled using advanced fabrication methods with one of the first microwave curing processes. Some section framings were created out of six loose layers of ash with a two layer overlay of maple.

The door and side panels were then formed in a press using loose wood-plys topped with a thin layer of Honduran ma­hogany. This jig-formed panel was then put into a micro-wave bonding oven under pressure. At the time, this process was referred to as "radio frequency bonding." The new process cured the panel in five minutes rather than the 48 hours it normally took! Once the bodies were completed they were shipped out by rail to assembly plants around the country.

The final run of Ford's "wood" Station Wagons looked somewhat similar from 1949 to 1951; however, there were many small differences in the wagons. These were the years of the "single and twin-spinner" Fords and in 1950 there was an attempt to lower the production costs when Ford dropped the wood graining on the tailgate and replaced it with a painted tailgate. The rear quarter windows were eliminated, the interior trimming was changed, with wood-grained Masonite door panels and a painted dash board replacing the wood graining. Other running changes were made with some items re-introduced and then dropped again on the 1951 model. As so many minor changes were made to this series of station wagons, restorers have a hard time determining exactly what a correct year model should or should not have.

Around October 1950, the mahogany paneling on the station wagons was replaced with Di-Noc plastic vinyl sheeting bonded to steel panels. Chrysler had been using this trimming idea on their Town and Countrys since 1948. Chrysler dropped Di-Noc and converted over to body color panels and wood framing in mid-1949.

Ford continued building the Ford and Mercury station wag­ons at the Iron Mountain plant until December 1951, when the plant was closed and 3,500 workers were laid off. To take up the loss of production of Ford and Mercury station wagons, production was moved to Mitchell-Bentley in Ionia, Michigan.

While in the USA for work last year (we won't be back there for a while I suppose) we visited Rick Mack. He's probably the best supplier of this type of wood. As noted above, the frames were laminated in the original ford design. This because there is a lot of curve in the pieces as the come up over the upper parts of the door 'skin'. If they were bandsawed out from a timber blank then the grain would weaken the structure. Rick doesn't use a microwave bonding but laminates the wood strips into forms using a press.

Pic below is Rick's personal woodie. 

End result of the visit was an order for a full wood set.

:

[Nominal]

Made up one of these tools to help with unscrewing a number of phillips head screws, works amazingly well. Just a cheap air hammer from SCA, weld a socket on the end, a torque arm, and an Ali 5/16th bit.

 

Some of the hinge screws needed a bit more persuasion with heat and a bolt welded on. Eventually got everything apart without having to drill any of the hinge screws for the woodie doors.

 

[Nominal]

Continuing on the door pillar, lower section

Inner guard area first

 

Then the pillar structure, piece by piece

[Nominal]

Lower hinge area is a double skinned piece

Inner reinforcing section first

 

Then the outer part

 

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Took a break from the front door and removed the rear tailgates over lockdown.

 

I hadn't been able to open the lower tailgate as the full width piano hinge was rusted solid. Only movement was due to rust flexing

 

 

Some of the screws came out, but many needed drilling as the heads were rusted away.

The flap at the bottom is attached to the tailgate and covers the lower valence area. Some of it is missing.

Removed the hinge and stripped the tailgate down.

 

This is a picture of one in good shape.........

 

[Nominal]

The upper tailgate unbolted easily, but contained a disturbing amount of rust flakes

I stripped the garnish mouldings and glass out. Looked pretty manky.

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Oh hey!

 

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Took the tailgates up to Stacey at Mercury Garage in Shannon

https://www.facebook.com/Mercury-Garage-Mr-Merk-Vintage-Gallery-467286810076025

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After a few weeks soaking in molasses tub

 

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Bit manky

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Holey

[Nominal]

Stacey did some nice repairs