Rembrant

Now there are some antiques!

I believe the left side of the block has the bigger of the two fittings. I ran all new steel lines on mine, but I have a flaring tool and a tubing bender, so it wasn't bad. Time consuming yes, but difficult, no. We can't buy the raw soft Cupronickel lines up here. It has supposedly been outlawed, however it is still available in prefab lengths with fittings already on them.

Ahhh, OK. I've heard about that system, but have never laid eyes on one. That may explain it. It's a nice little truck. I like the simplicity of it. Not sure it will fetch the asking price, but if one is not in a rush, might as well start high!

Not bad little short wheelbase 4x4 here. It's not a 100% original, but it's fairly well intact for being four decades old. https://www.ebay.com/itm/174186402848 The chrome wheel arch trim pieces are not correct...I don't think the originals flared out like that did they? And the interior has had some rehab work...the dash and dash pad have been changed. It has an AC dash, but the truck does not have AC. Still, I like the plainness of it, and white wheels and dog dish hubcaps. I'd say it's priced too high, for sure.

I've traveled all over the US and Canada and I have to say, the rustiest vehicles I have seen on the road were in upstate NY! lol. They rust just as bad up here in Canada, if not worse, but they get condemned here very early on, so they will no longer pass MVI once they get a little bit rusty. I see some on the roads that are very rusty, but they are often illegally on the road. My most recent trips to upstate NY were in the Finger Lakes area and I laughed every time I saw a car or truck that you can actually see inside the body from the outside...haha. There was this one Toyota Camry I kept seeing that had the outer door skins almost completely rusted away. In any case, it builds character eh Angelo?>..And you get to really hone your mechanic skills removing bolts with no heads and no threads. I remember the truck pics from over on FTE. Nice work!

David often finds rare and obscure stuff for these trucks. I'd say that vintage aftermarket accessories are pretty hard to find these days. Heck, a lot of them were probably pretty hard to find in the 1990's...lol. What are you looking for?

Yes. My truck, an '84 (302, non-feedback) just has a rubber plug in this hole, and I have a spare oval plug I removed from an '86 F150 (300/6, non-feedback). See below. On the '85 302 EFI truck that I had and junked, this is where the EFI wiring harness passes through the firewall, and the ECU is in the dash directly behind it. I removed this whole harness separately and sent it to another forum member. The wiring harness for the Feedback carb trucks also passes through this oval hole, but I believe only in the later models? I'm not up on the feedback carbed truck details, but I've often heard people comment that if you're looking at a truck for sale online, that is the first clue that it is a feedback set-up...that wiring harness through the oval hole directly behind the engine (right next to where the throttle cable is and the ground lug on the firewall). I'd rip it all out and get a blank plug from a Non-feedback DSII truck if possible. Dave, Here's a screen grab from a 1986 with a feedback 300/6. You can see the oval hole in the firewall has a wire harness going through it. You can't see it well, but that's what it is.

Yes. My truck, an '84 (302, non-feedback) just has a rubber plug in this hole, and I have a spare oval plug I removed from an '86 F150 (300/6, non-feedback). See below. On the '85 302 EFI truck that I had and junked, this is where the EFI wiring harness passes through the firewall, and the ECU is in the dash directly behind it. I removed this whole harness separately and sent it to another forum member. The wiring harness for the Feedback carb trucks also passes through this oval hole, but I believe only in the later models? I'm not up on the feedback carbed truck details, but I've often heard people comment that if you're looking at a truck for sale online, that is the first clue that it is a feedback set-up...that wiring harness through the oval hole directly behind the engine (right next to where the throttle cable is and the ground lug on the firewall). I'd rip it all out and get a blank plug from a Non-feedback DSII truck if possible.

It's not really...at least not in the sense that the 4.3 GM V6 is 3/4 of the 350 V8. The Essex V6 has the small block Ford bellhousing bolt pattern, but I thought that is where the similarities ended. Isn't it referred to as the "small" small block? Although Ford only used that engine very briefly in the early Bullnose trucks, the Essex V6 was later brought back in 1997 as the replacement for the 300 inline 6, and was used for quite a few years after. It was kind of an outlier at the time with it's old school pushrods!

I think I worded my question wrong, but thanks for confirming what I was already fairly certain of;). I'll just ground one side of the VSS. Easy as pie. Thanks Gary.

