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History The Great Conspiracy - Alcohol Powered Fords?

Discussion in 'The Hokey Ass Message Board' started by doctorZ, Aug 23, 2010.

  1. doctorZ
    Joined: Apr 10, 2006
    Posts: 1,270

    doctorZ
    Member

    I recently watch a documentary on alternative fuels, appropriately named FUEL, and it briefly mentioned that the Ford Model T was initially designed to run on ethyl-alcohol with an optional Holley Model G carburetor. This was so that farmers, who would not have access to refueling stations, could make their own fuel by distilling it at home. It continued to go on about how Standard Oil was the main monetary contributor to prohibition. By outlawing home distillation people would be, in effect, dependent upon Standard Oil for fuel. Supposedly, one year after Ford stopped making their cars ethyl-alcohol compatible Standard Oil cut its funding to the prohibition program and it was soon revoked because of a lack of support.
    Since prohibition ended in December of 1933, does this mean that there were Model A's and 1932's that could run on alternative fuels? Was there another optional carburetor to replace the Detroit Lubricator for 1932 V8s?!

    This is just out of curiosity because it is something I have never heard before and it really caught my attention.
     
  2. doctorZ
    Joined: Apr 10, 2006
    Posts: 1,270

    doctorZ
    Member

  3. AG F/C
    Joined: Oct 20, 2009
    Posts: 364

    AG F/C
    Member

    I'm sure guys ran ethanol in the pre/post Prohibition era. Moonshiners surely did burn there distillates.

    H Ford was always on the cutting edge so why not make his product attractive to the local runners.

    Just My Two Cents.:rolleyes:
     
  4. 62rebel
    Joined: Sep 1, 2008
    Posts: 3,232

    62rebel
    Member

    from what i read in Dad's old Floyd Clymer books, the T's and A's were so low compression they'd run on kerosene once you got it running... and since the spark advance and throttle were adjustable from the driver's seat.... if it would burn, a Ford would run on it. Ford was diehard about getting his product to farmers....
     

  5. 29nash
    Joined: Nov 6, 2008
    Posts: 4,544

    29nash
    BANNED
    from colorado

    Anything a Ford motor could run on, any motor could..... :D
    Any motor can be adapted to alcohol.
    Why hasn't it caught on?
    It's simple. Fossil petrol is cheaper to produce, then and now, than alcohol; (unit per BTU of heat energy).

    Absent government subsidy of production, using alcohol as a motor vehicle fuel would not even be an 'alternative'.
     
  6. hotrodstude
    Joined: Jul 30, 2010
    Posts: 70

    hotrodstude
    Member

    in the 80's i converted my 76 t/a to run on alcohol and i also made my own fuel.and yes the old fords could run on both types of fuel.you did not have a gas station on every courner.
     

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