October 25, 2017 • 50 mins
One Michigan museum is offering you the chance to get behind the wheel of an antique Model T for a driving lesson. Listen in as Scott and Ben tell you where it’s happening, and what you can expect from this unusual driver’s training course.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Go behind the wheel, under the hood and beyond with
car Stuff from how Stuff Works dot Com. I and
welcome to car Stuff. I'm Scott. I'm then we are
joined with our super producer Tyler playing. Everybody, say hi Tyler,
he's waving. He's waving to you. Let's have to take
(00:24):
our word for it. Okay, Yeah, that's great. I have
found an interesting fact. Okay, please share. Okay, the Model
T is the second most successful or popular car of
all time. Wait second most? Second? Why is this second? What? Okay? So, um,
(00:47):
let's think what would be the most piple. I'm gonna
I'm gonna make an educated guess. I don't know where
you're getting at here. All right, let's see. It's a
tough one. I'm gonna guess to the Volkswagon Beatle. Whoa
Scotty's rail? Yeah? Great, good? That was just shot in
the dark way. That's long long production. I remember when
we did the Model T story. Um, you know, I'm sorry.
(01:09):
I probably ruined your surprise. You're probably hoping to surprise. No,
I'm super impressed. Actually, I mean they've they've been in
production for a long long time, so so that's the
only logical choice I think, but what fifteen million on
the Model T? So Ben, do you have any any
numbers on the folks like a beatle forest twenty one
point five million, my friend? Impressive, impressive, that's like more
(01:29):
something like that. It's a lot, It's there are a
lot of Beatles out there, a lot. And it's still surprising,
I think, to a lot of people in the modern
day to realize just how popular the Model T was,
because it's become almost a legend in the automotive world.
It's part of the Henry Ford mythology, and it's a
(01:51):
car that people are only used to seeing in museums,
right it seems that way. Yeah, unless you're one of
the fortunate ones that owns one of these. Because of
still a lot of them around, I mean a ton
of them around. You'll find them in all stages of
uh of restoration, I guess, Um you know some parked
in gradges that are pristine and others that you know
are daily drivers. I don't know about daily drivers, maybe
(02:13):
not with the top speed of only what forty or
something like that, Um, not too practical these days. But
you'll find some that you know, of course, basket cases
and that's the ones that you know, people want, the
pre war cars are looking for, and the ones they
can restore themselves and make it their own. Baby. You know. Yeah,
and baby is a good word. I'm glad you use that.
I have no children that I am aware of. But
(02:35):
the the thing that we hear a lot about, you know,
parenting when you're when you're a new parent, you have
to pay super close attention to everything. You have to
be way more responsible than you were pre kid. Right,
and driving a Model T or heck, even starting it.
Remember when we did that podcast, Yeah, we did that
(02:56):
podcast a while back. In fact, we did that back
in August of two thousand nine, podcast about starting and
driving a Model T. And it was complex, yeah, and
dangerous actually, So it's driving a Model T. Starting it
requires like the same level of attention that my friends
(03:17):
who have kids tell me they have to pay to
their kids. I could understand that it's a it's not
an easy process, and it's one we'll we'll step through it.
I guess one more time, maybe not, you know, maybe
to the depth or the length that we did last
time we talked about it. Probably I don't remember that
podcast exactly how long it was but later we've in
our later podcast, we've been going a little longer than
we did in our early days. Right, this is back
(03:38):
from two thousand nine, So if you go back and
listen to that one, you know, be kind. I guess
because it was the early days of our show. It
might even be a high speed stuff show. I don't remember.
Oh wow, could be deep cut, it could be yeah. Anyways,
but this is all playing into something that you know,
we found it online or we were looking around for,
you know, some topics for this week, and uh, we
(03:59):
came across an interesting experience that you can have and
that's probably the best way to describe it. It's an experience.
And you've heard a lot about um, you know, sports
car experiences you can do like a rally car experience.
In fact, I got a whole long list of of
types of experiences that you can have, you know, like
a day at the track. Right. Yeah, so well, you know,
kids do stock car, you can do rally cars. There's
(04:20):
even a place um in the UK that does movie cars.
You can drive a replica of kit and generally, and
I think they had some others maybe like the Bullet
Mustang or something like that. Um, there's stunt car experiences,
which kind of surprised me. Of course, supercars and sports cars, exotics.
You know, you can do tank driving if you wanted to. Yeah,
here in Georgia, actually that's here, there's one here for
you could do that. I think there are a few
(04:41):
around the world that you can do that. Um. You
can do off road segways if you want to. Uh,
there's drifting. Um, there's even a semi truck that you
can drive. And I think this one is also in
the UK. Um it's the Optimus Prime American Truck Driving Experience.
How cool would that be? It sounds really cool. There's
hovercraft driving experiences. Um, I'm just there's a ton of
(05:01):
You want to drive a Ford g T forty, you
can do that as well. Um, let's see what else. Oh,
there's this is maybe one of the coolest ones. And
for young drivers, there's something called the Young Driver Experience,
and again in the UK, it's by a company called
UK Wide and anyone between the ages of ten to
seventeen can drive an actual car on their simulated road
(05:22):
track and they've got all these different layouts, like lots
of different structures and and you know items that you
have to um adhere to you know, like road road
rules that the kids have to adhere to. But it's
like a a primer for them, an early primer for
them for actual driving. And they get to drive actual
cars while their parents watch from a safe distance distance away.
But uh, I guess it's you know, wildly popular. A
(05:44):
lot of people do this because it's good experience. And um, again,
just all these you can any kind of race car
you can imagine. Um, there's a lot of different experiences,
but this is probably one of the most unique ones
that I've ever heard of. Yes, and this comes to
this courtesy of the Gilmore Car Museum in Michigan. Yeah,
Hickory Corners, Michigan to be specific. And that's right near Kalamazoo.
(06:05):
I think it's north and west of Kalamazoo if I
remember right. Um, But this will start. This is a
museum that we've talked about in the past, just just
in passing. Uh. It is a it's an incredible museum.
Really if you get on the site and look around
again Gilmar Car Museum. Uh. This place has ninety acres
of property and the car display area alone in this
(06:27):
property one hundred and eighty nine thousand square feet. They
have four hundred cars that they have on displayed, So
four hundred is that's getting that's approaching the number of
cars that you know that GM. Um, I forget that
they called the GM Experience or something like that. That
is close to the number of cars that General Motors
is kind of tucked away over the years. So it's
an enormous collection. And these go across the spectrum. They
(06:50):
include motor cycles as well. But they have Duisenberg's, Hudson's
of all these classics from the forties, the fifties, the sixties. Uh.
They even an early cars from the eighteen nineties. And
they have some Fords, Yeah, a few Fords right free
that we'll talk about in just a minute. They've got
on this property too, they've got partner museums. You know,
(07:11):
ninety acres that's a lot of property. So um, it's
this enormous compound. They have partner partner museums, Like there's
a miniature of museum that's on the property as well.
I think there's others. There's a gas station, a diner
that's been fully restored. There's barns, all kinds of structures
and these Model Ts that you speak have been I
guess they have a whole fleet of Model T vehicles.
Now we had said earlier, I think I don't know
(07:32):
if we mentioned the dates for the Model T, but
wasn't it nineteen o eight to ninety seven? I think
that they were built. So it's a long time period
or a long time frame. And again, fifteen million of these,
so you know, it's no surprise that a place like
the Gilmore would end up with a pretty substantial collection.
You know, it's a it's it's a favorite among collectors
really of pre war cars. I know that there are
(07:53):
other more prestigious makes out there, and people, you know,
often seek out vehicles of a certain uh certain mark,
but a lot of people are really fascinated by the
Model T. And it's just it's simplicity and of course
what it means to um, you know, not only American history,
but also to just automotive history in general. It's it
was a groundbreaking vehicle, um not just here in the
(08:14):
United States, but all over the world, really, right, And
it's I would say it's even more than just automotive history.
It's very much every Model T that you ever see
in person, is, in a very real way, a tangible
piece of a revolution. Yeah, we're talking about cars that
are now some of them are over a hundred years old,
(08:36):
and it's just impressive to me that, you know, somebody
has taken the loving care to keep them on the
road and drivable. And again, this museum is Gilmour Museum,
has a fleet of these cars that they are doing
something extraordinary with. There is a I'll just let the
cat of the bag here, but there is a I'm
sure everybody knows this already, there's a model t driving
(08:56):
experience that you can pay for and attend at this
at this ye More museum, and you have to register
and sign up for we'll tell you all about that
in just a minute. But they allow just kind of
ordinary people like you and me to go there and
take this four hour course. Um, it's about a hundred
and five dollars, I think if you want to sign
up for this course, and you know, they give you
all sorts of things. We'll talk about this specific school,
(09:18):
what they give you and what they teach you while
you're there. But isn't that incredible You can go and
get your hands on a car that might be over
a hundred years old and they let you drive it
around the property. There's you know, two and a half
miles of track, of of experienced track that they allow
you to drive on that that simulates, you know, different environments,
I guess you know, different types of roads they can
(09:38):
travel on. But what a fascinating idea to kind of
turn over these museum pieces to again, just ordinary people,
which it also seems odd that it would happen, you know,
to me, that was something that always seemed outside of
the realm of possibility. I would think that again, just
your everyday car fan, and would have to know someone
(10:04):
who has a privately owned Model T and a heck
of a lot of faith in your driving ability. For
a museum to let any license driver, because that's all
you need, folks, all you need is driver his license.
For a museum to let any license driver sign up
for this is amazing. I didn't know about it until
you told me, and you can since we're laying cats
(10:27):
out of bags. Just want to be clear, this thing
has limited space and it sells out fast, but I
think it's worth your time to register, especially if you
are anywhere near uh anywhere near the museum. Oh absolutely
I mean it seems like, okay, I just have to
ask you a question that was kind of not really
a side note, but this is related for don't you
(10:48):
think that this this is kind of a bucket list
item for a lot of car guys and car girls.
I mean, if you're interested in the automobile, you might
have always looked at the model T is something you
wanted to attempt to try. As you said, you know,
you'd have to know somebody and somebody that would trust
you in order to be able to drive that right,
or maybe you never really had much you know, thought
about it, but think like that's just another thing to
(11:08):
kind of check off the list, Like I've done this.
It's it's interesting and it's not like driving a regular car.
It's it's completely different. You have to remember as we
get to uh, you know, the controls, we'll talk about
those two. But the controls are not standardized controls. It's
not you know, this is pre um well I just said,
it's pre standardized controls for the automobile. So you know,
the gas isn't always on the right and the break
(11:31):
on the left. It's not that way. This is completely different.
So learning to drive one learning to start one is
really an accomplishment. Yes, yes, and do check out our
previous episode if you plan to start a model T
and Scott. Actually, for anyone who's a fan of Scott's writing, Scott,
(11:51):
you wrote a blog post on this that goes into
the detail of what do you do? You remember this
must have been a long time ago. I haven't blog
posted in a long time. Well, you write a you
write a great step by step, a step by step
instruction how to on the process of starting a model T.
So what would I think we we could do here
(12:12):
today is talk a little bit about how to start
it and then spend some time on how to how
to correctly drive it, because, as you said, this is
um this is not standardized at all. Three pedals, the
steering wheels, the whole thing. No, absolutely, there's more. There's
(12:33):
far more to this. The controls will go over in
just a second. I wanted to. I wanted to catch
up one thing with the registration, and that's it, and
then we'll move on to the controls. We were talking
about going to uh their site, you know, the gimm
museum site, and they've got a register here online, you know,
length you can click on and it tells you, you know,
like the dates of the classes and everything that stretches
from April through September. Now, I think the courses are
(12:57):
over for this year. For if you want to get
in a this foren you still have the opportunity. And
again right now, as of today, there was only one
sold out class. And I don't know why it was
already sold out. It's kind of in the middle of things.
