As we were watching “Downton Abbey” recently, I was reminded of some scenes from my kidhood. There were guys cranking the automobiles to start them! I hadn’t thought about hand-cranking an engine in years.
Advice from my dad: “Never, ever wrap your thumb around the crank.”
Back in the days before tractors had electric starters, you had to hand-crank them. I learned how to do that on an Dad’s beloved Allis Chalmers C. “Cup your hand and lay your thumb alongside the crank handle. If, for some reason, she kicks back (backfires) and the crank doesn’t disengage, you won’t spend an hour looking all over the yard for your thumb.” Dad liked colorful prose.
“For the same reason, crank only on the upstroke. Pushing down on the crank is a good way to get your elbow permanently embedded in your ear.”
Colorful, right?
Dad had a regular checklist for the starting procedure. If my memory still holds, it went something like this: 1. Turn on the gas. 2. Advance the throttle a couple of notches. 3. Double check to make sure it’s in neutral. 4. Set the choke. 5. Engage the crank onto the crankshaft pins and turn slowly until you are at or near the bottom of the stroke and you hear the impulse on the mag click. 6. Pull up sharply to the top of the stroke and let go of the crank. 7. Repeat 5 and 6 until it starts. (Depending on the C’s mood, that might take a while!)
Sometimes it would start on the second or third crank in warm weather on a cold engine. In cold weather, you could sometimes work up a good sweat before it would kick in. When the engine was warm, starting was easy. One crank would usually do it. It was usually only in the morning that it was “cranky.”
Ouch! But you know, it’s not such a bad pun. The online dictionary defines “cranky” as “marked by eccentricity,” “working erratically, unpredictable.” Those old tractors were erratic and unpredictable, maybe even a little eccentric. And a “crank” is a grouchy person.
Dad showed me how to stand with my left hand placed on the radiator grill and my right hand on the crank (with my thumb not curled around the handle, remember). I then pulled the crank up to the top of the stroke with a quick pull toward me, using my left arm as an opposite push, pulling the crank and starting the tractor.
Even if the engine might kick back, it would do it in a direction opposite from where you’re standing and pull the crank out of your hand instead of into it.
Grandpa Thompson had a Model A Ford (I’m guessing it was about a 1930 model) that had a really weird crank. At least I thought so. It was a lug wrench on one end and a crank on the other. Pretty versatile tool. I never had a chance to crank the Model A, but I saw Grandpa do it often, and usually with just one turn of the crank.
The first car I can remember in our family was a 1932 Chevrolet. I know there was a crank hole in the front under the radiator, but I never saw Dad crank it. It had an electric starter, but the crank was there for emergencies, I guess.
Ah, the goofy stuff you remember, right? Who would have thought I could crank out so many words on such a silly subject?
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