Service Replacement

[Dan Case]

NOS parts need to be stored properly to retain their value!!

About 10 years ago, I drove 8 hours to buy a NOS lot of early Mustang parts.  When I got there, I found rusty, pitted parts in Ford boxes and wrappers.  I said to the older gentleman "these parts are not worth the price we discussed, they aren't worth any more than used parts".  He proceeded to throw a couple parts at me and I left.

Lesson learned!

+1 Back in the 1980s I answered an advertisement in HMN for a pair of magnesium GT40 wheels still in the factory boxes. Guess what I found when I got there. Have you ever seen what happens to magnesium wheels and cardboard boxes stored under a house trailer in mid Alabama for years on damp red clay soil? The wheels were absolutely corroded into big hole sponge like blobs with white oxide ooze everywhere and the boxes crumbled to pieces. The man just didn't understand why I had no interest in NOS GT40 wheels at a very premium price...................

[papa scoops]

spoke with my friend pookie, and he says............phred

[Special Ed]

Well maybe we should use ANOTHER term  NOFS  new old FORD stock   Also beware of ebay auctions BOX NOT INCLUDED  as u never know what u are getting then . How do u know part is nos if u dont get the box & why not let the part go with the box even if box is not in good shape anymore as long as the CORRECT ford part # is still visable.

[Dan Case]

Best policy is to know exactly what you are after and if you don't know ask here on this site or privately offline.

[J_Speegle]

Well maybe we should use ANOTHER term  NOFS  new old FORD stock   Also beware of ebay auctions BOX NOT INCLUDED  as u never know what u are getting then . How do u know part is nos if u dont get the box & why not let the part go with the box even if box is not in good shape anymore as long as the CORRECT ford part # is still visable.

Just have to see the part from allot of angles and have something to compare it to to confirm it is the part you need. Box in itself is no guarantee and have seen the cardboard shaved or overcoated. If there is money involved someone will find a way to get it

Have had plenty of people offer to purchased empty boxes. Don't think all of them just wanted them to make their displays or shelves look full and cool

[Dan Case]

I had some time today so I made a slide to illustrate a Cobra related part. My example is what Ford defines as C3AZ-9355-A Sediment Bowl.  These bowls are more commonly called fuel filter canisters and will fit a variety of applications. I will totally ignore variations in painting and text for this study. This is just an example based purely on shape and application. To Ford they are all the same. I did not try to find pictures of the shapes I have seen but chose three very different physical shapes to illustrate with.
Cobra wise what "production" or "assembly line" fuel pumps with integral fuel filters were is very easy because all fuel pumps were 1963 model year ones.   There is no need to worry about early or later model year versions of sediment bowls and that is good because there were quite a few in design shape, paint, text, and or brand name identified.

On The Left:
That is an original 1963 "production" or "assembly line" part a brand new Cobra went home with. The original owner still owned the car when he took this picture for me. For some period of time, before Ford made some type engineering change (engineering changes are anything changed on purpose), one could buy exact replacements at their Ford dealer.  At some point in time, like after Ford no longer used the exact part or purposely changed something, the original production design became new old stock original design.  (NOS as used in the hobby for decades before the mid 1970s.)

In The Middle:
For some reason(s) we do not know Ford changed the part from 1963 production design to this service replacement design.  Another common description would call this a factory authorized replacement part and another used widely description before the mid 1970s was new replacement stock. At some point in time, like after Ford no longer offered exact part or purposely changed something, this design became new old replacement stock design.  (NORS as used in the hobby for decades before the mid 1970s.)  The confusion in parts buying includes sellers that don't know the difference in production parts and everything else or don't care about the differences for any number of reasons.  NOS gets a new meaning of new plus old.

On the Right:
Eventually Ford got to this design.  To Ford Motor Company this is the same as what  brand new Cobra was fitted with in let's say March 1963. Ford is using the same sale part number it did several decades ago.  The confusion here is sellers offering new made "modern" design parts as "NOS 1963" parts. The implication is that they are correct for a 1963 model year car. Well they are and they are not depending on what one calls correct. To Ford they are correct because they will retrofit all the way back to the 1963 model year and perform correctly. To somebody keeping a car on the road they are correct because they fulfill a need. To a car restorer trying to return a 1963 car to as close to day one everything they are just a new replacement stock part or new old replacement stock part.

[Bob Gaines]

Here are a couple more .

[Special Ed]

I think the bottom fuel can design change had something to do with the ford shop tools changes as ford dealers had special tools for working on cars & like the ford tool  i found in an old ford dealer that fit on the bottom  grove nothches of oil filter to unscrew them they would have had a tool to unscrew the fuel filter cans also i would think.