I used to own a 1979 F150 that I bought off my dad. Similar to this truck, regular cab, long box and 4x4; but in blue with the 351M V8 (5.8L) and the 4-speed manual. Very cool truck. I was a bit young and couldn't do the restoration to it that I wanted to, so it got sold and then completely restored and daily driven by the dude's son. Glad to see it live on!
I keep a flathead screwdriver in the console of my Jeep for adjusting the carburetor idle screws and whatever other things you can use a screwdriver for on an old car. I like how simple and square the gauges are. I have one of those radios, it died after only a few uses. I haven't bothered to contact Custom Autosound to warranty it. I dig the old-school roll bar and KCs. These trucks were considered big when they came out, today it's almost a midsize. There's something charming about a truck you can use as a truck and not worry about beating on it. This isn't a car to be coddled in. I greatly respect people who daily drive these brutes.
I never owned one of these trucks, but my father had 2 of them, one after the other, then three 70s Ford vans! Loved all of them, especially his first Ford truck, that thing was tougher than a two dollar steak!
The 6th generation Ford has always been my favorite truck. My dad had a beautiful 79 F250 Laurit in the '80s when I was a kid. By the early '90s it had a ton of body and suspension lift, 40-in tires, that truck was freaking amazing. And he built it to use it, we did off-road trails and rock climbing with it. Have you seen not insane rock climbing like you see these days, but stuff you can do going do with a mildly built daily driver pickup with minimal damage
I used to own one of the most unique 1979 F-100's. Started out life as a 2wd, 6 cyl gas engine. A trucking company up in Portland OR needed a vehicle to shuffle around empty trailers. The end result was a 4X4 conversion with a Perkins 6.354 backed up by a NP435 with granny low. Oh and did I mention it was a step side with chrome stacks sticking up in front of the rear fenders? Eventually I had it lifted 6" and ran a set of 38" Swampers. When the diesel became problematic it got replaced with a #51W. My dad initially bought it in 1984, in 1998 he handed it down to me. Sadly life got in the way and I had let it go.
We just installed our rebuilt 351m/400 in my wife's 1979 F-250 Ranger XLT CS. Phil Cook@C&C Performance in Duncan, OK did the rebuild. Bored 0.20, crankshaft turned 0.20, Edelbrock Performer Ford 400 intake manifold with a Holly, built 650 Brawler, Compcam FC260H-10, and all new internals. Just fired it up for the first time in 21 years and she sparked on the first turn of the key. Super excited and now on to the muffler shop for some nice sounding duals. Reply
My Dad bought a 79 F250 2wd metallic brown. in 1980. Changed out the stock seats to custom cloth same brown as truck with foldable center seat (still a bench though). Added a relatively unknown cruise control to it (3rd party) and a cassette deck. Had the A/C in it. Changed out to 16.5 meaty tires and true dual exhaust. Sold it to me in 1993 and finally died in 1996. NEVER left us stranded, EVER. And just for the record the 400 was 169 hp @3800 rpms and 276 ft lb at a really low 2k rpms from the factory with the highly restrictive smog.. He did spend 2 years Daily driving it with a 12' camper LOL
My grandfather owned a 1979 Ford F-250 Ranger XLT that had dual propane and gas engine which he later converted to just gas. I remember him pulling the Travelair trailer with it. I remember him showing it off when he was running out of propane and he flipped a switch to the gas.
These are my favorite trucks. They look great and they are built like tanks. My dad has had many of these and still has 2. My dad had a 78 that was a pulling truck for sled pulls and one of the ones he has now was a beat to shit farmtruck that his buddy owned and would take to sled pulls and tow sprayers and stiff like that and it still runs like a clock. Then he has a 79 F150 that has zero rot and basically all original that he put a suped up 460 and street slicks on the back and he just cruises around a sometimes races it. It runs high 12s through the quarter mile.
I own a 250 ranger manual and I fucking love it. Needs a little work to get it running like a top (and I mean things like some degraded rubber, the filler necks for the front tank and some general maintenance) but I love it. Mine Is a two tone burn orange with tan. Unlike that one, my seats have more of a pattern to it and it's a manual and is the Ranger version. Damn I love how throaty it is. Love this truck dude.
Own a 79 Bronco. Super simple to work on and not a lot to it. Working on a rebuild soon. Something about the old dent side fords that just looks better then any other fullsize truck on the road
The Ford F series was the only truck I drove for twenty plus years working on lawns. Easy to fix and they're very reliable. I'd only buy a Ford F series if I needed a truck.
I like the 400 Stock low hp but high tq You snatch the epa crap off and put some upgrades when you rebuild one. You can get the hp up a good bit and get some real good tq numbers
my neigbor has a f150 ranger package of the same era 1978 but he doesn't drive it i though about maybe restoring it to make it run maybe i might still do that.
he daily drives it, damn that must cost him a pretty penny! I daily a 1994 F-150 4x4 5.0 5 speed and I thought mine was pretty bad, but I can get 17mpg +. I drive it like a tractor and shift below 2500. you can do that in a truck though cuz I’m just riding the torque band.
Dude, I'm gonna be rude, old school steel, work horse truck. Period. They didn't need all of the creature comforts, to be real. Roll down your windows, hold on to your cup, while she kicked ass and got the job done. That's what these trucks were meant for
Diddling with those Turn Signal Sockets? Use the '80's or thereabouts and up to uhm.... I fergotsletsay '90's light bulb sockets! Same with the Starter Motor Relay, toss the Barrel for a sideways uhm, barrel! ... after dealing with those dang light sockets ANNNNND the starter motor stuck on times can jus' stay in the '70's. still, EFI'd mah '78 F'd150 4.9L using parts from a '96 (tried and failed to get the MAF stuff), it's HELL'eh STRONG!
I converted the entire truck to led lights and they can be finicky at times. The starter I replaced with a high torque one. The old one would have a hard time cranking after truck was hot
