Bought this truck with the intention on cannibalizing it for my 79 Bronco & doing a resto-mod on the wife's 59 F100. Well, my Bronco needs a fuck ton of work. I beat the crap out of it for almost 20 years & then sold it. Dude let it rot more & then I ended up with it again in a very convoluted way. But regardless, it needs a looooooooot of body work. Then the wife decided she'd rather just restore her truck. Basically, she intercepted the LMC catalog and ditched my plan.

So that left me with a "mostly" good 79 one ton truck. Said my final words before making any decision. "Meh, fuck it" and started in on fixing the truck. So far it's been one cluster fuck after another.  Like any old truck is likely to be.  

So project Nevermore (factory paint code is Raven Black, if ya can't figure it out from that, read some classic literature), started out life as a not super common 1979 Ford F350 4x4.  The first year for a factory Ford 1 ton 4x4. Came with a 400 with a 2 barrel, T18 four speed, Np 205 t-case, & I think dana 60's front & rear. What I got is all that, but with a Dana 70-1u out back & a Dana 44 up front. Plus a lot of rust & a flat bed. Well, not really that much rust. But I'd originally bought the truck for the firewall & engine / trans. Didn't really care about the rest.

Pick up day, or there abouts.






The old 2 bbl Motorcraft is a worn out pile of crap. Leaks like a sive out of the accelerator pump, but this is an excellent running 400 aside from that.


Was an adventure getting it home. I'd highly recommend against using a uhaul trailer for a 1 ton dent side. Fit by an inch or so. Had a friend with a real truck help, no way my little Cj5 was pulling this.


Most the light actually work. On the front at least.


Right about this point is when I realized that the Bronco is a project for another day & the wife made up her mind as well. So I started to assess what I had and it's really not that bad. Body wise it's the usual Ford rust out places, floor pans are shot, one door has some rot, couple spots in the back of the cab, passenger fender was hit at some point.

Rockers & B pillars are good amazing enough.


Frame is a bit crusty but solid without any breaks I've been able to find.

Happy little bonus was the PTO drive attached to the T18, these damn things are expensive.  No idea what I'll do with it yet.



Test drive on the dirt road we live on (instead of a field) produced a nice ka klunk once in 3rd gear. I'm figuring U-joint or trans, are shit. U-joints are easy & I've been known to rebuild a manual transmission on the kitchen table (I will not attempt to rebuild an automatic though). No, what I got pissed me off. I knew th kid I got it from replaced the rear-end,  he said as much. The new u-bolts & not connected e-brake cables confirmed the statement.  He said he drove down the road & all was good.

Dishonest little bastard,  I'd have bought it anyway.  Didn't care about axles at that point. Oh well, it happens. The drive shaft, ring gear & at least pinion are shot and I've no clue what the drive shaft came out of, but there maybe 1/2" of engagement of the splines with the slip yoke. Plus the ears that's garbage.  


After noticing the excessive sloppiness in the rear pinion I pulled the cover & what did I find. Quality awesomeness!


These teeth aren't that bad. I'd run it for now.


Buuuuuuuuut....... damn it man! Full rebuild time.


Then a feller on another forum sold me a Dana 60 rear with a Detroit locker and it's matching Dana 44 front for cheap.  Less than the cost of a new locker.  They came out of a 79 f250, so I'm assuming around 4.10 gears probably.  Gonna pick those up in a few weeks along with some other fiddly bits and bobs.  

In the meantime I've been plinking away at what I can. Primarily tires, wheels, and lift.

Ordered five 35x12.50 r16.5 hmmwv take offs. 95% tread or better Goodyear Wrangler MTR & that was a pain in the ass. Put them on a set of plain jane steel wagon wheels.  Simple, sturdy, classic.






I've been out of the army for a long time, I'd forgotten how absolutely fuck annoying hmmwv tires are to mount. Literally no shop within 40 mile of me could get the damn things to seat & inflate.  Gave up & bought some radial tubes. Hopefully that'll work to stretch them out after a few weeks in the sun. Was that or buy another $1500 worth of hmmwv wheels with a re-centered kit.


Looks good.




Had planned on a 6" skyjacker lift kit with all the associated goodies, but unexpected bills ate into the budget.  So I got a 4" Rough Country kit for the now, with the intention of upgrading later.