There must be some special weekend holiday or oh that's possible. Yeah,
because again the spots fill up quick. I don't remember
exactly how many people are in each class. I'll have
(13:18):
to have to dig into that a little more. But
it's not a giant class by any means. But you're
paired off with an instructor and uh they they with
then teach you a lot of different things. You'll teach
you how to use all the controls. They'll teach you
like hand and foot coordination, because that's gonna be at
element in this proper shifting techniques, how to stop the vehicle,
which is in itself difficult. Um correct use of the
(13:39):
neutral break lever, which I will describe in a minute,
reversing which reversed into something else. Too, and just basic starting,
you know, basic starting in the vehicle really so, um,
I think that they said that the instructors will handle
the hand cranking of the car if you if you
want that to happen, because um, as you've mentioned Ben earlier,
that's a dangerous operation. You can break a thumb, you
(13:59):
can break a forearm, I believe. Yeah, in the cranking process.
Let's let's talk about that just briefly. And I'm totally
plagiarizing your fantastic blog. Thank you, they'll get they'll get
two flats. Did I say? I said thank you? Right? Yeah,
I guess that's okay and thank you okay, okay, awesome. Guh.
So you have a categorized in three quote unquote easy
(14:24):
steps to start a forward model T right three h Wow,
I must really condense things. Yeah, I think, Well, tell
me what you think. So we're starting a model TAM.
Pull the choke which is adjacent to the right fender,
while engaging the crank lever under the radiator at the
front of the car, slowly turning it a quarter turn clockwise.
(14:47):
This is to prime the carburetor. Right if you and
then you get into the car, insert the ignition key,
turned the setting to either magneto or battery, adjust the
timing stalk upward to are the timing, move the throttle
stock downwards slightly for an idle setting, and pull back
on the handbrake, which also places the car in neutral.
(15:09):
There's a lot. That's it, right, Get out of the car,
go back to the front of the car. Use your
left hand to crank the lever. This is where this
is where there it's a real possibility of injury. It's
critical that you do this step in the right way.
If the engine backfires and the lever swings counterclockwise, your
(15:31):
left arm is less likely to be broken. All right, now,
I heard a little tip on this. You're supposed to
keep your thumb on the on the top side of
the crank of the handle, and that prevents breakage the
thumb and possibly of the form. Right, And so once
you have that, and uh, this is really where the
stakes are high. You're using your left hand to crank
(15:52):
the lever. Got your thumb on the top of the level,
give it a vigorous half crank, and if the automotive
God smile upon you, the engine should start. Oh my gosh,
what a what a process. Huh, I mean it is,
it's a it's a it's a complex process now, I mean,
but it's a simple machine though. That's the thing this,
(16:12):
this is a really simple vehicle. It's a six volt
electric system. And so let's saying that like six volts
comes from the battery. Of course it goes from well,
from the distributor. That electricity is sent to these four coils.
Then that are actually wooden boxes that are applied to
the I guess what do you call a firewall or
firewall and um, those six or seven volts of electricity
(16:36):
are then converted into twenty volts and then that's what
goes to the spark plots and that's what begins this
whole process. And because it's a magneto system, you know,
it's an magnets really on the flywheel. Once you get
it cranked and going, it starts right up. And that
it is based on the fact that you have everything
adjusted the right way. You have all the levers in
the right position, the hand the handles in the right position.
(16:57):
And we'll tell you about the controls here after work
from our sponsor and we're back Scott, I know, while
we were both flicking into this, we consulted a lot
of pictures and diagrams, and so if if you are
listening to this and you're not currently driving, or if
(17:19):
this interest you, we would highly recommend checking out some
of the awesome articles that will show you will visually
depict this process. It's a lot easier if you can
do that, or even watch a YouTube video someone starting
one of their own vehicles. A lot of times those
guys that I've been watching these about how to start
and how to drive Model T and a lot of
(17:41):
those guys will go into a lot of detail, will
explain mechanically what's happening as well. Uh so it adds
length to these. So all these you know, start and
drive videos are in you know, from six or seven
minutes up to about seventeen minutes. So you understand that
it's it's a complicated process that it can be um
described either simply or or in a very very drawn
out way. Um So it's so kind of pick and
(18:02):
choose what you watch online. But if you look at
a diagram, you're gonna see that there's a wooden box
that sits on the Actually to begin with, it's a
very simple interior as you would imagine very very simple. Um,
really only a couple of gauges. Really, it's very very simple. Uh.
There's a gasoline adjustment, there's a throttle, there's uh, you know,
of course, the steering wheel and pedal set. There's a handbrake. Um.
(18:25):
But but on the or in those areas there are
different things. You wouldn't expect the pedals to be where
they are. There are three pedals, and they're not what
you think that. The right most pedal is the foot brake,
and the middle pedal is the reverse. That's the reverse gear.
So the left one then you would think, well, that
must be the clutch, right there's gotta be what's happening there.
Because there's two speeds in a in a model Model
(18:47):
T rather and that's high and low. You would think
that that leftmost pedal would be the clutch pedal, but
it's actually the high low speed control. You know, it's
like one or the other. It's it's either forward or back. Um.
Low gears are all the way forward. High gears are
in the middle. I guess if you want to put
it that way back. Um. There's also an emergency brake
and clutch release which is on the left side of you,
(19:08):
and it has three positions, so uh, you know to
go rearward. Um, if you have a pulled rear word
I should say, you know with a handle in that
means that you're in neutral with a brake on. If
it's in the middle position, that's neutral. If it's forward
all the way, that's in the drive position. And that's
when you can select the low and high gear with
the left pedal. So you can see that this gets
complicated really quickly. In order to stop the car, uh,
(19:30):
you need to put the car into neutral first and
then apply the brakes. So it's not as simple as
just pushing on the brake pedal or even popping it
out of gear and a neutral. You have to do
two steps in order to break the car. Every time
it has to go to neutral. And then, of course,
all the while this is happening, you're constantly adjusting on
the steering wheel. You're adjusting the gas and the spark. Now,
the spark is something you know that's either to retard
(19:51):
the engine or to advance the engine, and you're continually
adjusting that based on your speed. That's on the left
hand side of the steering wheel. There's a gas control,
which is, if you want to think about it this way,
that's kind of your speed adjustment. Really. UM, so down
if you pull it down towards you, that's faster, push
it up away from you that is slower, and that's
on the right hand side of the steering wheel. Um.
(20:12):
Later models a vehicle will not have that wooden box.
I think I mentioned the wooden box or I started to. Anyways,
it's actually the coil box inside the car, and you
said it earlier. You switch this either to battery or magneto,
depending on what you're what's happening. I think for for starting,
you have it on the battery selection, and when you're running,
it's actually switched to the magneto position where it's charging.
(20:34):
So um that it's a lever on the earlier early vehicles.
On later vehicles they do have an actual turn key
ignition UM that you have to switch to you know
those positions as well. But um that's more standard looking vehicle,
I guess, a slightly more standard But again, as I'm
explaining this, I mean you should understand that nothing is standardized. Again.
(20:55):
It's it's not like you can jump into one and
just automatically know how to do it, someone someone has
to be kind of the keeper of knowledge and passed
us along to others. And that's what the museum is doing.
They've done that to the tune of what five hundred
people in alone. One of the instructors a guy named
Jim Brand nine in his nineties and drove Model t
(21:15):
s as a teenager and dearborn. So this this is
the kind of expertise and experience you're getting, all right
and dearborn. So he was in the heart of where
Henry Ford was operating at the time. He owned three
Model ts in high school. Uh, and he said, mainly
because they were cheap. That's a good, good reason, right,
And he still has he still has his own model.
(21:38):
He drives in parades and graduations and stuff. But this
is the kind of instructor you'll have, and you can
you can get a taste of the stuff they'll teach
you in that initial four hour course. The whole experience
includes three ride and observe opportunities and then three driving opportunities,
(21:59):
so you get a couple of at it. Really, because
I'm sure that there's some some mistakes made in that
first drive probably, I mean, not a lot of people
have that hand eye coordination to be able to do
that fluently. I guess you know, when you first get
behind the wheel, I'm sure. I'm sure that that's a
bit embarrassing. I imagine I would bet the second one
goes you know so so, and then the third. By
the third time, you probably got it. You probably understand
how to do it. Really, So that's probably the reason
(22:22):
behind having three separate times, so that you know that
first time you don't feel like I've failed. The first
time might just all be the learning curve, you know.
Sure what, here's what you get, so you luck out
and you're able to get in there before it sells out.
The instructors will teach you how to use the spark
and throttle control levers, you know, and the stocks we
(22:43):
talked about, how to coordinate hand and foot controls, the
proper shifting techniques, stopping the vehicle, which, as Scott as
Scott noted earlier, is not near as easy. All this
stuff makes me think we have it so easy today
as drivers. He really is been You turn the key
and that's about it, right. The also, yeah, the also
teach you the correct use of the neutral break lever.
(23:04):
We'll teach you how to reverse the vehicle, and they
will teach you how to start it. Yeah, and you
might think, well, what do I what do I get
for you know, attending this course? What do I get
from my one hundred and five dollars outside of a
couple of you riding drives? So you get a little
bit more than that for um the same price. Now again,
I should say that I don't know if we've said this.
We're not really We're not affiliated with Gilmore in any way.
We're not We're not trying to sell tour packages or
(23:25):
anything like that. This is just fascinating to us. We
just simply like this. It's it's so different, so unique.
It's the as far as I know, it's the only
one in the world that does something like this. And
we don't know how long it will last either. That's
part of it. They do have a full calendar for
that you can still sign up for. Yeah, but is
it gonna go beyond that? You never know? Who knows?
(23:46):
We uh, yeah, we're not in any way making this
an advertisement. We're just fanboying a little because we think
it's cool. And I don't know about you, Scott, but
I I adjust this figured that I would never get
an opportunity a D to drive a Model T. Well,
I think you and probably nearly every other listener had
thought the same thing. And that's a that's a real
(24:08):
possibility now at this place. I mean, you go and
pay your hundred five bucks and just like anybody else,
you can get behind the wheel, which is and you
you know how dude, I don't talk about all the time,
but you know how cheap I am. And this this
is the way. The price is way more reasonable than
I would have imagined. And as you said, it's it's
(24:29):
not just an experience where you get to drive a
little bit and learn how to start stuff. They include
other things. Well you know, okay, they do have other things.
I just wanted to talk about price for just one
more second. I had looked into the Porsche driving experience
here in Atlanta recently, and we were talking about, you know,
maybe going there and doing some video shooting and stuff
like that if possible. And we didn't even really get
(24:49):
too deep into it because I found out some of
the prices, and you know, they go from anywhere about
like I think you're I think you're just writing for
that price up to you know, eight and fifty dollars,
and I think they go north of that too if
you want to get you know, even more super training
and exactly right. And I think, how ever, reading a
lot about these experiences, and they said that, you know,
(25:12):
one of the it's a it's a really useful tool
for the local dealers to have this Porsche experience. And
what that means is there's a test track essentially for
Porsche that's right outside of Atlanta. It's in near the airport.
