INSIDE THE HENRY FORD
FORD ROUGE FACTORY TOUR
BREAKING THE MOLD Rouge complex is where Ford’s revolutionary flathead V-8 came to be TODAY, VISITORS TO THE Ford Rouge Factory Tour see the final assembly steps in building the best-selling Ford F-150 at the Dearborn Truck Plant. Long before the F-150 called the massive manufacturing complex home, the Rouge plant was the site where the famous Ford flathead V-8 was forged, cast and mass-produced. In the late 1920s, the Rouge plant was cranking out Ford Model A’s with a fourcylinder engine. But Henry Ford could see the writing on the proverbial wall, his competitive nature ruffled by Chevrolet’s recent introduction of an affordable, more powerful six-cylinder engine. As Ford leaned on the design prowess of a secret crew of engineers to not only meet but beat Chevrolet’s six (see
ONLINE For more information, hours and pricing for the Ford Rouge Factory Tour, visit thf.org/rougec
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story on Page 52), it was with the skill and determination of his foundrymen at the Rouge that their ideas came to life. While most V-8 engines of the day were constructed with separately cast cylinder banks and crankcases, Ford was insistent on simplicity and determined to create a one-piece block with integral cylinders. By 1931, the engineers’ concepts on paper became prototypes forged and built at the Rouge and first road-tested in Model A’s. Eventually, 3,000 of the famed flathead engine blocks were rolling off the lines at the Rouge each day. And they continued rolling until production of the engine stopped more than 20 years later and once more than 25 million Ford cars and trucks with the V-8 were on the road.
THE LEGACY GALLERY When visitors to The Henry Ford take the Ford Rouge Factory Tour, the Dearborn Truck Plant’s living sedum roof and final-assembly line experience are not the only entertainment and educational options on deck. The Legacy Gallery also gives tourgoers the opportunity to see some of the most famous Ford vehicles manufactured at the Rouge complex over the last nine decades. Be sure to search out the 1932 Ford V-8 on display — it’s powered by the flathead V-8 engine Ford engineers designed in Greenfield Village (see story on Page 52) — and then go explore more stories about the engineering of vehicles and related digitized artifacts at the gallery’s Truth About Trucks and Collections Explorer kiosks.
DID YOU KNOW? / Along with the ’32 Ford Victoria with the flathead V-8, the Ford Rouge Factory Tour’s Legacy Gallery displays a 1929 Model A, 1949 Club Coupe, 1956 Thunderbird and 1965 Mustang. All but the Model A have a version of a Ford V-8 engine under the hood.