(first posted 9/14/2018) This is the most embarrassing F-Series pickup in that long line of fine classic Ford trucks. Maybe to some of you what makes it so embarrassing is not immediately obvious. Let’s just say they resorted to what Studebaker did back in 1961; meaning, in this case the front half of the truck is the cab as used on 1961-1966 trucks, just like my ’66; it’s even the same color. But the rear half, the bed, is from Ford’s old 1957-1960 trucks, and doesn’t match the front half the slightest, starting with lack of that deep character line on the cab which suddenly ends, wheel openings a totally different shape, and as we’ll see from the rear, a primitive tailgate and latching system, as well as other details.
So why would Ford put on old bed on its next generation pickups?
Because they screwed up. This is how it looked when it came out in 1961. It looked great. It was called “integrated pickup” by Ford, although the term “unibody” soon came to be used to refer to them, despite that being a misnomer. They’re not a true unibody at all; it’s just that the cab and bed are integrated, sharing stampings and welds to create a single structure sitting on its frame, like a typical sedan or the Ranchero.
We recently had a post here about these 1961-1963 “unibody” Fords, also sometimes referred to as ‘slicks”. But that article focused only on the stylistic aspects, assuming that was the only or primary reason for their existence. The styling was a factor, of course, as this was an era where manufacturers were making their trucks more appealing to buyers other than the typical farmer-tradesman-woodsman demographic. The Styleside’s optional large rear window and nicely-trimmed Custom Cab were all part of that. But it would have looked just about as good if there had been a narrow seam between cab and bed.
The real motivating factor (as is so often the case) was reduced cost. The “unibody” had a single side stamping from the door back, as well as a single stamping that separated bed from cab, instead of those being duplicated. There were fewer welds overall. It also simplified painting, as the whole body could be painted together, instead of the cab and bed having to be painted separately, then joined. All this contributed to lower production costs.
This type of construction also saved space, and Ford bragged about 16% more load space.
In addition to its other qualities, Ford advertised a lower price in all of its advertising for these trucks. Ford had turned the new trend of full-width pickup bodies from a somewhat pricey extravagance into a very affordable commodity. It all made a lot of sense, which reflects the sensible McNamara era quite well.
But there was a problem, or several of them.
When these pickups were heavily loaded, problems began to pop up. Like welds between bed and body opening up. And doors popping open when the body was twisted or went over a rough rail crossing when loaded. Or doors that wouldn’t open at all. A Ford had failed to put this new construction to the test.
Although Ford knew there were structural limitations from the start, which explains why the 4×4 versions weren’t unibody, but instead carried the old bed from the previous generation, just like our featured truck. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.
For that matter, so did the 2×4 F350. The unibody was clearly not intended for really rugged work. But not all Styleside buyers were suburbanites looking for a stylish weekend hauler.
The solution to growing issues with the unibodies led to a very pragmatic solution: offer the same “hybrid” of new cab and old bed like on the 4x4s and the F350 in the F100 and F250 range, starting in mid-year 1962. And that’s what we’re looking at here, a 1963 version. Although it may have looked a bit off stylistically, it was embraced by the buyers. In 1963, the separate bed and cab version like this was outselling the unibody by 2:1. The unibody’s time was up. And Ford was scrambling to replace it with a proper Styleside, not one that reminded folks of the Studebaker Champ.
Admittedly, the Champ’s borrowed old Dodge bed fit even worse, sticking out the sides by a few inches. Have you no shame?
Ford not only created a completely new double-wall bed body for 1964, but also put a new longer (128″ with 8′ bed) wheelbase frame under it. It now looked like the definitive Ford pickups of this era. But looks can be deceiving.
The 1964 had the longer wheelbase and new bed, but still had the same leaf-spring solid axle front end and steering geometry from 1961. For 1965, Ford’s continuing effort to re-invent their pickup reached something of its peak. A completely new front end with Twin I beam independent suspension and new steering geometry substantially improved the ride, handling and steering. The two new sixes (240/300) were icing on the cake. In reality, for several decades to come, until 1997, Ford pickups were just mostly new body styling and subtle continued refinement, but not really ever a drastic change under the skin. If we’re asking about when modernity setting in for Ford pickups, 1965 would be it.