That where it's at currently.  I've ordered new floor pans & cab mounts, but they've been held up by a steel supplier for over a month at this point. But in the meantime, go full redneck. Boxes work right?


I'm think that I may rob all the fancy MSD crap off of the 351m in the Bronco & use on the 400. With the exception of the efi parts. Those are long since gone. It'd be the distributor, brain box, preformer intake & headers. That motor is a piece of shit & I don't intend to use it.


With the intake I could use the Holley 4180 a buddy gave me that came off of a 74 ford 390.


Is it for the now.

Cool old truck.  Gonna be hard to find time to post obscure firearm gunsmithing in the MOHTF now!

Oh just you wait, I've got something nifty in the works. Couple somethings, parts be expensive though.

Nice.


Another place for parts is.
https://www.npdlink.com/

I have bought from them before.

You are ambitious!

I'm just a dumb hick out in the woods who enjoys turning wrenches & doing body work.  Plus this one doesn't really need all that much hard work done to it. Now the Bronco on the other hand, holy poop! Essentially the whole floor from the firewall to the tailgate is Swiss cheese & most the support structure as well.

Ordered some braided extended brake lines for the front & rear today.  Since stopping without the aid of a tree is nice.

So here's my end goal ambitions.  To make essentially what could have a Ford version of the Jeep M715. Granted they never came with tire this big.


I'd intended to keep the flatbed, but it's kinda clapped out & there's shit tons of flatbed trucks running around. Plus I've already got the perfect donor bed. I've got a spare M105 trailer sitting in the yard that's been used exactly once in the last 5 years or so.


I'm not sure yet exactly how I'm going to mount this combination up yet. But have grinder. Can weld.

Ive been eyeballing that same bed set up for my 1991 Fteenhundred.

You guys that know how to work on that stuff amaze me.

Cool project. I love the 1978/1979 Ford trucks.

Just about got the lift under him. Back is in & the front is 3/4 done. My fucking floor pans I ordered almost 2 months ago finally shipped. So hopefully I can start on body work next weekend.

Kid had best be able to jump.



Now on to steering, rear-end, & driveshafts.

OP, where in MO are you?  I have a 78 step side with 80,000 miles I'd like to sell that needs restoring

South central, near bull shoals lake.

There are times that I wish I wasn’t a teacher so I could have more than one project truck. I like the looks of the dentsides, and Raven Black.

I have my late-grandfather’s 1959 F-100 that I’m going to do a two-time with Raven Black and Gunsmoke Gray.

After you’re finished with both trucks, you should drive them to Pigeon Forge to the annual F-100 Grand Nationals.

Do you have any pics of your wife’s Fridge?

Got pictures.  


Original 292 Y-block.


Daughters Fridge.

Dang, I’ve not seen that many 1959s in one spot before.

Looking forward to seeing how those two and your dent progress.

OST for future progress. Cool thread.

Looks like a cool project, a Sterling 10.25 rearend out of a mid ‘90s f250 or f350 srw will slip right in there also, did this on a 78 f250 4x4 and it was a good upgrade. It’s a service truck with a bit of weight on it and the wheel bearings and brakes were bigger on it. The spring perches are same width.

Damn things finally made an appearance.  


Drivers side


Passenger side


Hopefully I can get started on the floors this weekend.

Awesome build. I'm learnin' quite a bit, too.

Why do the new pans have all those splits in them?
And great thread I enjoy a  good project

I've been told that's it to be able to form them to the actual shape of the floors easier since Tabco uses thicker material than pretty much anyone else. Thunk they said 16ga or 18ga material on the phone.  

I've only ever used cheap Chinese tissue paper patch panels before. So I'm reeeeeeeeeally hoping that these work out well as I've got a lot to do on the Bronco & prefer to buy American if I can help it.

The Bronco is a rusty gem.

Have you ever used the EMS Automotive out of Detroit for panels? I know they make several for the Fridges.

I've not personally used them as yet, but they're who I plan on going with once the fridges come up in the build list. They're YT videos impressed me with how they design their panels. A fair bit more money for some particular pieces, but they just look so much better built.


