Early Ford Kingpins, Rekindled

Replacing Bushed Bushings With Much-Needed Needle Bearings

By Ryan Manson Photography by the Author

tight frontend can make all the difference between an enjoyable early Ford and a downright rotten roach of a hot rod. A car that wanders around the lane, is hard to steer and control, or clunks, clangs, and creaks while going down the road is not only uncomfortable, it’s dangerous. Thankfully, early Fords are easy to work on, simple to fix, and easy to find parts for because of companies like Speedway Motors. They stock everything from aftermarket, modern upgrades to OE-style replacement parts for 1928-1948 Fords and beyond.

When it comes to restoring an early Ford frontend or solving any of those aforementioned issues, most attention is usually paid to the area of the kingpin. Over time this is usually the spot that has seen the majority of abuse and is one of only a few items on an Early Ford frontend that requires any kind of maintenance. Put simply, a kingpin attaches solidly to the straight axle via a lock pin and the spindle rotates around the kingpin on brass bushings. Years of regular use eventually wear the softer brass bushings down, allowing the spindle-to-kingpin clearance to increase, resulting in negative handling characteristics. Caught early, it was a simple manner of installing new brass bushings, honing them to match the kingpins, and reassembling the frontend. But many Early Fords were driven into the ground, scrapped, and then scavenged for useful parts. That means buying an old axle at the local swap meet can be a bit of a gamble. Oftentimes, the wear that first attacked those brass bushings, moved on to attack the axle, hogging the kingpin bores out to an undesirable shape. This makes the job of the restorer/rebuilder that much more difficult. Thankfully, there are solutions to even the most clapped-out early Ford axle, one of which bears little resemblance to the old bushing kingpin design.

Recently, we sourced an original Henry Ford V8-60 front axle for our Project Potvin roadster. It was in decent shape, the kingpin and spring perch bores looked good. After careful consideration and thorough design of our chassis, it was decided that we would need to use a pair of Speedway Motors 3-3/4-inch dropped steering arms to clear the framerails of our one-off tube chassis. We had also decided to use their Bendix-style 12-inch drum brake kit, having installed a set on our Model A coupe and being thoroughly impressed. That said, it only made sense to use a set of their 1929-1948 spindles to mate the old and new. And since we were mixing up a couple new components with the old, we thought it was worth giving their Deluxe Spindle Kingpin Set a shot.

Speedway Motors’ Deluxe Spindle Kingpin Set does away with the old-style brass bushings, instead using a set of precision needle bearings pressed into the upper and lower spindle bosses. This design not only decreases the friction involved, providing easier steering and smoother operation but also negates the need for special tooling required to ream stock-style brass bushings to suit the kingpins. The stronger design is also easy to install and maintain, providing a cost-effective solution to the original, bushed design.

2. A 4-inch grinder with a 120-grit flap wheel made pretty quick work of clearancing our spindles, while still keeping things relatively smooth. A couple more minutes with a smaller sander will get things perfect before we paint.

4. We’ve used the stock-style kingpin bushing rebuild kits in the past but thought we might try out Speedway’s fancy Deluxe Spindle Kingpin Set for 1937-1948 Fords (PN 91032115) for this project. We like the idea of using precision needle bearings instead of the original-style brass bushings and the fact that we won’t need to hone the bushings to get a nice, snug fit. The needle bearing design is also reported to provide superior strength, better lubrication, and easier steering than the stock-style setup. The kit consists of a kingpin, four needle bearings, shims, lock pin, grease fittings, felt gaskets, endcaps, setscrews to replace the spindle-mounted grease fittings, and a thrust bearing for each side. Also pictured is the bearing installation tool at right.

6. The kingpin bores were in similar shape and thus received similar attention. This old Snap-On King Bolt Reaming Tool has been in service since these old Fords were new, handed down from my great-grandfather, who was a Ford mechanic before the war. It’s little things like this that make working on these old cars so much fun!

7. With all our parts properly prepped, we can now get started. The first step is to press the two lower needle bearings into the spindle. There are two different sized bearings; the taller bearings will be installed at the outside ends underneath the grease caps. Here, the bottom short bearing is being pressed into the spindle, flush with the top of the lower casting.

9. Next, the bottom tall bearing is pressed into service.

11. The two bottom bearings are now installed.

13. Our axle did require two shims on the passenger side, but none on the driver side. Thankfully, this axle should be good to go.

15. Next, the upper short bearing is installed into the spindle boss using the provided installation tool. This bearing will be driven in until it bottoms out against the axle.

17. The Speedway Deluxe Spindle Kingpin Set is designed to lubricate the inner bearings via top- and bottom-mounted grease fittings, negating the need for the spindle-mounted fittings. So, we’ll be replacing these fittings …

19. A felt gasket, covered by a stainless steel endcap is held in place by a new grease fitting at the top and bottom of each kingpin.