Nothing Special's '97 F-250 Crew Cab

Ford had an aversion to towing with manual trannies.  They preferred automatics, as is seen in the owners manual specs.

If you look in the 1981 manual it specifically states "Do not tow with manual transmissions".
I think they had a lot of clutch failures at the time and would be my guess for the restriction.

With that said, I tow with my 1981 all the time. No issues with it.  But I do not exceed my trucks capabilities.  A F-150 isn't supposed to tow a single wide mobile home for example.


As for rust protection.  Spray wax and paste wax are your friends.  Wax everything including the engine bay. Also keep the drain holes open and clog free.  Galvanized primer in critical areas helps too. Paint is also your friend. If you have a new part that isn't painted, paint it before assembly. Water pumps, brake boosters etc. are commonly not painted and will rust.

Also check the seams where sheet metal is spot and pinch welded together. If needed, caulk them with something like "3M all around body sealant."  The drip rails on the cab are a common place for cracked sealant. Water leaks here can rust out the lower cab corners for example as the water runs down the inside of the cab sheet metal. The bed of the truck has similar seams that should be sealed as well. The sealer in the bed seams are usually "removed" by people dragging and hauling things, etc..

Hope this helps

This truck now has a name:  Oswald.

Feel free to skip the rest of this post which has the LONG backstory on that name.

I've never really been one to name my trucks.  The one I have at any point in time has always just been "my truck."  My previous trucks have gotten names so to speak, but they haven't been particularly imaginative.  My first truck (an '85 F-250HD) is called "my first truck."  My second truck, a blue '95 F-150 SuperCab is called "the SuperCab" (although Lesley calls it "the blue truck").  My third truck, an '08 F-250 crew cab that I was able to sell back to Ford on a lemon law claim is called "the lemon."  My fourth truck, a '02 F-350 crew cab diesel, is called "the diesel."

But now I have two trucks, the '97 F-250 crew cab and the '07 Dodge, so "my truck" doesn't really work anymore.  The Dodge is pretty easy.  I call it "the Dodge".  But I've been struggling with what to call this truck.  "My old truck" doesn't really work because that also applies to all my old trucks.  "The Ford" doesn't really work because almost all of my trucks have been Fords (along with the Bronco and motorhome I currently have).  "The white truck" doesn't work for the twin reasons that "the diesel" was also white, and I don't expect this truck to be white when it's done.

So that's why it needs a name.  But why "Oswald"?  For reasons I'll put in my Bronco thread, my Bronco has come to have the name "Pluto."  Lesley is a Disney freak (and I'm at least an enabler!), so a Disney name seemed like a given.  While a '97 truck doesn't seem old on this board, "old" is the adjective that gets used for it the most, so the oldest Disney character floated to the top.

"But wait a minute" you say.  "Isn't Mickey the original Disney character?"  Well no, he isn't.  Walt's first work was animated "shorts" that would be shown before the main attraction at movie theaters.  Oswald the Lucky Rabbit was one of his first regular characters.  But when he went from California to New York to try to negotiate a better deal he found that Universal Studios (his distributor) had "stolen" Oswald from him (Walt had never copyrighted Oswald and Universal had) so Walt was out of luck (pun intended).  They had even hired away most of his animators.

So on the train ride back to California Walt came up with a new character, Mortimer Mouse (fortunately for him, his wife said something like "that's a stupid name, you should call him "Mickey").  And the rest is history.  But Oswald was still first.

An interesting post script to that story is that in 2006 Al Michaels wanted out of his contract with ESPN so he could move over to NBC and work with John Madden.  His request worked its way up through the ranks and eventually landed on the desk of Bob Iger, Disney's CEO (Disney owns ESPN).  Iger said that NBC could have Al Michaels in trade for Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.  No one knew what he was talking about (including NBC!) but Iger knew that Universal, the parent company of NBC, still had the rights to Oswald in spite of not having done anything with him for over 60 years.  So Disney got Oswald back, and Al Michaels became the answer to a trivia question!

So that's the LONG story.  And now I have a truck with a name!

I tow with a manual frequently and, so far, haven't fried a clutch.  But I do see how that could happen.  However, I also see how you could fry a tranny with something like a C6 that has no clutch in the torque converter.  So there's a real tradeoff there.

As for Oswald, that's an interesting story.  I'd heard of him but didn't really know the story.  Cool!  

On the towing I wonder if concern over breaking driveline components with a clutch-dump is a concern?  Basically that the ratings are for people that don't know how to drive a clutch.  Or if it has to do with ability to hold speed on a hill without manually downshifting.  Basically that the ratings are for people who don't know how to drive a manual.

Whatever, I always thought that was pretty silly, especially in the case of an 8800 GVWR truck with a 7900 GCWR (I think the GCWR with the 351, 3.54 gears and an auto would've been 10,000 lbs).

Well, Oswald got a little love this week.  No work ON him, that would be too much to hope for.  But at least he got to DO a little work.

We're at my folks cabin this week and I was putzing with a few smaller jobs.  I needed to split some wood which involved moving the log splitter around.  Then I needed to move the split wood out of the way, which involved moving my little utility trailer around.  And then I did some work on my boat which involved moving that trailer around.  As Gary knows, pushing a trailer off the front bumper is a LOT easier than backing a trailer, especially when it's a very small trailer that you can't see in your mirrors or over the tail gate.  Oswald has a front receiver while the Dodge doesn't, so he got to flex his muscles just a bit.  In spite of sitting in the woods for 2 months he started right up!

Way to go, Oswald!  

Yes, pushing in front is soooo much easier to guide than pushing in back.  So happy to have the front hitch.  

And that makes "work" so much easier.

Nothing Special wrote

As Gary knows, pushing a trailer off the front bumper is a LOT easier than backing a trailer

Couple of years ago, a friend of mine gave me a hitch to install on Big Brother's front.
Each time I need it, I grumble while remembering it is still on a shelve.  Shame on me.

Silly boy!  

Pluto (my Bronco) actually had a front receiver before he had a rear hitch!