1959 FORD F-100 PANEL 4 x4
CMA is spec building a 1959 Ford Panel being converted to the the original F-100 4×4 running gear. This truck is up for sale but our ending price has not been determined until after the build out is done.
Ford built this particular version of Panel truck for 3 years starting in 1958 and ending in 1960 and was offered in 2wd only.
This was the first year that Ford started making they’re own 4×4 running configurations. Prior to this time period Ford use to farm all 4×4 conversion out to companies like Marmon Herrington , NAPCO and Coleman.
As mentioned above, the Panel truck was not originally offered in 4×4 and most all of Ford’s 4×4’s were built using 118″ wheel base frames in both 1/2 and 3/4 ton. The 110″ short frame were used predominately in 2wd Panels and short bed trucks.
We are using the running gear from a 1/2 ton 118″ 1959 P/U truck and re-installing it into a F-100 110″ truck frame followed by using the Panel body installed onto the F-100 frame after it’s conversion.
Our original Panel frame was broken and not worth the effort so we opted to find the F-100 frame from a junk yard. The F-100 frame is the same as the Panels frame with the acception of a couple of body mount braces.
This truck originally was privately converted to 4×4 by it’s original owner using International Harvester running gear and combining it with a Ford 360 V-8 and automatic c-6 Ford transmission. The attempt to do this worked for awhile but as the pictures will show, the owner did not re-enforce the frame properly and therefore it could not take the punishment of heavy off road driving.
So far everything is coming together nicely. The engine we are using is the period correct and rebuilt Ford 292 V-8 with the 4 speed manual transmission. We will be making some changes to the engine exhaust, carburetion etc.
Feel free to re-visit us from time to time to check in on our progress.
Thanks for viewing!
