Lowering an '81 F-100

[Roger Carter]

Hello All,
Have a friend with an '81 F-100 short wide bed 2wd and he wants to lower it 4"-6" front and rear. I haven't dug into the truck yet and wanted to have all my ducks in a row before I start.
The rear doesn't seem to be an issue. Flip kits or dropped shackles will take care of that. However, the front seems to be a different story. I haven't found a manufacture of dropped beams that list the '80-'82 trucks. Plenty for the '79 and older and for the '83 and newer, just not the early Bullnose rigs.

What is the difference between the early and later Bullnose front beams? Anyone out there dropped an '81? Any other options for dropping one of these trucks?
I would appreciate any specifics that could be offered.

Thanks in advance.

[FuzzFace2]

I also have an 81 F100 flare side and looked into doing the same.

Part of the issue with 80-81 with kingpins is the pins come in 2 different sizes based on power or non-power brakes. I think because of that is 1 reason they are not made.

The other is alignment. With ball joints they make special parts to get it back in alignment.
With kingpins you have to bend the beams and if you don't know what you are doing you can turn them to junk.

So the $64 dollar question how to lower 80-81 trucks?
Use later ball joint beams. Now they say to use a certain year(s) but I don't remember what years they were. I want to say 90 something and the other reason they say it, it has better disc brakes.
So hit the junk yard get the beams on out. Remove the spindles on out and put them on the new drop beams.

I am sure someone that knows more will post up.
Dave ----

[Gary Lewis]

I found a discussion of this here.  But, I'm not sure what the takeaway is from it.

Roger - Can I delete the duplicate topic/thread?

[PetesPonies]

My suggestion for such a radical drop, is to use a completely different suspension, such as a Crown Vic. It's not as easy as on earlier trucks, but doable.

[Roger Carter]

Thanks all for the input.

FF, I will do more research into the later beams. The F-100 I am working on has power brakes and the 5x4.5" lug pattern, if that makes a difference.

Gary, thanks for the link, I will read through it. I see where I double posted. My apologizes. Feel free to remove the duplicate link.

Pete, thanks for the suggestion. I am familiar with the CV swap on the '65-'79 F-series rigs. For right now it isn't an option for this truck, though possibly down the road. Have you done the swap on a Bullnose? Any suggestions, hints or pictures.

Again, thanks for all the replies.

[Roger Carter]

Gary,

Again, thanks for the link. After reading through it a couple times it began to clear things up and at least gave me some things to look for to see if using a dropped beam was a viable choice.

Seems the 80-82 truck front suspension waas transitional between equal length and unequal length beams as well as between king pins and ball joints. Depending on which combination my truck has will determine whether there is a possibility or not of using a dropped beam.

I will post my findings.

[Gary Lewis]

Yes, please let us know so we can all learn.  And, the duplicate thread/topic is gone.

[PetesPonies]

No Roger, a lowered truck isn't my cup of tea. But the pic I posted is a Bullnose.

[FuzzFace2]

I thought the beams were the same other than pins/ball joints and cast or stamped, from 80 up to 90 or so and why it was posted to use the later year beams.

As for 5x4.5 wheels and power brakes if I checked it right you pins would be the smaller ones.
My parts truck had power brakes and my project non-power brakes. The project needed kingpins so I was going to swap front suspensions then found out about the wheel size and could not swap the hub so then found out about the pin size.

Some links I have saved may not be just for 80-86 trucks but you can see how it is done.
https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1415868-84-f150-2wd-project-need-help.html
https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1365547-crown-vic-ifs-swap-for-81-f150.html
https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1493460-its-been-too-long-yet-another-truck-build-cv-ifs-fuel-injection-etc.html
I don't think I have one on the drop beams so you will need to do a search for them.
Dave ----

[Roger Carter]

FF2,

Thanks for the comments and the links. I appreciate it all.

To all who have responded,

I have done some digging and found the front suspension on the '80-'82 F-100's to be confusing, at best. I haven't got into the Ford parts books yet (hopefully this weekend) and I think once I do it may tend to clear things up a bit, at least I hope so.

I did contact DJM tech line and asked if they had anything for an '81 or could make any recommendations. They responded yesterday and said they had a set of beams on the road now and were waiting for results before starting production. They did not say whether the beams were for the large or small kingpins. This morning I emailed the tech and asked if they had any estimate as to availability, but have not had a response as yet.

I will post back once I have more solid information.

[Gary Lewis]

I have some drawings and other info on the page Suspension & Steering/Front Suspension.

As for the parts book, I find this area to be quite complex.  Start on Text Section 30 Page 9, as shown below, although yours won't have my notes in blue.  


And, since that is hard to read, here is the part where I've made notes:




Then, note the number in the Parts List & Section column, to the right parts list pages.  Let's take 30.1A as an example.  Here's the page for it, which shows Section 30.1, and then the "A" column.  And you see that the right-hand axle is E0TA 3006-FA and the left is 3007-FA.  Make sense?

