Old Ford ID

[landman]

I saw this in a junkyard lot on eBay. It looks vaguely familiar. At first I thought it was a Frontenac head on a T or A, but it isn't, at least according to the reference photos I could find.

[landman]

Found it. I t is a Riley two port head.

[Skip]

It's the Riley Two Port head, looks to be out of the AMT '29 Ford Roadster.   Your picture looks different than the Revell '31 Ford sedan, woodie and sedan delivery Riley Two Port Head included in those three kits.  So I'm saying it is the AMT, also based on the white unpainted block and transmission.  

There was a thread asking about the Riley Head Conversion being offered in kit form.  See below.  Riley started making the Overhead Valve head for the Model T then for the Model A and I think Model B ('32 Ford 4banger).  They were a popular conversion with Speedsters, truckers and especially Boot Leggers forcing a few Police Departments to invest in either the Riley or Frontenac (Chevrolet brothers) head conversions just to keep up!  In addition auxillary transmissions and two speed rear axels like the Ruckstel and Columbia were necessitated to put all that extra power to the ground!

see previous Riley Head Thread below

[Ace-Garageguy]

Correct. 

It is DEFINITELY the AMT version.

The Revell version has a separate transmission, front cover assembly, side cover and starter as well...and is generally a nicer piece if much of the engine is going to be visible.

[stavanzer]

There was an article in SAE years ago where Tim Boyd showed off the options for hopped up Ford T and Ford A engines.

Basically you have one T option. The Frontenac OHV head and carb in the many versions of the AMT 1927 Ford T Touring kit. These parts are all in chrome, and pretty easy to find.

For Model A's you have two kits to choose from. Revell and AMT. All the Hop Up parts look to have been restored to the AMT kit in  the Mod Rod that is out now. They are the Riley Head, Twin Downdraft Carbs, and a Two Pipe 'zoomie' header. This Riley/ carb setup is authentic to the early 1930's, or so I have read.

The Revell A-Bone engine  comes with either a Two Port Riley Head or a Winfield flat head. The Dual Carbs, and Four Pipe 'zoomie' header are shared between both version of the kit. There is also a Winfield Side Cover included. The Riley head in this kit represents a later (1950's?) style head as might have been found on the beaches of SoCal, back in the day.

There is also one other vintage Ford Four Banger. The AMT 1932 Roadster has a stock only Model B engine. it is only 5 pieces, but not bad. Note that the Distributor is molded to one of the engine halves and using any of the hup up parts from the A will take some surgery.

The Model A engines can be built stock of course. The Revell engine has more parts and is more finely engraved than the AMT version. However there is more fettling involved in getting the Revell engine to look good than is needed for the AMT. I have many copies of each kit and engine, and both will work when properly detailed.

I will take a guess, and predict that there is a thread over at the H.A.M.B board that covers the specifics of the Riley heads in far more detail than my limited, second hand knowledge.

[Ace-Garageguy]

Alexis, I hope you won't be offended if I correct some of your information. You're quite close, but there are a few things slightly incomplete or misleading.

I had reason to research these engines extensively a few years back, and my comments are based on original-source documentation, and first hand observation of the real parts. I also have copies of every kit under discussion on the shelves, and have checked the accuracy of my statements just now.

The red type is not intended to be offensive or screaming, as I've been accused of by posters in the past, but simply to differentiate additional information.

There was an article in SAE years ago where Tim Boyd showed off the options for hopped up Ford T and Ford A engines.

Basically you have one T option. The Frontenac OHV head and carb in the many versions of the AMT 1927 Ford T Touring kit. These parts are all in chrome, and pretty easy to find.

For Model A's you have two kits to choose from. Revell and AMT. All the Hop Up parts look to have been restored to the AMT kit in  the Mod Rod that is out now. They are the Riley Head, Twin Downdraft Carbs, and a Two Pipe 'zoomie' header. This Riley/ carb setup is authentic to the early 1930's, or so I have read. That's correct, though the Riley 2-port heads were widely used on 4-cylinder model A and B based engines through the '50s (though production only ran from 1930-1934 or so). Reproductions of these heads have been made recently. http://www.secretsofspeed.com/riley-two-port-ohv.htm

The Revell A-Bone engine  comes with either a Two Port Riley Head or a Winfield flat head. Of the Revell kits, only the '28-'29 pickup-based kits have the Winfield flat head. The others ('30-'31 woody, sedan and sedan delivery) have the Riley head.  The Dual Carbs, and Four Pipe 'zoomie' header are shared between both version of the kit. Though of course, the intake manifold would be attached to and breath through the side of the block on the Winfield version, rather than to and through the head as on the Riley version. There is also a Winfield Side Cover included. Actually, all the Revell kits have an Ansen side cover. The Riley head in this kit represents a later (1950's?) style head as might have been found on the beaches of SoCal, back in the day. Production of the 2-port in any numbers pretty much ended with the introduction of the 4-port head around 1934.

There were essentially 3 main versions of the 2-port head: B (basically a hot street head); C (larger-port, high-compression combustion chamber), and D (for trucks). There were variations within these variations, as well.

The early versions of the heads had the spark plugs on the drivers side of the engine, and were said to be prone to cracking. Later versions of these heads moved the plugs to the passenger side. Neither of the kit engines portray the location of the plugs (the engraved dots are head studs with nuts on them) and the engines are both from the 1930-1934 period, though they continued to be raced long after production stopped.