Today's task, rear drive shaft repair, time to deal with this broke turd. A smart man would just replace this, but ain't no one ever accused me of being smart



Gots to dig out all the old nastiness. Ya don't want inclusions or porosity in the weld repair.  Should round over any sharp corners or edges for good measure. I doubt that they would be stress risers, but why not. I then beat a piece of copper for a backer.





Come one!. Come all! Check out my super duper clutch welding set up. I used to have a shop & a small fabrication business, but the beer flu kinda fucked that up for me. Since we bought the new property & moved, I now have no shop or garage.  Soon though, just gotta build it first. Bought the generator specifically because it'd run my little Esab how I like power wise, granted this was the first time I've plugged in the welder since we got the generator.  


Flip & weld the backside.


Time to grind. Maybe today, maybe next weekend.  Fortunately I like doing metal finish work a lot.



This could have just been a waste of time, or it could have saved me about $500. Time will tell. Plus, I'm just really don't don't want to rebuild the front shaft yet. I fucking despise double cardan / CV joints.  Such a pain in the ass.

Great thread OP, these are what makes ARFCOM such a cool place.

Little bit of this & a little bit of that, and out pops a drive shaft.









Now I just need to order a new ring, pinion & the associated fiddly bits for the rear-end. Hopefully that'll be next Friday.

Sweet thread. I love the pic of how you want the finished build to look.

So in!

79 is one of my favorite Ford years. There's one here that's really tempting but I've already got too many bikes and a truck that don't run.

Very cool old truck OP. I thought all trucks this vintage came with the 435 np 4 speed.

I've owned close to 20 dent side Ford's over the years. Primarily with a C6 auto for a transmission, but with more than a few 4 speeds as well. Out of all of them, this is the first T-18 I've ever had. Everything else was a Np435. I thought that this one was an Np435 at first as well due the shift pattern with Revere being right & down like all Np435 are. Little did I know that in 78 or 79 the was changed to Revere being the the right & down rather than right & up.

But it's a factory transmission F code T-18.





I need tosit my ass down soon and design a front bumper. Gonna be chonky for a 12k winch & double as a catwalk to deal with engine work.

Need an exhaust system as well since I had to cut it off to get the new springs in. I know that I'm going to stick with the factory manifolds unless I find some shorty headers I actually like. The 351M/400 manifold flows a lot better than most. Probably 2-1/2" or 3" tube & dump it just behind the cab. Really can't make up my mind about the noise makers of the system.  I very generally always used glass packs like Cherry Bombs or Purple Hornies, but ive really come to like Flowmaster. Probably end up with glass packs.

Then on to addressing the fuel system.  I hate midship tanks & this one has a shield that is rusted to fuck & is quite literally held in with bard wire. No idea if the tank itself even holds fuel either & it takes up a ton of space.  So it's got to go. I was planning to do a regular old rear mounted fuel tank. Simple cheap & easy. But when discussing this with the Minister of Sex and Finance, the real plan was revealed. Turns out that unbeknownst to myself, I wanted an in cab fuel tank. Fortunately the cab tank for a 60's ford truck is pretty cheap & will fit. Mounting holes are different,  but since I've got no existing mounting bolts, I figure I can put them wherever the heck I want. Cutting a hole for the fill neck will likely be a bigger headache.  

Got to do door mirrors too, but ive got a solution for that already.  I've got a thing for west coast mirrors & little did I know that there was a set of rather nice west coast mirrors sitting in the floor of her 59 F100. So I get to fit them up.


And she added a huge future project last week as well. Makes this one look like small potatoes.

Awesome build, awesome goals. For the record, Ford high boys are my all-time favorite truck

Nice project!  My brother just picked up this '79 F350 Camper Special.  It's a cool vehicle for sure.

The right-and-down thing has confused a lot of people, including me on my ‘72. It started life with a C6 but somewhere along the way somebody swapped in a T18, which must have been taken from a later truck because I, too, thought it had an NP435 until I crawled underneath.

Like the color scheme.

Thats really sharp looking.

My father had some sort of early 70s Ford 150, it had the manual choke. It was meant as only a beater to take crap to the dump. That thing was tuff as hell but a real piece of shit with the manual choke. I have many fun memories of it and miss it. I think in the 2-3 decades we owned it, we changed the oil only once.

