Larry brings up an excellent point I have a 63 international 1 ton 4x4 with 4.88s and i drive it to school from time to time. 45 seems to be its happy speed. It has a TON of power. So gears like this can be handy but also inconvenient for highway speeds

 

That's one thing I love about this forum. You will always get all sides of a discussion.

My Father-in-law told me it could handle highway speeds, but that may be why Grandpa Mark had to have the engine rebuilt sometime around 1970
Of course he also said it was a great mudding truck. They would put chains on the back and go have fun. Which is why I'm having to scrape a layer of grime off everything....

I really appreciate all this good info.

 

Harrier
Your kinda like I am ,not in a highly populated area and not on a interstate. If you wanted to go to Jeff. or Sedalia it would be back roads and 45 to 50 would be fine. Only you can decide if that would be ok with you. I would suggest you get it drivable and see how you liked the low gear rearend. The low gears have several advantages, being able to pull hills and not be shifting all the time. You will be able to turn a corner at 20mph and accelerate back to speed without ever having to shift and go across a field at 2 mph.
Good luck what ever you decide.
Larry

 

Also rear ends are not hard to change so you could run the truck and think about what you want to do and change gears or even the whole rear end if you like.

 

That's what I will end up doing. I don't have a bed for it right now, so it will be even easier. I will get it up and running....someday....and try it out for a while. It's good to have lots of options.

 

I changed the rear end in my 54 F250 to a 3.73 to be able to drive at highway speeds. The truck originally had a 4.88 like yours and screamed at 50+ mph. I was changing the engine/trans and drive train anyway and it wasn't my grandpa's truck either. The rear end change allows me to cruise at 65-70 with a reasonable RPM and 245-75-16 tires.

Now, the easy to change part might be an overstatement. The first change was a bear as the axle U bolts were a bugger to get off. Many hours, lots of PB blaster and a 4 ft cheater bar on the nuts. Easy would be to cut and find new u bolts, but I dont' know how available they would be or the cost.

OT, to Harrier, see my user name, GBR!

 

A good spring shop should be able to make up new U bolts for a fair price.. when i did the 4x4 kit on my 55 F250 i had the front spring stacks done and all new U bolts made up at the same time.. don't recall just what they charged to thread and bend the bolts for me but i think it was like 7 bucks a bolt.. but thats been a few yrs ago..beat the hell out of trying to get a 50 yr old nut off.. blueflame wrenched the old ones off..

 

$7 a bolt would be supper cheap for the amount of work it took to get the old ones off and keeping them in good enough shape to use again. Closest spring shop for me is about 50-60 miles away.

 

The only thing I don't like about the ones made locally while-u-wait is that they aren't flattened where they go around the axle tube, so they end up crushing the tube.

 

The U bolts on my front suspension weren't too bad the ATF/Acetone mixture seemed to help (plus the cheater bar.) I think I will let the rear sit until I get the front back together.

I was wondering about your user name and you are living in K-State land. Of course I live in MU country with my parents and in-laws all Missouri School system grads. My wife has adopted the Huskers. My 11 year old boy is already planning his Nebraska football career. Matter of fact, he chastised his older sister when she said she didn't want to go to NU because she thought it was too big. Being an ex-athlete I got a tour of the facilities a couple of years ago. I need to post a couple of those pictures, amazing. Much nicer than when I was there in the late 80's. (I can hijack my own thread can't I? )

 

OT-Grew up in Nebraska and graduated from NU in the early 70's. My daughters both went to K-State.