You can check it out if you want to. Um,
we'll probably talk about it another podcast soon. But you're
able to drive pretty much anything in the fleet. I
(25:32):
think they allow you just about anything. I know there's
certain packages that allow certain vehicles. But um, they say
it's an invaluable tool for dealers to be able to
bring a person and allow them to drive let's say, uh,
you know, Carrera four on the track, and then they
find out that a lot of times when they allow
them to do that and then drive a Carrera four S,
oftentimes the person that was going to buy the career
(25:53):
of four buys the four S model. So it's a
kind of an upsell opportunity for them because they're really
able to wretched that vehicle's legs, you know, tested out
see exactly how they would handle in a in a
tract situation versus like driving around the block, you know,
for a test drive near the dealership or something. Um. Again,
they've put something like a hundred million dollars into this
(26:14):
track outside of Atlanta, hundred million into this whole experience,
which includes a museum and all that stuff. But um,
it's still worth it for them for the word of
mouth that this creates and the opportunity that it presents
for not only the dealers, but the people of the area.
You know, anybody who is interested in this. I'm sure
they bring people in from farther away than just Atlanta.
(26:35):
I know, people you know fly in just specifically for
that and then leave again. So UM, again, a valuable, valuable,
valuable tool for them, and these experiences, I mean, don't
don't discount them too much. I think that you know,
they're they're they're incredibly valuable to people. And this is different.
They're not trying to sell model ts in any way.
But you know, this is more like again a bucket
(26:55):
list thing. So UM, students after they um or I
guess when they're find up for this, they get a
bunch of different things. It's not just you know, you
drive the car and that's it. You go home. First,
you get a historian guided tour um in portions the
museum collection with lessons on Henry Ford and how the
Model T changed the world for people who, due to
some great cosmic accident or injustice, have not had the
(27:19):
privilege of checking out our episodes on Henry Ford. Yeah,
maybe they have amnesia. They forgot. You know, I don't
remember anything from five years ago, so you know, go
back and check it out. Why not. You also get
a DVD of vintage newsreel footage from the the heyday
of the models. You're not bad. It's kind of fun
to watch that the old Model TS rolling off the
(27:39):
assembly line and had some of the uh, some of
those those factory conditions you know in the early Model
T factories in Detroit. Some of that stuff is unbelievable.
It's it's so different from what you see today with
your robotic arms and all the safety zones and all that.
It's not like that at all. This is it's dangerous
factory work, but really really cool to watch. And again
some running footage, I guess the vehicles. So also get
(28:00):
a model T driving book which was produced exclusively for
the Gilmore Car Museum. That'd be a nice thing to
have added the shelf. And you get admission for the
whole day to the historic campus of the Gilmore Car Museum.
And of course you get a certificate of completion so
people will believe you not bad, not bad. Oh, and
(28:21):
here's a couple of things that we should also mention too.
I mean, there's there's some important notes that you need
to understand before we sign up for this. But you
know what, first, let's take another word from our sponsor.
We have returned, and of course they're always going to
be some caveats, some concerns, some details, some fine print,
(28:43):
and this is all relatively reasonable. Uh. They say, yes,
we still drive in the rain just like they did,
so dress for the weather. Yeah yeah, toughen up, sally,
that's what they're saying there. You know, it's like, what
is it Is it insensitive of me to say, hitch
up your skirt and get out here and start this
(29:04):
vehicle like we used to a nineteen eight? You know
what can I say that? Um? Honestly, I guess it
depends on the context, you know, I guess, so I
think in this case, they're they're calling you out there saying, uh,
you gotta be a little tough, right, that's all. It means,
you just gotta be tough, You gotta be you gotta
be thick skin like we were back in the early Yeah. Yeah,
(29:26):
that's right. And then the well, yeah, and the idea is,
of course, to keep the experience authentic, which means that, yeah,
you'd be driving in the rain, and yes, you have
to start the vehicle where shoes. I personally feel like
that should go without saying don't wear flip flops or
high heels or um, yeah, well you gotta wears. You
(29:48):
gotta wear what they would call sensible shoes, I guess,
you know, like athletic shoes or something like that. Because
and there's a good reason for this. Not only you know, one,
of course, you can't drive in high heels or something,
probably not that easily. Uh. The other thing would be that,
you know, all those foot controls we talked about, they're
very close together, they're very narrow, so you gotta you
gotta remember that when you're trying to push that reverse pedal.
It's in the middle. You know, you might want to
(30:10):
consider your footwear and not where as you said, flip flops,
high heel sandals, anything like, you know, like big work boots. Oh,
really important point here, I think I mean a misspoke
earlier about starting the vehicle. They'll they'll tell you how
to do it, but I think when it comes to
the actual cranking where someone can break their arm, I
think they're leaving that to the instructors. Now. Maybe if
(30:32):
you're like the teacher's pet, or you're an honor student
or something, and they look at you and they think, oh,
this this is the best student I've ever had, maybe
they'll let you sneak crank one, but probably not. I
wouldn't count on it. If you're like an experienced pilot
who starts airplane engines that way, you know, like with
the old handspin contact, do it that way. Maybe, But
(30:53):
if if you're that person already, then you're probably an
instructor and not a student. Possibly, yeah, I would say,
so you got a little mechanical um aptitude. Yeah, I
would say that's maybe. I don't know, we'll see, but uh,
you know, it just sounds like a fun, fun thing,
and it's not limited to UM. I think we said
that you have to be a license driver. But there's
(31:14):
one interesting exception here, and I don't know how this happened.
There was someone very young who took the course this year,
very young. So anybody out there listening who thinks like, well, man,
I gotta wait until I get my license. I can't
wait to do this. I don't know if that's necessarily
the case. And this might have been who knows, maybe
this was a favorite called in or something. You have
to contact the museum and find out. But I think
(31:34):
I know, I think I know who you're talking about.
I'm gonna sound like a little guy. A young stir
from Detroit was able to pass the course. So Alan
Bennett from suburban Detroit was the youngest person ever to
complete the class, which of course they noted during ceremony.
He's the youngest so far. This guy, Alan Bennett is
twelve years old. He completed the course. Yeah, his dad
works for General Motors as well. Yeah, he's a designer
(31:57):
for GM. And I guess they said that he was,
you know, along with him for the day, cheering him on,
taking photos, that kind of thing, and the kid thought
it was really funny. He said, you know, I've only
driven go cards before this, but um, this is the
first time I've driven a real car, and that's pretty slick.
I mean, twelve year old passing the course. That's interesting.
So anybody again who's that age might want to check
into it, might want to call first before you just
(32:18):
show up. You don't expect to be able to drive.
But I don't know what the situation of the circumstances
were around that. But I wonder what the oldest person
to drive would be now, because you know, one of
the instructors nine two, he's gonna be ninety three next year.
I would assume him during this this course. So, um,
I wonder if there's anybody that's even older than that
has has taken the course. They don't. They don't mention
anything about the oldest driver, but the youngest again, twelve
(32:40):
years old, something to shoot for. I guess if you're
a you know, a ten year old, Yeah, I wanted
to take this, you know, maybe big big also we
do we do have the estimate on the class size.
I think each class size is around two dozen people,
so about twenty four people. I wonder how many cars.
That means, so I that's interesting. At twenty four it
(33:02):
seems like a lot for you know, three riding drives
and three driving experiences. You know, we're able to drive
it yourself, so it would be a lot of changing
the seats, you know. Yeah, I think that, you know,
we said earlier, they've got a full fleet of vehicles.
So I don't think that that's a problem. As long
as they limited to what you say, two dozen. As
long as they limited to that, I think, you know,
you still get your full time behind the wheel, and
you know, the whole experience, and of course that certificate,
(33:25):
you know, the science certificate that they get at the end.
I'd frame that and put that on the wall. I
love that sort of stuff, man, I really enjoy being
certified for things. Actually thinking of going and becoming a notary.
Just certify yourself for all kinds of things, and and
you can have the wall full of plaques, you know,
like that's what we'll do with diplumas. But you'll find
(33:46):
like it's uh like model T public notary MS word certified.
In this word certified, I have written a camel. That
was the first license I ever got. Man, what was
that a camel license. Camel license is a kid at
a at ah I guess seasonal amusement park in Tennessee
that some of you may recognize. I don't know. It's
called Twitty City. Twitty City, Yeah, Lady Bird for some reason,
(34:13):
you know, you know, like it's a winter festival kind
of thing, at least the way I remembered it. And
one of the cool things you could do was you
could get certified to ride a camel, which if you're
like a kid six or seven, what that essentially means
is that someone puts you on a camel and like
walks you in a circle, and they take some money
(34:35):
from your parents and then they give you a little
paper license. I was very proud of me at the
time of Polaroid photo or something like that. Right, Yeah,
I was power mad. I bet you know what. Kids,
kids love that, And I think that if you're a
kid that really likes that kind of thing, you know,
like when you, um uh, let's say the sheriff visits
your school and he gives you a deputy badge or something. Yeah,
or you know, you get some wings pinned on you
(34:58):
for your first airline flight. Here we go, ya love
that stuff. And you know what, I think if you're
a kid that the kid that enjoys that, I think
you become an adult that still enjoys that kind of thing.
You know, he's still, like you said, with your certificates
and you know, wanting to just get something to hang
on the wall that says, you know, this is legit.
I can legit. You know, I have a legit reason
for doing this, or I'm uh, you know, I'm an
authority in some way. What a cool you know, what
(35:20):
a cool surprise. And also I have to we would
be remiss if we didn't read this. One quote from
Keith May's, who was from Kentwood, Michigan, and took the
class recently. He says, at first, I was terrified, absolutely
terrified I was going to break something. But then you
realize that these things were built bulletproof, you know, And
(35:43):
I can completely identify with that feeling. Okay, I understand that,
but again, this is a car that's one hundred years old.
There's also a bit of delicateness to that, you know.
I mean, it's it's not it's not that it's so fragile.
It's just that you don't want to bump into a
tree with this, you don't want to know, grind the
gears because you feel like, well, it's only got a
few more of those left before I have to rebuild that.
(36:04):
You know that that's the kind of feeling that I
would have. I think I want to be you know,
gentle with it enough that I didn't damage it during
my time behind the wheel. I'd be nervous about that,
you know, you'd feel you'd feel self conscious about that
kind of stuff. I think, wouldn't you. But it's owned
by the museum. It's not like it's you know, the
instructor's personal vehicle or anything like that. So, um, although
you know, the two year old we talked about what
(36:25):
was his name, Jim Brand, he does I think he
still owns one that he drives in parades and yeah, yeah,
oh yeah, yeah, that's right. Yeah, he still owns that
that one for himself. But I don't think that's the
one that the students you're driving. Well, Ben, I think
maybe we've we've covered just about everything on this really,
So if if people are interested in this, and seriously,
it's a great gift for somebody, um, again, we're not
(36:45):
selling them. We don't get any kind of kickback. So
there's no car stuff, you know, discount or anything like that.
I promise you, Yeah, there isn't You know what I
should say this, if you're a member of the Gilmore
Car Museum, you might get a discount on the on
the admission, So you might want to check that out
and see you can get a discount. And the museum
itself is very much worth the trip. Yeah. I don't
have any idea how much it costs to become a
(37:05):
member or any of that. I've I've never been there.
I'd like to go someday. But you can go to
Gilmore Car Museum dot org and find out all the
information that we just talked about today, this to this
whole course, and again what a cool gift that might
be for someone unwrapped you're going to the Model T
experience that it was a Hickory Corners, Michigan at the
Gilmore Museum. That would be such a cool thing to
open on Christmas Day or you know, birthday or whatever.