Well unfortunately rather than going home this weekend, I get to drive to Phoenix. So ain't no work getting done this week.  But the wife ordered a new ring and pinion / bearings, fuel tank & some other fiddly bits.

Got to work for two weeks and some more fiddly bits show up, just not all yet.







New ring & pinion & bearings.  Bought one of the fancy bearing pullers, but it's yet to make an appearance.  




Starting to address the exhaust as well. Need headers that I can't afford yet.

Nots my best work, but not my worst work either. I fucked up while trimming my patch pan, so I had to get creative & give it the ole hammer massage.  

Got most of the drivers floor pan in as well. Ran out of energy & death wheels.








Sprayed some primer on the passenger side.



Going with an in cab tank. Yes, I know most everyone hate them. But the wife likes them & I just don't give a shit either way.  They've got their benefits & drawbacks.  


And with the seat back in, even though I get to tack it right back out again. More rust repair.  That was with the tank behind it. I'm 6' tall & am at a comfortable distance from the wheel.


Ordered a set of fenderwell headers that should be here soon I hope. I hope to finish the floors next Friday & do the rear-end next Saturday.

Got a good bit done in the last couple weeks.  

Replaced the cab lights & that went easy, they're a direct replacement.  


Finally got the rear-end dealt with.  This thing was fucking mint!




Now it confused me for a bit because I couldn't find the chunky broken bits. No idea how, but they were picked up & fed up the oil channel & ended up between the pinion bearings.




The new bearing puller is flipping awesome!  Pinion and carrier bearings pulled in maybe a few minutes.  Well worth the money.  










Carrier bearings need the supplied spacer to push on.


And press on the new bearings like normal. No need for setup bearings since the fancy pants bearing puller doesn't damage anything if you've got to pull a bearing for shim pack reasons.  






Pattern didn't come out to bad, probably could have gone with a few thousand more pinion stick out. But it's acceptable with .005" run out.








And I got all artistic and shit.


This weekends chore was exhaust & shocks. Had the wife soak the manifold bolts with balster during the week & they all came out but one.













And an adjustable drag link.  

I don't know anything about in cab fuel tanks other than stories form old timers who seemed to generally dislike them. Were they an option on 79's? I feel like I've seem them mostly on older trucks. Is there usable room behind the seat? That's precious area in a single cab

For the most part no, cab tanks weren't an option in 79. Some cab & chassis truck might have had them, but probably not many.

Seems the biggest dislike of cab tanks is the sound of sloshing gas & a gas smell. Maybe a fire hazard in a wreck too. I've seen rear mounted tanks crack and burn too.

Let us see now, what all have I done on this cluster fuck in the last month. I have fought little shit constantly & in an incredibly aggravated manner, but it been all bad.

My buddy from Kentucky came by one weekend needing assistance with  re-gearing for the Jeep I sold him. I sold the fucked so that I didnt have to work on it anymore, but I'm still working on it damn it! But he did bring ford goodies, parts for a future project and this little gem. It's virtually mint.



Then it was onto brakes. I'd bought new rear hard lines & drop line a while back, but hant gotten around to them, because I fucking hate doing drum brakes. Which was foolishness, these are about the easiest drum brakes I've ever done. I replaced everything including the wheel cylinders & hard lines. The new drums are still sitting on the porch, but at least I've got them right...... I think that I'll convert them to disk brakes the next time around.





And that's where shit started going sideways. I don't typically ever care about a parking brake, but for whatever reason I have with this one. So I've keep the cables up, out of the way & in good shape. Remember how this rear axle is out of an 83 something or other? I never quite caught onto that one cable is about 2' longer than the other. I needed 2 that are shorter than either one that I've got. So I spent 3 weeks waiting on new cables, which are currently sitting on the afore mentioned drums on the porch.

