"Delicately with that axe!"

[balthazar]

This one should be easier ~

The great Henry Ford spent a good deal of time building his first car. There really was no choice- the automotive components we have long taken for granted (spark plug, carburetor, wheels, etc) to build one with did not exist and the science was still 'in labor'; not 'born' yet. Other major components (crankshaft, camshaft, pushrods, bearings, etc) had to be designed, then machined from scratch, from materials certainly not envisioned for use in a motor car. In addition, Ford had a full-time job and a small family.

Having spent some of his teen years repairing watches, Ford was a known perfectionist, and he also took time to study (what little) work was being done by others. His first gas engine was completed in the family kitchen in Dec of 1893. He successfully ran it for a half minute, then never ran it again.

Nearly immediately, he began building another engine in the shed behind his house, and the car to put it into. He worked in his spare time, machining, testing, building, a LOT of trial & error, all thru 1894... 1895... and into 1896. With a best judgement pegging the date as June 4th, at about 2AM and with a light rain falling, he was finally ready to test drive his 'Quadracycle'.... except for one, final adjustment that required perhaps the LEAST precise instrument he had used yet; an axe.

For what.... ?

[Satty]

Didn't he have to knock down a wall because the car couldn't fit through the door?

[balthazar]

Correct- the doors on the (brick) coal shed were too narrow- he supposedly had not considered such before that moment. The door on the right is the one that was widened.

[Sixty8panther]

Great piece of history.