Ford F-Series: the truck that started it all

By Martin Buckley

| 19 Dec 2024

Classic & Sports Car – Ford F-Series: the truck that started it all

In Europe, the post-war pick-up truck or delivery van tended to be a bit too much like a converted passenger car or a scaled-down heavy-duty vehicle.

In neither case was it something you would drive out of choice, rather from practical necessity.

In Britain, only the arrival of the Ford Transit in 1965 adequately addressed this situation.

But Detroit had its ‘Transit moment’ almost two decades earlier, with the Ford F-Series pick-up.

This Ford F-Series pick-up’s column shift operates a three-speed manual gearbox

Post-1945, the Americans, heeding the newfangled science of market research, saw the need for something that was designed for rugged commercial requirements, but also had enough roadgoing refinements – performance and comfort among them – that it could be used for ‘civilian’ activities as an alternative to a station wagon.

Launched in November 1947 (as a ’48 model), Ford’s ‘Bonus Built’ F-Series got the balance just right from the start.

As the first standalone Ford truck design not derived from an existing passenger car, it carried over the well-proven six- and eight-cylinder flathead engines, but was based on a new chassis with a third crossmember, double-acting shock absorbers and the cab body isolated from the frame on rubber mountings.

This Ford F-Series is an early example of the utility vehicle that became America’s best-seller

It still used cart springs at both ends, but, given that the contemporary Ford sedans and station wagons still eschewed independent front suspension, this was not seen as any great disadvantage.

With its bull-nosed, cartoon-like styling and rugged stance, it is really the great-grandaddy of the various F-Series trucks that continue to top the best-sellers list in North America.

The F-Series was launched into a post-war North American market where commercial-vehicle sales were regarded as having equal importance to passenger cars.

After all, Ford had sold 17 million of them since the era of the Model T, so the business was highly valued.

The Ford F-Series pick-up was the ideal vehicle for American citizens in the immediate post-WW2 years

Henry Ford’s earliest days in the automotive business were focused on trucks rather than cars, perhaps reflecting his origins in farming.

Ford had transferred production capacity to building bombers, jeeps, trucks and tank engines post-Pearl Harbor.

With civilian life somewhat on hold since America joined the war effort, many of its citizens were focused on rebuilding and renewing their private and commercial lives, and starting new ventures.

A pick-up truck fitted well with the practical mindset of getting the country back to work in the immediate post-war years, as industry regained its momentum and shifted from the war-effort activities to satisfying the huge, pent-up demand for new vehicles.

‘The Ford F-1 looks a little out of its element in the UK – it really needs the open vistas of a Kansas farm or a desert road in Nevada’

There wouldn’t be a truly new Ford passenger car until 1949, in the form of the ‘shoebox’ models (the immediate post-war offerings were simply warmed-over 1942 designs), so Ford pick-up buyers were getting favoured treatment.

Built in 16 separate locations, from Texas to New Jersey via California, Missouri, and Michigan, the F-Series was available at eight different gross-weight ratings and not only as a pick-up: there were F-1 to F-3 panel vans, and F-5/F-6 medium-duty bare chassis to take delivery truck, cab-over or bus bodies.

The F-4 was the beginning of a heavier-duty specification, while the F-7 and F-8 were marketed as the heavy-duty ‘big job’ models, good for 17,000-22,000lb gross-vehicle-weight loads, latterly with the overhead-valve Lincoln Y-block V8 engines giving 145-155bhp.

The Ford F-Series pick-up’s tailgate is proudly emblazoned with its maker’s signature

In Canada, the F-Series was marketed under the Mercury brand as the M-Series.

Based on a 114in wheelbase, the F-1 was the mainstay of the range.

It was 7in wider and had more headroom than its 1942-’47 predecessor, with its doors mounted 3in further forward and with 45cu ft of load space: the F-2 and F-3 had a longer, 8ft bed with built-in skidplates.

Ford had offered V8 engines in its pre-war pick-ups. Post-war, the F-Series was the only American truck offered with a V8 until 1954.

Although heavier-duty options were available, the Ford F-1 was the mainstay of the F-Series range

In truth, save the carried-over engines, the ‘Built Stronger to Last Longer’ F-Series was the only genuinely new post-war pick-up design in North America: the GM and Chrysler offerings were facelifted early 1940s models.

