Where we had last left off, I had moved back home and taken a job at a local auto parts store on the counter. I’d bought a ’92 Saturn SC previously from a co-worker, and upon moving back to Cape Breton, I deemed it was time to buy myself another truck.I didn’t have too many requirements at the time. I wanted something in decent shape, and 4 wheel drive. A friend of my father had two trucks for sale, a 1990-ish S10 4X4 in black, and an ’87 F150. I’d tried the S10, but found it kind of small. The F150 caught my eye with the snazzy two-tone paint job. It was a Custom trim level, which – well, I have no idea what that gave you. I think it was a step above the base as I recall seeing these trucks with a badge on the dash that said F-series. For powertrain, it had a 4.9 L six – the old 300 upgraded with multiport fuel injection. It also had a New Process NP435 transmission, which was a 4-speed with the low first gear.
My favourite interior of the 80-96 trucks
The truck was reasonably well-equipped. It had full instrumentation, a AM/FM/Cassette, and as a suprise to myself and other owners of these trucks of this vintage, intermittent wipers. There was nothing marking it having them, I had had the truck for a while before I discovered turning the switch past “Off” you could turn on the pulse wipers. Instrumentation was clear, and well-lit at night. The heater in this – like the last generation truck – was not great, but was tolerable. The transmission shifted pretty well for what it was, and the gearing of the transmission, the differentials, and the transmission all worked well – it was a good setup, while not fast, the torque curve of the engine allowed the gap between gears to not be too noticeable.
Probably these Fords were the last trucklike truck. Look, two shocks per side on the front!
The twin-traction beam suspension was surprisingly good on the road, exhibiting no wander or strange tire wear. The driving position I found very comfortable as well. I’d had it on some long trips to Halifax and Moncton (4 1/2 and 6 hour drives, one way) and it wasn’t fatiguing. What was fatiguing, however, was the fuel bills. With the 300, the 4 speed, the 3.55 gearing, and big flat front the truck would get no better than 12 MPG on the highway. It was even worse around town. It was the same hauling a load, or empty. For the lack of power, I had figured it would have been a lot better on fuel. After a full tuneup it was really no better either. I checked for codes, but none came up. In the interim, a better offer had come around, as a counterperson for a heavy equipment dealer in town. I took it, and took the opportunity to get some training at the main dealership in Dartmouth, 4 1/2 hours away.
On a training trip to Halifax. It cost $80 to go 240 miles…
The F-150 did several trips to Dartmouth for my training. It never let me down, but man, it was hard on fuel. Thankfully, we got paid mileage, so it wasn’t straight out of my pocket.
The truck had some electrical issues as well. The salt we use on the roads here played hell with the wiring on this generation of truck – it was like the insulation was porous – and the wires would turn green and swell up. It happened with one of the main power leads to the fuse box, and to the power supply to the fuel pump as well. Mostly, though, the truck just worked. Having grown frustrated with the fuel consumption and lack of power above 3500 RPM, I figured I’d swap it over to a 302 and gain some power and a nice sound. It was a mistake. The injected 302, to me, used more fuel than the 300, and made less power to boot. The 300 was nice and torquey, and could pull from second to third to fourth without much issue at any RPM. The 302, unfortunately, could not be shifted too early or would be out of its power band. It had to be revved up past about 3000 RPM, and that killed any chance of economy.
Way better IMO than what was to come from GM in their ’88 trucks!
I’d met my wife-to-be in the meantime, and decided that I’d get a small car to use for day-to-day use. I kept the truck about a year and a half, and a good offer came in from a young guy who liked it. It was sold off, but I still miss it. I would in the future own a few more Fords and GM’s, and I still have a soft spot for the blue oval.
I liked tinkering with vehicles, but sometimes I’d be better off leaving them. This was one of those times. It was a good truck, but I ruined it by changing out the engine for something I thought would be better. Now that I’m older I can see the folly of my ways. Have any of you ruined something like I did?
A hint to as where I ended up working…
My first vehicle was a 1987 F-150 Custom with the 302 and 4 speed. The truck was purchased new as a fleet truck for my dads electrical engineering company. I bought it for $900 in 1994 with 115k miles on it. I turned 16 about a year after I bought the truck and drove it to 260k miles over the next 8 years. I spent a lot of money on that truck, but almost all of it was by choice. New paint job, new wheels, new interior, new dual exhaust, new stereo and speakers, and so on. It was really a sharp looking truck after all the stuff I did to it. As I recall it must have had a pretty small gas tank because I couldn’t get more than 200 miles on a tank of gas. What I remember most about the performance of the engine was that it was very quick off the line in 1st and 2nd gear, but once I shifted to 3rd, it fell off the power dramatically. It seemed like a huge spread from 2nd to 3rd. But the thing was bulletproof. The engine never smoked or showed any signs of wear. I did have to have the manual transmission rebuilt sometime after 225k miles. That was a really good truck and I wish I could find it again and get it back.
