I will have to admit, I have never been a Ford fan. Being a Acura/Honda Mechanic for the pas 17years, Ford trucks - not my thing! But so the story goes - Growing up my whole life my Grandfather had this truck, big old blue ford pickup. Always in the garage at his shop. I had ridden in it a few times as a young kid. But never much, it was his work truck. Well about 8 years ago, my grandfather passed away. My grandmother was still alive at the time, and she kept his shop, and of course his truck. Now then I was 29 or so. I had the chance to drive the truck when she was doing some work around her house. I loved it. No lie, was a great thing to me. Well grams passed away a couple years later, and so my aunt inherits the shop, the truck etc.. So for the past 5 years, my aunt has had this truck, this big blue truck.. At a graduation party recently I was talking with my aunt and I hear the words - I think its time I got rid of grandpas truck. Well that had my attention for sure. I said hey, Ive wanted that truck for a long long time. She kind of took it in passing and we continued on with our party.

2 weeks later, she calls (very rare) and goes on to tell me that she had thought about it, and sees it fitting that I get the truck, I am a mechanic, I can fix it, and I can appreciate its part in my families life. So I set up sometime to stop at her house and drive the truck to its new home.

I get there, we take pictures, go for a ride. All original 58k split rims, and a bit scary to drive. I mount the plow, make sure fluids are full. I see its leaking, but I am driving this puppy home, all 60miles! Ballsy I know! I made it fine. some fuel leaking (carb issue) an some moderate oil leaks. Safe an sound to my garage.

Heres a pic - and I will have a million questions as I go forward with pulling the drivetrain to reseal everything.. And the power steering issues, which from what I have been reading can be a challenge to figure out whats what and where it came from.



Purchased new Oct 1969 - F250 Highboy 360 4speed - Added Fisher Plow and 2piston dump running off the NP435 PTO setup Utilizing the factory bed - just reinforced.

David

 

Awesome truck!...and story. Good luck.

 

Man, that's great! You need to write that down and put it in the "truck file".

 

nice truck! looks to be in awesome shape.

 

That's a great story and a good looking truck. Enjoy and welcome to FTE!

 

Welcome to the forums. Wow...lucky guy! Nice set up. Is it as clean underneath as it appears? Looks to be a real bare bones model with the lack of any trim.

 

Welcome to FTE. Nice truck, looks like your grandpa kept it up and clean too.

 

Welcome to FTE and the Bumpside Kingdom.
And Welcome to the world. Great place to be. As said above, that is a real nice truck and Cool story. I have a sneaky suspicion you'll make Grandpa proud. He will be smiling down at you from above.

 

its pretty clean under carriage. It saw it's share of New England winters but was always garage kept. Has it's share of rust. Nothing crazy. The lower of the body all the way around has some light pitting. Biggest spots are at the front of the doors. Nothing serious but need attention. It wasn't treated to a great deal of proper mechanical work. I don't think the mechanic that had been working on it for a long time was all that great. But it's all fixable. I'm pretty meticulous so i will make it right..

 

That is an awesome truck and a great story. I also have a 1970 Highboy with the same 360/4spd/np435 setup. It is certainly a task to crank the wheel at slow speeds, backing up, etc. Power steering would be really nice. I'm curious to hear about how yours is setup.

You should look around on Craigslist and pickup a set of wheels off of an econoline van. I can't recall the last year, but you can use the rims off of vans up to 2008 or 09 (I think - someone else may know). You can use 250/350 wheels up to 1997 but I found them hard to come by. I bought a great condition set of 4 wheels of a mid-2000s van for $100. I did pick up a couple junkyard wheels at first, but they were in pretty rough shape and were still like $25 apiece. Unfortunately, none of the newer Super Duty wheels fit, so factory take off options are limited.

Do you know which front axle the truck has? I would think the original would be a closed knuckle Dana 44 (D60 in the back). Also, does it still have the drums up front?

 

I found a set of 97 f250 steels with tires for $300 new tires locally pretty quick and easy luckily. That's solved. Not sure on the power steering yet. When I pull the engine this coming Monday for the reseal the power steering will be investigated. Yes all drum. More info to follown soon

 

Go here:
Read First: 4X4 Power Steering Swap Articles
TigerDan


And here on page 2. Posts #21 & #22.


Read First: Technical Info Hyperlink Compilation ( 1 2) HIO Silver

 

I read both of those through, still no help on the system I have. Will keep digging. Very helpful info there though. As far as axles I don't know yet. Will learn all that as I tear it down. I pulled the grill and bumper today. As well as my plow mount. Only have 2 bolts holding the rad support in now. Getting ready to pull the motor this weekend when i have the time. After that is when the real digging and work comes in. Here's a few pics to show where I am at and what I've found.. going to be looking for a replacement rad support!!

Grill and lights off
Bumper and lower valance off
Pretty heavy hidden rot to the rad support. Left side is worse but right side has rot as well so time to find a new support

 

I can tell you that has been replaced before. That one is not from a 67 to 72 F100 to F350 unit. Also looks like it has a 1974 to 76 power ram steering installed.

 

how can you tell? The steering ram is on the passenger side not pictured.. and the spare hole in the rad support is cut through to add in the hydraulics and cables for the plow set up.. just curious on what I'm seeing/missing need to know as I go forward and buy parts..