Barbara's 'new' 1934 Ford pickup project. We started the project in November and she took it home on March 5, 2004. Although it is not finished, it runs and drives. They still need to have the upholstery done and at some point body work and paint. But for now it is a driver and she expects to use it that way.

The truck was originally an old "gasser" from the 60's. Surprisingly, even though the frame had been radically torched and modified it was still straight. We patched the holes and added boxing to re-enforce it. We installed a new 4 bar front suspension with disk brakes. Dale had collected quite a number of parts from various swap meets as well as donations from friends. Some of these worked out fine, others did not. Some of the parts that worked were a steering box from an unknown source. It is a Saginaw unit and has a very slow ratio. This makes the turning more gradual, little easier, and works great.

Another surprise was an alternator that came from a bucket of water. It was rusty and we were sure it was junk. After cleaning, it works fine. (at least so far) Unfortunately the swap meet engine turned out to be in very poor condition. After much anguish it was decided to replace it with a brand new crate engine. This engine is a 350 cu.in. topped with another swap meet part, an Edlebrock carburetor. The headers are swap meet, as is the turbo 350 transmission.

Dale decided to upgrade the project with a A/C unit from Vintage Air. The unit chosen is a Gen2 model with total electronic control. Reluctantly the cowl vent was closed and the latch mechanism removed to allow room for the A/C. Because of this sacrifice the unit is completely hidden behind the dash. Three point seat belts were installed, and a Pioneer radio/cd player was mounted in the roof header. The rear differential is positraction with parallel leaf springs.

Although the project has a way to go before it is considered finished it is fun to drive and gets lots of lookers. Sometimes we forget that the idea of hotrodding is to have fun with what we have.

More to come...

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