A Restoration Story - 1929 Ford Model A

And so it begins!

We are beginning the long journey of bringing this piece of history back to life!
This 1929 Model A, belonging to Mr. L, is starting a complete restoration from the ground up.

Today we began inspecting the condition of the vehicle's brakes and emergency brakes. The braking system is nothing like our modern day pressure-driven brake fluid systems - it is all made up of rods of different lengths that push in different directions, causing the brake pads to move against the drums and stop the vehicle.

Check out the comparison below for the brake setup on the Model A versus modern day drum brakes. You can see how there are more hard parts like levers and rods to help everything move whereas today's setups use more hydraulics, springs and fluids to make the brake system do what it needs to do.

The emergency brake works much in the same way.

After the brake inspection, we put the wheels back on so that the vehicle can be moved to its more permanent home during the restoration and disconnected the battery. We're getting everything ready for the BIG move - removing the engine and transmission assembly!