Thanks Andy! I hope to have some soon. You have a very good point there. It will be very interesting to see how the truck reacts with the AOD and the low geared rearend. I suppose, if I can't find a suitable rearend now I could always swap one in later. The truck will definitely been an in town/parade/business marketing truck.
So what are your opinions on welding up the holes on the frame???? There are a few holes that were not factory made that I had planed to weld up, but what about the factory holes?? Weld them up or leave them alone??
Well have to say I love finding this thread. I have rebuilt a 1948 F4 in a 3 year restoration and am glad to see some other folks out there that love this ol truck as well. I just joined the site today and loaded a few quick photos of of mine and will continue to add on.
I looked at your photos and wow! that is a great looking truck!! I can't wait to get the one I'm working on looking that good. I plan to get back working on it tonight so hopefully I'll have some progress pics in a few days. btw - be sure you introduce yourself in the "New to the HAMB" form.
Anyone know anything about the 1948 F4 Flathead? How does it compare with a 59AB? I seem to recall that the trucks used a 59L block and there was also a 59Y used in industrial applications. Can anyone verify that?
Alright, I'm getting back to the F4. I'm starting to "walk" my way around the frame to "fix" any issues that have been bugging me. I'd like to get this thing in paint or powder coat soon so I want the frame looking as good as I can get it. I started by knocking out the rest of the broken rivets. It's amazing how "stuck" those things can get! Next I wanted to fill in some of the holes. I'm not going to weld up all of the holes but just a select few; mostly holes that were drilled into it at some point in its past with the exception of the following holes. Before I started working on the truck someone had installed a power steering head of unknown Ford origin and modified the frame to make it work which included creating a new hole for the steering head to poke through for the pitman arm. So, I decided to weld up the original hole. I still need to grind down my welds but I'm out of sanding discs. The larger hole was made for the new power steering head.
Love watching all your progress pictures, awesome job. I am in the processing of re staining my bed. didn't like the tint of stain as it was, watch I will redo it and decide i liked it better the way it used to be.
Thanks bs3833! I'm glad to get back on the F4. I'm so ready to see some good progress of things going back together. What kind of wood did you use on your truck? I have a metal stake bed frame for the F4 that was made using an original Ford script bed as a pattern but haven't even thought about what type of wood to use for the floor. Guess I have a while before I get to that point. Hey, would you do me a favor and take some pictures of how the fuel line runs from the bottom of the gas tank and up to the motor on your truck? When I was running the fuel line on my F4 I wasn't sure the best way to route it and I really don't like the way it turned out. I'd like to see how the factory did one and model mine after that. thanks David
well i just bought me a BIG old ford truck.dont look as good as yours but thats ok cause it dont run either.lol got a 429 and a 460 and one of them is going in there.maybe.so ill be watching this alot more.
Outlaw, sounds like you have a nice project on your hands too! The ole 429/460 should be "adequate" to get her moving.
we are going to make a dovetail car hauler out of it.maybe lol so i thought it should have a bigblock in there to help her on down the road. how would you like to build another big ol ford truck.lol cause i aint really lookin forward to doing it.
Oh man, that would be a sweet car hauler. As soon as I get finished with this one, sure, bring yours on down and we'll "git'r done!"
Nice job on the welding! I think you're doing the right thing by welding up all the unnecesary holes, keep up the good work.
Thank you. Yeah, I've pondered whether to weld them all up or not. It's amazing how many holes a frame has!!
I took some pictures of the fuel line route but am aging trouble uploading them. I will try with some help tomorrow.
Well, I've spent a couple evenings figuring out which holes in the frame I want to leave and which ones I want to fill in. I have the driver's side frame rail pretty much done so I'm gonna start on the passengar side next. I'm sure the factory had a reason for so many holes but boy it sure looks better when you fill 'em in. I talked with a local powder coater last week so I'm trying to get all of the frame and suspension pieces prepped for powder coating and so I was looking for a sand blasting cabinet I could use to prep some of the smaller items. I took the day off yesterday to get new tires put on my wife's ride so after that was done I went to the Hobby Shop on Eglin AFB and low and behold they had a blast cabinet! So I rushed back home, boxed up some stuff and headed back out to the base to start blasting. My excitement was cut short though. Whoever cleaned the frame before I got it sprayed some red primer stuff on there that is tough as nails!!! After an hour in the blast cabinet, I barely scratched the stuff!! Not sure what I'm gonna do now since you can't powder coat over primer/paint.
Still filling in a bunch of extraneous holes in the frame but ran out of welding wire. In the mean time my boys found a good use for the frame, Monster Truck obstacle course! I guess that's one way to get the kidos involved.
Great thread. I'm doing an F1 right now so interested in your progress. You're doing a great job. BOutlaw
Finally figured out my problem and loaded the pictures. Not real sure if they help or not. Love the picture of your boys. Just got done re staining my bed.
Thanks Boutlaw!! I hope you'll start a thread on your F1. I recently finished helping a friend with a '50 F1; I sure do like those trucks. If there's anything I can help you with please let me know! I looked at your pics and they do help. The only other picture I'd like to see is how the fuel line is routed from the gas tank to the frame rail. On the F4 I'm working on there is a cross member right under where the fuel line exits the tank and I was just curious how the factory ran the fuel line.
No progress pics but I'm still plugging away at getting the frame prepped for powder coating. Hopefully I'll have some post worthy pics in the near future.
Well, I think I have all the holes in the frames rails filled that I want to fill. The sides of the frame looks like it has the measels or something with the patches of shiney metal down its length. Next up is figuring out how to mount some tail lights but I plan on taking a few pictures of my thoughts and get you guy's opinions/thoughts.
Ok, I worked on the tail light mounting tonight. I'm using some of my initial thoughts on how to best mount the tail lights. The owner of the F4 likes the '53-'56 Ford truck tail lights and he wanted the polished stainless ones. As I mentioned early on in this thread, several inches of the frame rails were removed at some point in the trucks past and I removed just a little bit more only to square up the ends. So here's where I'm at. I cut some angle iron and drilled some mounting holes for the tail light brackets. The following are several pictures of how I'm thinking of mounting the tail lights. Sorry for the pics, I had a hard time getting the camera to focus given the evening time. Your thoughts? Keep in mind the stake bed will extend past the end of the frame rails probably a couple of feet.
The other thought I had was to find some C-channel that would span the distance between the frame rails, sort of like another frame cross member and mount the tail lights directly to it. If I go with the angle iron brackets as pictured above, I was thinking of drilling holes through the frame rail and weld the bracket to the frame rail with some rosette welds and then put some dummy rivet heads on the outside of the angle iron.
Do you have a rear shot of the truck? If so, post it and a good shot of one of the lights and I can photoshop whatever you have in mind. Maybe a few different positions might help pin it down.
The Jalopy Journal