Oh and mine didn’t have intermittent wipers. That would drive me crazy when it was drizzling rain. But it did have ice cold AC all the way up till the day I sold it.
The drummer in my old band had an 88 or 89 with the inline 6 and the ZF 5 speed. Between plowing and his hardwood flooring buisness that truck made him a lot of money.
Quad shocks on a 6 cylinder truck? That had to be on the rare side. The quads are pretty rare in general in my experience though.
I’ve mentioned that I’m not a fan of the brick nose but I’ve warmed up to it. That’s a pretty sharp 2 tone too!
I don’t normally miss vehicles once there gone but my “Aero nose” or OBS is one I’d like to get back.
This is a pic from the day I sold it.
I liked the interior a lot better in the brick nose trucks, but the newer grille suited them better in my opinion. Just I liked the gauges a lot better in the older-style trucks.
I have had plenty of time in these trucks. 4 guys in my high school had 300 6 manual transmission long bed Ford’s from the late 80s. I think of these as peak Ford truck. I’m really not a Ford guy but they got these right. I seriously considered buying a short bed one while in trade school the 300 is a fantastic engine.
I’ve owned three Ford trucks, and the ’95 was easily the worst, despite having the 300 six (auto). I spent more time underneath that thing than I did driving it. Heavily rusted, I had to replace most of the brake lines and both fuel tanks. Electricals were flakey, although the a/c was super cold. Probably the best thing about the truck.
It succeeded my ’69 F-100 (CC at this link), and itself was succeeded by a late ’99 F-250 Powerstroke. The diesel truck was a brute, but had many of the same electrical gremlins the ’95 did. After a few years, I decided discretion was the better part of valor and sold it before I got hit with any expensive diesel repair bills.
Went to a ’15 RAM 2500 (single cab longbed 5.7 4wd), and have been very happy with it so far.
That Powerstroke was one of the HEUI ones, wasn’t it? The HEUI system gave all kinds of headaches to Cat owners over the years. You were probably wise to get rid of it if they were as bad as some of the Cats were.
Here’s a shot with the ’99. The Binder got sold off not long after this, too, as I was ready to shorten my project list.
I think that these were very handsome trucks, I found an ’89 F250 with a F.I. 351 for my brother who used it during his home remodel and then later sold it to a coworker of mine for his project. He still has it and loves it. He says that he is always getting offers to buy it. Old work trucks like this are getting light on the ground in California, First, due to Cash for Clunkers and now to the State funded emission based buy back program.
I know that the straight six engines get a lot of love on this forum, I like them myself, but they aren’t always as fuel efficient as you might think. My Datsun 240 and 280 Zs easily got over 20 mpg. My ’97 XJ6 gets over 25 mpg. But my ’70 Mustang with the 250 cube six only returned the best of 15 mpg. at a steady 60 mph. That was with radial tires, slight lowering, and a front spoiler.I was quite disappointed.My “07 F150 long bed with the 4.2 V6 gets 20 mpg at 70 mph. and I’m impressed with that.
I read in the Ford Truck Owners Bible, that the 302 was a poor choice in a work truck, due to a low torque curve. I’ve got a F.I. 5.0 in my ’96 Explorer that runs really strong but the fuel economy is less than my F150. Sometimes it’s just best to leave an old truck as is for work, and just find a smaller vehicle for economy.
Straight Sixes: the power of a Four with the fuel economy of an Eight!
+1, in my experience carbureted inline sixes always ran too lean on cylinders 1&6, too rich on 3&4, with 2&5 being the closest to optimum. Hard to beat that low-rpm torque though. It always amazes me to hear people complaining about the fuel economy on a pickup truck; you have a 5500 pound vehicle shaped like a brick, unless you have sort of waiver from the laws of physics, the mileage won’t ever be pretty.
Agree. The ’69 (240) probably got 8-10, loaded or not. The ’95 (300) maybe got 10-12. The ’99 Powerstroke did about 13. My RAM is sitting at 11 lifetime, although a lot of that is due to a lot of idling time. Best highway was about 15.5, which I’ve never been able to duplicate.
