1931 Ford Model A Review - The FIRST "Regular" Car!

all right what's up guys my name is zach and today i am driving a 1931 ford model a up front is a 3.3 liter inline four down below is a three-speed manual transmission now i'm excited to be driving this car today because well actually this is my own personal car this is my family's 1931 ford model a and as you'll notice from the review number at the beginning of the video it had an r next to it and that means revised i actually reviewed this car three years ago but at that time it was still owned by my grandfather before he passed and the video of me driving it was actually only the second time i had ever driven the model a now it's been in my possession for two years and i've really gotten this thing down now a brief history of the model a before we get into it the model a was built from 1928 till 1931 this is the last year the model a was offered in that time ford produced over 4 million model a's that's right 4 million over a million model a's were built a year and so this was the replacement for the model t and in 1932 they discontinued the model a and switched over to the model b which got the flathead v8 that really sparked something in history but this is the last year of the inline four in the last year of the ford model a 1931. this car is 89 years old all original so let's hop back up front to that 3.3 liter inline four i absolutely love how simple it is there is no fuel pump in the model a it is gravity fed down from the fuel tank which is right in front of the front window gravity fed down into the carburetor and into the engine while this car is tremendously slow it actually makes a ton of torque starting it in second gear is very easy to do and honestly what i do most of the time because we'll talk about the transmission in a second and i've used this car to actually push my 1985 mazda rx-7 into the garage this thing can push and pull very well that's it it's about as fast it goes the other night it was it was cool out and i just left the bar and i got this baby up to 50 miles an hour 5-0 people will tell you it'll go faster but when you have four-wheel drum manual brakes you really don't want to go much faster and you have to remember with this whole car when this car came out in 1931 there weren't that many paved roads especially not paved in the way that they are today so it was a lot of two tracks it was a lot of off road it was a lot of gravel and dirt roads that these cars had to handle because that was a lot of america's road system highways didn't even exist for another 20 years after this car so let's talk about the transmission the transmission is a three speed dog leg what that means is that first gear is actually left and back second gear is right and forward and third gear is right and back and that's it that's all the forward gears you get in the model a going along with that they are not synchronized there are no synchros between gears so the first time you drive a model a you'll probably grind a gear or two or three or more after that to prevent grinding what most people do is double clutch clutch to get it out of gear let off the clutch let back in the clutch then move it into the next gear and last but not least about the drivetrain of course the model a is it's rear-wheel drive it's got a solid rear axle not that far off from an rx-7 well first gen at least so let's talk about the interior there's not a whole lot in here but definitely some interesting bits well in front of me i don't have any gauges the gauges are actually in the center of the car i do have a fuel gauge i have an amperage gauge my key to turn the vehicle on we'll talk about that in a little bit then i have my speedometer and odometer and before you ask that is not the original mileage the odometer didn't work for about at least 35 years but it actually now works my dad and i fixed it a couple weeks ago actually i do have one cage that is outside of the car in true hot rodder fashion i have a coolant gauge that is up on the hood why is it up on the hood well that's because there's a thermometer that just dips down into the coolant that's it that's how they measure the coolant now the steering wheel is huge of course i don't have any power steering so leverage is your friend however in the center of the steering wheel i do have a horn button for the aoga horn i'll play it here and i have a switch the switch is actually for the headlights this is where the headlights will be found it's on the steering wheel and you move it to the right once for your headlights twice for your brights very interesting and something you don't really see anymore behind the steering wheel you'll find two levers on the left is actually for your spark you can advance and the spark of the engine so when you're idling i usually leave it up i it a little bit but when i'm cruising like so i crank it down and advance the spark a little bit the engine runs smoother at higher rpms i literally get to tune the engine while i'm driving there is no ecu i am the ecu on the right hand side i do have a hand throttle this is essentially cruise control you can crank this down and you'll just sit there and cruise on the door i have my handle and my crank for the window that's it of course manual windows center console wise well i don't have a center console but underneath the dashboard there are a couple of important things first of all this knob coming out of the dashboard that's my choke if it's cold i'll pull that it'll help the engine start a little bit easier then i have a valve this actually turns the gas on like i said there's no actual fuel pump it's just gravity fed so you have to turn the gas on and so let's talk about the starting process in order to start a 1931 ford model a there's a couple things you have to do that are different than regular cars so first of all you turn the key put it in the key and turn it on nothing happens you have to reach under the dash and turn the gas on like i just mentioned and then there is a starter motor button up to the left you hit that and the car will crank over you can actually get out and crank from the hole in the front of the car with a physical crank however that is super unsafe to do and we've actually only done it once we do have the crank i'm showing it on screen now and so you can crank start it if you'd like then i have my parking brake very very tall and you pull it up towards you like a traditional parking brake nothing really too crazy there and then i have my pedal setup that little circle to the far right that is actually my gas pedal along with a foot rest to the right of it that looks like a second button so the gas pedal is just a circular button to the left of that is the brake and then the left of that is the clutch what's interesting about this car is that this is the first ford product to have traditional driving controls meaning a steering wheel clutch brake and gas in that order the model t had completely different pedals and actually most cars at the time they'd have a pedal to do this a pedal to do