Even here in Australia where cabs off big trucks are easyish to find, but short chassis are rare people still search for a chassis rather than swap.
I have seen a couple of adaptions onto later F100 chassis (which are plentiful), but the floor usually requires rework to get them low.....and they always look "hacked about"
I looked at a Toyota HiLux chassis the other day and it looked promising, but would require all new suspension etc.....so for you guys it would be pointless.
IMHO people replace the front clip because it's the thing to do according to all the magazines. The beam axle doesn't buy ads. I've said it many times, because of our racing endevors, I more than most can appreciate good handling and ride. When I first bought my panel, I immediately started researching IFS setups while making plans to fly out and drive it back. However after driving it most of the way across the country with the updated beam axle (2" drop, reversed eye dropped springs, all new wear parts), I was pleasantly surprised to find it handles and rides as well as most modern sedans and much better than any current truck I've been in. By the time I reached home I had cancelled any plans to change the front end except for the steering box.
Does the 98 frame match the wheelbase and tread width of the 53?
Time and time again I see you mention IFS. The reason why you think the frame swap is a bad idea is the fact that you would keep it 2wd and the frame swap seems like more of a pain. Us who want to swap a 4wd chassis under an older body that was once a 2wd don't care about IFS. We want a solid 4wd driveline to start with that is already setup with the strength and reliability the manufacturer provided and we are willing to tackle the welding of some bodymounts and some wiring.
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1979 BRONCO 351m bored .03 over.
bassani headers. edelbrock intake, carb, and air cleaner.
Well, you guys were all right. The chop shop started the '56 F-100 on '78 F-150 frame today. The back rear spring shackles are too wide and will have to be boxed in. In order to fit the box on the frame and the cab on the slanted part of the frame the mounting had to go up up up. About 1 1/2" above the frame. That puts the fenders way up above the tires, about 8", so the '78 factory hi-boy blocks will have to come out. That will drop about 3". The tire width is too wide, maybe different wheels will bring it in or it may not matter cause she's up so high. The firewall will have to be bumped back about 3".
The good news [?], in one day it's all laid out and ready to start welding the mounts on the frame. I can definitely see this is not what some of you want, heck, it may not be wat I want, but it's doable.
--van
They stopped making HI-Boys in late '77. Lift blocks can be found in almost all ford trucks.
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1979 BRONCO 351m bored .03 over.
bassani headers. edelbrock intake, carb, and air cleaner.
Time and time again I see you mention IFS. The reason why you think the frame swap is a bad idea is the fact that you would keep it 2wd and the frame swap seems like more of a pain. Us who want to swap a 4wd chassis under an older body that was once a 2wd don't care about IFS. We want a solid 4wd driveline to start with that is already setup with the strength and reliability the manufacturer provided and we are willing to tackle the welding of some bodymounts and some wiring.
For one thing this site is not about 4wd or hacking up our beloved trucks. IMHO It pains most of us to see a good truck turned into something that looks like it escaped from a monster truck show. We don't spend hours, days and years searching out body panels and massaging them smooth to go out a run into trees and battle with boulders. You'll find much more sympathy and help in a 4WD forum than here. (My question would be since your intent is to beat up the truck anyway, why not leave the original body on the truck?)
Most late model 4wd chassis don't come close to fitting under a 48-60 body as VanHoy has once again proven (not picking on VH, his thoughts were pure, but it was a losing battle from the get go.) There's a WHOLE lot more work to a successful chassis swap than just welding on a few mounts unless you don't care how hideous the result is. Sorry, you're preaching in the wrong church.
__________________
Passionate about autocross racing!
2003 GSL, 2005 HSL National Champion
1956 F100 Panel support/tow vehicle
2007 Solstice GXP racer, the "KRAZED KANARY"
2002 Celica GT 2003 GSL National Champion retired to daily driving duties
Hoo boy !!! I'm glad that lynchin' is fairly uncommon in my neck of the woods or I'd head for the hills. Better warn any van Hoy kin I have left in North Carolina where my great great grandparents came from to stay away from Raleigh and AXRacer.
My truck is coming along fairly well now, though it's been on hold since Christmas. What I wrote before was at a low point actually. It looks darn good, though as AXRacer correctly states it is up high. [The 4x4 chassis is from '78 but had factory hi-boy which came out and that solved the problem of being way too high.] NONE OF THE ORIGINAL CAB AND BED WERE CHANGED IN ANY WAY!!! At this point the frame has been shortened 6", cab mounts fabricated and welded to the frame, rear frame cross members fabricated and bed mounts welded on, all the sheet metal is hung and checked for proper fit.
