I just found this gem on YouTube. In it Ford demonstrate two small 8hp cars and two V8s including a lovely roadster by driving them from Lands End to John O'Groats, performing all sorts of impressive feats on the way. The pre-war English accent of the presenter is a bit hard to understand but its amazing to watch. Highways and Byways - 1934:
Thanks for the video Edward, It's amazing what those Fords would do. I have a 34 Fordor Sedan that my Grandfather bought new in March of 1934. It's a concourse car now, but it spent half it's life on roads like that. It would go anywhere. We even brought a buck home on the back seat, deer hunting one year. What a mess.
I find it ironic that with all the years gone by and all the technology that's been developed, current state of the art off road machines are using long travel wishbone suspension, something that was standard fare 80 years ago. Somebody should trick out a Model A and bring it to a Jeep Jamboree, I'm bettin it would do pretty well!
Not a lot of people know this, but the Y Ford was developed in Dearborn and Henry had a hand in it. The Y came out in 1932 and it was the Y that inspired the Model-40 styling, not the other way round. Most people call it a scaled down 33 Ford but actually the 33 was a scaled up Y. The Y was produced in various forms as Anglia, Prefect and later Popular right up until 1959. Although called 8hp they were actually about 25-30 HP. They featured a small flathead four.