This ’63 has had its stock steering wheel replaced by a substantially smaller aftermarket wheel. Which might explain why this truck hasn’t moved in quite a while; if the steering on these pre-’65 trucks was hard enough, this smaller wheel would really require some upper body strength. Power steering on these trucks wasn’t even an option; it first was available in 1966. The HD four speed with granny low has gotten an extension and new handle on its shifter.
The hood emblem indicates the presence of a six under the hood, which in this case would have been the somewhat elderly 223 cubic inch “Mileage Maker”, an engine that developed a good rep for being reliable and rugged. But the new 240 that arrived in 1965 was significantly peppier, with its better breathing head and 12 ports, never mind the 300, which was a monster in its early years, rated at 170 hp, the highest ever for a pickup truck inline six from the old days.
What’s more than a bit embarrassingly old school on these beds is the lack of a modern latching system, which the unibodies had. here it’s back to chains and hooks.
So although the featured ’63 may look mighty similar to my ’66 at first glance, they’re actually very different. The cab and front end sheet metal is mostly the same, but everything else is different. Oh, right; the yellow paint is the same. And oddly enough, in both cases it’s a respray of a similar stronger yellow than the original.
Ford stubbed its toes with the “unibodies”, but within a couple of years they had perfected the pickup.
Related:
CC 1962 Ford F100 Styleside: That Most Feminine of Trucks PN
Nice write-up, Paul. At first glance, I thought your truck had a flat, but then quickly realized it wasn’t yours.
Never knew about this, at first I thought it was your truck. Interesting story
Very neat that the F-350 had a 9′ Styleside. Besides F-350s from 1957-66, the only flat-sided 9′ beds were on the ’58-60 Dodge D-300, and neither one was especially common then or now.
Are you sure that’s a 9 footer? I assumed 8′, but I may be wrong.
The 8′ bed on the lede pic has the axle almost perfectly smack-dab in the center of the bed at 4’/4′, and the 9′ has most of its extra length (maybe the entire extra 12″?) in front of the axle.
The redone ’65s were the first Fords to start pushing the axle farther back on the 8’s, which IIRC you mentioned elsewhere was done to get better weight distribution on the slide-in campers. This rearward push continued all the way through the ’97 jellybeans, with the unfortunate side effect of making the proportions look gawky on the RCLBs. Ram, Toyota, and Nissan do this too; only GM continues using an 8′ box with longer rear overhang. And from the single picture we’ve seen of a 2019 Silverado work truck, it appears that they are also jumping on that bandwagon next year, though it’s kinda hard to tell:
The 72 (?) GM “Camper Special” 9’ beds had a filler pirce just behind the cab which you are not supposed to notice.
A lot of the long wb “camper specials” got the tail lopped off to become wreckers.
I think that pillowy velour seat is from a circa-’85 Buick Park Avenue. A little touch of Brougham in an otherwise stark truck, I love it.
The 4×4 models still used the old box thru 1966.
As your brochure shows quite clearly, the F250 4×4 did, but not the F100 4×4. That change happened in 1966, as the F100 4×4 got the new coil spring Mono-Beam front suspension, which looks to be essentially the same thing they put under the new Bronco.
I kind of like them now, but when I first saw one with the old bed I thought it was a backyard job. It still amazes me that even on the 4×4 Ford did not invest in a matching bed at first.
That’s a very minor aesthetic sin, as back then, 4x4s were very uncommon and only used as snow plows and by those who really needed on for serious off-road working conditions, like utilities, oil companies, etc. Nobody bought a 4×4 pickup in 1961 just for the hell of it.
They had heavier frames than the 2x4s, and really hard springs. They were brutal to drive.
Actually, Ford gets credit for offering the first civilized 4×4 in 1966, when the F100 4×4 got a new coil spring front suspension that was shard with the Bronco. It reduced ride height and improved riding comfort significantly. It was a pioneer in that regard, and Chevy’s new ’67 pickups also had a much reduced ride height and softer suspension. 1966-1967 was a key turning point in making 4×4 pickups more civilized.
I thought the same thing. With as much money as the Big Three continually spent on styling, I’m surprised Ford didn’t do a quick re-skin on the outside of the bed.
