So Monday and Tuesday I started to strip paint off the roof of the truck. Under many coats of paint, I found bondo and huge pitted rust areas. So I'm glad I went thru the effort to get to the metal. Here are some shots.

My mascot and his faithfull companion

Pretzel is a great pal. Always following me around, begging for walks or a game of fetch. He also has a great sense of humor, as he will bounce tennis ballls on me while I'm under the truck or climb in the cab if I leave the door open!

Heres a shot with his girl friend Teva!

What I would like the truck to look like

Here are two different f1's that have nice red paint jobs that I'd like to paint this one with. Don't know the names of the reds though!

Body work continued

Just finished this door and have now done the front two fenders, hood, and passenger door.

Welding in old gas filler hole

With no welding experience but lots of encouragement and advice, I bought a MIG welder, and welded in a sheet metal patch on the old filler hole. Here are a few shots.

Gas tank relocation, Welding and Learning!

The old gas tank location is in the cab, behind the driver's seat. Since this is not a safe place, it was relcated to the rear of the chasis, under the pickup bed.

The grill Part 2

So I was able to find a great deal on an intact almost perfect grill on Ebay. Since it was obscurely listed I had no bidding to compete with me, so I got it for less than half of what the normally go for. It had tons of old peeling paint that had to be stripped off, and the hit with a rust inhibitor.Here are a couple before and after shots.

The grill

The grill turned out to be held in by 18, 60 year old rusted bolts! Tree days, and many nasty cuts later the last of the were sawzalled off!

Body Work and gas tanks

Now while the weather is nice I'm slowly stripping down old paint and rust, replacing the front grill in the process. I'm also treating the frame with a rust converter to protect it, and give it a nice finished look. I also got the engine compartment painted, and the rear frame.

Engine Update

With the brakes done I started to try and narrow done the engine ID. After taking off the valve covers, it became apparent that the engine was in need of a rebuild. The heads were DOVE-C which are low chambered high compression, desirable heads. So I bought a cherry picker and pulled the engine. At this point I figured if Im spending all this time replacing stuff with newer, safer options, then what's the point if it potentially could break down any minute, and eats oil, leaking all over the shop too. So I pulled the engine and took the transmission to Santa Rosa Transmission shop, where they diagnosed it as old and worn. $1100,00 dollars later, it was rebuilt with new parts ready to go. The engine rebuild locally would have cost around 3k, but I could get one built with a 70k, 7 year warrenty for 2k form Spokane, so that is the next big savings project.

The best part of the truck was it came with a new front disc brake conversion kit for Classic Performance Parts and a new brake booster master cylinder. So my next project delt with doing this conversion and putting in all new brake lines.

After buying the truck, Mel graciously delivering it to my house. I had no idea where to start, so I figured why not try and get it running. So where to start? No idea of what the engine came from or what year of car, etc..., no battery or coil, battery cables coming through the fire wall to the passenger side floor. So I searched for numbers on the engine block, hit the internet and narrowed it down to a 71 lincoln, either 460 or 429. I bought the appropriate coil for it, and a new battery. The truck cranked over great but would not start. No spark. After trying everything I could think of, I remembered what Mel had told me. "If you get stuck, go online to the Ford truck forum and ask those guys, they are very helpfull!"

So I went, but found that most of the members were dealing with stock truck issues, not hodge podge hot rod stuff. Thus Clubhotrod.com came to the rescue. These guys build anything and everything. The are quick with the answers or where to find them. A few days later, I had a new negative wire from the distrbuter, to the negative terminal on the coil, and boom! It starts and runs, first crank over, with seven year old gas! Things were looking up. I had great plans, I'd modify the engine with some highperformance parts, do the body work and be good to go!:)

48 Ford F1 Resurrection Page

Last September(2007) I finished reading a book by Michael Perry, called "Truck a love story", which journels a year in the life of Michael, as he and his brother-in-law rebuild his 1951 International Harvester Pickup. My wife had read the book, and thought I'd enjoy it. Thebook was great in many ways. First it motivated my wife to work in the garden with me, which she enjoys in short spurts! Secondly she said to me after I finished the book, " now if you wanted to restore an old truck, that would be something I'd support" Words I'm sure she must regret now that I actually doing this. I immediately got on the internet and went to craigslist. I found a 1948 Ford truck in good shape, that had been started into a hot rod project. It had a 1971 Lincoln 429 engine, and Ford c-6 transmission already installed. Mel the man I would end up buying this truck from, had purchased it as is, 7 years earlier from the original hot rod conversion guy. The truck was running when he bought it, but had since sat for seven years, and now wouldn't start.

So the story begins!