If the roof was crushed or damaged it wouldn't be all that hard to transplant the roof section from another truck. I replace the entire roof from the belt line up on a panel truck without much work.

 

Tempting...... get thee behind me....... and give me a push!

I've even thought about bringing a trailer with me

 

Stu, the bed floor changed with the whole bed redesign in mid '50.

 

Okay, here's some pics the seller sent me. He confirmed the truck has the single crossbrace on the bottom of the window like a 51-52 cab. We talked on the phone. Really nice guy. I explained our curiosity and it got him interested as well. He looked the truck over again, and he says it looks totally unmolested as far as a potential sheet metal swap at anytime in the past. On top of that, the dash looks to be original as well to him. PLUS, he said the firewall tag and the vin tag on the glove box door MATCH. I don't know what to say. Here's the pictures. Thanks for recognizing this and posting it, hank50car. Very interesting.

 

Another data point if you want to ask the guy, would be the under-dash braces near the radio/wipers.

As crappy as the welds are on my dash, I don't know how you'd tell if it were replaced!

The firewall stamping is the wild card, does it have a data plate on the firewall (near the horn relay) he is reading, or is he looking at the stampings in the center of the cowl? 51-52 wouldn't have the data plate, but that's easy to add.

Edit: I just re-read your post; did 48-50 have glovebox ratings plates? I thought that was a 51-52 thing in lieu of the one on the firewall?

 

I agree with Ross. Under the dash behind the radio on a 48-50 is different than in a 51-52.

Ross, the data plate remained on the firewall through the 51 model year. It was eliminated on the 52 model year. Glove box rating plates were in all trucks from 48-52. The design of the tags inside the glove box door is the only thing that changed in 52.

Looks like a possible rare cabbed truck......


Doc, does the seller know the history of the truck?

 

Thanks Ilya, my head is spinning lately.

It would be nice to have the Plant designation from the rating plate. I looked in the 49/50 VIN cutoff thread, and saw a couple of people's VINs were within a few thousand of this one's. No mention of unusual rear windows.

 

Doc I have been a car junky all my life. I bought my first f1 when I was 18.It was a 48. My next one was a 50 that I went to the darkside with camaro subframe ,tilt column and pedal assembly out of a 78 chevy c-10, nova rear with c-10 spring hangers. It was hit sitting in the yard by a drunk driver running from the cops about 20 years ago . I still have it . Been dragging it around with me for the past 20 years collecting parts to fix it. About 5 years ago while searching for parts I found a decent 49 f1 ,the PO replaced the 6 cylinder with a 350 out of a 69 Caprice using a Wilcap adapter. I grenaded the trans and swapped in the gears out of a 47 Zephyr trans I had gotten in a trade. The only other mod I made was adding disc brakes and a dual master cylinder. I'm hardly an expert on these trucks but I have picked up a little knowledge about them over the years. This forum has been a wealth of information on these trucks for me. I would like to improve the steering but can't bring myself to put a toyota box on this truck lol, Hank.

 

Heck I imagine you know more than me about these things. Show us pics of your stuff. What part of NC are you in? And (based on your ursername) do you have a 50 car?

Ilya, I sent the seller another email. We'll see. Maybe one of you guys could ask him too about the braces under the dash. I'm not sure I could tell the difference, and I know that I couldn't describe the difference to him.

So, let's just assume this is truly an unmolested 1949 farm truck with an intact cab and no evidence of a dash replacement. What else could explain it?

 

If the truck took a hit in the side, in the door and cab corner, it wouldn't have been unusual to order a door and back panel from Ford and replace those parts. That type of repair is still done today. The back panel is only welded along the bottom at the floor, and the seam at the roof. Much simpler than messing with wiring and doing r&r on the whole cab, if you didn't have to. And if insurance companies were as hard to deal with back then as they are today, they wouldn't have paid for any more than necessary.

The new pictures Doc posted don't show what we need to see. I want to see the seam inside along the top, and how it's attached along the bottom corners and along the floor. I don't have any better explanation, but it's the only one that seems remotely logical, to me. I'm certainly not buying that it's some rare prototype that Ford 'lost' along the way. If it was repaired, it's obvious it was done a long time ago, when the truck was fairly new still, and done quite well.

 

I agree, its serial number is far, far away from '51 production. I'm just curious how it ended up this way.

Here is a comparison of the 48-50 and 51-52 under-dash bracing. (Courtesy Ilya's 51 and BobbyT's 49) The 51-52 have no bracing, essentially.

 

I live in Blowing Rock , NC just off the Blue Ridge Parkway. The 50 car (read five o ) refers to my former profession as a police officer which I retired from in April. I got a poor picture posted of my truck on my profile. As soon as I get some pictures taken I will post them.

 

There is a simple explanation for this, and Wayne is on the right track. The small back window panel was discontinued very early, so any replacement cabs were assembled with the later panel. This truck had it's entire cab replaced when it was only a few years old. I have seen several trucks like this one over the years, as well as a complete 1948-50 NOS cab w/1951-52 rear panel installed.
Chuck

 

Thanks for the info, Chuck. That makes perfect sense. I looked through my catalog trying to find the listing for a complete cab to see if it had any notes like the cab back panel, but couldn't find it. Would you know what the part number is, or if it's even in the catalog?

 

Rumor out there is that mid 50 the bed changed. I can see where the confusion lies with the cab being a mid year change too. IF the cab had to be replaced early on, maybe even before 1951 even came around, that only adds more to the confusion, lol... Not likely, but it's possible. I would say by the looks of this truck, and Stu is right, he does deal a lot of old iron in MN, is that this truck probably either had the cab replaced, or the back section (it comes off way easier than cutting around the window) replaced. Just looking at it, for a MN pickup, it would likely be in a lot worse rusty shape. So it's possible it's been redone a long time ago. My two cents of guessing.