Jive-Bomber submitted a new blog post: The Ford Model A Town Delivery: One Odd Rod. Continue reading the Original Blog Post
Interesting......the upper windshield header strikes me a bit, and the seemingly contoured piece behind driver on the top. Was there a piece that originally sheltered the forward area? Be crazy if Targa tops were actually found to be traditional, huh? Probably a stretched tarp of sorts......but that would be cool enough to hot rod I think. Cool post.
Works for me.It really wouldn't take much to turn that in to a real Hot Rod.It has a real quality look to it.
what sucks is the Discount Tire ad covering half the picture when you click on the pics...what's up with that?
Couple of other super-rare Model A's that are really neat: The 1932 Traveler's wagon...this was a two door woody with no rear quarter windows, equipped with water tank and bed as a one-man camper. From memory, total production was under 10! the '30-31 (and '32) Deluxe pickups...these had bed sides continuous with cab contours, like a Ute or ElCamino. There was also an AA version called "service car", essentially a snazzy wrecker. The 1928 Taxi...not just an unusual layout, but a basically 4-door early A with the small type cowl!
I saw one of these town car deliveries at the Model A Restorers national meet in San Diego in 1963. The owner was from Chicago if I remember right.
The snap-in lid for the driver was an important part of the town/limousine look from a social standpoint...giving him a targa lid might have given him ideas and crazy notions about equality. The roof was for the elite, or elite goods... for the chauffeur the only need was to keep his expensive company owned uniform fairly dry. The traveler's wagon was elsewhere in the spectrum...a self-sufficient home and transport for the solitary explorer, probably a geologist chasing oil or gold through the badlands.
Ha! Way ahead of you on this one!!! My buddy that I mention frequently here, Ron Olmstead, has had an unnatural addiction to these things since the seventies. He 's had a couple real stockers over the years, but now is about 3/4s of the way through a hiboy version made from a '30 Tudor sedan, but done very accurately. Rear door, leaned back posts, filled rear windows flushed just like the original. I'll snap a few pictures next time I'm over. Now, nobody has mentioned it, but there was one that was an ISCA show car back in the late seventies. It was full fendered, and candy apple red with I'm sure Zenith wires. It showed up in a few of Peterson's different one shots in '78 or so. I'll big and see if I can find it.
Oh, by the way, as we discuss these odd body styles from the Model "A" era, some might have noticed that I have lately been lookin' around for the back half of a '30-'31 sedan body. The intention with this is do another version of the sedan delivery from this era. The regular Sedan Delivery for '30 '31 didn't actually use a Tudor sedan body. It was extended about 6-8 inches. They also made a "Formal" sedan delivery on a semi custom basis that found favor in the florist and funerary businesses that was the standard Tudor Sedan body with a rear door and no rear window blanks. That's the plan...
A Model-A Town Car Delivery was rodded years ago. I used to see it at the Nats East in York, PA., in the 1980s. It was a stock body - bumpers, cowl lights, etc. and had a very hairy engine - I think 671-blown big block. No hood. And I remember - probably from a display board - that it was from a fleet of twelve that had originally been bought by a tea company to deliver their tea to stores. Tea drinkers would presumably expect their tea to be delivered by a vehicle as fashionable as an afternoon tea party..
The Town Car Delivery is one of the rarest Model A body styles produced. Production started in December of 1930 and only 19 were made. 841 were built in 1931 and only 40 were produced in early 1932. Only several are known to exist.
Ahh, Chip, I saved these pics just for Ronnie....you know, just in case he didn't already have a stack of images of this weird car. I think it could be totally cool, knowing Olmstead, I'm sure it will be alright!
As far as I know, the Tea Company was the impetus for the original '28-'29 sedan deliveries, not the town car delivery. As mentioned above, the Town Car delivery ended up being a sort of weird low production vehicle, although I don't know where the original thought for these vehicles came from.
GMC built a Town Car Delivery in 1929, and White Truck also built something similar around the same time.
They do have a greal look to them, everything behind the doors is custom rolled aluminun attached to a wood frame. An unrestored one if you could find one would cost your the same as two Brookville '32 3Window bodies. Bob
If these weren't factory offerings, albeit farmed out to Briggs, I'd copy the pics on the Coachbuilt Early Fords thread. Still, they are getting some ideas going. How about shifting the partition behind the seats rearwards? A bit, to allow a slightly more sporting driving position? A bit more, with a tiny back seat? Taking this to the extreme produces something like the Scaphandrier and Cab-Skiff bodies people like Labourdette were doing in the early '20s. Phaeton Delivery anyone?
While my pulse could be measured in RPMs I can't see it as a hot rod. It would be nearly pointless or maybe fall into "...because you can doesn't mean you should...". I've seen 1 in all my years of this car schtick and it was restored stock. I've seen only one deluxe pickup in person and that was a drive-by at Hershey 2yrs ago. Sometimes they're better left as intended, but using the concept as a guide I could see a custom creation vs using the real thing. A Powerstroke 31 Deluxe wrecker would work, aluminum wheels and all.
Another low-production commercial A - the 30-31 Special Delivery. Always thought it would make a cool rod - repro bodies are available.
Here is a slightly different one that a customer of mine is working on.The back half of the body was purchased at a swap meet and the rest is cobbled together. It will be lettered as a Hershey truck when finished.Also included are pics of the Danbury Mint model.
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