I don’t keep track anymore of the mileage of my 240 F100, but I did get 19mpg once on a highway trip in overdrive. And back when I did keep track, I got about 12-14 around town. Your numbers sound excessively low. But then the C6 behind it was notoriously inefficient, and could suck up a significant amount of power into heat. Up to 30 hp, I’ve heard, but that’s probably with a big V8 in front of it.
The only pickup I ever owned was a 1997 F150 SuperCab with the 4.6 V8/4AOD combination. Thanks to the 3.55 final drive I got around 12 MPG around town and 15-16 on the highway. That seemed pretty bad to me but it was pretty much the same as my late father-in-law’s Town Car we inherited a few years later. It had the same drive train, with a higher rear end gear I’m sure. The few times that I drove the Town Car before my wife sold it I was not especially impressed, it didn’t ride as well as the F150 did and was noisier to boot.
My first truck was a 1995 F-150 regular cab with the short bed. It was a XLT model with power everything, sport seats, two tone red and white paint, and the 5.0/5 speed/4×4. I turned 16 in June of 2002 and we found the truck in November. It had 72k miles on it, but I later found that they were hard miles. Nonetheless, I loved it. I drove it for about a year until my dad got tired of having to work on it and I sold it and replaced it with a MUCH more modern 2002 Chevrolet Silverado Ext Cab 4×4. That truck was a huge upgrade, but I will always have a soft spot for that two tone Ford. I drove Chevrolets for a while, but changed sides and now drive Fords. I’ve had a 2010, 2014, and now a 2018 F-150 and don’t see myself switching back!
I got rid of an ’09 F150 in January that I’d had for 4 years. It was a really, really good truck, but some body rot and repeated exhaust manifold replacements turned me off of it. Highway fuel economy was around 20 MPG, and the 4.6 3v/6 speed was one of the nicest powertrain combinations I ever came across (Aside from the exhaust manifold issues)
Oh, yes. The combination of dogmatic enthusiasm, excessive theoretical knowledge, and insufficient practical experience caused more than one case of grand-mal feature creep after which the car—whatever car was at hand—wasn’t better than before (or was actually worse, in those moments I’d admit it to myself).
‘grand-mal feature creep’
Love it. CC term of the day!
302? yeah nar, not a good choice,Ive done a lot of miles in a 302 F100 you get to visit every gas station along the way especially towing even a light caravan, good motor in a car but in a vehicle designed to work nope, the 302 in my XB Falcon wagon used less fuel on the highway than the 250 6 in my XY sedan, put an F series around that engine and it empties your wallet.
Strange since the GM 305 seemed to work so well in a truck. Not a real revver but enough torque to get it done.
The ’87-91 “bricknose” Fords are probably my least favorite looks-wise–they had neither the slightly baroque ’70s-holdover style of the bullnose nor the slick look of the OBS–but at least they did have fuel injection.
While the body/frame/suspension of these trucks were ok, powertrains were weak. I test drove a new ’93 4.9 (300ci) and it was unbelievably gutless. The supposedly torquey six was a joke. I ended up buying the Chevy 4.3 (262ci) V-6 and was more impressed. Torque peak was at a diesel-like 1900rpm and it just felt better.
Fast forward a few years and I bought a used ’94 F-150 because I moved to snow country and needed a 4×4. I was also suckered in by the more “trucklike” appearance. 5.0 (302ci) and E4OD transmission. The 302 was gutless at any altitude above 4000ft, forcing gas-guzzing second gear climbs. Brakes were also weak in the mountains. The E4OD had aluminum sun gear carriers that failed, along with other electrical parts. The Ford/Sterling 8.8inch rear axle also failed prematurely.
I ended up with a 2000 K2500 Chevy with the 5.7 Vortec (350ci) in its last year of production. Gas-guzzler, but, coupled with the L80E transmission and “14 bolt” axle, has more than enough power, even at over 8000ft and has lasted over 160,000 miles with zero powertrain failures.
Sorry for the rant. Paul’s ’66 is an honest truck. Some of the later Ford’s, not so much. This article dissed the ’88- (GMT400 series) GM trucks, but they have turned out, for my family, the best ever.
My son and his gf just bought this exact same truck, except in 2wd. 2000 Chevy C2500 with a 350/4L80E.
94,000 miles but sounds like it has 30,000.
