'71 "F200" SWB PROJECT

[mc33212]

Hello all! Well it's been a while that I've been wanting to post, ever since I joined the site, but another baby girl later and a new house and I'm just picking up my truck project again. The best part is my new place has a separate 1-car garage I'm turning into my shop. That's made it A LOT easier for me to work.

So my truck is a 71 F100 SWB Ranger. It was my dad's truck when we were growing up but wound up sitting for over 5 years, not running. I decided to do a "mild" rebuild and put it back to work, especially since I sold my daily driver pickup. The idea behind the build is to keep it simple and reliable, with the focus on keeping it a "work" truck....or as much work as can be done in urban Phoenix.... LOL. As an added incentive, my brother picked up a 67 SWB he's turning into a hot rod...so the challenge is on!

Here's the truck when I picked it up:

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A new gas tank, new brake lines, rebuilt carb, new fuel lines, new spark plugs, a battery later.....I was able to start her up!

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And then the real work begins. The truck is essentially a hodge podge of parts. I think everything on it has been removed and replaced at one point in time. The VIN says FE motor and C6....it's got a 302 and a C4 now. The doors are not correct, they are 67 doors, not 71. It HAD A/C at some point, but the under dash assembly is gone. It does have power brakes and power steering...that's been a big help. But brakes are drums all the way around and pulls hard to the left when applied. Plus a wheel cylinder blew in the rear and bled out. So no rear brakes. Time to layout a plan.

[mc33212]

Next step was to get some parts. The cab supports, lower rockers, fenders, cab floor, sills are all rusty. I'm surprised the cab doesn't sink into the mounts or that my foot doesn't go through the floor. After checking junkyards and Craigslist I decided to buy a whole parts trucks. I found a 72 F250 Camper Special with a good cab, good front clip and a LOT of extra parts. Plus it had an underbed gas tank which is something I'd like to convert mine to.

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So brought the truck home and started taking a look at the parts. Once I sort out everything I may post some up here for others. I've got a lot of side trim, headlight doors, some clusters (including F600) and other assorted items.

[mc33212]

Back to my F100...I started looking at the braking situation first. Like most people here, I don't have a ton of money or a ton of time, so my first choice is using what I've got available and as many stock parts as possible. After owning 3 "sport trucks" over the years, I wanted to get slightly larger tires on it, 33 or 35s, with a small lift. So with larger tires, I definitely wanted to make sure it stopped well. I looked at the standard disc brake swap options for up front and wasn't entirely satisfied with the size of the brakes available on Dentside trucks. I didn't want to go aftermarket, so I went ahead and decided to use the big disc brakes from my Camper Special. The beams on my F100 were bent to heck anyways and both trucks had the same power steering gearbox, so I figured it would be a bolt in affair. Plus, I think I saw someone else on this forum with a short bed and 3/4 ton drivetrain and I liked the look.

So out with the old drum brakes:

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And here's the front end assembly out of the F250:

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[motzingg]

wow

i've had the same idea about the massive 250 disk front end, can't wait to see how this ends up!

if you're going to go disc, seems like the easy way to do it is swap the beams and everything from the 250 and not screw around.

Might be able to swap in some big block front springs for a free lift, not sure if they had different springs for those but i know putting the V8 spings under a f100 six is good for 1.5 inches

[mc33212]

I was able to clean the crud off of the beams and brake hardware. Then I went ahead and gave the shield, and caliper mounting brackets a quick coat of paint.

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After that I installed the beam setup back in the truck with some Energy bushings at the axle pivot and the radius arm.

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The calipers though were junk. I took them all apart but they were rusted together and needed to be completely rebuilt. I'd bought a lot of brake stuff on RockAuto and saw they had a cheap price on calipers, so just went ahead and got new ones. The rest of the brake stuff (pins, bushings, springs) I was able to get at O'Reilly. The new calipers are NICE:

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[mc33212]

Hi motzingg, yeah it was a simple affair, I'm actually done with the swap and no issues. Now just trying to get you guys caught up! After all the help I've gotten from the site, it's the least I can do.

I looked at springs, and I've got some ideas. I'm working on the rest of the drivetrain first though.

[mc33212]

So something I COULDN'T get at O'Reilly was my rotors machined. I broke their machine........ Luckily by my work is a big fleet truck place. I took them my rotors and they machined them no problem. They were doing a school bus at the moment so I figured it'd be easy for them.

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These are the rotors installed:

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Then with the calipers:

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[mc33212]

So now I needed wheels. A quick search on Craiglsist yielded some stock Econoline 16s. I figured that would work for now. Here's a test fit of the wheel:

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It's amazing how little clearance there is for the rotor and caliper, but it all fits:

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And a set of used tires from my brother's Excursion:

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[mc33212]

After I got this far is when I wound up having to move! So in a hurry, I got new brake lines, bled the calipers and got her setup to move to my new place.

Here's the final stance of the truck with the new front end:

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I still only had front brakes operational, but I can attest to how well they stop. Getting up that ramp was a bit hairy with dry rotted rear tires!

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[motzingg]

ah man that is so perfect! exactly the look i'm going for, damn, now i really wanna grab that 250 front end... passed one up in the JY a couple months ago, really kicking myself now.