(37:27):
I just think it's a fun idea. Yeah, I agree.
So if you are fortunate enough to find yourself in
the area and you take the Model T driving experience,
let us know let us know how you felt driving those,
because one thing I hear a lot from people with
driven Model ts is what the top speed is? Forty miles?
(37:48):
I want to say, but apparently it feels a lot
faster when you're when you're driving this contankers, it's mostly
open air, right, and I think a lot of these
that we're looking at have no tops on them, and
you know, it's pretty pretty spartan interior. I bet it
does feel pretty quick in that. And you're like, you
don't want to go any faster than for any probably, yeah, right,
so so right in, let us know, and even if
(38:09):
you have experience with a Model T but it's not
part of the Gilmore Museum experience, we we'd like to
hear it, especially if like, oh, if somebody restored one,
how cool would that be? Oh? Sure, yeah, I mean
they're fifteen million of them out there. At least there were.
I wonder how many are still left, but a lot
of more crushed for you know, metal during the war
and stuff like that. But you know, there's a ton
of them out there, so we'd love to hear from you. Yeah,
(38:30):
there are a bunch of hidden in barns and stuff. Oh,
and speaking of hearing from you, Scott, I think it's
time to return to a segment that we haven't done
in a while. What's that listener mail? Let's bring it on. Okay?
This email comes from Ed m. Ed m is writing
to us regarding our episode on boring cars from the
(38:53):
design perspective. Yeah, he said, I listen on Stitcher while
I'm working. Is about boring cars? First, says Ed, I
always say how impressed I am that car companies can
make a product with thousands of moving parts, some with
tolerances of thousands of an inch. I got there, Uh,
And that work and work for years under adverse conditions,
and are affordable, and they get changed completely every few years.
(39:16):
Having said that, I continue to think that it doesn't
cost any more to design a beautiful car than a
boring car. I tend to believe it's more of a
bean counting decision that manufacturers want you to spend more
to get the beautiful models on purpose. Pretty good point. Additionally,
says Ed, I think sometimes engineers might take the easy
way out. For instance, I rented a Chevy Sonic for
(39:39):
a week and never could figure out how it worked completely.
After a week, I discovered the trip information could be
reset if you push this, pulled that, and turned something else.
Once trying to put my car mug in the cup holder,
I turned off the stability control Because the button was
in the middle of the console between the seats, the
entertainment was incomprehensible and mostly invisible behind my arm while
(40:00):
I drove. The reason I complain about this is because
I've owned hunt Eyes in Akia, and for reasonably priced cars,
they have coherent switch gear. The trip information is altogether
on the dash or on the steering wheel, and the
stability control and other such switches are grouped together also
on the dash. If they can do it, Chevy can
to anyway. That's my rant, all right, Now, a couple
of things. Now, I agree that sometimes it appears that
(40:23):
they've taken the easy way out. But we talked about
the scarcity of real estate in cars, sometimes especially small cars,
and especially as we have more and more on board
electronic components. Yeah, I'm not I'm not arguing with that
in any way. I think he's right on a lot
of these cases. I think, you know, they could design
something a little better, but you know they're gonna save
that for the the upsell S model or you know,
(40:44):
the whatever it would be that the top end right
GT model. I'm tempted to agree, and yeah, I think so.
But the thing is, we learned also about tooling for
these you know, for the metal shape, you know, the
outside metal shape. If you put more bends, more curves,
more um, interesting items onto a vehicle, you know, it's
interesting to look at, I mean an interesting the way
that they reflect light and all that, you know, the
(41:05):
way they're curved and bent and shaped. It's more complex,
it's more expensive. And again all these panels costing. You know,
these these dyes for the metal panels on the outside
of the vehicle, they cost millions of dollars each one,
each panel. So you know, make them simple. Is is
really simple. It's more cost effective, I guess to create
a simple die for that for that metal to stamp
(41:27):
out in the way that it does. And I don't know, um,
you know what I think a lot of you know,
the creases and stuff like that. I also have to
do with again space concerns. You know, you have to
have a certain amount of room under the hood for
the engine. And if you look at a lot of
you know, the small, tiny little economy cars, you know,
basic basic transportation. There's not a whole lot of extra
room under the hood of those, in fact that the
windshield practically starts at the front. Bump around a lot
(41:49):
of those vehicles and say they still get the engine
and transaxle in there. Uh, the front wheel drive car.
So you know, again it comes down to real estate,
it comes down to cost. And I do but you know,
I'm kind of on the fence about this a little
bit too, because it seems like they could add just
a little bit more style to them personality, and I
think they're getting I would think we did say this
in the episode, that they're getting better. You know some
(42:11):
of the uh, some of the current hatchbacks and small
cars that are you know, economy cars, you know, they're
the ones that are real just again basic transportation. There
they are a lot more interesting to look at than
the cars that were built thirty years ago. Uh there.
You know, although there's a you know a group of people,
I'm one of them that likes the boxing style from
you know, the seventies and eighties, but even earlier than
that sometimes. But you know, they were so simple, they
(42:34):
were so flat, they're so square, they just didn't put
a lot of effort into their their lowest of the line,
the base model vehicles, And I think now they're doing
a much better job with it. Do you think, Ben,
that it comes down to more than just more than
just space concern? Do you think it is the engineers
sometimes just taking the easy way out, like we'll just
let's put that button there because it's simple. There's there's
(42:54):
you know, two square inches of space, we only need one.
You know, are you asking if I think of them
are like four thirty pm on a Friday decision? Yeah?
I think yeah, you think that. You think it's like
kind of just just put it there and it's done.
We careful, Scott. We got a lot of engineers in
the I know we do. And I'm not saying that's
in every case. I think it occasionally happens. It has
(43:14):
to write. I think that could I think that could
happen in any industry. From what we what we looked
at with our anonymous source, Mr. Car Designer, what what
we looked at really showed us how how much compromise
goes into multiple departments working together to produce a car.
(43:37):
So I would be less without being an automotive engineer myself,
I would be less likely to just attribute something that
was confusing or my opinion, poorly engineered or poorly designed.
Would be less likely to attribute that to laziness and
more likely to attribute that to some kind of unfortunate
(44:00):
it compromise. I think you're I think you're right off
as well. I think there's a lot of cases where
they say, well, okay, I've tried the switch in eight
spots already, and that caused a lot of trouble in
every spot because you know the way that they do
this with you know, everybody working on the same model
at the same time, right, so you know, conflicts are
known instantly and and they're loudly pointed out. You know
(44:20):
that you can't do that. So maybe it's just a
point where well, well, then where can I put it?
Where would you allow it? And and they tell them
and they say, well, then fine, that's where it has
to be. And anybody involved in any sort of group work,
if you're a student right now and you're listening to this,
I'm sure you are acquainted with the hazards of working
(44:40):
in groups. And one of the things that happens is
for every individual member of a group specializing in something.
Their thing that they're in charge of is automatically the
most important thing to them, So they could probably care
less in some cases over where a certain switch goes
as long as it doesn't it in in the way
(45:01):
of whatever they're trying to accomplish. You know, I see
that too. I mean, again, there's so many different ways
to see this, and you never know with every situation,
but I think it it's got a point. You know
that there a couple of things that could be done
a little bit better, you know, across the board, Like
you know, the style of the design of of a
small vehicle with the appearance, the outward appearance of it
totally um, but you know, I think they do. They
(45:21):
put out the best product they can. They want it
to be appealing. Uh they don't, but they don't want
it to infringe upon you know, the next model up,
you know, the sales of that. They don't want to
cannibalize the sales of their mid mid level model versus
or even the upper level models with their base model.
It's a different group of people that they're they're targeting
with that vehicle, and I think maybe that's part of
it too. No, I know we're running a little long,
(45:43):
but I I gotta tell you, I think this is
this might be exciting for you too. I'm starting to
consider getting a different car. Oh really Yeah, I love
the money Carlo to death. I don't want to get
rid of it, but I am looking into options for
what kind of cars get. I don't think I'm going
(46:06):
to end up with the Bugatti. Looked over the numbers, Yeah,
didn't quite fit right, um, but hopefully I get something
nice and them. So, dude, I am so hyped about
this because you know, I have never owned a car
like the The newest model I've ever owned was a
(46:28):
two thousand and eight. And even with the pace of
technology now, things are changing so quickly. I'm going to
feel like I'm someone from the age of Model t
s who accidentally walked into the future. Yeah. I mean
I've heard people say this, or maybe maybe it's something
that we came up, but I don't know. People when
they get into a car, it feels like you're in
a rocket ship or something. It looks like you're looking
(46:49):
at the controls for an airliner, because there's so much
more than there was, you know, ten years ago, even
in cars if you look back to you know, yours
is what a two thousand eight? Am I correct? NTI
Carlos and O four Okay, so it's even even pre
date set. So look at the dash of that vehicle
versus the dash of anything from let's say two thousand
fifteen on. And I'm just thinking that because it's two
(47:11):
years old at this Yeah, it's two years old. And uh.
One of the things I noticed though, because I started to,
you know, put around look at some different cars and
ask ask my buddies, like, how do you feel about
the car you have? You know, basic cursory research, one
of the things I noticed is I might I might
be turning into an old, old man style car guy
(47:33):
because I feel like I feel like I'm fighting against
some technology that is increasingly becoming just standard and not optional,
like backup cameras. You know. I it's it's I'm good
luck finding a car without one now. Yeah, okay, that's
a little generalization. But in two years from now, good
luck finding one without it. Well that's right. It's a
trickle down technology. I was you would have appreciated it
(47:55):
because I was such a I was such a curmudgeon.
I was so very much like get off my law.
And because one of my friends is trying to parallel
park and they had his backup cameras and I thought
they were relying too much on the camera and it
was screwing them up. And then I cheating. Yeah, well,
I said, why don't you, Why don't you just know
how to parallel park? Use your mirrors, use your mirrors?
(48:16):
Wrong with you? I know I'm being dragged, kicking and
screaming into the future. So wish me luck everyone, And
if you have some recommendations for cars that I should
look at. I don't know if there's a definite yet,
I don't know my timeline, but I'm officially I'm interested
real suggestions. Anybody that says a Honda Odyssey will be
block blocked from our email service forever. No, don't be
(48:39):
your new best friend. All right, well, we are going
to we are going to conclude today's episode, but not
our show. Stay tuned. We will be back with more
car stuff in the meantime. You can find Scott and
I on Facebook and you can find us on Twitter.
We your car stuff h s W. If you would
like to learn the ins and outs of starting a
(49:01):
model T again. We do recommend our podcasts and Scott's
blog on the subject. Uh, Scott, I think you already
said be kind, right that was oh nine as a
long time ago. It was a long time ago. Yeah nine,
that's right, Yeah it was, it was a long time again.
You can find it on you know, car stuff show
dot com. It's you know, it's a searchable website. You're
able to find it, so check it out. And it's
(49:21):
I don't know the length of the show, but um
it's a little bit more in depth about the starting
and operation of driving. And you can also while you're
on car stuff Show dot com check out every single
audio episode that we have ever done. Scott, you might
be saying, Ben, you might be saying, I have experienced
with a model T. I'm a storing one right now.
