After (not) much weighing up of the joys and ballaches of owning american tin over here in the UK, I went and picked up my new pride and joy tuesday just gone. Two owners, the USAF posted over here and the loving hands of an older chap local to me (HE is responsible for the colour).

She would appear to have only done IRO 75000 miles and its condition would reflect this. I'm REALLY not keen on the 3.8V6, but as it runs well (at the moment!) it can stay until I find something sweeter to replace it with although my priority is to get it somewhat closer to the ground.

Anyways here are a couple of pics, I apologise for quality being as they were taken using the camera on my mobile/cell phone.The tasmanian devil transfer has now gone!





I have one small question. From what I have read the stud pattern is 5 x 4.5 on these, why is mine 5 x 5.5?

 

some f100's snuck threw with the small bolt patern while allf150's had the big pattern. one good thing tho you have 31 spline small pattern axles so some day after the truck is used up you could put the axle under somting else and run car rims

 

Heh heh I guess every cloud has a silver lining.....

Makes replacement wheel selection a pain though as nearly everything I see (trying to source using whats on offer here) is 5x114.3 (chevy?) or 5x120.6(?) is there anything else that is 5x5.5? Or 5x139.7 - if I guessed that right.

 

ya'll must not use salt over there

 

Oh man if only that were true! The truck is filthy at the minute, the gearbox blew on my Girlfriends Fiat so the truck is the daily use grunt. Gotta get a pressure washer on it asap.

 

all 1500 chevys from around 89-99 are all 5x5.5 bolt pattern so wheels should be extremely easy to find

 

Well that's handy to know, thank you.

 

no problem. do you have any updated pics of the truck? and specs of the actual drop?my previous truck was on a 6/10 drop.in your avatar it looks slammed and me likey

edit.got the drop specs from your sig.

 

I do, I thought I had put some on the '80 - '86 forum but maybe not (It's been plugged over here on a few forums as its something of a rarity.)

Ok quick build thread.........

Axle out........



Chassis notched......



ARB shortened appropriately.....



Back on.....



Stance check.


It looks like somewhat less than a 6" drop and with the BFG's being a touch on the large side I knew that they would be no good and had already secured a pair of 225 50 15's .

This added up to a more pleasing 8" drop....



However, the dream beams (lowering I beams for Ford Trucks) still hadn't arrived from the States, so the front and rear wheels were swapped around and the truck was driven back from Poole to Bristol gasser style - it was so ugly I couldn't bring myself to take pics. To keep me going and to get an idea of what it was like, another kind friend did a photochop of the truck with the front down....



In the meantime while waiting for the Beams to arrive, I picked up some E150 van steels to replace the chrome steels with - due to their offset I was concerned about clearance at the front. You wouldn't think it, but you are actually pretty limited on running wide wheels with a drop.

They, and the wheels arrived a week before Christmas and again Mr Coltech was kind enough to have my truck in on the Monday after Christmas (as well as store it from Christmas Eve!) to get the front down. I'll be honest in saying that as much as I had a great Christmas with the other half's family but knowing that the truck was only 15 mins away meant much time waiting for monday to come around : ;D.

After a day spent on the front, she was finally looking more like my kind of truck. Paul's workshop was pretty busy and I was happy to get on with it myself although he did help with one or tweaks - the springs needed shortening as the beams only give a 3" drop so new securing clips for the spring tops were needed. Also, we couldn't understand why it hadn't dropped as much as it should have until we saw that the ARB was fouling the steering arms. Bye bye ARB, hello lowered truck. 6 1/2" at the front to be exact.

So here is where she is at today.....thank you for reading my essay.

 

 

wow.verrryyyy nice.i love lowered trucks.around here everyone is lifted so with the last truck i did the same thing.and thats good you did a weld in notch.i did a bolt in when i was only 6" drop in the rear and it was crap.so when i went to 10" i made sure to do a weld in.what are your future plans for it?

 

Glad you like it, wasn't sure on how it would be received as you guys over there tend to make 'em taller. I'd love a lifted truck but our roads are narrow enough without me wandering dangerously all over them!

Yep, had to notch it, may yet get another as planning four link for the rear, Jag or Crown vic front clip and air. Wasn't going to change the clip but am taking chunks out of the road with various cross members and other parts of the front undercarriage (there is only about 2" between tarmac and radius arms) and not too keen on running without a front ARB.

Also going to lose the mirrors, fit a slider, rollpan and lose the front cruising lights on the grille (which may lead to a change of grille for one that hides the lights.) Also going to replace the POS 3.8 for something with the right amount of cylinders and lose the LPG - scared the girlfriend to death one night when the LPG tank ground out and sent sparks out in front of her car (oops). Prob. one or two other things too. It get some looks already owing to the size of it and how low it is, I kinda like that.

 

ya well im on of the others that had it lowered.haha.but i cant talk now cuz my new ones lifted.are you planning to just backhalf/4link it or do you plan for bags and such?i myself am all about static.ya bags are cool but being static dropped is so much cooler cuz you cant lift it over speed bumps.you going to a big or small block?

 

Will prob end up on 'bags. I've always been one of the "**** air ride" school but our roads are pretty poor for the most part, and I'm done with spine jarring rides, having to swerve potholes and plan my route in advance

Engine wise, small block but which size depends what comes up as I'd like an EFI donor. I ask much for what we have available over here.

 

well as long as you have a good amount of notch and you put some good reservoir shocks on then it will ride nice.my buddy has a single cab chevy lowered 6/10 and he put some fox reservoir shocks on and the thing rode like a cadillac.are you going to stick with the 15's or go bigger? as far as motor goes.get a big one haha.i went with the 6.0 lq9 in my old truck and boy did i absolutely love it.total sleeper.it was great