[mc33212]

So now I've been at my new place enough to get my shop space sorted out and I started working on the rearend. I figured I'd just go ahead and match the 8-lug front end with the Dana 60 out of my parts truck, plus the master cylinder and proportioning valve are already matched for that setup. So shouldn't cause any weird braking issues. There is the added weight issue....but then again it's not my daily driver and I'll let the Prius owners worry about getting the best fuel economy. Plus, the added beef should stand up to my heavy right foot. Althougth the 9" in my F100 though was no slouch either. It was actually equipped with the big bearing 9-3/8" axle, 3.54 gears and limited slip. But since I started the 8-lug swap, my brother asked to use in on his 67 SWB build. He'll need it behing that 460 motor......LOL.

So I go ahead and look at the VIN tag on my F250 part truck and got excited: 4.10s and a locker! Sweet! I go ahead and pull it. When I get it in my shop I notice something odd:

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First off the pinion is WAY OFF to the right, over 3.5" from centerline. Also, the drum brakes didn't look like the examples I had seen on this site or the parts shops. I find the Spicer manual and check the BOM code: 1979 Dodge Van.

I later found out that the stock Dana 60 would have been a 16 spline axle anyways, and this one was a 30 spline, which was a plus. Also, it was full width, 65", an I liked how the rear tires were flush with the front......but that pinion offset. Also, the brake line was on the wrong side and upon closer inspection I found they hadn't done a great job of relocating the spring perches and shock mounts either. None of that was insurmountable, but wanting to avoid pinion angle issues and keeping it in the Ford family, I decide to look for another axle.

[mc33212]

This time I decide to do my homework so I know what kind of axle to get. I decided if I'm spending money on one, it might as well be the same....full width and 30 spline. So that leads me to late 70s Dentsides. I hit a couple junkyards and was shocked the trucks I'd been hitting up for the last few months were all crushed!! I actually had a really hard time finding a yard with ANY 70s trucks at all. I finally find a place with a 79 F250 on the list, so I go check it out. Sure enough, it's an F250 Super Cab with a Dana 60. Man, that thing was buried under that truck though...also, I couldn't even read the diff tag or the BOM code (I brought the Spicer manual with me!). The other thing that worried me is it looked like it had been leaking....A LOT!

Well....I keep it in mind and as I'm walking out I find this:

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I figured I'm already WAY overkill with the HD front end....so if a Dana 60 is good, a Dana 70 is better, no??

The axle wass in an 84 F250, and it's the U model, which has the smaller, smooth case. So really it wasn't that much bulkier than the Dana 60 I looked at. Plus, this DID have 4.10 gears, a Powr-Lok, was 65" wide, had the right pinion offset and the added bonus of 35 spline axles!! It was already out of the truck, only the e-brake cables and one shock bolt holding it in. So for $150 bucks, I took it home.

[mc33212]

So as far as where I am now, I took the other 9" rear from my brother's truck and sold it for $100 bucks, so got some more seed money. I then went ahead and pulled the rear leafs and started looking at cleaning those up and getting new bushings.

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As far as the D70, I pulled the cover and checked the carrier and gears. Everything inside seemed in order. Also verified it had the Powr-Lok:

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And here are the massive 1.5" diameter, 35 spline axles:

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After that I was stuck waiting on a spindle nut socket. My local parts place didn't have it, but found it online for only $13 bucks. It's a special 2-9/16" Rounded hex socket.

[mc33212]

Well, the socket came in and began stripping the axle tube by pulling the hubs and drums. Here's a pic of the socket and the spindle, notice some broken lug studs I'll have to replace:

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After the drums and hubs came off, I wish I would have kept them on! It was pretty cruddy and rusted there too. Fortunately this 3" wide brake stuff was cheap as dirt. I got all the hardware new, along with the shoes, cables, nuts, etc.

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After that it was simply a matter of pulling off the old hardware, backing plates and brake lines. This shows the end result with the axle tube stripped down:

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[mc33212]

Then it was back to the brake shop. Not even trying O'Reilly, I just went straight back to the fleet truck service place and had my drums machined:

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While I was at it, I gave the backing plates and hubs a cleaning and shot them with a quick coat of paint:

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The next step was addressing the spring perch issue. Obviously the perches were going to be off, plus they were 3 inches wide, not 2-1/4". To make things a little harder, they are cast pieces, so cutting them off seemed like it was going to be a bit more difficult especially not having a torch. But....I do have a grinder, so between the grinding blade and a cut-off blade, I was able to get them off:

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I knicked the tubes a bit with the cut-off wheel, but I figured I did okay considering how hard it was to tell the axle tube from the solid cast perch. I figured that could be touched up with the welder once I get the new perches on there.

I went online looking for new perches and found that 2-1/4" wide springs weren't a very "popular" item. Seemed like most places had 2.5" wide spring perches for just about any axle tube combination available. Well I was not necessarily looking forward to replacing the springs and hangers for a 2.5" wide setup, especially considering stock replacement 2-1/4" springs are available. My brother just got a set for his 67 from General Spring. Instead, I just called a local fab shop and they are making me a pair.

If you DO need to find some online, Currie Enterprises makes a 2-1/4" wide perch for the Ford 9" and Dana 60s. Also, Ruff Stuff and Great Lakes had 2.5" wide perches for pretty much everything else. I verified with Great Lakes their perch runs a little narrow, more like 2-3/8" wide. I'm sure that minor difference would be tolearable.