Wonder if anyone ever put fender skirts on those half moon shaped wheel openings.
I wonder if this was just an idea before its time? Perhaps Ford was a bit of a visionary in that it saw that pickup trucks would go from being strictly vehicles for trades folks and construction work to being parked driveways and be used as a passenger vehicle with maybe a trip to Home Depot and tried to bring about this vision 30 years too early?
I have never driven in one of those “unibody” trucks but I am going to guess that its drive manners were a bit more refined and the construction of it might have lowered the chance of the empty bed rear wheel hop over bumps?
As for the “old school” chains and hooks latching system. I think that is a better system then the modern system with the latches controlled by a handle. Of course I might be a bit jaded after grabbing the handle to open the tailgate on my truck only to have it snap off and not allow me to open it safely until I replaced it.
Everyone was making pickups increasingly more palatable for a wider range of customers. That really started in 1955 with the Chevy Cameo Carrier, and then both Ford and Dodge jumped into the sweptline era. In the era of fins and low, wide bodies, it was a way to bring trucks out of the pre-war era into the 50s stylistically.
These “unibody” truck were simply a way for Ford to to them cheaper. There was absolutely no technical advantage; quite the contrary. I can’t imagine why you would think ti made them ride better; that’s all in the suspension, and these trucks were as crude as ever in that department.
“Empty bed rear wheel hop” is strictly the result of stiff springs and a light body when using a primitive suspension system.
If this type of construction had any benefits, I can assure you it would have been put back into use.
I’m not surprised that you think the wagon-era chains and hooks are better than a tailgate latch. I wouldn’t expect you to step out of your comfort zone. 🙂
Am I the only one who, upon seeing the title “Ford Pulls a Studebaker”, was expecting a story about the Ford truck literally towing a Studebaker?
You mean like this? Sorry. 🙂
The ‘integrated’ body ’61-’63 pickups had a short life span here in the Northeast, rust savaged the structures at the cab/box junction after only a few years salt exposure. It was common to see them sag in the middle with widening door gaps.
Since the Studebaker Champ arrived for 1960, selling about as well as could be expected, Ford thought they had ‘cover’ for their mismatched sheet metal. This was well before our current era of ‘passenger trucks’ when a truck was for work, not for style.
I wonder if customers of the time just viewed this bed as another bed option, as a wider equivelant to the rugged and simple long bed flaresides, which also carried over the basic 50s box(well into the 70s to boot). Obviously we all know it for the obvious compromise it is today, but back then it seems forgivable since the “unibody” was at least optional as long as this bed was used, unlike Studebaker who had zero stylish option.
Aesthetically I actually prefer the taller wheel opening of the wrongbed to the unibody/styleside’s semi skirted opening.
I believe the F-250 4X4 used the same chassis from ’61 to ’66. The ’64 8′ Styleside bed wouldn’t fit on the F-250 4X4 because it’s wheelbase was too short.
Yes, the coil spring front suspension the ’64 4X4 F-100 was very similar to the Bronco’s.
Chevy’s lower profile 4X4’s in 1967 were due to GM mounting the transfer case on the transmission, borrowing the idea from the Jeep Gladiator. Not sure when Ford followed suit, but I know F-250 4X4’s continued to use divorced transfer cases until the mid-70’s.
The turquoise 4X4 and the yellow F-350 have the rare radiused front fenders.
Great piece on one of my favorite trucks!
I just saw a 1962 version of this truck two weeks ago, a mostly original orchard truck with low miles and genuine patina. The owner told me “it’s not a short box, or a long box, it’s a wrong box”
Seems like a suitable model designation – 1963 F100 WrongBox – one I will use from now on.
Given Ford’s names of Styleside and Flairside, maybe we could call this a Failside. 🙂
Fascinating story. All these decades of car-spotting and I never noticed the “unibody” Ford pickups. I am humbled.
Did we ever figure out if that fancy rear window on the unibody was repurposed from something else, or custom made for that model?
It’s hard to imagine where else they could have used that window, except maybe on a van.
With that said, the chrome filler piece at the bottom is mightly suspicious.
poor Studebaker ! the best name they could come up with was ” CHAMP ”
for the “NEW ” pickup They just retired the name CHAMPION after 40
years ! Talk about an outfit from the stone age !
