Bring Back the Fat Man Steering Wheel!

[00:00:00]Well, this is an interesting car. Uh, I mean, it's a what? A 1918 Caddy.

[00:00:05]>> That's correct.

[00:00:06]>> And what's the model?

[00:00:07]>> It's called a type 57.

[00:00:09]>> Type 57, >> which is, you know, they didn't always change the model every year in those days.

[00:00:15]>> So, this spanned 57 spanned a few years.

[00:00:17]>> Would have been a a 1918 or 19. Then the 59 was the next year would have 20 and 21 and so forth. Well, now I mean this is a cool car and it's it's it's been I guess repainted in in like 60 or so 62 or something like that.

[00:00:34]>> But I love the story of this. You >> pulled us out of a junkyard and drove it home basically, didn't you?

[00:00:39]>> Well, not quite.

[00:00:40]>> Not quite. Okay. What's the story then?

[00:00:42]>> Well, I was a freshman at Dartmouth College and >> this was like 10 15 years ago.

[00:00:47]>> Yeah. This is like 1939. And riding my bicycle past the uh Bailey Brothers salvage yard in West Lebanon, New Hampshire. I saw the Cadillac just like the one that my father had when I was a real little kid. So I had to talk to men and one thing led to another. And for $40, the car was mine.

[00:01:10]And the man helped me. His name was Paul Bond running the yard and he uh helped me pumped up the tires with his electric pump and I borrowed a battery from him and we put water in the radiator. I sampled the contents of the crank case to be sure it was oil and it was and something smelled like gas in the gas tank, stepped on the starter and she took right off.

[00:01:32]>> She fired up.

[00:01:33]>> Right up probably.

[00:01:34]>> Unbelievable.

[00:01:36]>> Oh yeah. So I drove it around the junkyard a couple of passes just to know that it all the gears worked and the brakes and everything and uh was happy but I was a freshman. They didn't allow me to have car.

[00:01:48]>> What' you do with it?

[00:01:49]>> I kept it in the junkyard and nobody no only few people knew that I had infracted the rules.

[00:01:54]>> So on a Saturday you would go out and to the junkyard and get >> and if as long as you didn't come near handover it was all right.

[00:02:01]>> Okay.

[00:02:02]>> Yeah. That >> So you've had it since 39?

[00:02:05]>> Yeah. I I wouldn't normally How old are you?

[00:02:08]>> 91.

[00:02:09]>> You're just So, you're just a kid?

[00:02:11]>> Yeah. Yeah. And my wife thinks I >> Well, this is so cool. Now, you you actually even have in here what they called the the fat man steering wheel.

[00:02:19]Is that right?

[00:02:20]>> Oh, yeah. Yeah. You want to look at it?

[00:02:21]>> Oh, I do. I love these things.

[00:02:22]>> Well, you see, this is set up now for a fat man to get into the car. No obstruction.

[00:02:29]>> Yeah.

[00:02:30]>> But if he wouldn't fit through here, I can just barely go through there. And I put scratches with my belt buckle all over the wheel here. So I learned to drop the wheel before I get in.

[00:02:42]>> She just drops like that. You just pinch it.

[00:02:43]>> You just squeeze these two little buttons together and that's it.

[00:02:47]>> And is this the original wheel?

[00:02:48]Original?

[00:02:48]>> Yes. Yeah. This is There's nothing new about this car except the seal beam headlights and the the upholstery went new in 1962.

[00:02:57]>> And this is the gauging that that was in a 1918 Caddy.

[00:03:01]>> Yeah. Yeah. Everything is is original there. And uh >> man, >> well, it's it's good. It works.

[00:03:08]>> And how about these little jump seats back here? That's >> Well, that makes it a seven passenger touring car. You see, these are you can lean let people get in the back that way or you can actually close it all up that way.

[00:03:22]>> Stash them away.

[00:03:24]>> So, that's uh makes a nice family car.

[00:03:27]>> I'll say now is this this picture? This is >> well this is this is me in 1939 with Thanksgiving weekend. There's a five other students wanted to go to New York and I was on my way from Hanover, New Hampshire to Wilmington, Delaware with a the man that took the picture was a Wilmington guy and uh we uh dropped the BS off in New York and went on home. It was cold day. See we got the >> Are there No, there were. Okay.