I know the sort of car you should look into
(49:42):
if you're going to get a new car in twhen
he's seventeen. But I don't know how to reach you
guys directly. We have good news for you. You can
send us an email. We are car stuff at how
stuff works dot com. For more on this and thousands
of others topics. This is at how stuff Works dot
com let us know what you think. Send an email
(50:04):
to podcast at how stuff works dot com. Mm hmmm
hm
Go behind the wheel, under the hood and beyond with
car Stuff from how Stuff Works dot Com. I and
welcome to car Stuff. I'm Scott. I'm then we are
joined with our super producer Tyler playing. Everybody, say hi Tyler,
he's waving. He's waving to you. Let's have to take
(00:24):
our word for it. Okay, Yeah, that's great. I have
found an interesting fact. Okay, please share. Okay, the Model
T is the second most successful or popular car of
all time. Wait second most? Second? Why is this second? What? Okay? So, um,
(00:47):
let's think what would be the most piple. I'm gonna
I'm gonna make an educated guess. I don't know where
you're getting at here. All right, let's see. It's a
tough one. I'm gonna guess to the Volkswagon Beatle. Whoa
Scotty's rail? Yeah? Great, good? That was just shot in
the dark way. That's long long production. I remember when
we did the Model T story. Um, you know, I'm sorry.
(01:09):
I probably ruined your surprise. You're probably hoping to surprise. No,
I'm super impressed. Actually, I mean they've they've been in
production for a long long time, so so that's the
only logical choice I think, but what fifteen million on
the Model T? So Ben, do you have any any
numbers on the folks like a beatle forest twenty one
point five million, my friend? Impressive, impressive, that's like more
(01:29):
something like that. It's a lot, It's there are a
lot of Beatles out there, a lot. And it's still surprising,
I think, to a lot of people in the modern
day to realize just how popular the Model T was,
because it's become almost a legend in the automotive world.
It's part of the Henry Ford mythology, and it's a
(01:51):
car that people are only used to seeing in museums,
right it seems that way. Yeah, unless you're one of
the fortunate ones that owns one of these. Because of
still a lot of them around, I mean a ton
of them around. You'll find them in all stages of
uh of restoration, I guess, Um you know some parked
in gradges that are pristine and others that you know
are daily drivers. I don't know about daily drivers, maybe
(02:13):
not with the top speed of only what forty or
something like that, Um, not too practical these days. But
you'll find some that you know, of course, basket cases
and that's the ones that you know, people want, the
pre war cars are looking for, and the ones they
can restore themselves and make it their own. Baby. You know. Yeah,
and baby is a good word. I'm glad you use that.
I have no children that I am aware of. But
(02:35):
the the thing that we hear a lot about, you know,
parenting when you're when you're a new parent, you have
to pay super close attention to everything. You have to
be way more responsible than you were pre kid. Right,
and driving a Model T or heck, even starting it.
Remember when we did that podcast, Yeah, we did that
(02:56):
podcast a while back. In fact, we did that back
in August of two thousand nine, podcast about starting and
driving a Model T. And it was complex, yeah, and
dangerous actually, So it's driving a Model T. Starting it
requires like the same level of attention that my friends
(03:17):
who have kids tell me they have to pay to
their kids. I could understand that it's a it's not
an easy process, and it's one we'll we'll step through it.
I guess one more time, maybe not, you know, maybe
to the depth or the length that we did last
time we talked about it. Probably I don't remember that
podcast exactly how long it was but later we've in
our later podcast, we've been going a little longer than
we did in our early days. Right, this is back
(03:38):
from two thousand nine, So if you go back and
listen to that one, you know, be kind. I guess
because it was the early days of our show. It
might even be a high speed stuff show. I don't remember.
Oh wow, could be deep cut, it could be yeah. Anyways,
but this is all playing into something that you know,
we found it online or we were looking around for,
you know, some topics for this week, and uh, we
(03:59):
came across an interesting experience that you can have and
that's probably the best way to describe it. It's an experience.
And you've heard a lot about um, you know, sports
car experiences you can do like a rally car experience.
In fact, I got a whole long list of of
types of experiences that you can have, you know, like
a day at the track. Right. Yeah, so well, you know,
kids do stock car, you can do rally cars. There's
(04:20):
even a place um in the UK that does movie cars.
You can drive a replica of kit and generally, and
I think they had some others maybe like the Bullet
Mustang or something like that. Um, there's stunt car experiences,
which kind of surprised me. Of course, supercars and sports cars, exotics.
You know, you can do tank driving if you wanted to. Yeah,
here in Georgia, actually that's here, there's one here for
you could do that. I think there are a few
(04:41):
around the world that you can do that. Um. You
can do off road segways if you want to. Uh,
there's drifting. Um, there's even a semi truck that you
can drive. And I think this one is also in
the UK. Um it's the Optimus Prime American Truck Driving Experience.
How cool would that be? It sounds really cool. There's
hovercraft driving experiences. Um, I'm just there's a ton of
(05:01):
You want to drive a Ford g T forty, you
can do that as well. Um, let's see what else. Oh,
there's this is maybe one of the coolest ones. And
for young drivers, there's something called the Young Driver Experience,
and again in the UK, it's by a company called
UK Wide and anyone between the ages of ten to
seventeen can drive an actual car on their simulated road
(05:22):
track and they've got all these different layouts, like lots
of different structures and and you know items that you
have to um adhere to you know, like road road
rules that the kids have to adhere to. But it's
like a a primer for them, an early primer for
them for actual driving. And they get to drive actual
cars while their parents watch from a safe distance distance away.
But uh, I guess it's you know, wildly popular. A
(05:44):
lot of people do this because it's good experience. And um, again,
just all these you can any kind of race car
you can imagine. Um, there's a lot of different experiences,
but this is probably one of the most unique ones
that I've ever heard of. Yes, and this comes to
this courtesy of the Gilmore Car Museum in Michigan. Yeah,
Hickory Corners, Michigan to be specific. And that's right near Kalamazoo.
(06:05):
I think it's north and west of Kalamazoo if I
remember right. Um, But this will start. This is a
museum that we've talked about in the past, just just
in passing. Uh. It is a it's an incredible museum.
Really if you get on the site and look around
again Gilmar Car Museum. Uh. This place has ninety acres
of property and the car display area alone in this
(06:27):
property one hundred and eighty nine thousand square feet. They
have four hundred cars that they have on displayed, So
four hundred is that's getting that's approaching the number of
cars that you know that GM. Um, I forget that
they called the GM Experience or something like that. That
is close to the number of cars that General Motors
is kind of tucked away over the years. So it's
an enormous collection. And these go across the spectrum. They
(06:50):
include motor cycles as well. But they have Duisenberg's, Hudson's
of all these classics from the forties, the fifties, the sixties. Uh.
They even an early cars from the eighteen nineties. And
they have some Fords, Yeah, a few Fords right free
that we'll talk about in just a minute. They've got
on this property too, they've got partner museums. You know,
(07:11):
ninety acres that's a lot of property. So um, it's
this enormous compound. They have partner partner museums, Like there's
a miniature of museum that's on the property as well.
I think there's others. There's a gas station, a diner
that's been fully restored. There's barns, all kinds of structures
and these Model Ts that you speak have been I
guess they have a whole fleet of Model T vehicles.
Now we had said earlier, I think I don't know
(07:32):
if we mentioned the dates for the Model T, but
wasn't it nineteen o eight to ninety seven? I think
that they were built. So it's a long time period
or a long time frame. And again, fifteen million of these,
so you know, it's no surprise that a place like
the Gilmore would end up with a pretty substantial collection.
You know, it's a it's it's a favorite among collectors
really of pre war cars. I know that there are
(07:53):
other more prestigious makes out there, and people, you know,
often seek out vehicles of a certain uh certain mark,
but a lot of people are really fascinated by the
Model T. And it's just it's simplicity and of course
what it means to um, you know, not only American history,
but also to just automotive history in general. It's it
was a groundbreaking vehicle, um not just here in the
(08:14):
United States, but all over the world, really, right, And
it's I would say it's even more than just automotive history.
It's very much every Model T that you ever see
in person, is, in a very real way, a tangible
piece of a revolution. Yeah, we're talking about cars that
are now some of them are over a hundred years old,
(08:36):
and it's just impressive to me that, you know, somebody
has taken the loving care to keep them on the
road and drivable. And again, this museum is Gilmour Museum,
has a fleet of these cars that they are doing
something extraordinary with. There is a I'll just let the
cat of the bag here, but there is a I'm
sure everybody knows this already, there's a model t driving
(08:56):
experience that you can pay for and attend at this
at this ye More museum, and you have to register
and sign up for we'll tell you all about that
in just a minute. But they allow just kind of
ordinary people like you and me to go there and
take this four hour course. Um, it's about a hundred
and five dollars, I think if you want to sign
up for this course, and you know, they give you
all sorts of things. We'll talk about this specific school,
(09:18):
what they give you and what they teach you while
you're there. But isn't that incredible You can go and
get your hands on a car that might be over
a hundred years old and they let you drive it
around the property. There's you know, two and a half
miles of track, of of experienced track that they allow
you to drive on that that simulates, you know, different environments,
I guess you know, different types of roads they can
(09:38):
travel on. But what a fascinating idea to kind of
turn over these museum pieces to again, just ordinary people,
which it also seems odd that it would happen, you know,
to me, that was something that always seemed outside of
the realm of possibility. I would think that again, just
your everyday car fan, and would have to know someone
(10:04):
who has a privately owned Model T and a heck
of a lot of faith in your driving ability. For
a museum to let any license driver, because that's all
you need, folks, all you need is driver his license.
For a museum to let any license driver sign up
for this is amazing. I didn't know about it until
you told me, and you can since we're laying cats
(10:27):
out of bags. Just want to be clear, this thing
has limited space and it sells out fast, but I
think it's worth your time to register, especially if you
are anywhere near uh anywhere near the museum. Oh absolutely
I mean it seems like, okay, I just have to
ask you a question that was kind of not really
a side note, but this is related for don't you
(10:48):
think that this this is kind of a bucket list
item for a lot of car guys and car girls.
I mean, if you're interested in the automobile, you might
have always looked at the model T is something you
wanted to attempt to try. As you said, you know,
you'd have to know somebody and somebody that would trust
you in order to be able to drive that right,
or maybe you never really had much you know, thought
about it, but think like that's just another thing to
(11:08):
kind of check off the list, Like I've done this.
It's it's interesting and it's not like driving a regular car.
It's it's completely different. You have to remember as we
get to uh, you know, the controls, we'll talk about
those two. But the controls are not standardized controls. It's
not you know, this is pre um well I just said,
it's pre standardized controls for the automobile. So you know,
the gas isn't always on the right and the break
(11:31):
on the left. It's not that way. This is completely different.
So learning to drive one learning to start one is
really an accomplishment. Yes, yes, and do check out our
previous episode if you plan to start a model T
and Scott. Actually, for anyone who's a fan of Scott's writing, Scott,
(11:51):
you wrote a blog post on this that goes into
the detail of what do you do? You remember this
must have been a long time ago. I haven't blog
posted in a long time. Well, you write a you
write a great step by step, a step by step
instruction how to on the process of starting a model T.
So what would I think we we could do here
(12:12):
today is talk a little bit about how to start
it and then spend some time on how to how
to correctly drive it, because, as you said, this is
um this is not standardized at all. Three pedals, the
steering wheels, the whole thing. No, absolutely, there's more. There's
(12:33):
far more to this. The controls will go over in
just a second. I wanted to. I wanted to catch
up one thing with the registration, and that's it, and
then we'll move on to the controls. We were talking
about going to uh their site, you know, the gimm
museum site, and they've got a register here online, you know,
length you can click on and it tells you, you know,
like the dates of the classes and everything that stretches
from April through September. Now, I think the courses are
(12:57):
over for this year. For if you want to get
in a this foren you still have the opportunity. And
again right now, as of today, there was only one
sold out class. And I don't know why it was
already sold out. It's kind of in the middle of things.
