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Just found a "small block" ZF 5-sp. I guess this is the rare-er of the bunch, Most ZF's were big block?
Got it from a guy who was told it fit the 460...well it fits my 351 quite nicely (in the future)
Here are some pics of a Free Wheeling Edition that I came across with original paint. The stripes and FORD lettering on the tailgate were gold, on black paint. Wish I'd saved a few more actually.
You can see the thick / thin stripe widths pretty well in these:
Tough to see in the picture of the front, but the stripes don't come out the full width of the hood. They follow the angled hood line just outside of the "D" in FORD - you can see it if you look carefully.
An old hood that I have still has marks where the special edition striping was. If there are any good visible spots left we may be able to measure the stripe widths. Will check (it's at the garage, don't have access tonight)
Following this thread with interest by the way! Thinking of doing mine this way when it's finished too.
This is my first old vehicle restoration, having fun finding things out and threads like this help with the "truck archeology"... hmm... truckeology?
I'm not a huge fan of how the rectangular outline on the tailgate sits higher than the stripes on the fenders, and was thinking of just doing the FORD letters without the stripes on the gate.
Thanks for the pics. I didn't notice the different alignment of the tailgate box until you mentioned it. Does look a little odd. I guess that is the decision between correctness and personal taste. The style side trucks had a stripe at the door handle level that is missing on flareside trucks because that body line does not continue. I wonder if it is at the same height, and if adding it to the cab and front fenders would tie it together??? If you get a chance to examine the hood, could you see where the stripes end near the cowl? I can see the hood stripes pretty well in some of the other pictures but it's hard to tell how far they go because of the angle. Are you keeping the black and gold scheme? Not sure how I want to do mine... I'm way into creative license land putting freewheel stripes on a crew cab.
Interesting idea, about the door handle level body line. If you're right, that would tie it in with the tailgate well... on the other hand, the flareside fenders on the box look a bit lowered if you don't accent the body line that flows on the fenders through the cab side.
The freewheel stripes on a crew cab would be really cool! It's sort of a "what if" scenario, and keeps in the spirit of the truck's history imo.
I may be making a bit too much of the box on the tailgate. This morning when I'm looking at the pics, they look pretty good
My truck will be black when finished. I'm debating just leaving it all black, and living with it for a little bit before adding the freewheel stripes - think this truck below looks just awesome.
Later can add the freewheel stripes just on the body side but leave off the tailgate stripe for a while. Can always add those later too
Interesting idea, about the door handle level body line. If you're right, that would tie it in with the tailgate well... on the other hand, the flareside fenders on the box look a bit lowered if you don't accent the body line that flows on the fenders through the cab side.
The freewheel stripes on a crew cab would be really cool! It's sort of a "what if" scenario, and keeps in the spirit of the truck's history imo.
I may be making a bit too much of the box on the tailgate. This morning when I'm looking at the pics, they look pretty good
My truck will be black when finished. I'm debating just leaving it all black, and living with it for a little bit before adding the freewheel stripes - think this truck below looks just awesome.
Later can add the freewheel stripes just on the body side but leave off the tailgate stripe for a while. Can always add those later too
You know all the ideas they had back then were not all good. I guess it's personal taste, but I didn't like all those stripes back then when they came out. It would be period correct, but I would not put them on my truck. I like the clean look of the plain black truck. The plain Custom trim level trucks always caught my eye more than any of the other higher level trucks with some sort of trim down the side. I remember back then a guy I worked with had a Custom truck with the higher level Ford mag wheels on it, and it was a sharp truck.
Took a look at the hood today. Stripes look to be about 3/32" (small one) and 5/32" (larger one)
They run all the way back to the back of the hood, but I don't have the cowl unfortunately so not sure if they went back onto the cowl or not.
Here is a tight photo of what's left of the hood stripe. Wish I'd done a wide view also, but so you can picture what you're looking at: The hood is sitting on it's nose and this shot is of the drivers side of the hood, just ahead of the cowl / windshield. Imagine looking down on the hood, right ahead of the driver. You can see the drivers side hinge at the top of the photo
The wide stripe is on the outside and the stripes follow the angled hood line.
I like that truck too, who's is it again? I've seen it before.
Here's the rebuild thread on that truck - it's NickMobile67 from New Jersey... he's since added red tailgate letters. His truck originally had the freewheel stripes also. Tires are 32s
Thanks for the pic SCFlareside, I know exactly what I'm looking at in that view of the hood and it is very helpful. Thanks.
Originally Posted by SCFlareside
Took a look at the hood today. Stripes look to be about 3/32" (small one) and 5/32" (larger one)
They run all the way back to the back of the hood, but I don't have the cowl unfortunately so not sure if they went back onto the cowl or not.
Here is a tight photo of what's left of the hood stripe. Wish I'd done a wide view also, but so you can picture what you're looking at: The hood is sitting on it's nose and this shot is of the drivers side of the hood, just ahead of the cowl / windshield. Imagine looking down on the hood, right ahead of the driver. You can see the drivers side hinge at the top of the photo
The wide stripe is on the outside and the stripes follow the angled hood line.
You know all the ideas they had back then were not all good. I guess it's personal taste, but I didn't like all those stripes back then when they came out. It would be period correct, but I would not put them on my truck. I like the clean look of the plain black truck. The plain Custom trim level trucks always caught my eye more than any of the other higher level trucks with some sort of trim down the side. I remember back then a guy I worked with had a Custom truck with the higher level Ford mag wheels on it, and it was a sharp truck.
You know, I was wondering about this. These trucks do seem to be quite rare and I am wondering if it was just a popularity thing, (i.e. no one cared for them when they came out?) Or was the package just ridiculously priced? Or did Ford just make a very limited number of them as a limited edition thing? There were not many XLS trucks either. I definitely understand it is a different taste and I fully expect some flack for it. Still, it is a lot more subtle than the reflective chromatic striped Bronco and Pick up trucks. Now that is a lot of "style"!
Oh holy cow I didn't realize they were reflective! That's so awesome it's almost... groovy
That Bronco actually looks pretty good, and to your point I don't even remember seeing those back in the 80s. I bet a custom paint shop would have a hoot with that gradient sunset paint scheme.
Someone else posted in another thread, and highlighted that the interest rates were very high in the early '80s, which made these trucks a bit less common than the average F150 in a given year. Franklin 2, you put it well when you said that not all ideas they had back then were good ones. By the time the late '80s rolled around, these trucks would have really looked... well, "70s-ish" and I'd bet some repaints made them plain.
All the above is just conjecture without any real facts of course.
I wonder if / when the '80s trucks are going to see a bit of an uptick in value like the early-mid '70s trucks are doing. You make a bood point about the freewheeling edition, it's rare enough to see a bullnose in really great shape let alone one with "correct" graphics.
