Project Old Skool Part 8: Our Re-born 1953 F-100 Hits the Streets

Today.

It's finally here. Graduation day.

We're taking project old school out of the classroom and out on the road. We'll take a look back to see the changes our F 100 has gone through along the way

and then do a little post graduate work out on the street.

It's all today here on.

Hey, welcome to trucks. Today, we're gonna take you on a journey.

We're gonna take a look back at project old school and reminisce about its humble beginnings and walk you through its complete rejuvenation and total transformation that brings us to where we are today standing beside one of the most popular vehicles ever to come out of the truck shop. The project old school represents a fairly common scenario for a lot of people finding a previously restored or customized vehicle badly in need of a second chance and

these fines are still out there.

They can be reasonably inexpensive to get your hands on. And if you're willing to forgive a few sins of the past from previous owners or even overlook someone else's sense of style that may not be your own.

You can see a diamond in the rough like we did,

we found this 53 F 100 cheap in the local classifiers. Chevy Drive train on a Ford.

Yeah.

Neglected. Yes. Worn out. Well, yeah, but it still had that great fat fender look of a classic F 100 that was begging for a new life. So we pulled it all apart.

Took a long, hard look at what we had and hatched a plan.

So what do you do when you wind up with a truck with a ford skin, a Chevy Nova clip and a GM drive train? Well, the truth is that this was a pretty common mod back when this truck was first rebuilt, there's a lot of clip trucks out there and the work we found was pretty good.

So rather than replace the frame or get into major reconstruction, which can get a little pricey, we decided to run with what we brung and stick with GM running gear,

but first it had to be safe. So we beefed up some of the welds where they had grafted the nova clip onto the original frame and started in on creating the stance that we wanted.

We knew we wanted an air suspension, not only for adjust

and ride control, but for reliability as well. And air ride technologies had a universal for

length for the rear and shock waves and control arms to take care of the front

under the hood. These custom scripted valves covers from innovators, West were one of the last things we added to our new 350

as good as this engine bay looks. Now, it's been a lot of work

starting with getting rid of the tired 305 and getting a fresh start with a solid foundation in the form of a remand four bolt main 350.

This provided us with a base to add some functional eye candy in the form of an Edelbrock top end kit

and their new dual quad setup and their enduro

shine finish.

It may be named Old school, but we've incorporated tons of modern parts

like this Serp system from

Zos that buys us clearance mounts our accessories and looks great doing it

behind the block. We used a bulletproof boulder tranny

out back. We got a little lucky with the rear axle and then stuffed it with a clutch type posse

unit and a 373 ratio ring and pinion set. That'll work great with our custom transmission.

Now, there's a lot of great bolt

on exhaust kits out there,

but none for an old Ford truck with a new Chevy engine.

So, what'd we do?

Well, we started with a set of cast block hugger headers and then decided to fab our own pipes with a universal hot rod kit from Magna Flow

that is totally custom and since it's stainless steel, it's durable as well.

Now you never want to increase engine performance without also increasing your braking performance and we accomplish this without throwing a high dollar braking system on this truck by using these slaughtered rotors and carbon metallic pads. Now, this combined with our frame mounted booster and master cylinder tucks it all in tight in true hot rod fashion and cleans up our firewall to boot.

The worn out bed was another sore spot and an area where we could have fixed what we started with.

But when you factor in labor and materials, we came out ahead with our pros

pick bed kit complete with a brand new oak wood floor.

We knew that we were going to get some serious wheels and tires for this thing. So we had to make room for them. And Bebop's glass works had the perfect set of fenders with their three inch wider rears and stock replacement, front, fiberglass fenders that'll facilitate our big and little stands

and that left us with a multicolored empty shell with a kick butt drive train.

Now, that was a great start, but it was nowhere near roadworthy like it is right now. So after the break, we're going to show you guys how old school went to paint school. Stay with us

next up. We'll put the finishing touches on old school and later

we're hitting the road.

Hey, welcome back project. Old school here has been a labor of love and a great way for us to pay tribute to a classic era of hot rodding.

We're about to see whether our goal of creating a head turning, classic out of a worn out has been, was accomplished.

Now, if you're just joining us, we're taking you back in time and looking at one of the most popular vehicles that we've done on trucks. We're just about to get knee deep into the styling phase.

And with our drive train button down, it was time to define our style a little more clearly And wheels and tires play a huge role in that. So we decided on classic looking Coker wide whites with 2 35 70 fifteens on eight inch wheels up front and massive 285 seventies mounted on 10 inch wheels out back

that combined with the inch and a half rake we designed into our air suspension gets this truck sitting with one mean attitude.

Yeah,

but that attitude needed some character that would complement the white whites and steely. And you guys know that any paint job is only as good as the foundation. It's sitting on an old school needed some serious finessing.

So we got rid of the glass filled holes in the doors, holes in the cap and holes in the firewall, then leveled and smoothed it all until it was ready for priming and blocking.

Now, it's no secret that it takes a lot of hand work to smooth out a body, especially one without a flat panel on it.

So we showed you how to use a long board and straighten out the waves and really get the body smooth and flat and ready for paint

with the truck back in the booth. We shot our own recipe of a flat black base clear that won't chalk up and fade like primer and mocked it up one more time to check the fit and get a glimpse of what she's gonna look like. Finished.

Of

course.

Now, another issue we ran into when we started was this 50 year old wine harness they had been hacked on and spliced into and was definitely ready for retirement.

So we called Ron France's wiring and got a custom harness built for our truck with plenty of circuits for any accessories we could possibly throw at it

while we were at it. We rebuilt the factory battery box and installed our fuel tank into its new home behind the axle, ran all new fuel lines and filters and connected the plumbing and control systems for the new air springs.