The GMT400s had their typical GM not-so-well-appointed-kinda-cheap foibles common to those days from the General, BUT they drove and rode well and ran forever with ordinary maintenance.
This brought back fond memories.
I had one of those, also an 87 if memory serves, with the 302, automatic, four wheel drive, extended cab, 8 foot bed, dual fuel tanks. It served as a work vehicle for my landscaping business at the time, and was also my personal ride. It was the nicest, newest, largest vehicle I had owned up to that point in my life. Though I was, even then, not terribly fond of the body style, it was a great truck that suited my needs at the time.
It was a very reliable and durable vehicle, running many miles loaded, pulling a trailer, frequent stops and starts, and also comfortable, taking me and my friends on road trips, and four wheel drive made it great in the snow and on the beach.
A trip that will forever be a happy memory, and the last one I took in that truck, was from Connecticut to Vermont during a blizzard when the highways were officially closed. We filled both tanks, stocked food and beverages for a long ride, locked the hubs and went for it, and had the entire road to ourselves for most of the trip. The truck handled the snow with aplomb and took us to our destination in style; we felt comfortable and safe the whole way, never doubting that it could handle the conditions, and it did not disappoint.
I sold it to my business partner when I went away to grad school and could no longer justify such a large, hungry vehicle. Regular maintenance, with perhaps a few larger repairs now lost to my memory, got it well past 200,000 miles before its timing chain went and he got rid of it. That truck still ranks as one of my favorite vehicles.
That was not a good swap. The torque curves on these two engines are quite different, and that 4 speed is essentially a three speed with a granny low.
Later versions had the Mazda five speed, which was a totally different animal. It didn’t have a granny low, but had four very nicely stepped gears plus of course the overdrive 5th. That transmission would have worked very well with a 302 too.
Because the 300 is a low-revver, running it at higher rpm in the setup you had took it out of its efficient powerband. These sixes really need overdrive. My 240 turns 1900 rpm at 60mph, which is also right on its torque peak. keep in mind that every engine is inherently most efficient at its torque peak. The further up the rev band you take above that torque peak, the more efficiency drops off.
I’ve gotten as much as 19mpg with my 240 running around 60mph. The engine is loafing. But your 300, which has a longer stroke and even lower torque peak (1600 rpm) was being run too fast with those gears. And the 302 was unhappy because of the gear spacing.
What you should have done is figure out some way to lower the speed of your 330 six at speed. Not easy; swapping in the Mazda 5 speed from a later F150 would have been the best bet, but I don’t know how easy or hard that is.
IIRC the 4 speed to 5 speed swap is pretty involved. You basically need the trans,transfer case, clutch pedal and other assorted bits. My old boss did the swap but his was an F350 with the ZF trans.
Looking at that Saturn and remembering your article on it made me realize that those first generation Saturn SC (and the 1st generation Saturn Sedans) were very attractive cars that still look good in 2018. They age well.
There are still a lot of that era Ford F Series and the next generation(9th) still running around Maryland (though the 10th Gen has almost all disappeared) landscapers and contractors love them. I was behind a stake body F-Series this morning and it was filled to the gills with crap and happily hauled it all.
The 7th, 8th and 9th Generation F-Series are some of my favorite trucks and still look better then most trucks offered in 2018.
I think you might have been happier with the S-10 though. As long as it had the 4.3l V6. Despite GM offering this engine in the first Gen S-10 starting in 1988, you still could get the turd 2.8l V6.
The 4.3l was a great engine(at lest VIN Z(TBI) )with good power and good mileage. I was repeatedly getting mid to upper 20’s in the MPG dept with my 1992 GMC Jimmy
My folks go from Maryland to Nova Scotia once every year for vacation. It is a nice area.
Almost ended up with a ’91 Lariat when I was looking for a work truck. I liked the styling of the contemporary GMs much more than the Fords as a kid, but as an adult, I think the stub-nose was at least as sharp as the aero nose these trucks got later.
In the end, I’m glad I got what I did-Ford needed another generation to really sort out the powertrain choices in these trucks, especially when GM showed up with the ’88s. I wound up with a ’95, with the 5.0 and the 4R70W behind it, and I find it to be a pretty driveable combination. I regularly get 14-15 in suburban driving with it. I’ve managed over 18 on the highway at a steady 60 mph. Driving from Illinois to Michigan fully-loaded and towing a two-place covered snowmobile trailer filled to the top as well, I still managed 12 mpg at freeway speed.
Still, I can’t help but look every time I see one of these stub-nosed F-150s!