Now about the philosophy-- the frame is a one-owner 69K miles that my uncle bought new to rockhound in the Nevada desert. My wife rolled it end-for-end over a cliff in 2000 and walked away with cuts and bruises. The frame had one little tweak at the front and one at the rear, but all the sheet metal was ruined. That's why this project. No one is going to take this truck out and bash it up!
I appreciate determination as much as the next guy, but there are differences of opinion. To me a truck is a truck, and a chopped, lowered, altered suspension truck is just not right to me. But that's just my opinion. The '56 effie that went for $37 large or so on Barrett Jackson the other day was nice, but IMHO too altered to be considered desirable to me. [And it was Ch--- powered.] Heck, you wouldn't even put a bale of hay in the back.
There's a '56 F-100 Marmon-Herrington 4x4 running around town which is a correct restoration of a rare original. The owner's son, one of the restorers and a big Ford man himself, stopped at the chop shop and looked at mine, and called me to compliment the work. That means a lot to me.
VH,
Like I said, I was not trying to pick on you! Can someone please explain the purpose of 4WD if it isn't going to be taken off road or driven under other similar adverse conditions? Or do you (NOT a personal "you" VH) 4WD highway cruisers just prefer a truck with horible ride, poor handling, poor gas milege, that's likely to assume the dead cockroach position in an accident aviodance manuever or turning a corner at more than walking speed? Call me predjudiced or whatever, but I share the hiways with WAY too many (IMHO) 4WD poseurs in SUVs and trucks that haven't seen so much as a gravel road, much less dirt under their tires. Every day in the parking lot in front of my store I see (women especially) drivers trying to wrestle these things into a parking space or unable to see what's behind them when backing out. Yet these highly waxed and spotless trucks are dripping in chrome brush guards, skid plates, double hoop roll bars and enough driving light to light up a football stadium, as well as huge tires with agressive tread that give nearly no grip on wet pavement. To me that's as ridiculous at the imports with huge wings, fart can exhausts, and racing numbers and stickers that have never seen a race track. But each to their own.
__________________
Passionate about autocross racing!
2003 GSL, 2005 HSL National Champion
1956 F100 Panel support/tow vehicle
2007 Solstice GXP racer, the "KRAZED KANARY"
2002 Celica GT 2003 GSL National Champion retired to daily driving duties
Out here in the country we do have snow occasionally and a 4x4 comes in handy. Granted, it will probebly be the '04 Ranger or the Subaru before the F-100!
Sometimes it's just nice to take the road less travelled. We're on the edge of a number of National Forests, and many of the roads are just old dirt logging roads.
Our family car for a while was a '92 Exploder, wife loved it, but I agree with you it was overkill. Subaru is just fine for daily use, as would be an Escape or similar. But when the nearest town is nine miles of curved road away and the nearest shopping mall is 22 miles, a 4x4 is sure welcome.
Glad to see you're passionate about your Ford, just please keep in mind that this is a big country and differences of opinion are welcome. [As long as George W. doesn't eavesdrop on your telephone conversations and throw you in jail for subversion, but that's another loaded weapon of a topic.]
AX, you invited us to call you prejudiced, [yes you did] but I'd prefer to think you just need to get out of those mall parking lots and off the crowded highways and get out into God's country more often!
I'm originally from the snow capital of the world, so I can appreciate 4WD under adverse conditions, and have traveled many a dirt trail, I just wouldn't risk vintage tin in those conditions. I couldn't imagine attaching a snow plow to my panel even if it was 4WD like my brother does with his F250 4WD. You said you have 2 other 4WD vehicles to drive in those conditions, I'd suggest you try a good weather vintage tin cruiser and see how much FUN those curved roads can be to drive!
PS: my original point was it is stiil far easier to transplant a drive train, 4WD or 2WD, to an existing chassis than to transplant sheet metal onto a different chassis.
__________________
Passionate about autocross racing!
2003 GSL, 2005 HSL National Champion
1956 F100 Panel support/tow vehicle
2007 Solstice GXP racer, the "KRAZED KANARY"
2002 Celica GT 2003 GSL National Champion retired to daily driving duties
For one thing this site is not about 4wd or hacking up our beloved trucks. IMHO It pains most of us to see a good truck turned into something that looks like it escaped from a monster truck show. We don't spend hours, days and years searching out body panels and massaging them smooth to go out a run into trees and battle with boulders. You'll find much more sympathy and help in a 4WD forum than here. (My question would be since your intent is to beat up the truck anyway, why not leave the original body on the truck?)
Most late model 4wd chassis don't come close to fitting under a 48-60 body as VanHoy has once again proven (not picking on VH, his thoughts were pure, but it was a losing battle from the get go.) There's a WHOLE lot more work to a successful chassis swap than just welding on a few mounts unless you don't care how hideous the result is. Sorry, you're preaching in the wrong church.
