MTFCA Forum

Ok a question for those in the know. Does anyone have solid verifiable evidence or information on the placement, etc. of these tags? I was told that these tags were not put on by Ford at the Factory. Making a guess here, were they added at dealerships?
Thank you in advance. Trying to settle a dispute/discussion.

I own the later Model T’s in the 17-25 era. As with the later T’s and comparing when certain things were done to bodies with the Brass era T’s you’ll find that it’s not an exact science. There was a general way of building the T bodies and the way it was done and dated. Different Body manufactures may not have done the assembly exactly as another and adding the data wasn’t always in the (exact) place.
You would think that Ford added the data plates and Ford could have but that could have been left up to the dealer in some situations. Same goes for engine numbers and that’s another rabbit hunt in itself! Good luck in finding the exact information. And I know with the later cars there is more than a few rabbits out there.

Some years ago on the forum, I seem to remember a photo of the T assembly line, that showed the patent plate on the cars firewall. Perhaps someone can find the photo.

Photos I've seen date from the 1913 moving assembly line. The dash, being support for the steering column, was part of the rolling chassis presented to the body drop. I presume the data plate was affixed to the dash in production. At that time, Ford was not producing bodies "in house". Their suppliers were principally Beaudette, Fisher, Wilson, and perhaps other coach makers.

From some of my research on this; I can't help you with information about the specific placement of the body tag but in my opinion the body number on the patent plate was assigned by Ford before the car left the factory and not by the dealer as you were told. I have looked at Ford factory inspector tags from previous discussions about this topic on this forum and the inspection tags consistently list both a motor number and a body number. In all of the tags I looked at the two numbers were different from each other.
Additionally, from the October 6, 1911 Acc. 509, Letter, Ford Archives "Motor and body numbers not to agree in the future." Again, in my opinion, this leads me to believe that the body number was assigned by Ford at the factory and in this letter to their dealers they were letting them know the motor and body numbers will be different from each other.

Mark,

Your top photo is a 1914 car and that dash for U.S. cars was drilled both sides for the
carburetor mixture control. The dash can be used on either a RHD or LHD car.

That patent plate covers the unused "mixture control hole". On my July 1913 Touring,
the tag is right above the steering column and secured by four small brass rivets and
covers that hole.

Ford appears to have continued that in the 1915 wood dash as the left two shiny rivets
show in the below photo. The tags were attached to the dash at the dash assembly stage.

I have factory firewall drawings covering the 1917 model year and they show the exact location of the holes for the patent plate.

Angmar wrote: ↑

Sat Mar 02, 2024 6:45 pm

Ok a question for those in the know. Does anyone have solid verifiable evidence or information on the placement, etc. of these tags? I was told that these tags were not put on by Ford at the Factory. Making a guess here, were they added at dealerships?
Thank you in advance. Trying to settle a dispute/discussion.

From reading this discussion. https://www.mtfca.com/discus/messages/29/6661.html
It also explains
by Hap Tucker , September 16, 2005
"The engine numbers and the number stamped onto the ID/Patent plate usually matched from at least the 1906 Model N and later R & S cars. But then sometime around 1911 or so I think -- I need to look that one up, they started to diverge. I have never found any reason listed for why they began to diverge but sometime along in there or shortly after that they did. By 1915 they had gotten quite a bit different even to the point that on Apr 29, 1915 they issued a factory letter stating, "On or after May 1, the use of body numbers will be discontinued (by Ford) and no records will be kept of same." See Bruce's on line encyclopedia at: http://www.mtfca.com/encyclo/doc15.htm That is why I thought your car would be an early 1915 -- as your plate still had a number stamped onto it. They continued to use the same plate -- but they just left the area blank -- which is shown with Jim Cook's early 1916 ID plate above. "

-- -- --

Thank you to everyone, very helpful information. Great to have such a valuable resource for the hobby.

One of the T's has a "Dealer-tag" which is placed on the passengers side of the car and is different from the patent or id tags in the first 2 photos I posted. I understand that this tag was indeed added by the dealer.