French Foot

[Milkybars]

Some more interesting paperwork .. Stocked in 13" (French Foot Lenghts)
In the instructions for oil Hardening it has some interesting suggestions Whale Oil, Cotton Seed or Colza Oil
I had to look up https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colza_oil and likewise https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cottonseed_oil
Lancashire Pinion Gauge..

 

[Alan Reynolds]

I can tell you that Stone & Sons are no longer in Church St. It's all estate agents and cafes/takeaways. Yuppy sandal wearers now. A sad reflection of times past.

 

[Milkybars]

I think this is early maybe 1920's

 

[ronan]

I can tell you that Stone & Sons are no longer in Church St. It's all estate agents and cafes/takeaways. Yuppy sandal wearers now. A sad reflection of times past.

You can probably say that for every street in the western world now. There was a thread on one of the irish car forums about places in Dublin that used to assemble ckd (complete knock-down) cars. Jaguar, VW, Merc, Triumph, Opel/Vauxhall, NSU, Talbot, Datsun etc all around the town. Places in the city centre nearly that are now yuppie/banker apartment central, but used to be places normal actually put things together with their hands.

 

[ronan]

Some more interesting paperwork .. Stocked in 13" (French Foot Lenghts)
In the instructions for oil Hardening it has some interesting suggestions Whale Oil, Cotton Seed or Colza Oil
I had to look up https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colza_oil and likewise https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cottonseed_oil
Lancashire Pinion Gauge..




View attachment 271266

I presume whale oil is no longer available ? Used to see it a lot in books about quenching in whale oil. There must be a modern alternative ?

 

[Wallace]

I presume whale oil is no longer available ? Used to see it a lot in books about quenching in whale oil. There must be a modern alternative ?

Phased out over time but still used in places here and there that have old tanks.

 

[pedrobedro]

They weren't cheap at half a crown a pound

 

[ronan]

They weren't cheap at half a crown a pound

I always liked this song, "i was all of a fidgity fidge".

 

[pedrobedro]

I always liked this song, "i was all of a fidgity fidge".

I've got a Stanley Holloway CD with some great monologues on it. I made my mate a copy and he drove his missus up the wall playing it in the car Albert got ate wi' a lion is a favourite of mine.

 

[TechnicAl]

Ive never heard of a FRENCH FOOT before......wonder why they used 13" and why was it called a French foot....I should google it

 

[TechnicAl]

its PIED DU ROI....KIngs Foot which is 32.48 cm.....almost 13".....Also called the Paris Foot or the FRENCH FOOT

obviously it was a measurement used in France

Traditional French units of measurement - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[julianthegypsy]

I presume whale oil is no longer available ? Used to see it a lot in books about quenching in whale oil. There must be a modern alternative ?

The first time I visited the Massey Ferguson factory at Banner Lane Coventry in 1997, I saw huge baskets of red hot gears being dipped in a vat of oil. Quite a sight it was, flames everywhere. I was told it was whale oil, because they still hadn't found a good alternative. Sadly the factory is gone now, and the foundry was outsourced years before that, but hopefully there's now an better alternative!

 

[ronan]

The first time I visited the Massey Ferguson factory at Banner Lane Coventry in 1997, I saw huge baskets of red hot gears being dipped in a vat of oil. Quite a sight it was, flames everywhere. I was told it was whale oil, because they still hadn't found a good alternative. Sadly the factory is gone now, and the foundry was outsourced years before that, but hopefully there's now an better alternative!

Didn't the yanks close Banner lane in a fit of pique ?

 

[TechnicAl]

The first time I visited the Massey Ferguson factory at Banner Lane Coventry in 1997, I saw huge baskets of red hot gears being dipped in a vat of oil. Quite a sight it was, flames everywhere. I was told it was whale oil, because they still hadn't found a good alternative. Sadly the factory is gone now, and the foundry was outsourced years before that, but hopefully there's now an better alternative!

We helped set up a MF factory in Libya......it was a joke....I didnt go but the stories my lads came back with....the work force had been made to work there and the majority didnt want to.....we were showing them how to weld and when backs were turned they ran away.....or they turned the gas off....we told the management that we would pull out unless they helped....they didnt so I brought them home....they later asked us to go back but we never did.

 

[Gritineye]

By the look of them broken spokes he's better at singing than he is at riding a penny farthing!

 

[Gritineye]

Ive never heard of a FRENCH FOOT before......wonder why they used 13" and why was it called a French foot....I should google it

Same committee that invented the guinea I shouldn't be at all surwondered...

 

[julianthegypsy]

Didn't the yanks close Banner lane in a fit of pique ?

Like all these things, it was a bit more complicated. Banner Lane was set up to make smaller tractors, up to about 90 horses, and over the years, the French factory had got the investment to make the larger tractors. Larger tractors have become a lot more popular, so they were selling less and less of the smaller ones. Banner Lane was huge, but running at about a third of its capacity, which is massively expensive. In its heyday it employed 11,000 people. They'd outsourced quite a lot too, so the foundry work was done by qualcast for example (no more whale oil gears), and by the time it closed there were only 1,100 people working there. There were a further 4,000 jobs lost across Coventry as a direct result too. I put it down to the French being better at persuading the management to invest in their plant as much as anything. It's a great shame, as the tractors coming off the line in Banner Lane were unequalled in my view, and the last ones won all the important awards. I taught drivers and mechanics how to drive and repair the stripped back versions in Africa and Asia and there was nothing that would stand up to the conditions as well. In Iraq, the farmers couldn't be convinced to make them work hard running in, which meant the bores got glazed. The cure was an old one with no wheels, but still with stub axles. The smoking, glazed up tractor would be chain to the dead chassis and dragged across the desert for half an hour, then dragged back. That usually cured it, but the last resort was a handful of Ajax down the air intake, run for a minute then flush the oil, and then drag the dead one. It was brutal, but it worked.
@TechnicAl Don't get me started. I had friends that worked there. I dodged that particular bullet. My boss was determined to send me, and at one point I even had a visa, then a Far East sales manager phoned him up and insisted he needed me in Sri Lanka and would accept no substitute. I was less than heartbroken, it was a nightmare. As you say, no-one actually wanted to be there. They got an award for assembling 10 tractors in a day...at a time when I was supervising the assembly line in Cairo, who were knocking out 45 as a matter of course. The difference I should add, was nothing to do with me, it was all about the Egyptians. Happy days!