This is a topic that may get quite lengthy. I have always been curious as to what was farmed out and what was kept in house as far as casting, forging, and stamping went. I think the Model A and Model T guys have a lot more answers to this question. Anyway, I always saved anything that had a logo and or date stamp on it to hopefully some day put it all in persepctive. The ROUGE plant had everything needed to make a car, truck, or tractor from scratch. Canals brought barges of raw materials to the blast furnaces for the cast iron and steel parts, the glass plant made windows, the textile mills produced upholstery, sawmills made wood products, rubber plants made the tires, and so on. Many outside vendors were contracted to produce specific components that they were already making and had their processes down. On the N-Tractors items like wheels from Kelsey-Hayes or the Budd Compnay, tires from Firestone, oil filters from FRAM, governors from NOVI, and electrical parts like the voltage regulators from AUTOLITE to name only a few. Mr. Harold Brock told me that MANZEL was a supplier of axle forgings too as well as other items like tools. My guess would be that production demands required additional suppliers be brought on board to help keep the production lines moving. So, I will start with some of my own pictures I saved along the way of restoring my 8N mostly. I encourage you to add your pictures too with as much info as you can post about the item.

Tim Daley(MI)

Outside suppliers were heavily used in all Ford production after the war. In addition to what was mentioned Carbs came from various suppliers, tires from all major mfgrs, (8N's used about 70-80% Firestone, 20% or so GoodYear and remaining 10% Goodrich to plus 8N's had M/S carbs and Saginaw Steering by GM. Very difficult project to persue but an interesting one.

Gaspumper-
I think FORD made tires too and the Saginaw Steering Plant is still standing, still in operation, at I-75 and M-46, under DELPHI now. I drove by it for a year when I was working in Saginaw on my way to GM Metal Casting Operations at the next exit, M-81. Gages were probably Stewart-Warner Co. Roller Bearings from TIMKEN.

Tim

Bower roller bearings were used and were located in Detroit. General Products in Jackson was a big Ford supplier.

Correct on the bearings, and seals were often Chicago Rawhide. Not sure about the tires being made at Ford other than during an expiramental Wartime effort. The tractor tires labeled with the Ford script were only used on tractors on permanant display or on the show circuit so far as I know. I have no idea who built those tires. FMC required that all important supplied parts had at least one and prefered two back up sources as with the tractor tire suppliers. For being approved sources a percentage of the part requirement was guaranteed to the back up suppliers too, so there will be other mfg names on original parts accordingly.