There must be some special weekend holiday or oh that's possible. Yeah,
because again the spots fill up quick. I don't remember
exactly how many people are in each class. I'll have
(13:18):
to have to dig into that a little more. But
it's not a giant class by any means. But you're
paired off with an instructor and uh they they with
then teach you a lot of different things. You'll teach
you how to use all the controls. They'll teach you
like hand and foot coordination, because that's gonna be at
element in this proper shifting techniques, how to stop the vehicle,
which is in itself difficult. Um correct use of the
(13:39):
neutral break lever, which I will describe in a minute,
reversing which reversed into something else. Too, and just basic starting,
you know, basic starting in the vehicle really so, um,
I think that they said that the instructors will handle
the hand cranking of the car if you if you
want that to happen, because um, as you've mentioned Ben earlier,
that's a dangerous operation. You can break a thumb, you
(13:59):
can break a forearm, I believe. Yeah, in the cranking process.
Let's let's talk about that just briefly. And I'm totally
plagiarizing your fantastic blog. Thank you, they'll get they'll get
two flats. Did I say? I said thank you? Right? Yeah,
I guess that's okay and thank you okay, okay, awesome. Guh.
So you have a categorized in three quote unquote easy
(14:24):
steps to start a forward model T right three h Wow,
I must really condense things. Yeah, I think, Well, tell
me what you think. So we're starting a model TAM.
Pull the choke which is adjacent to the right fender,
while engaging the crank lever under the radiator at the
front of the car, slowly turning it a quarter turn clockwise.
(14:47):
This is to prime the carburetor. Right if you and
then you get into the car, insert the ignition key,
turned the setting to either magneto or battery, adjust the
timing stalk upward to are the timing, move the throttle
stock downwards slightly for an idle setting, and pull back
on the handbrake, which also places the car in neutral.
(15:09):
There's a lot. That's it, right, Get out of the car,
go back to the front of the car. Use your
left hand to crank the lever. This is where this
is where there it's a real possibility of injury. It's
critical that you do this step in the right way.
If the engine backfires and the lever swings counterclockwise, your
(15:31):
left arm is less likely to be broken. All right, now,
I heard a little tip on this. You're supposed to
keep your thumb on the on the top side of
the crank of the handle, and that prevents breakage the
thumb and possibly of the form. Right, And so once
you have that, and uh, this is really where the
stakes are high. You're using your left hand to crank
(15:52):
the lever. Got your thumb on the top of the level,
give it a vigorous half crank, and if the automotive
God smile upon you, the engine should start. Oh my gosh,
what a what a process. Huh, I mean it is,
it's a it's a it's a complex process now, I mean,
but it's a simple machine though. That's the thing this,
(16:12):
this is a really simple vehicle. It's a six volt
electric system. And so let's saying that like six volts
comes from the battery. Of course it goes from well,
from the distributor. That electricity is sent to these four coils.
Then that are actually wooden boxes that are applied to
the I guess what do you call a firewall or
firewall and um, those six or seven volts of electricity
(16:36):
are then converted into twenty volts and then that's what
goes to the spark plots and that's what begins this
whole process. And because it's a magneto system, you know,
it's an magnets really on the flywheel. Once you get
it cranked and going, it starts right up. And that
it is based on the fact that you have everything
adjusted the right way. You have all the levers in
the right position, the hand the handles in the right position.
(16:57):
And we'll tell you about the controls here after work
from our sponsor and we're back Scott, I know, while
we were both flicking into this, we consulted a lot
of pictures and diagrams, and so if if you are
listening to this and you're not currently driving, or if
(17:19):
this interest you, we would highly recommend checking out some
of the awesome articles that will show you will visually
depict this process. It's a lot easier if you can
do that, or even watch a YouTube video someone starting
one of their own vehicles. A lot of times those
guys that I've been watching these about how to start
and how to drive Model T and a lot of
(17:41):
those guys will go into a lot of detail, will
explain mechanically what's happening as well. Uh so it adds
length to these. So all these you know, start and
drive videos are in you know, from six or seven
minutes up to about seventeen minutes. So you understand that
it's it's a complicated process that it can be um
described either simply or or in a very very drawn
out way. Um So it's so kind of pick and
(18:02):
choose what you watch online. But if you look at
a diagram, you're gonna see that there's a wooden box
that sits on the Actually to begin with, it's a
very simple interior as you would imagine very very simple. Um,
really only a couple of gauges. Really, it's very very simple. Uh.
There's a gasoline adjustment, there's a throttle, there's uh, you know,
of course, the steering wheel and pedal set. There's a handbrake. Um.
(18:25):
But but on the or in those areas there are
different things. You wouldn't expect the pedals to be where
they are. There are three pedals, and they're not what
you think that. The right most pedal is the foot brake,
and the middle pedal is the reverse. That's the reverse gear.
So the left one then you would think, well, that
must be the clutch, right there's gotta be what's happening there.
Because there's two speeds in a in a model Model
(18:47):
T rather and that's high and low. You would think
that that leftmost pedal would be the clutch pedal, but
it's actually the high low speed control. You know, it's
like one or the other. It's it's either forward or back. Um.
Low gears are all the way forward. High gears are
in the middle. I guess if you want to put
it that way back. Um. There's also an emergency brake
and clutch release which is on the left side of you,
(19:08):
and it has three positions, so uh, you know to
go rearward. Um, if you have a pulled rear word
I should say, you know with a handle in that
means that you're in neutral with a brake on. If
it's in the middle position, that's neutral. If it's forward
all the way, that's in the drive position. And that's
when you can select the low and high gear with
the left pedal. So you can see that this gets
complicated really quickly. In order to stop the car, uh,
(19:30):
you need to put the car into neutral first and
then apply the brakes. So it's not as simple as
just pushing on the brake pedal or even popping it
out of gear and a neutral. You have to do
two steps in order to break the car. Every time
it has to go to neutral. And then, of course,
all the while this is happening, you're constantly adjusting on
the steering wheel. You're adjusting the gas and the spark. Now,
the spark is something you know that's either to retard
(19:51):
the engine or to advance the engine, and you're continually
adjusting that based on your speed. That's on the left
hand side of the steering wheel. There's a gas control,
which is, if you want to think about it this way,
that's kind of your speed adjustment. Really. UM, so down
if you pull it down towards you, that's faster, push
it up away from you that is slower, and that's
on the right hand side of the steering wheel. Um.
(20:12):
Later models a vehicle will not have that wooden box.
I think I mentioned the wooden box or I started to. Anyways,
it's actually the coil box inside the car, and you
said it earlier. You switch this either to battery or magneto,
depending on what you're what's happening. I think for for starting,
you have it on the battery selection, and when you're running,
it's actually switched to the magneto position where it's charging.
(20:34):
So um that it's a lever on the earlier early vehicles.
On later vehicles they do have an actual turn key
ignition UM that you have to switch to you know
those positions as well. But um that's more standard looking vehicle,
I guess, a slightly more standard But again, as I'm
explaining this, I mean you should understand that nothing is standardized. Again.
(20:55):
It's it's not like you can jump into one and
just automatically know how to do it, someone someone has
to be kind of the keeper of knowledge and passed
us along to others. And that's what the museum is doing.
They've done that to the tune of what five hundred
people in alone. One of the instructors a guy named
Jim Brand nine in his nineties and drove Model t
(21:15):
s as a teenager and dearborn. So this this is
the kind of expertise and experience you're getting, all right
and dearborn. So he was in the heart of where
Henry Ford was operating at the time. He owned three
Model ts in high school. Uh, and he said, mainly
because they were cheap. That's a good, good reason, right,
And he still has he still has his own model.
(21:38):
He drives in parades and graduations and stuff. But this
is the kind of instructor you'll have, and you can
you can get a taste of the stuff they'll teach
you in that initial four hour course. The whole experience
includes three ride and observe opportunities and then three driving opportunities,
(21:59):
so you get a couple of at it. Really, because
I'm sure that there's some some mistakes made in that
first drive probably, I mean, not a lot of people
have that hand eye coordination to be able to do
that fluently. I guess you know, when you first get
behind the wheel, I'm sure. I'm sure that that's a
bit embarrassing. I imagine I would bet the second one
goes you know so so, and then the third. By
the third time, you probably got it. You probably understand
how to do it. Really, So that's probably the reason
(22:22):
behind having three separate times, so that you know that
first time you don't feel like I've failed. The first
time might just all be the learning curve, you know.
Sure what, here's what you get, so you luck out
and you're able to get in there before it sells out.
The instructors will teach you how to use the spark
and throttle control levers, you know, and the stocks we
(22:43):
talked about, how to coordinate hand and foot controls, the
proper shifting techniques, stopping the vehicle, which, as Scott as
Scott noted earlier, is not near as easy. All this
stuff makes me think we have it so easy today
as drivers. He really is been You turn the key
and that's about it, right. The also, yeah, the also
teach you the correct use of the neutral break lever.
(23:04):
We'll teach you how to reverse the vehicle, and they
will teach you how to start it. Yeah, and you
might think, well, what do I what do I get
for you know, attending this course? What do I get
from my one hundred and five dollars outside of a
couple of you riding drives? So you get a little
bit more than that for um the same price. Now again,
I should say that I don't know if we've said this.
We're not really We're not affiliated with Gilmore in any way.
We're not We're not trying to sell tour packages or
(23:25):
anything like that. This is just fascinating to us. We
just simply like this. It's it's so different, so unique.
It's the as far as I know, it's the only
one in the world that does something like this. And
we don't know how long it will last either. That's
part of it. They do have a full calendar for
that you can still sign up for. Yeah, but is
it gonna go beyond that? You never know? Who knows?
(23:46):
We uh, yeah, we're not in any way making this
an advertisement. We're just fanboying a little because we think
it's cool. And I don't know about you, Scott, but
I I adjust this figured that I would never get
an opportunity a D to drive a Model T. Well,
I think you and probably nearly every other listener had
thought the same thing. And that's a that's a real
(24:08):
possibility now at this place. I mean, you go and
pay your hundred five bucks and just like anybody else,
you can get behind the wheel, which is and you
you know how dude, I don't talk about all the time,
but you know how cheap I am. And this this
is the way. The price is way more reasonable than
I would have imagined. And as you said, it's it's
(24:29):
not just an experience where you get to drive a
little bit and learn how to start stuff. They include
other things. Well you know, okay, they do have other things.
I just wanted to talk about price for just one
more second. I had looked into the Porsche driving experience
here in Atlanta recently, and we were talking about, you know,
maybe going there and doing some video shooting and stuff
like that if possible. And we didn't even really get
(24:49):
too deep into it because I found out some of
the prices, and you know, they go from anywhere about
like I think you're I think you're just writing for
that price up to you know, eight and fifty dollars,
and I think they go north of that too if
you want to get you know, even more super training
and exactly right. And I think, how ever, reading a
lot about these experiences, and they said that, you know,
(25:12):
one of the it's a it's a really useful tool
for the local dealers to have this Porsche experience. And
what that means is there's a test track essentially for
Porsche that's right outside of Atlanta. It's in near the airport.