Please check your space bar and return key. They seem to be malfunctioning.
Great read.
My 63 F-100 was the short bed Flairside and I began to notice these only after I bought mine. I wonder if Ford considered how infrequently everyone in the industry changed their old fender side beds and considered doing the same thing here. They clearly came to their senses quickly.
I never knew mismatched beds on these 60s Fords could be the way they came from the factory. Thanks for the education. I love old pickups when I come across them and assumed that a mismatched bed was always the result of damage to the original. One of the mechanics that I worked for had an 85 F150 with a later bed on it from the 90s restyle of the F150. That was due to a wreck, and insurance replaced the entire bed with a newer Ford bed. It matched fairly well in that case with the exception being the newer rounded and flush mount tail lights on the rear of a truck that was square and had sealed beams up front.
Chevy/GMC kept the chain and hook tailgates through 1966. So, I can see why Ford thought they could get away with losing the latches. I believe Dodge had a modern one-handle center latch beginning with their ’61’s.
Keep in mind that Ford’s “unibody” bed did have a latch, but when they went back to the old bed, the chains and hooks came back too. retrograde.
As far as I can tell, the, the Chevy bed of that generation is structurally very similar to the one from the previous generation, right down to the wood planking floor. It was clearly not as new and up to date as the Ford’s unibody bed, or the new bed that replaced it in 1964. It’s one of the main reasons I chose a Ford truck of that vintage over a Chevy, as I didn’t want to be replacing rotted floor boards.
It didnt have a modern centeralized pull handle for the latches though, each side had to be unlatched to drop the tailgate down so there wasn’t really a functional benefit to the unibody tailgate over the chains sin and pins besides the aesthetic cleanness.
The unibody design was a problem for the VW (Rabbit/Caddy) pickup as well. Too much weight would buckle the floor, seam welds would pull apart, doors would jam. They were fine if you didn’t overload them.
Once again, I learned something about mismatched beds on Fords that I never noticed. I doubt too many work truck buyers back in the day cared much about the mismatch if they noticed at all. I do remember a few old trucks with mismatched beds replaced due to accident, not that uncommon years who.
I’ve always thought they looked wrong but when I came upon my 63 shortbed wrong box I had to have it!!!
The early 60s Ford trucks aren’t the only ones with a unique bed. The issue reappeared in the 1985/86 dual rear wheel F350s. Up through 1984 Ford used Dana 60 full floating rear axles on their HD pickups (F250 HD and F350). On the DRW Dana, the axle width was the same and the centerline of the dual rear wheels matched the centerline of the front wheels. This was pretty much standard for the industry and led to the problem of loading a 4X8 foot sheet of plywood as the rear inner fenders had something on the order of 45″ between them. The bed floor and inner fenders for the DRW trucks were narrower between the wheel wells.
In 1985, Ford came out with their 10.25″ replacement for the Dana, and the inner rear wheels on the DRW axle were now directly behind the front wheels allowing for about 50″ width between the inner fenders. This also makes the beasts wider across the “hips” as my late wife called them, a full 8′ of width, and a lot of it is a fiberglass fender that can be easily damaged.
Here is a rear view of mine:
Well, the picture didn’t load.
Another idiosyncracy of this generation of F series light truck is the different cab floors. All the pre-’65 versions had a narrow cab floor with step wells, while the ’65-’66 ‘Twin-I-Beam’ 4X2’s and F-100 coil-sprung 4X4’s went to a wider cab floor without step wells. The changes to the frame to accommodate coil springs permitted the redesigned cab floor which I believe also allowed the seat to be mounted a bit lower for increased head room.
Yes. What a lot of folks don’t realize is that the ’65-’66 pickups may look like the previous ones, but in reality they are riding on the same new frame and suspension that underpins the ’67-up trucks, and for quite some years after. Parts interchange with the later trucks, going even through the ’80s is very high, while that’s not the case with the pre-’65 trucks.
The steering column is also completely different and has a substantially different angle.
Yabbutt ;
Those Uni-bodies looked so sweet ! .
-Nate
That lead image is spectacular. The colors, the mid century house. I love it.