that there wasn't really any standard driving controls and so this is actually the first ford product to have standard driving controls now below my feet is actually where you'll find the battery but the battery system is not like a normal car this is a 6 volt system as opposed to 12 volt and it actually has a positive ground the chassis of the car is positively charged something you do not see anymore an interesting story about the floorboards is that ford was so poor at the time at the time that they made the model a you have to remember this is mid prohibition but mainly mid stock market crash mid great depression since ford was so poor at the time they would buy parts from other manufacturers and when the parts arrived in wooden crates they would take the crates disassemble them and make them into the floorboards for the model a so these floorboards were originally meant to be a crate for parts and they were reused ford was recycling in the 30s now the seats are very comfortable they are made of mohair which is a very old fabric style you don't see seats like this anymore these seats were reupholstered in the 80s but they used the original fabric now speaking of seats we will do a back seat review because that's where you want to be in a model a all right so we're in the back of the 1931 ford model a and first of all the one thing i want to show off is suicide doors really really cool so the reason why i say the back seat is the place you want to be is first of all i am fully spread out and i have no prayer of hitting the front seat i do have these nice little armrests these third windows i call these the queens windows do roll down it's kind of weird because their crank is like a i don't even know how to describe it it's like a hook instead of like a you can't really get good leverage on it so it kind of takes a while to roll down but these go all the way down these go most of the way down however as you'll notice the door is kind of cut to accommodate the wheel so they don't go all the way down one question i get all the time whenever i drive people around in the model a is there's no seat belts is that legal and yes it is legal to not have seat belts the reason is is that every car has to conform to the law that was in place the year it was made so in 1931 the seat belt actually hadn't been invented for automobiles yet so going by 1931 laws we don't need seat belts we don't actually even need turn signals we don't need airbags we don't need a backup camera we don't have a catalytic converter and you don't have to retrofit any of that because your car only has to abide by the laws set in place the year it was made so with all these increasing emissions laws and and things like that today this car will never be affected by that because it's only the laws that were in place in 1931. speaking of that actually another question that i'll get is that these are the original license plates for the car front and back i get a lot of questions on this as well yes these are legally registered here in the state of illinois if you have antique plates or you register your vehicle as an antique vehicle as this is it's well into that area almost over three times over as long as you have the year specific plates or original license plates you can keep those on the vehicle you just have to keep the brand new license plate in the vehicle so if you do get pulled over which we knock on wood we never have in this car you would have to present the actual true license plates because this is an antique it's sort of a show car even though this is not showroom quality you can actually keep the original license plates on if they're period correct and it's registered as an antique vehicle at least here in the state of illinois i don't know what it's like abroad i've never registered an antique vehicle in any other state so i can only tell you about illinois please leave a comment down below if you have same similar or no laws wherever you are overall i love the look of the model a it's so 30s the swooping fenders the exterior headlights the big front grille and the windshield that tilts out the windshield can actually tilt out about four inches really get that ac going now these are not wooden wheels previous year vehicles did come with wooden wheels these are actual metal wheels and they are tube tires so there are actual tubes inside of these tires and we actually got a flat last year my dad changed the tire just like you would a bicycle no different the best thing about the model a at least in my own opinion is that it always gets a reaction out of everyone everyone loves to see the model a people liked my rx7 people would approach me about my rx-7 and say oh that's a rotary that's neat but even non-car people love seeing the model a i've had male workers stop and will ask to sit in it kids adults elderly people everyone loves the model a because it just gives you this sense of of gatsby sort of i know gatsby was the 20s but like that sort of era this sort of jazz music through a big record player and sort of grand occasion i've driven my friends we actually take this car out to the bar a lot and every time we roll up everyone just sits in stairs because they don't expect to see a 1931 ford out on the town at 10 p.m and then they don't expect a bunch of 23 year olds to get out of it and so a lot of people will say to me you really drive the crap out of that thing yeah i drive it all the time if it's a summer warm day i'll drive it my dad drives it to work the thing is dumb reliable it's well built we've never had a major issue with it it leaks a little bit of oil it beeps and squeaks every once in a while but besides that it starts and runs every time and everyone loves it it's just the best if you can't experience a model a at least drive something old sometime people love it i love it it always puts a smile on my face i'm gonna get where i'm going a little late and a little bit smelling like gas but that's okay because i showed up in the best style of anyone well i hope you guys enjoyed the video i hope this shed some light on the model a the last review that i did i didn't do the thing justice it was only my second time ever driving it but now i'm willing to bet i have probably close to 500 miles logged on this car and boy is that only the start this was an anniversary gift from my grandmother to my grandfather back in 1985 when my dad asked my mom to marry him they got picked up in this car and now in this past week i lost a dear dear friend of mine and i drove this to his funeral and so like it or not this car is ingrained in my personality and my life this is single-handedly the most important car i've ever driven and i love it hope you guys enjoyed the video don't forget to rate the video comment on the video and subscribe if you really liked it take care guys [Music] [Applause] [Music] you

Channel: Shooting Cars

Views: 9,783

Rating: 4.8992443 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: DpSJW12_M8Y

Length: 15min 39sec (939 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 24 2020