Well, here goes! Pat has been on my **** for months to start this, then he got Neil, Bill and Shaun on my ****, so I guess I need to start it up. It won't be very impressive, because i don't know what the heck I'm doing with this truck, but I'll do my best.

 

I think I'll name her "Gracie", since she's a slick.

 

Rewired the entire truck with an American Autowire harness. I never did that before, so it was interesting. I'm just about finished, but I haven't tested any of it yet.

 

In for the pix, and before the "it's about time!" posts...lol.

 

YEEEESSSS!

Peer pressure....Get's 'em everytime!! Awesome, Steve, I can never get enough truck ****! So, give us more!





And, thanks for doing this, bud!

So, tell us a little more about the truck. How long you've had it, any back story we might need. Future plans.....

 

The bed was pretty rotted and old, so I've cut out almost all of the wood. I'll be making a new bed myself. I'm not sure what kind of wood I'll use.Probably oak.

 

Is that stock for the tailgate, or did someone add that wood there?

 

Ah, the story. It's going to be long. I'm sorry about that. Here goes...

When I was in the Navy I bought a 63 flareside from a fellow sailor. We were in electronics school out in Mare Island, California. He was my roommate in Great Lakes for 9 months as we went through "A" school. He shows up with this truck in California and I just fell in love with it. He sold it to me and I drove it back to Norfolk, VA when school was over in CA. That trip was intense. Three guys in the front of the truck for 59 straight hours, with one of the guy's motorcycle and all our gear in the back.

That truck had a 1969 351W in it that rocked.

When I started college after the Navy I sold the truck to a friend to help pay for my tuition. I would see him cruising around in it sometimes. But he died of a heart attack in his 20s, and the truck was lost.

I got married, had kids, etc. etc. Then one day my brother calls me and says he saw my truck for sale on the side of the road! I went and bought it immediately. It was rough, but still, it was mine. Unfortunately, I had no where to keep it and no money to fix it so I had to sell it. I've never seen it again.

Kids grew up, I have some time and money now, so I thought I'd go looking for the truck one more time. Needle in a haystack search; couldn't find it. But I wanted one like it, so I found this truck on Ebay. My wife said go for it. I overpaid for it, and it turns out it's pretty rough, but it's mine now. I drove it back from north Jersey, and it's been in my garage ever since.

First thing I had to do was address the steering column. It was a chevy tilt column, and it was dangerously loose, so I decided to rip it out and find an original Ford column that was period correct. It was more difficult than i thought it would be. I'm STILL working on that 18 months later. Pat sent me a 67 column, so I'm combining that with a 64 and hoping that works. I'll post pictures of that later.

So that's it. 18 months of doing something I've NEVER done before. I'm not a mechanic, and never even worked on my own cars except for the basic stuff. It's frustrating but it's fun.

 

Not stock. The previous owner made it out of wood. Just another thing on the list.

 

This is how the previous owner connected the chevy column's shaft to the Ford steering box. He drilled a hold in the shaft and put a bolt through it. I've been told by multiple people that it was a bad and dangerous idea. I'm going to cut that part off and use a HDT-SC-040 U-joint to connect the 67 shaft to the 64 shaft.

 

The truck has a 1974 302 in it. I think it's from an Econoline van, but I'm not sure.

 

I bought a new gas tank, because the previous owner (sense a theme here?) put a hacked up old tank under the bed and it was AWFUL. I know a lot of people like to put the tank under the bed, but he didn't do it correctly, so i went back to how these trucks were originally designed (with the tank in the cab). What, me worry?

Oh yeah, a guy named Eric from this site provided me with lots of stuff, including the correct gas lines. Thank you Eric.

 

Great story, Steve. Just another reason you HAD to do this thread!

 

Thanks Pat, and thanks for pushing me to do it.

 

subscribed....

the internet is your friend, someone somewhere has done it and all you have to do is research it....you'll do great....