Once we terminated a few electrical connections, we threw the fire to it and heard the beast roar. For the first time

when you're bringing a vehicle back from an empty shell, it becomes a big, big job. But if you take it one system at a time, it's easy to keep track of. Now, we made this truck run better stop better and we definitely made it look better. Next, it was time to make sure it was going to stay cool

with a fully polished

Apco radiator with its own shrouded cooling fan as the centerpiece, we hand formed our own radiator support and used over the counter hoses to route the cooling.

Then we made sure that we're going to stay cool with an ac heater system from old air products designed to fit right into the factory location

that was followed by some serious insulation,

a cool interior kit

and a custom upholstered seat to top it all off.

Of

course,

all that was followed by installing new glass, a cool wood bed floor back there, some new and replayed chrome and stainless pieces and some really nice finishing touches on the inside.

Now, one of the last things we're going to do to this truck is also one of the coolest which is install our new custom made emblems for project old school. Now, we've had a lot of help with this truck and we want to send a big shout out to Steve Longacre and Matt Hawkins for helping us design these logos and also to thank Bruce and Andrea and everybody at Motorhead jewelry for bringing our logos to life with these cool chrome steel emblems that are actually three dimensional hand formed. They're going to find a happy home right here on the tailgate

and with that, along with hundreds and hundreds of hours of work on and off camera, this is project old school. So when we come back from the break we're gonna be out on the road to see what this thing will do on the streets.

Hang on

because it's time to play a little hookie away from the shop.

Stick around.

Hey, welcome back to trucks. We've got an old school out on the asphalt where it was born to be. Only this time she's beefed up just a little. We're gonna see how much.

Well, the first thing we notice is how true this thing is, there's no wobbles, there's no bumps, there's no rattles or shakes. You let go of the whale and it tracks true and straight.

Another great thing is this air ride. You can ride around, cruise around a ride, hike, nice smooth ride, no bumps, no shakes, no rattles, pull into your local cruise in

air it out, lay it down. Look good.

It

now, as much as the hush mat insulation out, this is still a 50 plus year old vehicle. So we've got those aerodynamics working against us. So you're gonna get a little bit of wind noise. You just have to live with it. Especially with these vent windows. You're just gonna have to deal with it.

That was the air conditioning on this truck.

And these Coker wide white wall tires really help to find the retro look of this truck and offer a nice smooth ride of a modern radial tire without beating you up in the old thump, thump of an old bias fly tire. That's right. They're gonna last about 30,000 miles. Too

smooth the whole time.

One thing we've noticed all the heads turning as we drive by is something you're not going to get in a modern truck. People just really appreciate the old classic styling of this pickup truck

kicking it

old school. All right.

Ah,

what do you think?

Yeah, it's on air, air ride. Universal four length outback. Choc

Las in the front. Check out the wood kit in the

bed.

Yeah, it's, it's nice enough to. So

we

just,

it's reliable, man. It's a four volt main, uh, short walk from here

with an anal rock top and dual quad intake.

Yeah, it's cleaned the firewalls. Nice and clean, cleaned up everything.

How

many hours ago? Got

hundreds.

Well, you guys did a great job. Thanks, man.

Appreciate it

as good as this thing. Looks when you pop the hood, all that chrome ain't gonna get you home. We've got some reliable stuff under here. A nice new short block overdrive transmission, aluminum drive jet

373 Posi

rear end

and we're set. This thing's good to go.

Hell, yeah.

Oh,

this thing sounds nice.

Ok,

don't go anywhere.

There's more old school hot rodding when we get back.

Hey, welcome back to trucks. Finally got old school out of the shop out on the road where it belongs. See what this thing can do.

The beer freaks me out. I gotta tell you, I know it takes a little getting used to it easy there, buddy.

Is there eight months worth of work you're about to pull out in front of.

It's a really interesting mix of a classic vehicle.

The windows are surrounding us. We feel like we're back in a 1953 vehicle, but it's got the right quality of a late model because basically, and literally everything is brand new in this truck. The engine is new, The transmission is new. The drive line is completely new. A balanced aluminum drive shaft from Denny's so it feels like a brand new vehicle, but it puts you back in time. It's awesome.

Another cool thing is this air conditioning, keep us cool down here without overheating. Got the windows rolled up. We're cruising in comfort

down the street.

Yep.

Oh,

yeah.

You feel back in squat.

That's,

that's dumb, isn't it? Yeah,

that's all the way down

in the round.

We're up in the front.

We love the look and feel of a restored vehicle. But that wasn't our goal here with project old school. Our goal was to have a reliable daily driver with all the amenities of a modern vehicle with a classic, good look and the appeal of that. We've got it all here, man. We've got a wolf in sheep's clothing to boot.

A lot of hard work. Went into this thing.

Yeah,

it paid off.

It

does pay off, you know, it's worth it. It's always worth it.

Hey, if you guys enjoyed watching project old school come together a fraction as much as we did, putting it together. Well, now you can have a piece of old school yourself in the form of this cotton T shirt from Power block swag.com. It's got this great rendering of old school across the back,

the truck's chrome logo across the front and the old school script down the right sleeve. This will cost you about 25 bucks from power block swag.com.

Now check this out. This edge evolution programmer for diesel pickups is the very first programmer that allows you to monitor egts or exhaust gas temperatures. It also displays and clears all check engine codes adjust for tire size and speed limiters. You also get alerts such as tranny temp and max RPM and it amounts in its own custom designed pod to make it look factory installed.

The evolution also does 0 to 60

quarter mile performance tests and it even shows you its own drag strip Christmas tree so you can test your reaction times.

It ships with a USB cable for internet upgrades and is available for early and late

Duramax and Ford power stroke applications.

The edge evolution will cost you just about 600 bucks. Thank you for watching trucks. See you next week.