[00:04:00]>> Side curtains on there.

[00:04:02]>> Was there any heat in it though or >> Oh, well, we took up the top the top uh floorboard on the in the front and that let some of the heat from the engine come in and it was made it quite quite a lot better. It wasn't really cold.

[00:04:15]>> But how's that carbon monoxide? Uh >> well, the gas the exhaust system was tight. It didn't leak any.

[00:04:22]>> So, you and you live to tell about it.

[00:04:24]>> Oh, yeah.

[00:04:26]>> So, what powers the the the 1918 Caddy?

[00:04:29]a 314 cubic inch V8 engine.

[00:04:32]>> Can we look at it?

[00:04:33]>> Yeah, we got to have a look at that.

[00:04:34]>> Got to have a look at that.

[00:04:34]>> You want to go around and have a look?

[00:04:40]Now that's the 314 cubic inch V8 designed by the son Henry Leland was the original Cadillac guy and his son Wilfford Leland was the real red hot engine designer and developed essentially that engine in 1915 Cadillac and this is >> what they're still using three years later.

[00:05:02]>> Three years later it has detachable cylinder heads. the the block itself or the crank case is one casting and then and then each of the uh uh >> cylinder blocks are cast iron on an aluminum crank case.

[00:05:15]>> And is this the carburetor setup or >> That's the carburetor with water heated coolant heated manifold.

[00:05:21]>> Oh, that's nice.

[00:05:22]>> The next the next model came out with a exhaust heated manifold which was a little hotter.

[00:05:28]>> And this is >> and that that's the rain cover over the distributor that looks just like a modern car underneath that. And what's the unit back there? Is that >> Well, that's that's Charles Ketaring's original electric starter, which is a combination starter motor and generator to charge the battery >> in 1918. This had an electric start.

[00:05:48]>> Yeah. Oh, yes. They had electric starts for Cadillacs.

[00:05:54]General Motors and Ketaring put them on in 1912.

[00:05:58]>> And uh the exhaust up and out.

[00:06:00]>> Yeah. Out through two dual exhaust all the way back. Oh boy.

[00:06:05]>> The hot rod even back and and still had primer cups.

[00:06:08]>> Yeah, that's I think the like that. They just I've never used them essentially except just to demonstrate when the engine's running unopen and it blows pop pop out through the >> Did you ever use that to like decompress the thing if you had starting problem or or >> No. No.

[00:06:25]>> Never had a starting problem.

[00:06:26]>> Never had a starting prop. It always runs.

[00:06:29]>> Well, I mean she runs I mean you drove it in today.

[00:06:32]>> Sure. Right. Can you fire it up?

[00:06:33]>> Sure.

[00:06:34]>> Go over there and fire it up. I want to see this thing run.

[00:06:39]>> I'm a thin man.

[00:06:40]>> Yeah, you can get right in there, man.

[00:06:45]>> I hear the fuel pump.

[00:06:46]>> Yeah, you're all set.

[00:06:53]>> That's fantastic.

[00:06:56]>> I don't I wish it didn't have that knock.

[00:06:59]>> You got a good ear.

[00:07:03]She It runs like a a champ.

[00:07:11]>> Well, you must be idling at about 500 RPMs or something right now.

[00:07:17]>> Not that fast.

[00:07:18]>> Even lower, huh?

[00:07:18]>> Yeah, that >> sound like more 400.

[00:07:22]>> Again, we've got to go to air. Well, I work single cylinder air airplane engines for Ranger aircraft and we I know what a single cylinder engine sounds like. Test engines, you know, >> you just have to multiply it by eight for this.

[00:07:37]>> Wow, >> dude. This is a fantastic car.

[00:07:41]>> Thank you for your time.

[00:07:42]>> I shut her down.

[00:07:43]>> Shut her down.

[00:07:45]>> Now that's a car. Yeah.

[00:08:01]Heat up here.

[00:08:24]Now, this was because he got in. Yeah.

[00:08:29]>> Politicians would have trouble getting into