I picked up a former plow truck a few days ago, the price was right for a 4x4 diesel with a manual transmission and aluminum flatbed so it followed me home.
This thread will detail my repairs and mods to turn a rusty POS into a reliable farm beater/tool hauler/backup daily on the cheap. Bear with me as I work 40-50 hours a week and the weather hasn’t been cooperating lately so this may take some time
Truck specs:
F350 cab and chassis
Single cab dually
6.0 Powerstroke
ZF-6 manual transmission
301k on the odometer, heat and A/C work well, drivetrain is solid.
First thing it needs is a power steering line replaced- it leaked about 1.5 quarts in my 45 minute drive home.
Batteries- the old ones were Interstate and 27 months old so my local dealer replaced both for free. I suspect a significant drain but for now I’m just going to put disconnects on both positive cables.
Up-pipes from the manifold to the turbo need replaced as the truck builds zero boost and has the typical screech and exhaust fumes in the cab. I still held 60mph in 5th gear but only on flat ground. Don’t confuse the up-pipes with the charge pipe that’s seen in the picture, those like to blow the boots off under hard acceleration which sounds like a 12 gauge under the hood
Front bumper and plow mount are junk, I have a winch bumper that will be replacing that mess. Already rounded a few nuts off so I’ll just be torching all the bolts out. I actually have extractors and penetrating oil that would probably work but ain’t nobody got time for that
Interior is pretty decent other than the console, just needs cleaned up. It’s an XL trim truck so it has the vinyl seats/floor, crank windows, and manual 4x4 shifter (GD’s favorite truck)
Other things I plan on doing in the future:
straightening one corner of the bed up (jackknifed trailer)
repainting the wheels
cutting rockers and cab corners out and hitting all the raw edges with undercoating
undercoating the front of the frame, oil pan, and steering linkage
straight pipe (still has the cats and muffler
)