NOTE: You can easily drill and countersink the heads to represent the early or later plug location, if you're doing a very specific build.

Note the spark plug position relative to the OP's real-engine photo:   

There is also one other vintage Ford Four Banger. The AMT 1932 Roadster has a stock only Model B engine. it is only 5 pieces, but not bad. Note that the Distributor is molded to one of the engine halves and using any of the hup up parts from the A will take some surgery.

The Model A engines can be built stock of course. The Revell engine has more parts and is more finely engraved than the AMT version. However there is more fettling involved in getting the Revell engine to look good than is needed for the AMT. I have many copies of each kit and engine, and both will work when properly detailed.

I will take a guess, and predict that there is a thread over at the H.A.M.B board that covers the specifics of the Riley heads in far more detail than my limited, second hand knowledge.

One final note: any of the Riley 2-port engines could be (and were) equipped with the OEM-style distributor shown on the OP's model-engine photo, a later-style 'conventional' distributor as offered in the Revell kits, or a magneto (driven through the head as in the OP's real-engine photo) or front-driven by the timing chain.

The earliest advertising I've found for the Vertex-style magneto shown in the OP's real-engine photo is 1935, so that mag style would be correct from then forward.

 

Edited October 8, 2016 by Ace-Garageguy

[landman]

Wow! This sure is a lot of info. Thanks, guys.

[stavanzer]

No Bill. Far from being offended, I'm grateful to learn more! That is one of the best things about this forum. I can learn from others when I might be(am) mistaken. That is wonderful Information. Can I ask a question though? Why the vastly different shapes between the Revell Riley and the AMT Riley? Two Different Kinds? Different Era's? I prefer the 'look' of the AMT but the Revell is definitely the better engine.  TIA, Alan

[Ace-Garageguy]

 Why the vastly different shapes between the Revell Riley and the AMT Riley? Two Different Kinds? Different Era's? I prefer the 'look' of the AMT but the Revell is definitely the better engine.  TIA, Alan

I can't honestly say I know every version and permutation of the Riley heads, and the variations are many, which is not that surprising given that the tooling and casting was all done pretty much by hand in short runs.

That said, the AMT kit engine seems to me to be lacking the 'ledge' on the carb side of the head that's supposed to be there (at least on every one I've ever seen, and every photo, if I remember correctly).

And THAT said, I would guess that the more rounded shapes of the AMT rocker covers are more in keeping with the earliest design, of which this is a recent exact reproduction. I'd also suspect that the AMT tooling isn't particularly accurate. Their engines of that period were notoriously blobular, which is why I preferred Revell's level of detail at the time.

The slightly later heads, with the spark plugs still on the driver's side, appear to have more square-cornered rocker covers, more like the Revell version. 

Another early-style Riley 2-port head (below) with a different design rocker cover. Also note the the tach-drive coming out of the old distributor drive hole on this engine.

Sorry I can't give you a really definitive answer. Though I know a fair bit about these engines, I certainly don't claim to know everything.  

It's interesting to note that there were several manufacturers besides Riley making OHV and cross-flow heads for the A and B bottom ends, and even Chevrolet and Oldsmobile heads were also occasionally swapped on to the old Ford.

 

 

 

Edited October 8, 2016 by Ace-Garageguy

[Art Anderson]

No Bill. Far from being offended, I'm grateful to learn more! That is one of the best things about this forum. I can learn from others when I might be(am) mistaken. That is wonderful Information. Can I ask a question though? Why the vastly different shapes between the Revell Riley and the AMT Riley? Two Different Kinds? Different Era's? I prefer the 'look' of the AMT but the Revell is definitely the better engine.  TIA, Alan

I also suspect that when AMT was tooling up their '27 T Touring (probably starting on that project in late 1962/early 1963 for a 1964 new release kit) they probably didn't have access to a real Riley-equipped engine for reference--thus relying on photographs of one.  Revell, on the other hand, being based in Venice CA (coastal suburb of LA) back then more than likely were able to find such vintage speed equipment to reference--given that LA was still pretty much the epicenter of hot rodding then--and that going back well into the 1920's and 30's.

It's rather hard to realize now, in 2016, that back 50-some years ago, while certainly vintage speed equipment did exist in real life, and a great many period photo's existed of such, but they were nowhere nearly as available for researching for a model kit as all that stuff is nowadays..  Also, it's well to consider that in the early 1960's, the model car hobby was still just developing--AMT had the edge on "buildability" while Revell began going a good bit "farther out on the limb" with amazingly intricate and super-detailed model car kits which really did "move the needle" out there a good bit with intricately designed and molded model car kits that sadly so many pre-teen and young teenaged model car builders (back then, the vast bulk of the market for model car kits) all too often found very intimidating.  AMT Corporation's formula did work back then:  By 1964, they were as big (if not bigger than)  pretty much all the other American plastic model kit manufacturers combined, manufacturing some 15-million model car kits alone in 1964 (Wall Street Journal, in early 1965  published an article on AMT Corporation, nothing that they produced almost as many model cars in 1964 than the entire World's production of real cars that year.

Art

 

[stavanzer]

That makes sense, Art. Glad to have learned more about my favorite Ford engine.

Thanks for the History lesson.