37 Ford Pickup truck -original post date 4/6/2013

 

This is the 1937 Ford pickup truck that my dad has owned since before he ever even met my mother. I know a thing or two about its history because it's been in my family so long, so here we go.

For starters, this truck is not a restoration... rather, what my dad did with this truck is called a resto-mod. This means that there were not pains taken to keep everything all original. Instead, my dad tried to preserve the look of the truck that he liked so well, with its sweeping fenders and prominent grill, while at the same time, updating and upgrading the functional aspects of the vehicle.

Some history:

This truck was purchased new in 1937 by a farmer in Courtland township, MN named Herb. Herb didn't much like the truck after amassing 42,000 miles, and parked it in his grove in 1951, where it remained until 1966 when my dad spotted it. My dad purchased the truck from Herb for $20. Herb later told him that he would have given the truck to my dad, but he was trying to discourage my father from taking on a project like this and thought a $20 price would do the trick.

The truck was originally a drab brownish color. In 1968, it was repainted a kind of maroon/purple hue that was actually a Chrysler paint option of the day.

My dad soon discovered that the original flat head V8 engine that came with the truck had seized up into a mass of rusted metal. He pulled the engine and replaced it with one he yanked out of a 1948 Mercury he got his hands on. This engine lasted up until 1984, at which point, it was overhauled, with .040 oversize pistons, .020 off the heads and fitted with adjustable lifters from a Ford tractor. This arrangement lasted until 1989 when the block froze. It was at this point that the engine was replaced with a Ford 302 V8 (roughly 5L) that it still has today.
There were other upgrades made along the way, including a late 1970's addition of power brakes with the master cylinder from a 1958 Mercury station wagon. The brakes were upgraded again in 1988 when they were adapted to fit a Chevy 3/4 ton pickup truck dual master cylinder. Not too long after that, the front brakes were changed from drums to disc brakes from a Ford F-150 using an adapter kit from Speedway Motors in Lincoln, NE. This necessitated fitting the truck with new rims to provide clearance for the brake calipers.
Perhaps the biggest modification was grafting the rear portion of a 1966 Ford F-100 frame onto the truck in place of its original frame. To accomplish this, my dad designed his own adapter plates and with the help of his friend Dewayne, fabricated them. Added to the new back end was the sway bar from a mid-90's Ford Explorer. There are dozens of other changes, upgrades and adaptations made to this truck, but that's a lot of detail to go into here.

The last upgrade I'll mention is something I contributed to this truck...its new paint job. In 2008, the paint from 1968 was looking pretty rough and nasty, so I urged my dad to have it repainted. My siblings and I were all used to seeing the old truck in maroon/purple, so it seemed important to keep it at least in the same range. I thought it would be good to use a genuine Ford color, so I recommended the color you see on the truck now, which was available on Ford Explorers in 2008 and is called Dark Cherry Metallic.

This truck has been in my family longer than I have, and I remember climbing all over it, playing in and on it, and admiring it from the time I was very young. What you see here is countless hours of my dad's time and effort poured into a vehicle that he loves and has held onto for nearly 50 years. I consider it the most beautiful truck I've ever seen, even back when its paint was faded and dull. This truck is a member of my family.