I don't consider it hacking up a beloved truck when the body will look the same from the outside. The only change by looking at it will be the ride height and tire size. If anything, placing a (in my case)59 panel truck on top of a 78 4wd chassis will improve the truck 10 fold. Instead of just slamming the truck down and only driving the thing to a cruise in on occasion or to the grocery store once a year, it will be something that can be used to tow, haul, maneuver irregular terrain, and tackle tough winters. The reason for not keeping the existing body is obviously to get that vintage look, to have a vehicle that I can sleep in while camping and still have access to the interior as a whole with easier rear access than a bronco, and to stand out from the other 4wd's. In my opinion and many others, that is not hacking it up. So if modifying the original look or performance to better suit my desire is hacking it, what is it called when someone chops, lowers, or swaps a motor on a vintage vehicle?
All I was interested in were a few stats about a vehicle which IS part of this forum. I was not interested in proving who has better taste in vehicles.
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1979 BRONCO 351m bored .03 over.
bassani headers. edelbrock intake, carb, and air cleaner.
Sorry, but the only way to put a late model 4wd chassis under an early body IS to hack it up. There isn't a 4WD that isn't significantly wider in track and frame width except possibly a jeep, and the frame depth of most late model trucks is several inches deeper, so would definitely show from the side, especially jacked up. Once jacked up if you could find or modify the axles so the tires didn't look like rollerskate wheels sticking out of the fenders, the center of gravity and roll center would be so high compared to width that it could roll easier than a Samuri just going around a corner. Overlay a picture of the chassis of choice over a picture of a 59 panel and you'll find the wheel base, frame shape firewall location, seating and steeringwheel position etc doesn't line up, so how do you resolve all those issues without a lot of hacking?
My main point is not about esthetics or purpose of the vehicle, but with the complexities and small chance of sucess in transplanting an early body onto a late chassis vs transplanting a different drive train onto the original frame. A lot of people have tried the chassis swap, but I've yet to see one completed that didn't look like a fugitive from a Mad Max movie.
PS I use my panel for towing and can sleep in it if I should desire to, but it still uses the original 2WD and suspension. I however would never think of risking it by off roading it. I also have trouble with the "patina" look (rusty and worn paint) that is becoming popular. This is my opinion and taste, granted yours may be different, but you came here asking for advice/info on chassis swapping, but just because you didn't like the answer, don't shoot the messenger.
__________________
Passionate about autocross racing!
2003 GSL, 2005 HSL National Champion
1956 F100 Panel support/tow vehicle
2007 Solstice GXP racer, the "KRAZED KANARY"
2002 Celica GT 2003 GSL National Champion retired to daily driving duties
Sorry, but the only way to put a late model 4wd chassis under an early body IS to hack it up. There isn't a 4WD that isn't significantly wider in track and frame width except possibly a jeep, and the frame depth of most late model trucks is several inches deeper, so would definitely show from the side, especially jacked up. Once jacked up if you could find or modify the axles so the tires didn't look like rollerskate wheels sticking out of the fenders, the center of gravity and roll center would be so high compared to width that it could roll easier than a Samuri just going around a corner. Overlay a picture of the chassis of choice over a picture of a 59 panel and you'll find the wheel base, frame shape firewall location, seating and steeringwheel position etc doesn't line up, so how do you resolve all those issues without a lot of hacking?
My main point is not about esthetics or purpose of the vehicle, but with the complexities and small chance of sucess in transplanting an early body onto a late chassis vs transplanting a different drive train onto the original frame. A lot of people have tried the chassis swap, but I've yet to see one completed that didn't look like a fugitive from a Mad Max movie.
PS I use my panel for towing and can sleep in it if I should desire to, but it still uses the original 2WD and suspension. I however would never think of risking it by off roading it. I also have trouble with the "patina" look (rusty and worn paint) that is becoming popular. This is my opinion and taste, granted yours may be different, but you came here asking for advice/info on chassis swapping, but just because you didn't like the answer, don't shoot the messenger.
I would love to continue our little debate here but after taking a look at your profile, I have lost all respect for you as a Ford owner and refuse to converse with you. Ruining a ford with a chevrogay motor and owning ricers...shame on you.
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1979 BRONCO 351m bored .03 over.
bassani headers. edelbrock intake, carb, and air cleaner.
I would love to continue our little debate here but after taking a look at your profile, I have lost all respect for you as a Ford owner and refuse to converse with you. Ruining a ford with a chevrogay motor and owning ricers...shame on you.
Your loss! Goodbye and have a have a good day.
__________________
Passionate about autocross racing!
2003 GSL, 2005 HSL National Champion
1956 F100 Panel support/tow vehicle
2007 Solstice GXP racer, the "KRAZED KANARY"
2002 Celica GT 2003 GSL National Champion retired to daily driving duties
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