1934 Aussie door hinge pins

[JR48]

A first post from a new member. I am recently back into early Fords after a 40 year break and have returned an 1934 Australian assembled RHD Roadster from the US into New Zealand. The car is an older restoration that needs many details tidying up and I’m hoping that an Australian Fordbarner might be able to help me? Here in Auckland we do have Flathead Ted who is a mine of knowledge and is very helpful around these early Fords, but there are still intricacies to unravel around the differences between Australian and US assembled cars.
The present hinge pins are utilitarian modern hex drive machine screws and need to be replaced. For some arcane reason these Australian pins are different from US assembled Ford open car pins and although I can probably retro-design adequate substitutes from the actual hinge parts, it would be good and very helpful to see an actual pin. So if any Aussie Fordbarner can provide an image, or even better loan a pin & nut that would be very helpful.
I’m also going to 're-fresh' the upholstery and need an image of the original ‘look’ of the leather door panels and seat, from preferably an untouched, original car.
This is only part 1 of an on-going project so I hope to make some good Aussie connections. Thanks in advance.

[DavidG]

Ford U.S. was not a supplier of bodies to Ford Australia during this period (as Ford Australia was/and I believe still is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ford of Canada as was Ford New Zealand). While some body components were likely imported from Canada, Australian bodies were primarily made locally. If your car's rocker panels do not meet the running boards, then your body was made in Australia. Any U.S. or Canadian-manufactured '34 roadster bodies found today in Australia made the journey years later in used condition.

It can be confusing in the case of New Zealand where Ford had no significant manufacturing capability and despite it geographic proximity to Australia, vehicles and service parts were imported directly from Canada.

[Mart]

Are these the ones with a countersunk slotted head, a brass ball between the two hinge halves, a keyway in the end of pin, a spring, a washer keyed into the keyway and a nut? If so they were the same as the ones used on the thames 300E van rear doors. I think they were semi proprietary UK coachbuilders type stuff.

I might be talking rubbish but I did notice the Aussie hinges looked like the thames hinges. I did have some Thames hinges somewhere, but I don't know if I could lay my hands on them.

Mart.

[1932tub]

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/s...d.php?t=701029

Read through this thread there are some good pics of open car hinges

[flatheadute1934]

I have an aussie. Roadster and a canadian touring there is still a couple of orginal pins in the roadster also have some pics of some original tourings from Australia.

[JR48]

Sponsored Links (Register now to hide all advertisements)

Thanks for all the replies. I've had some very valuable information supplied to me and I'm confident I can get some good copies made.

[FlatheadTed]

[ The source of Australian body panels . Australia had no design falsities and was tightly controlled by Canada who in turn had to stay with in the guide lines of there agreement with Ford US as far as design goes .cars were made up from varouse cabs and chassis brought in,Since there stamping abilty was limted , The Roadster Body' stampings stand out on there own except for the shortened height they are identical to the US ones .Discussing this with the Australians its thought that the lower panels were trimmed to accommodate a wood floor as the local content of there cars had to be about 20%.Tooling came from the parent co USA and was expensive .Anticipating a reasonable production run by the Model a era they were stamping some of there own .Because of the small production run of the 33 & 34 Roadster Its unlikely that Ford Canada would have funded the tooling for just 1000 ,33 & 34 body's ,Its documented that they could not get funding for tooling for later models that had projected runs of 600.As far as I can tell Canada did not have stamping faciltys but had assembly plants only, panels were sourced across the river possible from a out side suppler such as Murray or possibly Buffalo NY .Others may add to this .

. When the word US body is used in this neck of the woods is refers to US design, as far as designs go Ford USA had control over Australia ,And was bringing cabs and chassis
QUOTE=DavidG;704271]Ford U.S. was not a supplier of bodies to Ford Australia during this period (as Ford Australia was/and I believe still is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ford of Canada as was Ford New Zealand). While some body components were likely imported from Canada, Australian bodies were primarily made locally. If your car's rocker panels do not meet the running boards, then your body was made in Australia. Any U.S. or Canadian-manufactured '34 roadster bodies found today in Australia made the journey years later in used condition.

