STICKY: Best mods or upgrades you have done to your bump?

[390F100]

Show off

Mine is not complete and I have never driven her in the year and a half I have owned her so I would say from my previos experience with my old bump, getting the Pertronix installed has to be one of the nicer ammenaties for my old girl...I remember with my old bump and the points driving down the road at night and having 4ft long flames shooting out the exhaust, although very loud and awesome cause it lit up the street, Idont want that to happen again.

390

[BradyCouchman]

ok this is going to sound bad but the best thing i did was put a mopar ignition system in her...used a duraspark 2 dizy with the mopar box.
or replacing the worn out busted 460 with a new long block.

[ArizonaDan]

Do tools count?

If they do then my answer is a Lincoln Weld Pak 125 HD. Sweet Mother Mary and Joseph I'm having fun with this thing! I had never welded anything before i bought this for the sole purpose of resto-modding my '68 F100. I have to tell 'ya wire feed welding is nothing to be intimidated by. The most critical factor with these types of welders is to get the metals to be welded as clean as possible. It makes all the difference in the world. Great fun! And you discover a whole new level of creativity when you work with metals.

I have cut out and replaced patches in the floor, cut out and replaced a section of the "bump" that was crunched on the bed, patched the hole where the under-bed fuel tank filler used to be, patched the hole in the cab where the fuel selector valve used to be, all within the first week of owning this machine. I'm no expert welder but I now have complete confidence that I can do metal fabrication work to a high degree of quality workmanship. I now look at scrap metal piles in a whole new light just imagining what I could do with a grinder, a cut-off wheel and my trusty little Lincoln. Quite possibly the best $450.00 I have ever spent.

Dan

[tybob81]

I think the two best upgrades on my 68 have been the ididit tilt wheel and power steering. Well maybe three the dealer a/c I rebuilt and installed.

[71 LONG BED]

As simple as it sounds, I'd say the intermitent wipers. It took less than 15 minutes to put in and it works great! Seriously, you could install it on your lunch break and still have to eat your sandwich.

[austin]

mine has to be installing a cd player with four speakers and my engine upgrades bigger cam .30 overbore headders and dual exhaust on an inline six

[HillbillyDelux]

so far crane cams electronic ignition and the electric fan
im sure when i get my intermittent wiper switch itll be near the top of the list too

[Alvin in AZ]

Wow, this thread is moving kinda slow so...

http://www.panix.com/~alvinj/file12/toe-in1.jpg
http://www.panix.com/~alvinj/file12/toe-in2.jpg

The few times an "ex-spurt" adjusted my toe-in, it was too much "in", like an 1/8" or more. :/
I even experimented with a little toe-out and decided that 0 to 1/32" in was my favorite. :)
Stopped the bad tire cupping problem I had since the pickup was -new-! :)

I believe my method with the cement blocks to be better than using a helper because the
cement block is consistent and not got anything better to do so is thinking only about holding
the 1+1/2" thin-wall square-tubing and nothing else. ;)

Two tricks to it, one is to use a 1" wide tape measure or bigger and learn how to repeat your
measurements. Second is to figure out what angle your steering wheel sits while going straight
down the road and have it at that angle when measuring the toe. That angle will change with
a change in the toe adjustment.

Has worked out really good for me. :)
IME, it's better than "pro" work, YMMV.

--------------------------------

Something that might be very important here is how my rear axle is -square- with its frame.
Also the position and "squareness" of my front eye-beams are right on the money too. :)
And the front end's "right height" as Ford calls it is good on mine too...

http://www.panix.com/~alvinj/file12/rideheight.jpg

Measure yours and correct those problem first, IMO.

Alvin in AZ

[Alvin in AZ]

I added a Dana speed control system to my '75 F150 in '77. :)
It was on sale at Sears for $79, got it through the catalog. LOL :)

http://www.panix.com/~alvinj/file12/speedcontrol1.jpg
http://www.panix.com/~alvinj/file12/speedcontrol.jpg
{edit} http://www.panix.com/~alvinj/file12/throttle.jpg

Only problems I ever had with it were caused by the 3M
wire connectors! What a pain in the ass those things are! :/
Later I used simple butt connectors and shortened all the
wires and it's worked perfect ever since. :)

Also lost one magnet off the driveshaft and it quit working,
so I readjusted it to work with one magnet and found out it
worked better than ever after that. Later found out the old
instructions were wrong to have me put two magnets on it
to start with. :)

Alvin in AZ

[sport71]

Crapet and tilt


Rear disk


Sound deadener


Working scoop


Rear tank


Hanger flip


Filled in the light, and left some slits


New A/C

[Fordtastic]

As simple as it sounds, I'd say the intermitent wipers. It took less than 15 minutes to put in and it works great! Seriously, you could install it on your lunch break and still have to eat your sandwich.

where did you get them?

[1971ford]

Full rollcage, 5 point harnesses.
Nothing like having no fear in rolling

and the 429 of course.

[ak-1970-360]

I would have to say my best mod is the homemade 4'' lift and 35/12.5r15 mickey thompson baja claws. Its also the most fun when out in the nasty Alaska mud and crud. Hopefully soon will be the new 390 so i have some power to turn those tires in the muck, my 360 is pretty much toast.
Josh

[eggman918]

twin stick TC shifter.stock drum brakes suck in mountains, 2-low is handy

[sport71]

I just put Pioneer DVD flip out 7" screen, 2 amps, with 2 - 12" woofers where the gas tank used to be, and 4 - 6x9's. The best sounding $1800 I've ever spent.. It took me like 3 years to get it though.

Here are some pics..

if you look in you realy can't tell it has a system. (I'll be hiding the yellow wire ).







The speakers are down to 1 ohm.