[FuzzFace2]

Gary / others, What I see using the parts books and that Bill aka numbers dummy does, it ONLY shows what years that part fits NOT what they INTERCHANGE with.

Look at the 300six EFI exh manifolds. If you were to look up what they fit it will give you the years that EFI was installed on the 300 six engine. We now know the EFI exh manifolds will fit earlier 300 and think the other six motors with the intake/exh bolted together.

So with that said any front suspension parts with the same dimensions "should" swap as a whole.
So "should" be able to use stamped arms in place of cast if you swap all parts from the pivot on out.
You might get away with reusing say spindles on out or brake parts but to be safe pivot on out is best.

I would also check the pivot bolt size to see if the same bolt is used but I think they are.
I think I seen it posted the radius arm bracket bushings were different but someone did this swap just don't remember what was involved to do so?

Just my take on the parts interchange.
Dave ----

[FuzzFace2]

Roger Carter wrote

FF2,

Thanks for the comments and the links. I appreciate it all.

To all who have responded,

I have done some digging and found the front suspension on the '80-'82 F-100's to be confusing, at best. I haven't got into the Ford parts books yet (hopefully this weekend) and I think once I do it may tend to clear things up a bit, at least I hope so.

I did contact DJM tech line and asked if they had anything for an '81 or could make any recommendations. They responded yesterday and said they had a set of beams on the road now and were waiting for results before starting production. They did not say whether the beams were for the large or small kingpins. This morning I emailed the tech and asked if they had any estimate as to availability, but have not had a response as yet.

I will post back once I have more solid information.

Roger, Good to hear that DJM is looking in to making the beams again.

As for the kingpin beams and the different sizes in the pins and I have not looked into this, the beams "may be" the same size hole for the pin and the spindles may be different as are the pins you need for the different brakes?

One way I would look into this and maybe with what Gary posted (I have not looked) you could check if the part numbers for say, 81 or 82 with cast beams list the same numbers wither power/non-power brakes.

I do know there is for the ball joint beams a cast or stamped beam and as I posted in Gary's post I think if you were to swap out as a whole from pivot on out it would work.

Just me thinking and that can be a bad thing, look at the firewall swap to have AC and style side metal floor in place of flare side wood floor
Dave ----

[Gary Lewis]

Dave - I agree that at first blush the catalog shows what parts came on which trucks, but not what they will interchange with. However, with some digging you can often figure out the interchange bit.

For example, on the EFI manifold, if you look at the engine block you might find that the same block was used for several years, and that during that time both EFI and carb intakes were used. So both intakes will bolt to the same block.

Same thing on the axles. The frames were the same, but things like the pivot brackets could have changed. And, on the other end, what spindles were used. Those are in the catalog so, with great effort, you can usually figure that out as well.

The catalog isn’t easy, and it isn’t perfect, but with a lot of work you can figure a bunch of things out by digging into it.

[FuzzFace2]

You said it "A LOT OF WORK" if using the Ford parts "book".
1 section to look at a picture and get a part of the part number then another area to look up the right part number for year truck.

Then Ford calls the part something else than what everyone else calls it so trying to find it in the first place is a job. I already have one of them
Dave ----

[Gary Lewis]

Yes, Ford went to great lengths to make finding part numbers in the catalog WORK, as Maynard G would have said. And, they were successful.

The best way I’ve found to get around the issue of what Ford called it is to find it in an illustration, get the generic part number, and go look that up.

[Roger Carter]

Happy Thanksgiving All, don't overdo with the turkey and such today. At least not too much..

I appreciate everyone taking the time to post on this thread. I am taking it all in. When I first asked for help I didn't realize how convoluted the front suspension was on these early Bullnose trucks. I am used to working with the '65-'79 trucks.

Gary, I agree with you on the use of the parts books. Find the illustration and then go to the text. That is the way I was taught many years back.

I have learned when digging for old Ford information is to use the earliest parts books available for the year in question. Ford did a lot of part number superseding over the years and sometimes the original part number can get lost. Using the Ford "Standard Parts" (?) manual is helpful as well. It defines the nuts, bolts, clips, clamps, etc. used in the illustrations by the part numbers called out in the illustrations and text.

As for interchange, the Hollander interchange manuals are invaluable. They don't spell out everything, but they can get you pointed in the right direction and they typically use readily available identifiers rather than part numbers.

Again, thank you all and Happy Thanksgiving.

[Gary Lewis]

Roger - You are right about Ford's parts catalog.  In their infinite wisdom they frequently deleted numbers when they were replaced by a later part or when they were no longer available - to Ford.  But, some of them are floating around "out there" and come up for sale from time to time and we can't figure out what they are since the numbers are no longer in the catalog.

Most, if not all of us, are working from the 1994 version of the catalog, the one available on CD.  And by then many things were no longer shown in the catalog.  Fortunately I have on loan a set of microfiche of the catalog as of 1988, and a microfiche viewer.  So I do have a chance of finding some of the numbers.  But, it is a laborious process.