Then I made the mistake of figuring out the lights. I would like to say that I work a lot, like 70 to 80 hours or more a week & I get Saturday off and that's it. So I'm always tired & rushed. I do stupid shit & I despise electrical on top of that.
Well first off there was exactly nothing coming out of the blinker switch. So after consultation with smarter people than me, I replaced it. And nothing. Let's replace all the fuses. And nothing. Let's clean all the grounds. And taillights, sorta kinda when they happen to feel like it. And let's replace all the light sockets and bulbs. And what the fucking fuck. Taillights work, but the front running lights are a no, left blinker causes the roof lights to flash as well, the right blinker  has the head lights all wonky, the 4 ways have the roof lights flash too. But hey, the brake lights work. I couldn't figure this shit out at all & none of the Ford forums I'm on had any help either past "you're getting feedback from something", we'll no fucking shit. I said fuck it! It's an old farm truck, the wiring has been hacked (except that it hasn't)  & I'll just replace the whole harness. So $900 later I've got a nice brand new American Autowire wiring harness sitting on top of the safe that I don't particularly need. Let's go back to those sockets that I replaced. I replaced them on the Bronco many many years ago & they always worked right. So a reasonable man would check the wire colors before installing some new sockets right, which I did. White to white,  black to black & red to brown. I hooked the truck up the same way, just like any reasonable man would right. I even swapped the red & black wires around trying to figure it out. I've messed with a lot of these trucks, I know that the black wire is ground, the brown wire is power, the white wire with a blues stripe is the indicator wire & white goes to the fucking white wire damn it! Except that the little Chinese dude who designed the new sockets didn't get the damn memo. Before I ripped out the harness I  decided to flip the red & white wires....... and everything worked like it should & all was right with the world. I still haven't found the ratchet I threw in frustration.  I'm sure the lawn mower will find for me.

It really is a nice harness / dust collector though.

So move along to the first ride down the road. I went to the car wash and it sucked.

Going down the the first big hill, those nice new brakes found an air bubble & decided that they were on coffee break. My fuel pump crapped out & the card was discovered to literally held together with RTV & is one giant damn vacuum leak. As well as the ignition system being about as weak as I've ever seen one & still work, sorta.
Killed the battery cranking on it & the wife drives a Prius, so no jump starting off of that one.  The car wash is on maybe to only level ground around here, so no popping the clutch. Tow trucks are ridiculous around here. So a new battery & gravity feed gas for the win, with a side of please stay together carb. But we made it home.

So whether I wanted to or not, I took the fancy parts off the Bronco, because I'm tired of buying crap.


First up, new fuel pump. And damn it man, some people need to learn that RTV is a privilege & not a right. I think there's a gasket in that mess.



I think more & more that this truck sat for a good long while, or was just neglected.  I've owned a lot of these dent side Ford's over the years and I have wrenched on even more. I've never once had a distributor snap off before & be absolutely seized up right good & solid. Since was in a good cussing and throwing shit mood at this point, I soaked it down with Free All & Kroil. Then went in and made salsa, I cook when I'm pissed off & one can never have too much salsa.  


So it soaked Saturday night, Sunday, Monday and part of yesterday while I made a run to Dallas and St Louis.  I got home early enough yesterday to mess with it. Pulled the radiator, steering pump, coolant neck, fan & the water pump pully. And after the gentle ministrations of an 18" pipe wrench and a 3' cheater bar, the little fucker came out.
I was think corrosion was the problem, but no. O-ring failure let crud it. Change your O-rings people, it is a maintenance item.



And shiny MSD & timing fun times.

Sounds like some of my high school adventures.

Ditto.

The funny part of it is that when I was in high school & my 20's, I would have happily part someone to have worked on my vehicles. But couldn't afford it.  Now that I'm older & could afford to pay someone to work on them, I'm to much of a cheapass to pay someone.

Glutton for punishment I am.

79 F250 2wd. Supposed to be a 400 backed up with a C6 & a limited slip Dana 60 out back with 3:54 gears. Needs a tune up, a good brake job, windshield, & a passenger side exhaust manifold gasket. Got most of that sitting here already.

Drove it 80 ish miles homes across the top of Arkansas up into Missouri, which ain't exactly flat or straight. Took about 1/4 tank (about 5 gallons). Stopped on the way and got a windshield coming to a glass shop, $300 installed. Probably another $300 in the tune up / brake job, so there'll be $2600 in it.

Are you me? Am I in the matrix?

What’d you use to clean that yoke bore up? Some kinda tool or a die grinder and patience?