You can check it out if you want to. Um,
we'll probably talk about it another podcast soon. But you're
able to drive pretty much anything in the fleet. I
(25:32):
think they allow you just about anything. I know there's
certain packages that allow certain vehicles. But um, they say
it's an invaluable tool for dealers to be able to
bring a person and allow them to drive let's say, uh,
you know, Carrera four on the track, and then they
find out that a lot of times when they allow
them to do that and then drive a Carrera four S,
oftentimes the person that was going to buy the career
(25:53):
of four buys the four S model. So it's a
kind of an upsell opportunity for them because they're really
able to wretched that vehicle's legs, you know, tested out
see exactly how they would handle in a in a
tract situation versus like driving around the block, you know,
for a test drive near the dealership or something. Um. Again,
they've put something like a hundred million dollars into this
(26:14):
track outside of Atlanta, hundred million into this whole experience,
which includes a museum and all that stuff. But um,
it's still worth it for them for the word of
mouth that this creates and the opportunity that it presents
for not only the dealers, but the people of the area.
You know, anybody who is interested in this. I'm sure
they bring people in from farther away than just Atlanta.
(26:35):
I know, people you know fly in just specifically for
that and then leave again. So UM, again, a valuable, valuable,
valuable tool for them, and these experiences, I mean, don't
don't discount them too much. I think that you know,
they're they're they're incredibly valuable to people. And this is different.
They're not trying to sell model ts in any way.
But you know, this is more like again a bucket
(26:55):
list thing. So UM, students after they um or I
guess when they're find up for this, they get a
bunch of different things. It's not just you know, you
drive the car and that's it. You go home. First,
you get a historian guided tour um in portions the
museum collection with lessons on Henry Ford and how the
Model T changed the world for people who, due to
some great cosmic accident or injustice, have not had the
(27:19):
privilege of checking out our episodes on Henry Ford. Yeah,
maybe they have amnesia. They forgot. You know, I don't
remember anything from five years ago, so you know, go
back and check it out. Why not. You also get
a DVD of vintage newsreel footage from the the heyday
of the models. You're not bad. It's kind of fun
to watch that the old Model TS rolling off the
(27:39):
assembly line and had some of the uh, some of
those those factory conditions you know in the early Model
T factories in Detroit. Some of that stuff is unbelievable.
It's it's so different from what you see today with
your robotic arms and all the safety zones and all that.
It's not like that at all. This is it's dangerous
factory work, but really really cool to watch. And again
some running footage, I guess the vehicles. So also get
(28:00):
a model T driving book which was produced exclusively for
the Gilmore Car Museum. That'd be a nice thing to
have added the shelf. And you get admission for the
whole day to the historic campus of the Gilmore Car Museum.
And of course you get a certificate of completion so
people will believe you not bad, not bad. Oh, and
(28:21):
here's a couple of things that we should also mention too.
I mean, there's there's some important notes that you need
to understand before we sign up for this. But you
know what, first, let's take another word from our sponsor.
We have returned, and of course they're always going to
be some caveats, some concerns, some details, some fine print,
(28:43):
and this is all relatively reasonable. Uh. They say, yes,
we still drive in the rain just like they did,
so dress for the weather. Yeah yeah, toughen up, sally,
that's what they're saying there. You know, it's like, what
is it Is it insensitive of me to say, hitch
up your skirt and get out here and start this
(29:04):
vehicle like we used to a nineteen eight? You know
what can I say that? Um? Honestly, I guess it
depends on the context, you know, I guess, so I
think in this case, they're they're calling you out there saying, uh,
you gotta be a little tough, right, that's all. It means,
you just gotta be tough, You gotta be you gotta
be thick skin like we were back in the early Yeah. Yeah,
(29:26):
that's right. And then the well, yeah, and the idea is,
of course, to keep the experience authentic, which means that, yeah,
you'd be driving in the rain, and yes, you have
to start the vehicle where shoes. I personally feel like
that should go without saying don't wear flip flops or
high heels or um, yeah, well you gotta wears. You
(29:48):
gotta wear what they would call sensible shoes, I guess,
you know, like athletic shoes or something like that. Because
and there's a good reason for this. Not only you know, one,
of course, you can't drive in high heels or something,
probably not that easily. Uh. The other thing would be that,
you know, all those foot controls we talked about, they're
very close together, they're very narrow, so you gotta you
gotta remember that when you're trying to push that reverse pedal.
It's in the middle. You know, you might want to
(30:10):
consider your footwear and not where as you said, flip flops,
high heel sandals, anything like, you know, like big work boots. Oh,
really important point here, I think I mean a misspoke
earlier about starting the vehicle. They'll they'll tell you how
to do it, but I think when it comes to
the actual cranking where someone can break their arm, I
think they're leaving that to the instructors. Now. Maybe if
(30:32):
you're like the teacher's pet, or you're an honor student
or something, and they look at you and they think, oh,
this this is the best student I've ever had, maybe
they'll let you sneak crank one, but probably not. I
wouldn't count on it. If you're like an experienced pilot
who starts airplane engines that way, you know, like with
the old handspin contact, do it that way. Maybe, But
(30:53):
if if you're that person already, then you're probably an
instructor and not a student. Possibly, yeah, I would say,
so you got a little mechanical um aptitude. Yeah, I
would say that's maybe. I don't know, we'll see, but uh,
you know, it just sounds like a fun, fun thing,
and it's not limited to UM. I think we said
that you have to be a license driver. But there's
(31:14):
one interesting exception here, and I don't know how this happened.
There was someone very young who took the course this year,
very young. So anybody out there listening who thinks like, well, man,
I gotta wait until I get my license. I can't
wait to do this. I don't know if that's necessarily
the case. And this might have been who knows, maybe
this was a favorite called in or something. You have
to contact the museum and find out. But I think
(31:34):
I know, I think I know who you're talking about.
I'm gonna sound like a little guy. A young stir
from Detroit was able to pass the course. So Alan
Bennett from suburban Detroit was the youngest person ever to
complete the class, which of course they noted during ceremony.
He's the youngest so far. This guy, Alan Bennett is
twelve years old. He completed the course. Yeah, his dad
works for General Motors as well. Yeah, he's a designer
(31:57):
for GM. And I guess they said that he was,
you know, along with him for the day, cheering him on,
taking photos, that kind of thing, and the kid thought
it was really funny. He said, you know, I've only
driven go cards before this, but um, this is the
first time I've driven a real car, and that's pretty slick.
I mean, twelve year old passing the course. That's interesting.
So anybody again who's that age might want to check
into it, might want to call first before you just
(32:18):
show up. You don't expect to be able to drive.
But I don't know what the situation of the circumstances
were around that. But I wonder what the oldest person
to drive would be now, because you know, one of
the instructors nine two, he's gonna be ninety three next year.
I would assume him during this this course. So, um,
I wonder if there's anybody that's even older than that
has has taken the course. They don't. They don't mention
anything about the oldest driver, but the youngest again, twelve
(32:40):
years old, something to shoot for. I guess if you're
a you know, a ten year old, Yeah, I wanted
to take this, you know, maybe big big also we
do we do have the estimate on the class size.
I think each class size is around two dozen people,
so about twenty four people. I wonder how many cars.
That means, so I that's interesting. At twenty four it
(33:02):
seems like a lot for you know, three riding drives
and three driving experiences. You know, we're able to drive
it yourself, so it would be a lot of changing
the seats, you know. Yeah, I think that, you know,
we said earlier, they've got a full fleet of vehicles.
So I don't think that that's a problem. As long
as they limited to what you say, two dozen. As
long as they limited to that, I think, you know,
you still get your full time behind the wheel, and
you know, the whole experience, and of course that certificate,
(33:25):
you know, the science certificate that they get at the end.
I'd frame that and put that on the wall. I
love that sort of stuff, man, I really enjoy being
certified for things. Actually thinking of going and becoming a notary.
Just certify yourself for all kinds of things, and and
you can have the wall full of plaques, you know,
like that's what we'll do with diplumas. But you'll find
(33:46):
like it's uh like model T public notary MS word certified.
In this word certified, I have written a camel. That
was the first license I ever got. Man, what was
that a camel license. Camel license is a kid at
a at ah I guess seasonal amusement park in Tennessee
that some of you may recognize. I don't know. It's
called Twitty City. Twitty City, Yeah, Lady Bird for some reason,
(34:13):
you know, you know, like it's a winter festival kind
of thing, at least the way I remembered it. And
one of the cool things you could do was you
could get certified to ride a camel, which if you're
like a kid six or seven, what that essentially means
is that someone puts you on a camel and like
walks you in a circle, and they take some money
(34:35):
from your parents and then they give you a little
paper license. I was very proud of me at the
time of Polaroid photo or something like that. Right, Yeah,
I was power mad. I bet you know what. Kids,
kids love that, And I think that if you're a
kid that really likes that kind of thing, you know,
like when you, um uh, let's say the sheriff visits
your school and he gives you a deputy badge or something. Yeah,
or you know, you get some wings pinned on you
(34:58):
for your first airline flight. Here we go, ya love
that stuff. And you know what, I think if you're
a kid that the kid that enjoys that, I think
you become an adult that still enjoys that kind of thing.
You know, he's still, like you said, with your certificates
and you know, wanting to just get something to hang
on the wall that says, you know, this is legit.
I can legit. You know, I have a legit reason
for doing this, or I'm uh, you know, I'm an
authority in some way. What a cool you know, what
(35:20):
a cool surprise. And also I have to we would
be remiss if we didn't read this. One quote from
Keith May's, who was from Kentwood, Michigan, and took the
class recently. He says, at first, I was terrified, absolutely
terrified I was going to break something. But then you
realize that these things were built bulletproof, you know, And
(35:43):
I can completely identify with that feeling. Okay, I understand that,
but again, this is a car that's one hundred years old.
There's also a bit of delicateness to that, you know.
I mean, it's it's not it's not that it's so fragile.
It's just that you don't want to bump into a
tree with this, you don't want to know, grind the
gears because you feel like, well, it's only got a
few more of those left before I have to rebuild that.
(36:04):
You know that that's the kind of feeling that I
would have. I think I want to be you know,
gentle with it enough that I didn't damage it during
my time behind the wheel. I'd be nervous about that,
you know, you'd feel you'd feel self conscious about that
kind of stuff. I think, wouldn't you. But it's owned
by the museum. It's not like it's you know, the
instructor's personal vehicle or anything like that. So, um, although
you know, the two year old we talked about what
(36:25):
was his name, Jim Brand, he does I think he
still owns one that he drives in parades and yeah, yeah,
oh yeah, yeah, that's right. Yeah, he still owns that
that one for himself. But I don't think that's the
one that the students you're driving. Well, Ben, I think
maybe we've we've covered just about everything on this really,
So if if people are interested in this, and seriously,
it's a great gift for somebody, um, again, we're not
(36:45):
selling them. We don't get any kind of kickback. So
there's no car stuff, you know, discount or anything like that.
I promise you, Yeah, there isn't You know what I
should say this, if you're a member of the Gilmore
Car Museum, you might get a discount on the on
the admission, So you might want to check that out
and see you can get a discount. And the museum
itself is very much worth the trip. Yeah. I don't
have any idea how much it costs to become a
(37:05):
member or any of that. I've I've never been there.
I'd like to go someday. But you can go to
Gilmore Car Museum dot org and find out all the
information that we just talked about today, this to this
whole course, and again what a cool gift that might
be for someone unwrapped you're going to the Model T
experience that it was a Hickory Corners, Michigan at the
Gilmore Museum. That would be such a cool thing to
open on Christmas Day or you know, birthday or whatever.
(37:27):
I just think it's a fun idea. Yeah, I agree.
