Ok so a little back round on the truck, its a 83 F100 single cab, long bed with the 302 and AOD trans. I got the truck about 2-3 years ago from my wife's uncle, he was the oringal owner and the truck had been pretty much sitting for 5 years. Started off doing some work on the interior parts and then a friend of mine who owned a body shop made me a offer on a paint job that I couldn't refuse. I will come back and post some pics of the body later. Back in May of last year I decided that I was going to swap the motor and trans and make the truck a nice little daily driver. I had ordered a ton of parts from summit, Jegs, LMC, Rock auto, ebay etc etc etc. A friend of mine works for a dealership so he got me a great deal on a rebuilt motor through LKQ. I picked up a rebuilt AOD trans that I found online. Now at this point I have had very little experience with a project like this so I talk to my father in law and ask for some help with the whole project. Now first off I figured this would be a good learning project and I would get to know the truck in and out, was not looking to do a perfect ground up resto, just wanted a realible truck that works for me.

So first up truck parts, truck parts, truck parts





Now for the old motor








nice empty engine bay after a ton of degreaser



Then after some fresh spray paint



Now on to the new motor





ended up switching out to a distributer from skipwhite off ebay

New radiator and other goodies



Also upgraded to the 3G alternator



Still need to switch out the blower motor, have all new AC stuff going in as well....here is some of the wiring for the 3G



Now for a little customizing....when we pulled the motor I couldn't seperate the shifter linkage so we cut it and I decided to install a Lokar shifter kit


Next up is a pair of sport bucket seats I got from summit

The stock 15in wheels weren't cutting it so went with a nice set of XD



Will continue to update with pictures as I move forward with it. New Years day we got the motor to fire and got to hear the new beast for the first time and after working on it a day here a weekend there for 6 months it felt great. Had a lot of small things fight us here and there but hey just got some practice at making it better right. Still waiting for a few parts to come in to finish everything up but could use a little help. When I did the 3G conversion somehow I manage to lose my ignition. I got the wiring kit from RJM here on the forums. So I hooked up the wiring harness to the alternator and spliced the green wire to the old wiring. Ran the postive wire with the mega fuse just like in all the diagrams on the forums. Now for some reason when I turn the key nothing. For the meantime we have just been using a jumper wire to fire up the motor.

 

Here is the truck when I first got her

 

Lol! Looks like the FTE servers are making up for lost posts by doubling up the pictures. Jeremy's thread got doubled up as well.

Anyway, I take back what I said about no progress. Obviously you have been WORKING. Lots! I'm subscribed to this thread as I want to follow this excellent work. But, are you sure this is your first time? Sure looks good.

 

After the body shop

 

Thanks Gary, yea not sure what is going on with the double pictures.....and yes a lot of this is my first time (just have the right friends and family helping)

 

Some work on the interior

Door panel after SEM spray paint (found it here on the forum)

 

It sure is looking good. You certainly do have the right friends and family. They are advising you well. That 302/AOD combo can turn in good MPG if you have tall rear gearing.

Edit: How hard was the floor to do? Mine is rusted out similarly and the corners are gone and there are dings. So, I'm weighing cutting and welding vs swapping cabs as I have a solid cab as a donor or replacement.

 

It has the stock 8.8 rear....haven't messed with that yet.....

 

 

The problem w/the AOD is its OD is .67:1. So a 3.55:1 rear will act like a 2.38:1, which is very high gearing. And, since a 302 isn't endowed with lots of low RPM torque you have to spin it to get into its zone. If you do have to work on the diff you might consider going with something like a 4.10, which would give you the equiv of 2.75:1 overall gearing when in OD. That's pretty close to the overall gearing I have with 3.50's and the ZF's .76:1 OD and it is a very good highway gear. But, my 351M puts out more low RPM torque than a 302 can due to its longer stroke, so it can handle tall gearing.

 

Subscribed. "D

 

so going to a 4.10 gear what will that do to city MPG.....also that will give it a little more get up and go correct?

 

You should drive it before you make any such changes to see what you think of the gearing. But, 4.10 gearing will give you more "get up and go", for sure. And, I don't think it will hurt your city MPG as it will just allow the tranny to shift up earlier. But get input from some others as I've never owned an AOD, nor a 302 for that matter. To paraphrase a famous Okie, all I know is what I read on FTE.

I think you said you had the AOD rebuilt. Or, did you say you picked up a rebuilt one? In any event, did they beef it up? The AOD isn't known for strength but can be built up quite well. That and the serious OD ratio are two of its foibles. Another is the TV cable - it has to be adjusted properly or you can quickly damage the tranny.

 

I bought the AOD as a stock rebuild, was trying to keep this as low budget as I could. I got the TV cable from Lokar and was working on that today, hooked it up to the carb, still have to get underneath and hook it up to the trans. There really is a ton of info on here and it has been very helpful, it was because of this forum that I found out how important the TV cable is/was....I would have been sooooo disappointed if I wouldn't have got it and fried that new trans.

 

A stock rebuilt AOD should be fine as long as you don't plan to tow, or at least not tow often nor anything heavy. Guys on here have reported towing fairly light trailers with no problems, but you want to make sure you don't try to tow in OD. And, if you do plan to tow something light that might give more credence to going with a lower rear gear - although that would cause your highway RPM to go up since you wouldn't be towing in OD.

What do you plan to use the truck for? Just daily driving or???