Restoring my great grandfathers and fathers '64 pickup, ground up restoration, there isn't a straight piece of metal on the truck and there is more bondo then paint but its still a nest old truck and I can't wait to get it finished, planning on a 600 horse 460 but that'll be later to come, right now the cab is gutted and ready to be pulled and the front clip is off, obvisouly the first step is to blast the frame and paint it, but with the 460 im going to need a better suspension up front, any suggestions with that? I know a lot of guys sub frame old trucks but id rather go a different route of there is another option? I'm thinking a crown Vic front end but idk if anybody else has ever done this? Thank you in advance for the help

 

Welcome to FTE!

I haven't done the swap but I have read a lot of good builds on it..

here's one

https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...0-restore.html

 

Thanks for the link! Some good info! I've decided to go with an 06 crown Vic police interceptor front end, seems pretty straight forward

 

Please consider my advice.....#1 The stock suspension on a 64 is more than capable of supporting a 460, it's like a little dump truck.

#2 It's nearly always simpler and more cost effective to just repair what's already there.

In my opinion I would keep it as simple and trouble free as I could and that would be using the stock suspension. As new these trucks drove pretty good and were plenty tough.

 

I will definitely take that into considerstion, I just figured those leafs wouldn't support it, but I want power steering and disc brakes so I figured a crown Vic front end swap would work pretty good.. I found one at the local salvage yard but haven't decided on anything yet

 

 

Now that's sexy

 

That is in a 64.

 

In yours? What kind of power is it pushing?

 

Yes it is in mine. I have no idea what it is making, but do know it is quite a bit more healthy than it was originally. 60 over with Hi comp pistons cammed up a little with a 4bbl and headers and electronic ignition.

 

What trans are your running behind it and did you keep the stock front end?

 

The trans is the T98 4 speed it came from the factory with. The whole truck is original including the engine pictured except for the mods I did to the engine. Straight axle front with drums on all four corners. I won't be racing it and it stops fine in normal driving conditions. Just like it did for the first 95K miles it had it before the rebuild. I have no idea why so many people are down on drum brakes and single master cylinders. At one time there were millions of them on the road.

 

I think drum brakes are fine, but disc brakes loos a lot cleaner and a whole lot easier to service. I'm also wanting to run 600 horse and want to be sure that my braking is not going to fail and would feel better with a front end swap

 

You can do a dual master cylinder conversion, power or manual. Which you will have to do with the crown vic swap You can also do a disk brake conversion to the straight axle with a lot less work than the front end swap. But it is your truck and you will be the one driving it

 

600 hp with a carb means a big cam, hi compression and lots of machine work.


Whats wrong wit 300 hp mated to the the right tranny and gears?


It will scoot the truck down the road, get decent mileage, be realiable and not cost you 10-15k to build just the engine.