Rick,

I have been told you just need to shim the spring perches to achieve the correct pinion angle. How far off was yours? I have been asking around, here and other people I have run into, to get the skinny on how's it done. I keep getting slightly different stories. Some say it's a drop in, others have told me you have to replace the spring perches and modify the drive shaft, and everyting between. I get the feeling that either none of the early F-1s were made exactly the same or each pre-'73 9" is slightly different.

I will be swapping my rear axle this spring sometime, if we ever stop getting snow! I also have read that you can use the shock mounts from a F-2, that the 9" axle has the same diameter. I have a F-2 parts truck sitting in the back forty.

 

Havi,
There is alot of room under those phat fenders. I am running old (68 vintage) American Torqe Thrust mags, 8.5X15 (or is that 15X8.5 ?) with 255/60's on them and still have plenty of clearance, inside and out. My son has 275/60 15's on his 52 with plenty of room left. With the correct offset I believe a 10" wide rim is possible.

Later, Rick

 

Bob,
The angle was off ALOT. Way too much too shim in my opinion. Probably because it came from a long bed and they have a split driveshaft. I believe if I had one from a short bed the angle may have been closer. The perch centers were the same on both rears but the 68 perches were bigger that the 52. I just cut them loose then loosly bolted them in and rotated the pinion up, tacked them in place then dropped the rear and finish welded. I think I used the same drive shaft from the Dana 44 too. If the pinion angle had been correct it would have ben a bolt in. Not long after that is when I did all of the suspension mods. That is when I put new perches on it to match the new springs. Been running that way for about 18 years now. All the F1 frames should be the same. My friends 48 is just like mine.

Later, Rick

 

I have a 72 truck rear in my 49 F-1 and the same in my 50 F-1. I ended up needing 4-6 degrees of shim on mine. It depends on how your engine and trans are mounted. The F-2 shock mount brackets work perfectly. Hope this helps.

 

I don't think it matters if the rear axle came from a short bed or a long bed truck. I hope not, the axle that I got with my 9" is a two piece so I assuming it came from a long bed. The guy I bought it from still had the truck but it was cut up into little pieces, I didn't think to ask. I would also think Ford wouldn't have two different axles, but I could be wrong.

As for the '48-52 frames, as far as I know they are all the same with a few minor exception, some of the '52 came with a different engine mounting arrangement to accomodate the new OHV six engine.

 

Bob, Rick has a non factory engine and transmission which could explain the differences.

 

I figured that might be the case. The FTE article made it sound like it was pretty much a bolt in:

https://www.ford-trucks.com/article/...ial_Swaps.html

John Niolon has a great page set up detailing the whole pinion aligning procedure and it didn't seem that difficult:

http://www.clubfte.com/users/jniolon...nephasing.html