85lebaront2

Hey Lebaron, Another quick check would be the cover bolts. If you look at the covers in the link I posted above, the Dana 60 cover has 10 bolts, and the Sterling 10.25 has 12 bolts. I have no idea if that is a 100% accurate chart, but if that chart is correct, then his rear diff appears to be a Sterling unit. The certification label will give us an idea of whats going on here...on what the truck was supposed to be at least;). Correct by the information you shared. I did a cover bolt count and came up with that. He could have an SRW Sterling as the wheels would fit like they do on a Dana and would clear his springs also. I learned about the difference right after I bought Darth, the inspector showed me the difference in the width, the station had a 1986 F350 cab and chassis wrecker, built in Norfolk, wrecker body by Dynamic Industries, located across the street from the Ford plant. They had some sort of deal set up where I believe the trucks were ordered through a dealer (on paper) but delivered directly to them. The wrecker rear duals would clear the base of the twin post lift in the inspection bay, Darth's would have run over the anchor bolts. I used to have to pull in from the back, but then back out to avoid running over the anchor bolts.

Gary, the assumption that the first digit is the year of release is probably correct, if you look at the 1983 calibrations for the 460, one of them is 9-97J-R0, which would indicate it was one of the last issued in 1979 when the 460 was going to be phased out. In 1979 only trucks had 460s available.

I believe there were only 2 different calibration codes for 1986 F250/350 with the 460. AllData didn't give the calibration numbers on those. Most of the other engines calibration numbers are on the diagrams I sent you, that should help with a lot of them.

My thought exactly, Bronco tank complete with skid plate.

First item, if it was built as a cab and chassis, it should have the Dana 60 rear axle. Quick check without pulling everything apart is the track width. Cab and chassis trucks have a narrower track width than the dually pickups in 1985-86. The 10.25" Sterling rear was introduced in 1985 and the track width was increased, this allowed the between the fender width of the bed to be the same as a single rear wheel truck. Drive through some water, continue straight and get out and look at the tire track pattern. A cab and chassis or pre 1985 dually pickup will produce what appears as a very wide single track on each side. A 1985 up dually pickup will produce a 4 tire track pattern. The reason for this is the Dana rear, the center line of the dual wheels is in line with the center of the front wheels, on the Sterling, the center line of the inner dual is in line with the center of front wheel. Axles ready for parts swapping, rear is an SRW Sterling, same width as a Dana.

Looks good from what I saw, do you need me to send you the original calibration label/number from Darth?

Gary, exactly! I have had to replace or resurrect extensively small engine carburetors, some of which approach vehicle carburetor prices. Since lawnmowers, garden tractors and other similar items are seasonal usage it means they sit for several months. Most newer equipment will have plastic fuel tanks, but the carburetors are metal with a few exceptions so the small amount left in the carburetor can still destroy it. Fuel hoses are another problem area, older fuel hoses were made for pure unadulterated gasoline and the 10% ethanol will attack the rubber and cause it either get so soft it leaks or pieces flake off causing at best clogged filters, at worst ruining the carburetor.

Make sure you get ethanol resistant hose!

Here we have several stations that carry ethanol free gas, but we are on a long narrow peninsula with large bodies of water on both sides (Chesapeake Bay on the West and the Atlantic Ocean on the East). I use the 10% ethanol in Darth, the Taurus and Flex. All my small engines get ethanol free premium. I wish the damn Iowa corn farmers lobby hadn't convinced the EPA that that crap was good for us. FWIW, here is what the inside of a gas tank that sat with 10% ethanol in it.

When you have a chance get me some pictures of the filler necks.

Very nice sir. Interesting to look at even the 10.25" sterling and see the number of older parts still being used.

Funny thing, the 460 is damn near as long as the 300, there is 5 1/4" from the end of the waterpump shaft to the radiator core on Darth and barely room to get your hand behind the heads. If crash worthiness was a criteria, maybe that was part of the reason for killing the 460 and replacing everything except the 4.2L V6 with mod motors. V10 isn't short either. I would suspect emission requirements played a far greater role than crash tests. As for moving the power band up, my son's V10 Excursion with 3.73 gears, needed to drop clear down to 2nd coming across the Blue Ridge Mountains towing his 1986 F150 5.0L 4WD on a trailer, I can take a similar load with Darth and never drop below 3rd with 3.55 gears. Mod motors need rpm to develop torque, even a very low compression 460 has more low end grunt than that V10! BTW, transmissions are essentially identical. E4OD for Darth and 4R100 for the Excursion. I calculated that with his 3.73 gear vs my 3.55, his 17" wheels and larger tires, he still has a slight gearing advantage.