So if you are fortunate enough to find yourself in
the area and you take the Model T driving experience,
let us know let us know how you felt driving those,
because one thing I hear a lot from people with
driven Model ts is what the top speed is? Forty miles?
(37:48):
I want to say, but apparently it feels a lot
faster when you're when you're driving this contankers, it's mostly
open air, right, and I think a lot of these
that we're looking at have no tops on them, and
you know, it's pretty pretty spartan interior. I bet it
does feel pretty quick in that. And you're like, you
don't want to go any faster than for any probably, yeah, right,
so so right in, let us know, and even if
(38:09):
you have experience with a Model T but it's not
part of the Gilmore Museum experience, we we'd like to
hear it, especially if like, oh, if somebody restored one,
how cool would that be? Oh? Sure, yeah, I mean
they're fifteen million of them out there. At least there were.
I wonder how many are still left, but a lot
of more crushed for you know, metal during the war
and stuff like that. But you know, there's a ton
of them out there, so we'd love to hear from you. Yeah,
(38:30):
there are a bunch of hidden in barns and stuff. Oh,
and speaking of hearing from you, Scott, I think it's
time to return to a segment that we haven't done
in a while. What's that listener mail? Let's bring it on. Okay?
This email comes from Ed m. Ed m is writing
to us regarding our episode on boring cars from the
(38:53):
design perspective. Yeah, he said, I listen on Stitcher while
I'm working. Is about boring cars? First, says Ed, I
always say how impressed I am that car companies can
make a product with thousands of moving parts, some with
tolerances of thousands of an inch. I got there, Uh,
And that work and work for years under adverse conditions,
and are affordable, and they get changed completely every few years.
(39:16):
Having said that, I continue to think that it doesn't
cost any more to design a beautiful car than a
boring car. I tend to believe it's more of a
bean counting decision that manufacturers want you to spend more
to get the beautiful models on purpose. Pretty good point. Additionally,
says Ed, I think sometimes engineers might take the easy
way out. For instance, I rented a Chevy Sonic for
(39:39):
a week and never could figure out how it worked completely.
After a week, I discovered the trip information could be
reset if you push this, pulled that, and turned something else.
Once trying to put my car mug in the cup holder,
I turned off the stability control Because the button was
in the middle of the console between the seats, the
entertainment was incomprehensible and mostly invisible behind my arm while
(40:00):
I drove. The reason I complain about this is because
I've owned hunt Eyes in Akia, and for reasonably priced cars,
they have coherent switch gear. The trip information is altogether
on the dash or on the steering wheel, and the
stability control and other such switches are grouped together also
on the dash. If they can do it, Chevy can
to anyway. That's my rant, all right, Now, a couple
of things. Now, I agree that sometimes it appears that
(40:23):
they've taken the easy way out. But we talked about
the scarcity of real estate in cars, sometimes especially small cars,
and especially as we have more and more on board
electronic components. Yeah, I'm not I'm not arguing with that
in any way. I think he's right on a lot
of these cases. I think, you know, they could design
something a little better, but you know they're gonna save
that for the the upsell S model or you know,
(40:44):
the whatever it would be that the top end right
GT model. I'm tempted to agree, and yeah, I think so.
But the thing is, we learned also about tooling for
these you know, for the metal shape, you know, the
outside metal shape. If you put more bends, more curves,
more um, interesting items onto a vehicle, you know, it's
interesting to look at, I mean an interesting the way
that they reflect light and all that, you know, the
(41:05):
way they're curved and bent and shaped. It's more complex,
it's more expensive. And again all these panels costing. You know,
these these dyes for the metal panels on the outside
of the vehicle, they cost millions of dollars each one,
each panel. So you know, make them simple. Is is
really simple. It's more cost effective, I guess to create
a simple die for that for that metal to stamp
(41:27):
out in the way that it does. And I don't know, um,
you know what I think a lot of you know,
the creases and stuff like that. I also have to
do with again space concerns. You know, you have to
have a certain amount of room under the hood for
the engine. And if you look at a lot of
you know, the small, tiny little economy cars, you know,
basic basic transportation. There's not a whole lot of extra
room under the hood of those, in fact that the
windshield practically starts at the front. Bump around a lot
(41:49):
of those vehicles and say they still get the engine
and transaxle in there. Uh, the front wheel drive car.
So you know, again it comes down to real estate,
it comes down to cost. And I do but you know,
I'm kind of on the fence about this a little
bit too, because it seems like they could add just
a little bit more style to them personality, and I
think they're getting I would think we did say this
in the episode, that they're getting better. You know some
(42:11):
of the uh, some of the current hatchbacks and small
cars that are you know, economy cars, you know, they're
the ones that are real just again basic transportation. There
they are a lot more interesting to look at than
the cars that were built thirty years ago. Uh there.
You know, although there's a you know a group of people,
I'm one of them that likes the boxing style from
you know, the seventies and eighties, but even earlier than
that sometimes. But you know, they were so simple, they
(42:34):
were so flat, they're so square, they just didn't put
a lot of effort into their their lowest of the line,
the base model vehicles, And I think now they're doing
a much better job with it. Do you think, Ben,
that it comes down to more than just more than
just space concern? Do you think it is the engineers
sometimes just taking the easy way out, like we'll just
let's put that button there because it's simple. There's there's
(42:54):
you know, two square inches of space, we only need one.
You know, are you asking if I think of them
are like four thirty pm on a Friday decision? Yeah?
I think yeah, you think that. You think it's like
kind of just just put it there and it's done.
We careful, Scott. We got a lot of engineers in
the I know we do. And I'm not saying that's
in every case. I think it occasionally happens. It has
(43:14):
to write. I think that could I think that could
happen in any industry. From what we what we looked
at with our anonymous source, Mr. Car Designer, what what
we looked at really showed us how how much compromise
goes into multiple departments working together to produce a car.
(43:37):
So I would be less without being an automotive engineer myself,
I would be less likely to just attribute something that
was confusing or my opinion, poorly engineered or poorly designed.
Would be less likely to attribute that to laziness and
more likely to attribute that to some kind of unfortunate
(44:00):
it compromise. I think you're I think you're right off
as well. I think there's a lot of cases where
they say, well, okay, I've tried the switch in eight
spots already, and that caused a lot of trouble in
every spot because you know the way that they do
this with you know, everybody working on the same model
at the same time, right, so you know, conflicts are
known instantly and and they're loudly pointed out. You know
(44:20):
that you can't do that. So maybe it's just a
point where well, well, then where can I put it?
Where would you allow it? And and they tell them
and they say, well, then fine, that's where it has
to be. And anybody involved in any sort of group work,
if you're a student right now and you're listening to this,
I'm sure you are acquainted with the hazards of working
(44:40):
in groups. And one of the things that happens is
for every individual member of a group specializing in something.
Their thing that they're in charge of is automatically the
most important thing to them, So they could probably care
less in some cases over where a certain switch goes
as long as it doesn't it in in the way
(45:01):
of whatever they're trying to accomplish. You know, I see
that too. I mean, again, there's so many different ways
to see this, and you never know with every situation,
but I think it it's got a point. You know
that there a couple of things that could be done
a little bit better, you know, across the board, Like
you know, the style of the design of of a
small vehicle with the appearance, the outward appearance of it
totally um, but you know, I think they do. They
(45:21):
put out the best product they can. They want it
to be appealing. Uh they don't, but they don't want
it to infringe upon you know, the next model up,
you know, the sales of that. They don't want to
cannibalize the sales of their mid mid level model versus
or even the upper level models with their base model.
It's a different group of people that they're they're targeting
with that vehicle, and I think maybe that's part of
it too. No, I know we're running a little long,
(45:43):
but I I gotta tell you, I think this is
this might be exciting for you too. I'm starting to
consider getting a different car. Oh really Yeah, I love
the money Carlo to death. I don't want to get
rid of it, but I am looking into options for
what kind of cars get. I don't think I'm going
(46:06):
to end up with the Bugatti. Looked over the numbers, Yeah,
didn't quite fit right, um, but hopefully I get something
nice and them. So, dude, I am so hyped about
this because you know, I have never owned a car
like the The newest model I've ever owned was a
(46:28):
two thousand and eight. And even with the pace of
technology now, things are changing so quickly. I'm going to
feel like I'm someone from the age of Model t
s who accidentally walked into the future. Yeah. I mean
I've heard people say this, or maybe maybe it's something
that we came up, but I don't know. People when
they get into a car, it feels like you're in
a rocket ship or something. It looks like you're looking
(46:49):
at the controls for an airliner, because there's so much
more than there was, you know, ten years ago, even
in cars if you look back to you know, yours
is what a two thousand eight? Am I correct? NTI
Carlos and O four Okay, so it's even even pre
date set. So look at the dash of that vehicle
versus the dash of anything from let's say two thousand
fifteen on. And I'm just thinking that because it's two
(47:11):
years old at this Yeah, it's two years old. And uh.
One of the things I noticed though, because I started to,
you know, put around look at some different cars and
ask ask my buddies, like, how do you feel about
the car you have? You know, basic cursory research, one
of the things I noticed is I might I might
be turning into an old, old man style car guy
(47:33):
because I feel like I feel like I'm fighting against
some technology that is increasingly becoming just standard and not optional,
like backup cameras. You know. I it's it's I'm good
luck finding a car without one now. Yeah, okay, that's
a little generalization. But in two years from now, good
luck finding one without it. Well that's right. It's a
trickle down technology. I was you would have appreciated it
(47:55):
because I was such a I was such a curmudgeon.
I was so very much like get off my law.
And because one of my friends is trying to parallel
park and they had his backup cameras and I thought
they were relying too much on the camera and it
was screwing them up. And then I cheating. Yeah, well,
I said, why don't you, Why don't you just know
how to parallel park? Use your mirrors, use your mirrors?
(48:16):
Wrong with you? I know I'm being dragged, kicking and
screaming into the future. So wish me luck everyone, And
if you have some recommendations for cars that I should
look at. I don't know if there's a definite yet,
I don't know my timeline, but I'm officially I'm interested
real suggestions. Anybody that says a Honda Odyssey will be
block blocked from our email service forever. No, don't be
(48:39):
your new best friend. All right, well, we are going
to we are going to conclude today's episode, but not
our show. Stay tuned. We will be back with more
car stuff in the meantime. You can find Scott and
I on Facebook and you can find us on Twitter.
We your car stuff h s W. If you would
like to learn the ins and outs of starting a
(49:01):
model T again. We do recommend our podcasts and Scott's
blog on the subject. Uh, Scott, I think you already
said be kind, right that was oh nine as a
long time ago. It was a long time ago. Yeah nine,
that's right, Yeah it was, it was a long time again.
You can find it on you know, car stuff show
dot com. It's you know, it's a searchable website. You're
able to find it, so check it out. And it's
(49:21):
I don't know the length of the show, but um
it's a little bit more in depth about the starting
and operation of driving. And you can also while you're
on car stuff Show dot com check out every single
audio episode that we have ever done. Scott, you might
be saying, Ben, you might be saying, I have experienced
with a model T. I'm a storing one right now.
I know the sort of car you should look into
(49:42):
if you're going to get a new car in twhen
he's seventeen. But I don't know how to reach you
guys directly. We have good news for you. You can
send us an email. We are car stuff at how
stuff works dot com. For more on this and thousands
of others topics. This is at how stuff Works dot
com let us know what you think. Send an email
(50:04):
to podcast at how stuff works dot com. Mm hmmm
hm
CarStuff News
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Scott Benjamin
Ben Bowlin
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