Rouge: Pictured in Its Prime

18. Motor Building

18 MOTOR BUILDING In the design of automobiles, Henry Ford’s talents lay predominantly in engines. As early as 1901, his reputation was established as a racing-engine engineer. The four-cylinder Model T motor, introduced in 1908, was still being manufactured at Highland Park and elsewhere at the rate of about 10,000 per day as the Rouge Plant was being constructed. The first Model T motor built in the new Rouge motor building was stamped with serial number 10,566,001 on September 30, 1924. Assembly procedures developed at Highland Park were similarly applied at the Rouge — conveyors bringing parts to the workers and workers in fixed positions each accomplishing his small portion of the total assembly process. Model T engine number 12,000,000 was built at the Rouge Plant on August 20, 1925, number 15,000,000 on June 26, 1927. Model T engines were produced in quantity at the Rouge until mid-1927, when the Model A engine, an improved four-cylinder engine, was introduced. The 25-horsepower Model T motor, which had for nineteen years provided a speed of 40 miles per hour, was replaced by the Model A motor producing 40 horsepower and a speed of 60 miles per hour. In 1932, in order to counter the Great Depression, Henry Ford decided to equip Ford cars with V-8 engines. This engine, of radical design, employed an engine block cast all in one piece. For a while, one could buy a Ford with either a four-cylinder or a V-8 engine. Both were manufactured at the Rouge. The single-block V-8 casting was very troublesome at the start but became a winner over the years. By 1939, 3600 V-8 motors were being built daily at the Rouge, each requiring only 3.25 hours. 119 Opposite, top: Castings large and small on their way to the motor assembly building. Clearly visible in the foreground are engine blocks, heads, manifolds, flywheels, and crankcases. This photograph was taken in June 1932, when both four- and eightcylinder Ford motors are being built. Mercurys have not yet been introduced. (833. 57060) Opposite, bottom: A Footburt eight-spindle boring machine boring sixteen valve and pushrod holes simultaneously in a 1935 Ford V-8 cylinder block. (833. 62054) 120 Top: Long rows of Hall Grindovac machines, with operators grinding valve-seat inserts in Ford V-8 engine blocks on February 19, 1935. (833. 62239-A) Bottom: The crankshaft department in June 1933, where fifty-eight separate milling, grinding, and checking operations are performed. A continuous overhead conveyor system brings the unmachined crankshafts to the machines and takes the machined crankshafts away. (833. 57557-1) 121 Top:The Snyder crankshaft drilling machine.This special-purpose machine drills the entire oil system in an automobile crankshaft in one continuous operation.(833.95085-2) Bottom: An inspection station for Ford V-8 crankshafts on May 1, 1936. Bearing surfaces need to be accurate to 0.0001 inch. (833. 65896) Right: Assembling 1937 Ford V-8 engines on December 18, 1936. Men on the left are inserting pushrods, while men on the right are installing crankshaft-bearing retaining bolts. (833.67507) Below: The engine break-in room, normally filled with dozens of workers. Not every station would have an engine. Each newly assembled engine block, together with transmission, is connected to water and oil lines and coupled to an electric motor. The motor spins the engine until the engine’s mechanical friction is reduced to a value acceptable for use in a vehicle. The same operation allows detection of engine oil or water leaks. (833.65142) ...