1925 Ford Model T Touring

1925 Ford Model T in Tobacco Road, Movie, 1941

Class: Cars, Convertible — Model origin:

Vehicle used by a character or in a car chase

Comments about this vehicle

Author	Message
Alessandro58 ◊ 2011-06-15 08:13
nzcarnerd ◊ 2011-06-15 09:02	Amazing how a car less than 20 years old can be considered such a joke.
rjluna2 ◊ 2011-06-15 14:39	I believe back then, these 20 years old cars were considered clunker where average life of the cars about 3 to 5 years old. I guess we are now enjoying longer life on these cars with current average life of 7 to 10 years old. I guess 30 years old car by today standard be a joke
somename ◊ 2011-06-15 16:27	^Who is the joke on? The guy who can keep a 30 year old car running? Or the guy 20 grand in debt just because he wants something new?
G-MANN ◊ 2011-06-15 16:29	A car is really only "old" at 7 years old if it's done a very high mileage.
johnfromstaffs ◊ 2011-06-15 16:42	My Bentley is, as we speak, 8 days short of its 58th Birthday. I don't see it as a joke, despite its age.
G-MANN ◊ 2011-06-15 16:43	No one would laugh at a classic Bentley.
nzcarnerd ◊ 2011-06-15 22:55	Non-car people always like to say "They dont' build 'em like they uesed to" but anyone who is into old cars knows that to be untrue. Todays cars last so much longer than the old ones due to precision production and vastly improved fuels and lubricants, along with much better roads - except here in Christchurch NZ due to all of the earthquake damage at present (we had two more big shakes on Monday June 13 and are still getting about 20 aftershocks every day which are making our roads a real trial to drive on). Electronic fuel injection has made engine life and maintenance intervals longer.
dsl ◊ 2011-06-15 22:59	Musical tribute - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_kxHSfk_-k .
Ingo ◊ 2011-06-15 23:13	nzcarnerd wrote Electronic fuel injection has made engine life and maintenance intervals longer. Sorry, but I disagree. This modern technology, especially the fuel injection system, causes very often the death of otherwise well-preserved, just a bid older cars When it's broken, the repairing, resp. the exchange, because the parts itself aren't repairable, also never ever with a possibility for a homework, costs so much money, that often the costs will be higher than the value of the car. Old-style carbuarators you can repair, often even at home in your cellar. No chance for that with injection systems. I had this drama with my Omega 2 1/2 years ago. The broken Dti-injection has cost me roundabout 1700 € - an absolute friendship price. My friend ( www.teilethimm.de ) could organize a renewed-exchange-system, original Bosch, for "only" 960 € (regular Bosch-price for a renewed injection-system: 1500 €, the Opel-price for a brand new one: 2500 € ) and the local garagist had mounted it, incl.all extra work as re-mounting fuel tank and all fuel-hoses (necessary due the metal-splinters of the bursted injection-needles) for only 700 € cash without receipt. At an Opel-garage the work would have cost twice as much, minimum. It was a hard thinking back then, what I had to do. Normally it was a reason to bring the Omega to the crusher, or make a try at eBay or mobile.de to get rid of it. Now, 2 1/2 years and 50.000 km later, a much smaller defect will cause the immediate wrecking of the car. The turbocharger is defect since a time ( http://forum.imcdb.org/index.ks?page=forum_topic&id=6306&index=0 ) but fortunately the car is still running. We are intensely looking for a good, used one - a NOS part is not discussable. If we won't get one, or it will not work after a repair, the Omega will be wrecked or sold for the export. Everything else would be uneconomic, though I like my car a bit.
nzcarnerd ◊ 2011-06-16 09:10	Ingo, it seems as if your experiences are similar those of European car owners here. It seems that many Japanese cars just keep on going whereas European ones become obselete much sooner. Cars are usually replaced because the owners get bored with them. I agree that they often get to a point where they are uneconomic to fix but often it is the heating or air-con systems - or the rust in the bodywork - that are the problem not the engines. When I refer to older cars I am talking about those of the 1970s and earlier. At that time anything that lasted 100,000 miles (about 160,000km) was considered very good whereas now one should expect several hundred thousand km as long as the maintenance is kept up. Frequent oil changes are very important. Many short trips and much cold running will kill any engine of course. Pre WW2, due to poor quality fuels and lubricants amongst other things, car required frequent decarbonising and valve repairs and replacements, along with greasing of joints every few hundred miles. Nowadays all that is required is an oil change every 10,000km and a car should last a long time. My Toyota has 340,000km and still has the original clutch. The only engine work has been to replace the valve stem seals. Of course a new cambelt every 100,000km. Lead free petrol means that spark plugs and exhaust systems last for years. My car is 24 years old and has only had the rear muffler replaced, and used two sets of plugs. I think one difference here is that we have no high speed motorways (autobahns) so cars do not work as hard. The open road speed limit is 100kph but most local roads it is 80kph or less. I have just acquired a 1988 VW Golf with 133,000km on it (1800cc, 3 speed automatic, Wolfsburg-built, sold new in Japan and imported to NZ about 15 years ago). It will be interesting to see how long before it gives mechanical trouble, but as it was very cheap it will not be a problem. -- Last edit: 2011-06-16 09:13:51
Nightrider ◊ 2011-06-16 12:55	nzcarnerd wrote Todays cars last so much longer than the old ones due to precision production and vastly improved fuels and lubricants. He. Old Soviet cars were very easy to maintain, and built with non-iproved fuels and lubricants in mind. Now, you can't fix almost nothing in car with your hands, and in case of absence of that fuels and lubricants...