Yes, I'm using the 1988-1991 style VSS that plugs into the transmission, and then the speedo cable plugs into it. I've confirmed that the Ford VSS output is fine for the aftermarket cruise, but the instructions only tell the installer to splice into one of the existing wires to the VSS (and this is what I have done with the cruise system previously). The problem is, my truck does not currently have a VSS, and therefore no wires going to it. So I know the VSS output is fine, I just wasn't sure what to supply it with. I looked at the EVTM as you have shown above, and was curious where the ground wire comes into the Amplifier (C717) is that tied directly to the ground in the C727 connector? That black ground wire is labelled #57 from the ground to the amplifier and then back out to the VSS. I was just trying to confirm that all I needed to supply TO the VSS was ground.

I'm actually in the pump business. That's what I do from Monday to Friday when I'm not searching for rusty Ford parts;). I'm working on an application now that requires two 28" vertical pumps each with 1000HP electric motors. However, I don't do municipal water projects all that often, and never residential. I was just curious about Jonathan's water situation is all...and not his situation specifically, but more generally curious about Arizona. Around here, A residential dug well like mine is usually between 12-15 ft deep. Residential drilled wells are often 2-300 ft deep around here. A grew up on dug wells, and being conservative with usage in the summer is just a way of life. Having to haul water to your home is completely foreign to me, so I'm following along with fascination. I'm no help with heavy haulers;).

Gary, I just wanted to circle back to this thread and say thanks for the info. I just ordered a factory clutch switch myself and it was the last piece of my aftermarket cruise installation puzzle. The aftermarket companies sell generic clutch switches, but this one being a factory piece that just pops in place and is a 2-wire N/O makes it perfect. One quick question though. On the VSS there are two wires. One is the pulse output to the controller obviously. The other is just tied to ground, correct? I'll be using a later style VSS that bolts to my 5spd trans, but I assume they operate exactly the same as the cable mounted Bullnose VSS?

I'm no help with the heavy haulers but I've been following along with interest. We have a shallow dug well at our house and it sometimes gets too low in the summer and we have to be careful with it. My wife is a city girl that never had to worry about water growing up, so it has taken me a long time to get her to be conservative with it in the summer! The girl next door to us ran out of water twice last summer and she's angry enough about it she wants to dig a deeper well. We've had to call a water truck a couple times for a fill up, but that's somewhat extreme for us...I believe we had a running toilet last time that drained it when it was dry. We could put in a drilled well, and that would solve the supply issue, but it then creates other issues, like requiring treatment. Jon, can you do a drilled well? Or is there simply no water to hit (or it's too deep).

Yeah, that's what I thought. I'm just spit balling some plans on how to do this once I get my hands on all of the parts. I may end up with a hybrid system...that is mostly factory AC with the distribution/vents more like a dealer AC system. It would work fine and most people wouldn't know the difference visually anyway.

Life in the land of salted roads and rust Gary...lol.

Guys, I'm just spit ballin' some ideas here, but with the heat/AC plenum below, I could make my own distribution ducts if I wanted to, correct? If I had everything installed for factory AC up to this plenum, I could then make a header of sorts to go over the AC door, and then run flex ducts to the passenger dash and instrument bezel, correct?

This picture will not likely surprise anybody in the northern areas, but I was behind this Chevy in traffic today and happened to look down to see the entire shock and upper shock mount dangling behind the rear wheel...lol. You can't really see it in the picture, but it was hung up on a cable of some kind that was running left to right. Not sure what it was, but the cable was keeping it from falling further. I can only imagine what the rest of the frame looks like in this thing. Got rust?>..lol.

Welcome aboard. That's a great truck to fix up. Short wheelbase 4x4 with a 6 and a 4spd. I love it.

Hey Shaun, Let me know what you'd want for the stuff. You can PM on here or whatever...

I believe so, yes. I looked them up myself a couple weeks ago.

This pretty little Bull was listed all across the country last night. https://newyork.craigslist.org/mnh/ctd/d/sherman-1985-ford-f150-swb-4x4-pickup/7070389663.html It looks like a pretty clean truck. The exhaust is interesting. They put a fair amount of effort into duals into a single in dual out muffler, with dual tailpipes. It looks nice at least.

Gary, I was joking with Ron on FB that he'd soon be making parts for Sikorsky!

Ron, I see it is now listed for sale in Boston...lol. https://boston.craigslist.org/nos/cto/d/haverhill-1986-ford-bronco/7068173088.html We'll have to wait and see if Shaun can confirm if it's still in Florida or not. This isn't unusual...since my searches start out from New England, I've seen a lot of people buy southern vehicles and then they'll often pop up for sale again in the Northeast.

Yes. I like using a knotted cup wheel wherever I can... A regular wire wheel on a drill is great too. I've put thousands of miles on them...lol. Another one that works wonders for removing paint and loose rust is a strip wheel. I've used these with great results as well. Available at Home Depot. You can get them for grinders or drills. Remove loose paint and rust, get it good and dry, then apply Ospho or whatever your rust converter of choice is.