If you still had the bed and rear fenders I could give you a suggestion, but since those are gone I have no idea what filler necks and system you have.

I am just glad my konvertible has a copper/brass one and I have a spare complete with intercooler. Next one for Darth may be all aluminum and hopefully more than the two measly rows Ford used.

Gee, must have been a Polish joke. My late friend, Joe Krol, used to call (before cell phones) from wherever he was stopped for the night or waiting for a load and tell me Polack jokes, even funnier because he was a Pennsylvania Polack. His favorite was that he had the Polish throne in his house, a Royal Quiet Flush. Krol of course being the Polish word for king.

In some cases the Aluminum can simply be crimped back onto the tank without any other work. Mine lasted another ~3 years before the tank itself cracked in a different area. https://supermotors.net/getfile/943848/thumbnail/radiator17.jpg Steve, that was the original intent of the plastic/aluminum radiators, the theory being the tanks could removed, core cleaned, new gaskets installed and you would have an essentially new radiator. Fallacy was aluminum fatigue fails much quicker than steel or even brass, making uncrimping and recrimping a crapshoot as to whether it would seal or not. A good friend who owned a radiator shop told me that the failure rate on those repairs was close to 50%, so he stopped fooling with them.

I think it is 1/4".

Gary, you may be correct, the 1975 Pinto Pony MPG model was essentially set up for the maximum engine efficiency. My daughter had one and drove it from Newport News to Radford and back numerous times at 30+ mpg on the interstates. The salesmen may have tagged the truck "Pony" for that reason.

That's not exactly its purpose... It's there to "spoil" the air flowing under the bumper & hitting the engine crossmember, which creates pressure BEHIND the fan, reducing airflow THROUGH the radiator. With the spoiler, more air comes through the rad, making the tiny fan more-effective without as much weight as a larger fan would require. On later trucks, especially those with A/C, the spoiler is larger & more-critical. And another barrier was added there, as the 2nd TSB in this caption describes: https://supermotors.net/getfile/724185/thumbnail/tsb961710refrgtsubs.jpg Steve, as far as the TSB on air conditioning, I added the lower air deflector to Darth and since then added a pair of side "baffles" from a 1995 F450 that was being scrapped. I haven't really been in stop and go traffic in hot weather since the side baffles were added, but the lower air deflector behind the bumper did help last summer when I had to go through downtown Portsmouth VA to get to the I 264 tunnel.

Some groups do allow pages to join, such as the 429/460 Big Block Fords page.

Mine did have the, as you call it, V8 black box. But along with the other changes I went with the later all electronic speed control. It uses the same switches so when Ford changed from vacuum to electronic in 1993 only the wiring changed. You will also see a metal can with 3 leads next to it, that is the horn relay, only speed control equipt trucks got that since the speed control switches use the horn circuit for power and ground.

No, but a styleside with the trailer tow package will still have that same relay. It shows it as either or. I see you also have the hot fuel handling package from the fuel pump relay (inside the cover below the green relay).

No but when you look at the fluid diagram it shows out to cooler, then from the cooler back to rear lube. If you look at the transmission itself there is a fitting near the front, if I remember correctly right behind where the pump mounts, the other fitting is at the rear of the case, where it feeds into the lube passage in the output shaft. Logic says that the front fitting is going to be the hot oil from the torque converter and the rear fitting the cooled oil into the lube passages.

Do you have any pictures that show the cooler lines to transmission connections? At worst case. take a line loose, unplug the coil "horseshoe" so it won't start and crank the engine by jumping the starter relay and see which way the fluid comes out. Front line on transmission is out to cooler, rear is return to lube circuits.

You need to use the 1986 EVTM, Ford changed a number of wiring items between 1985 and 1986, the most important being the wire colors. 1985 used dots or dashes, 1986 it was changed to stripes.