It can be confusing in the case of New Zealand where Ford had no significant manufacturing capability and despite it geographic proximity to Australia, vehicles and service parts were imported directly from Canada.[/QUOTE]

[Tudortomnz]

Basically, there was a high import duty on imported bodies & panels into Australia after the WW 1. The Aust. govt. wanted manufacturing & jobs within Australia. I have never read there was any set ''local content'' ; whatever design changes Ford Australia done was to suit the market & their production budget. The wooden framing used by Ford was more economical than having the presses for metal subframing etc. They were also buying fittings, nuts ,bolts etc. from Aussie suppliers.
GM Australia was capable of making all Australian bodies [ Holdens] & Chrysler was using bodies supplied by TJ Richards, Vic., although of course some expensive models did sometimes have Fisher bodywork. Ford Australia was quite capable of producing body panels for the high volume models or models specific to Australia, eg. the Sloper Tudors & Coupe Utilities.
They also used to import the odd Canadian built up body for their own design dept.[ Lew Bandt was in this Dept. from the '30's to early '60's] especially during the Model A years. Many of these still exist
There has been a lot of published material about what Ford Australia made.

[FlatheadTed]

My interest is primary what was done in 1933/34 with the 33 & 34 Roadster ,I am of the belief that the panels were stamped in the USA ,Later on as you say, as time went on they had the ability to stamp a lot more of there panels such as the sloper .Designing ,I should have said autonomous, they did some designing there but it had to have Ford USAs sanction they were a lot more tied in than one would believe .The utility had to be sent over to Henry for approval .Wood framing I have added a photo of the Yankee door that also has wood framing this was necessary because of annual model changes ,This wood differs little to what the Ausy ones had .

[FlatheadTed]

Here's a copy of what Fords thinking was at the time were Lew could not get tooling approval for his Falcon convertible at a ltd production run of 600, instead the panels were imported .

[FlatheadTed]

Here's a couple of factory shots

[flatheadute1934]

There were no canadian built roadster or touring bodies these were imported from USA. And put on canadian chassis. They did built 2 door and 4 doors bodies in canada. And Canadian top and body company made the 3 windows and cabrio bodies. 5 win bodies were also made in canada. In 1934 there was no canadian production of 4 cyc engines. They came from England with USA serial numbers. David

[mrtexas]

Originally Posted by JR48

Thanks for all the replies. I've had some very valuable information supplied to me and I'm confident I can get some good copies made.

If it were me I'd buy the closest ones already made and order a reamer to fit. On my 36 woodie I used pins for a 50 that were just enough oversized to fix the looseness.

[FlatheadTed]

This may look like we are taking over the /pin thred .The originator says continue the subject ,

[flatheadute1934]

Import from commonwealth country was less the usa. Hence having ford of Australia a subsidy of ford of Canada.

[flatheadute1934]

The Australian hinges are shorter and weaker and put a lot more stress on the pins. David

[mercman from oz]

David mentioned that the Hinges were weaker on the Australian 33/34 Ford Open Cars. I can attest to that.
When my Phaeton was being painted in the back yard, we removed the Fasteners to get a better paint coverage. That meant that the Doors were not shut, but were just swinging. It started to rain, so we quickly pushed the car into the Shed.
Unfortunately, the Drivers Side Door swung open as we got near the doorway & the partially opened door hit the Wooden Door Post. The door dropped onto the ground, as both Hinges had snapped clean off.
The search was on for a replacement set of hinges. Mercman<><

[flatheadute1934]

Here are some pictures supplied by an Australian member. There is also a spring that sits on top of the Washer.

[flatheadute1934]

Hinges appear to be cast rather steel.

[Tudortomnz]

This has nothing to do with point scoring on who knows what about Ford Australia, but I have recently noticed the '33 '34 Aussie door post on the Phaeton is wider than the US Phaeton. They must have been adding a couple of inches to the rear seating as they did with the 1930- '32 [ Model A production] Phaeton.?
Ford Australia began full manufacturing of the Fordor 3W Sedans in 1930 which have many interior differences to the Canadian sedans in NZ. They got a guy ex Fisher US to set it up. They used the Sedan door on their sport Coupe, rather than the Nth American Coupe door.
A good source of info is from Ian Irwins book, The New Car, Australia welcomes the Model A Ford. It is hard to find. Eddie Fords 'Restored Cars'' mag. has run articles on Lew Bandt & Ford Australia over the years ; much more accurate than hearsay.