Factory hardened valve seats

[coxswain98]

Did Ford put hardened valve seats in their 1940 blocks?

[Brian]

Yes

[Bored&Stroked]

Yes - on both intake and exhaust

[blucar]

The fuel of the 30's/40's was pretty bad until they added Eythel to the fuel, valve jobs were pretty common in 30/40 k miles. Ford felt that the American Farmers and common folks, had contributed a lot to the success of Ford, so they went to hardened valves and seats for greater longevity. I believe it was in about '52 that Ford stopped using hardened vales/seats in the flathead engines.
Do you need to put hardened valves/seats in an engine, only if you are going to drive it further than 40/50 K miles. Of course most machine shops and/or mechanics won't tell the customer that.

[coxswain98]

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Thank you for the answers! Especially about machine shop honesty. My machinist told me that, but he was not aware that there were already hardened seats. I wasn’t either and so I thought it still might be best to have hardened seats for unleaded gas, ethanol, etc. thanks again! Y’all saved me some money!