nzcarnerd ◊ 2011-06-16 21:44	I stand by what I have said, that older cars required frequent and regular maintenance which modern cars do not, and the reason for it is better production standards and improved fuels and lubricants. Whether ot not you can fix a modern car yourself is not the issue. Here in NZ, up until about 25 years ago, imports of cars were severely restricted so older cars were kept going, particularly as they maintained their value. Since deregulation in the 1980s we now have the massive depreciation that most countries have always experienced so people now tend to change their car more often. When I began driving in the 1960s there were still many pre WW2 cars on the road here. Nowadays the average age of a car here is older than in many countries (about 13 years I think) because many of our cars are imported second hand, but it is still less than it was 30 years ago. As well, because they do not require the frequent maintenance the older ones did they tend to neglect them, which is why some do not last as long as they could do. -- Last edit: 2011-06-16 21:48:16
Nightrider ◊ 2011-06-16 21:57	Sorry, I can't remember where Ingo was talking about BMW E38 nowadays reliability... Modern cars can be maitenance-free, while they still new, but what it would be with some like BMW X5 after 30-years lifespan?
nzcarnerd ◊ 2011-06-17 01:20	I agree that complex modern cars will be almost impossible to restore when they get old, but for the span of their useful life, as a car to be used daily rather than as an occasional-use classic, they will require much less normal maintenance than something that was built and being used more than 30 years ago.
rjluna2 ◊ 2011-06-17 14:31	nzcarnerd wrote I agree that complex modern cars will be almost impossible to restore when they get old, but for the span of their useful life, as a car to be used daily rather than as an occasional-use classic, they will require much less normal maintenance than something that was built and being used more than 30 years ago. I agree with you nzcarnerd. Since the modern cars are cheaply made with rivets and plastic snap-in making difficult to pry open without damaging the part.
Ingo ◊ 2011-06-17 23:27	Maybe I should specify my opinion a bit. nzcarnerd is correct, when he points out, that the modern cars have much longer maintenance-intervalls, and that they are more reliable than the cars decades ago (the statistics are confirming that Link to "www.adac.de" ) - but when high-tech features (today finally everything) will be broken, it will be much more expensive than in the old times (the motor-management-electronic of an actual 7-Series-BMW costs more, than years ago a NOS-engine for a BMW 2002 ti). And the components are usually not repairable, totally different than in the past. In Germany there's a dismissive nickname for younger/newer car-mechanics: "Teiletauscher" = "Component-Changer" because many of these young boys are unable to repair/restore parts in the old fashioned way. And this is true. Classic car-fans have really to look around for experienced specialists, when any components of their cars shall be repaired or restored and not only be changed with NOS-stuff. Nightrider and nzcarnerd are both correct, that modern cars will not be repairable/restorable, when they will come into their ages. Not repairable components (no chance for hobby-homeworkers), unavailable, not remanufactable spare parts, plus the fact, that plastic- and electronic parts have a much shorter lifetime than metallen stuff. Just because of the chemical material compound
Nightrider ◊ 2011-06-17 23:32	Cars are manufactured to be in use for a few years and then utilized, not to lasts for a centuries.
Ingo ◊ 2011-06-17 23:39	To come back to the T-Model above: Ford has acted in this movie (obviously hardcore-product placement) in a very idiotical way It's their own product, they are reducing here. And an extreme reliable multi-million-seller. Never ever again Ford could offer such a quality product whith such a good reputation. I don't know, how it's with the American Ford, but for many decades, just until the a few years ago, in Germany Ford had no good reputation. To be precise: the worst of all German brands. British Fords were even worse ill-reputed (in other countries, in Germany there were no UK origin Fords sold, only some single exceptions as the Capri I 3.0 for example). Ancient, primitive technic, in combination with unreliability, this was the common opinion about Ford in Germany. P.S.In some classic car-buyer's guides is written about Ford: "Choose a T-Model, an A-Model or the 1948 Taunus. This was the last really reliable quality-Ford. Every newer Ford is junk." -- Last edit: 2011-06-17 23:49:20
Ingo ◊ 2011-06-17 23:45	Nightrider wrote Cars are manufactured to be in use for a few years and then utilized, not to lasts for a centuries. This is true. A friend of my K 70-Club has worked for 31 as a development-engineer in the VW Passat-factory in Emden. He told me, that they had the expressive targetline by the leadership, to construct the cars, that they going broken after some years. It was never, not even decades ago, a problem to construct extreme reliable and solid made, non-rusting long-term-cars. No big deal to construct and produce such car - but it was forbidden. Because then noone would buy new cars any more.
Sandie ◊ 2011-06-17 23:51	Over the last couple of years in particular Volkswagen's quality has gone downhill badly.
Ingo ◊ 2011-06-18 00:02	Not only VW. Mercedes Benz and Opel, too.
nzcarnerd ◊ 2011-06-18 03:10	Dennis lawnmowers of the post WW2 era are a good example of a product made to last - big and heavy with a slow turning motor. They almost never wore out if maintained properly and this led to the company running into financial difficulties in the 1980s. -- Last edit: 2011-06-18 03:10:33
johnfromstaffs ◊ 2011-06-19 19:29	The 58 year old Bentley has done 325,000 miles, and is being rebuilt, very slowly, following the failure of its cylinder head gasket due to corrosion of the waterways in the alloy cylinder head. The other major problem is rust in the bodywork extremities, all other mechanical units are fine. The Audi is now 5 years old, has had two broken rear springs, and awaits replacement of its cambelt, which is a service item, not a wait for it to break item. The car has done 45,000 miles. My wife has a Vauxhall Corsa 1.4 Auto which is 14 years old and has done 51,000 miles, it passed its last test without any replacements. All that has ever been done to it is brake cylinder replacements. There must be a point here about expensive German cars.

1925 Ford Model T Touring

1925 Ford Model T in Tobacco Road, Movie, 1941

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