Long story here but the truck sort of deserves it
Learned to drive on my grandfathers 71 longbed F-100 Heavy Duty Special (1/2 ton 302/C-4, with 16 inch rubber and cowl tags) If anyone has any info on the "Heavy Duty Special" I'd be very interested, the tags look like Camper special badges, but say Heavy Duty. I have never seen another, and my grandfather bought the truck new
He left it to me when he passed and I drove it for years. Eventually, the kid in me put it on a 4x4 360, 4 speed frame, and lifted it. This picture is from the 80's, hockey puck body lift, headers, and glasspacks LOL
As I got older, we hot rodded it, and sort of restored it, added a stout 390 and lost the kid stuff. This is about 2 yrs, maybe 3, after the prior pic. Its really tight and clean in this pic, literally show ready but used every day as a work truck, this would be about 1988 as a guess
Then the bed rusted out and I couldn't find a good long bed body, so in 1990 or so, I found a perfect short box, and shortened the frame.
I don't have any pics, but you'll get a little peek in down below. We did a lot of lengthening and shortening heavy equipment for oil trucks, over the road diesels, etc, so this was a no brainer, done on a weekend and we made sure the frame was straighter and stronger than Ford ever made it
I ran that truck until mid 95 when I joined the Air Force, it worked its whole life, had gone from a 302, to a 360, to a built 390, even nitrous and a Predator carb with 35 inch tires for a while.
It ran high 14 sec 1/4s, and would tow a buddy on a trailer to the track then beat him LOL
Flash forward 12 years, the truck had been put away all this time, and I kept "meaning to go get it", my dad came on some tough times and it got kicked out of his garage and was covered with leaves. It would have surely been junk if I didnt go get it. Its back home with me and its sort of amazing how much I missed it. Although time took its toll, I will have some work to do.
I had to use my 08 PSD to go get it, and now I can afford to bring it to the same standards. My wife is excited, and I am too.
Here is the pic of the loading process. We didn't try to fire it up, although it did turn easy grabbing front pulley. The later model pickup is my dads, which was powering a winch pulling the truck onto my trailer.
The next pic is a little road block, but nothing that dropping the air out of the tires didn't fix LOL
So the game plan is AGAIN (3rd time) going to bare frame and doing it right, new springs, all new bushings (12 yrs in storage didn't hurt the body, but the underneath isn't happy
The question is, does it stay .040 over 390 or go big? I am an FE guy of course, but this may be time to play with a stroker 460, like 557-big. Its currently set up with a .040 390, 9.5:1, Street Dominator intake, Hedman headers, 600 Holley, Comp 280H cam, and a Duraspark
Its also currently set up with a 4.56 gear, as it had 35 inch tires for a while, and I run a later integral power steering box, but I expect to change the gearing and make it more street friendly
Anyway, glad to be here, I'll post more pics when I drag it out of the trailer and start cleaning it up again
welcome!
