i bought a 2013 f250 diesel crew cab that had been in an accident previously,i know your thinking why the hell did you do that!! Everything looked good and I took it to ford dealer and told them it was in an accident and check it out, and they said everything looked good. Brought the truck to a local mechanic, put it on the lift said it looked good. Six months later I went to put a plow frame on it and found out the frame is bent. The shop had a hell of a time getting the frame on . The plow frame sits crooked and it's a pain in the *** to put the plow on. I live in SE PA and I'm having trouble even finding a place that is able to put a truck this big on a rack, being it is a crew cab it's a few inches too long . I found one guy but he tried to convince me not to do it because I'd be plowing with the truck and the frame is compromised and could be easily damaged if i hit a curb or something while plowing. Anyone have any thoughts?

 

Superduty frames have a splice point behind the front wheels just ahead of the cab body mounts. Duck your head under and you'll see the C section of the frame is doubled and there's 3 crappy little welds and 5, 1/2" rivets holding each rail together. It's basically made to be replaced. You can get the whole front section of the frame new from Ford for about $900, iirc. Sucky job to swap it out, but you actually have to do minimal disassembly to do it. I'll be giving it a go this weekend.

 

I guess it depends how bad the frame is out of whack. Straightening a frame is pretty commonplace in the Auto body business, you just may have to do some calling around to find someone that can do it.

As for the plow, honestly as I said before it is really going to depend a lot on how bad the frame is. There are plenty of guys here that have plows and some that do it in the winter season and do landscaping and parking lot/paving etc in the summer who should be able to help answer the questions you have with respect to the plow end of the equation

 

[QUOTE=FractureCritical;16840741]Superduty frames have a splice point behind the front wheels just ahead of the cab body mounts. Duck your head under and you'll see the C section of the frame is doubled and there's 3 crappy little welds and 5, 1/2" rivets holding each rail together. It's basically made to be replaced. You can get the whole front section of the frame new from Ford for about $900, iirc. Sucky job to swap it out, but you actually have to do mdisassembly to do it. I'll be giving it a go this weekend


Let me me know how it goes, and what kind of hours are in the job. I realize it all depends on the accident but do the frames usually bend further back when it's in a decent collision?

 

Find a proper Frame repair shop..

ones with the proper power equipment.. lts like a 1-2 hour job.
try a truck/trailer shop.

they fix them as well.

stop going to a Car shop.. no help there. its a truck.
YES, most Ford dealerships are JUST car shops. just like Chevy and Dodge.

 

Yup, straightening the frame isn't a big deal. I'd call around to your local body shops and finding one with plenty of experience doing this.

 

[QUOTE=PJS29;16840783]Here are some pictures of the front frame section. You can see that the frame has a 27" long section that extends geyond the engine crossmember. These sections just hang out there with no additional cross member towards the front like other trucks have. IMO, that is vulnerable to any shock from an accident or ?? You can also see that the inside corner at the crossmember narrows and has rivets on one side. I have seen them bend at that section. So the question is, how bad was the frame bent, and how much stress was imposed on the rivets and that joint during the repair and accident. I have seen the rivets sheared off. Now, on the drivers side, the steering gear box mounts there, so it would have to be removed to inspect that joint. Fortunately, imo, the frame is pretty strong from the crossmember back. If the truck was hit hard enough, it can still do damage further back, and even diamond (knock the entire frame out of square).

I can write a whole essay on this, but I won't bother you with all that. IMO, The front frame cannot be straightened properly in 1 or 2 hrs, unless it is just being "straightened to fit". Apparently, in your case they did not straighten to fit a plow. The set up time, and removing all the truck parts that are in the way to properly inspect it would take more time than that alone. If it were my truck, I would want to have those frame sections, rivets, and joints well inspected before I started putting the stress of a plow on it.

 

[QUOTE=erikkloss;16841925]

I agree with this. for the cost of the replacement part, just replace the part. the frame behind the cradle is ridiculously strong, but the front part is explicitly designed to fail as a crumple zone in an impact. If Ford wanted it fixed, they wouldn't have designed a replacement part.

 

WOW, I did not know Ford designed a replaceable nose frame assembly...

NICE.

see what happens when you Retire..

 

here's what the replaceable chunk looks like. this is for a 1999-2004 F250-f550 with leaf springs. Naturally, the piece I need is discontinued, so I had to buy a clean one from a Tennessee scrap yard and get it shipped. wire brushing it and slathering it in rustoleum is just two days of joy I'd rather have skipped.

 

Thanks for the info! Do you know the amount of hours a job like this could take? I asked a local mechanic and he said ford probably has it listed as a 30-35 hr job. could that be right?

 

You should have asked here first. I have a nice undamaged frame from a burned 2003 truck that i am just going to scrap. I could have cut the front off for you.

 

did you scrap it yet?

 

No I didn't, but it won't work for your 2013. The picture I posted is another frame I have that is the same as the 2013, but I think I am going to hold onto that one for now.

 

I did!
about a month ago I posted up to see if anyone had done anything like this before and got nothing but crickets.


At a minimum, save that frame chunk. sooner or later, someone is gonna play whack-a-curb with a plow and they're gonna need that frame. At the other end, save the whole frame if it's good. OBS ford and even older Dodge guys like to use our frames for swaps on their own rotted out rigs