As well as a choice between flathead straight-six and V8 engines, there was a wide range of transmission options: three-speed ‘light duty’ and ‘heavy duty’, four-speed with or without overdrive, plus a four-wheel-drive system made by Marmon-Herrington.

With a standard specification that included an adjustable bench seat, an ashtray, a driver’s sunvisor and a three-way ventilation system, these were certainly the most habitable Ford commercials yet, but you still had to pay extra for a heater, windscreen washers, or a wiper and sunvisor for the passenger side.

The Ford’s more powerful V8 shrugs off the F-1’s 4700lb to give it peppy performance

Ford claimed to have spent a million dollars making the cabin more comfortable, with the steering wheel more horizontal and closer to the driver, rubber mats on the floor for better heat isolation and a one-piece, 2in-taller windscreen for improved vision.

The rear ’screen was larger, too.

There is a huge following – and nostalgia – for these first F-Series Fords in North America, although, with even the youngest examples now more than 70 years old, the ranks of those who bought one new must be very thin.

As an evocation of the post-war rural American experience, it would be hard to conceive of an object that captures the feeling of that place and era more succinctly.

The classic Ford F-1’s fuel tank is sited directly behind the bench seat

They would rarely have been seen in the United Kingdom outside of American military bases, and few British buyers, lumbered with high fuel prices, would have had much use for an 18mpg behemoth such as this – although they did make it to Australia in right-hand-drive form.

The Ford F-1 looks a little out of its element in the UK.

It really needs the open vistas of a Kansas farm or a desert road in Nevada.

One of 360,000 built in 1950, this Texas-born half-ton stepside reminds me of any number of hilariously awful American B-movies – the ones with UFOs and alien invaders, in which the cowboy-hatted pick-up driver and his screaming companion always end up getting zapped by the little grey people in the cardboard flying saucers.

The Ford F-Series pick-up’s workmanlike interior

I suspect that many more of these classic commercials have found their way to British shores since the arrival of the internet than ever did in the preceding 40 years.

This Ford F-1, appearing somewhat lost among the high-end exotica that is the workaday fare of The Classic Motor Hub, was restored in America more than 20 years ago and came here as a promotional vehicle for a company in London, but has been with its current owner since 2008.

Being a 1950 model, it still features the simple, vertically orientated grille with the headlamps inset into the smoothly rounded wings, giving a look somewhat akin to a Volvo PV444.

The Ford F-Series sticks out in middle England

Later versions had a toothier-looking arrangement with three chrome spears supporting a central horizontal section spanning the width of the opening.

It has all its factory panels, too, likely thanks to having had its origins in one of the drier states.

The early Ford F-Series and subsequent F-100s have always provided the perfect blank canvas for the ministrations of the hot-rod fraternity, so it is particularly nice to see one with all of its original features, sitting on its utilitarian four-bolt wheels.

The Ford F-Series pick-up’s hidden bonnet-release catch

There is minimal chrome – the front bumper is just a flat piece of painted steel attached to the chassis rails – and the immaculate load area looks too pristine to ever risk filling with tip-run junk, never mind the scrap, builder’s rubble and farmyard detritus that was the destiny of most of these vehicles.

The catch for the bonnet release is found in the left nostril of the rounded proboscis.

It lifts to reveal a massive radiator that is a nod to the cooling problems associated with the flathead Ford V8 – a corollary of the heat-transference issues between the exhaust headers and the cylinder heads in this classic piece of Detroit production engineering.

The Ford F-1’s 3920cc flathead V8 engine makes 100bhp at 3800rpm

Good for 100bhp on a 6.8:1 compression ratio, this 239cu in (3.9-litre) manifestation of the Ford flathead was the improved 8RT version of the engine that had brought V8 torque and refinement to the masses.

This was mainly by way of new methods in foundry work and heat treatment around the design of the cheaper-to-make, forged, three-main-bearing crank and the casting of the block.

First seen in 1932, the V8 was Henry Ford’s final technical contribution to the cars that bore his name: it had a 21-year production life, but Henry I did not quite live to see the introduction of the F-Series commercial line.

The Ford F-1 has funky script on its clear instruments

With its tiny carburettor, saucepan-sized air cleaner, distinctive valve covers and somewhat inconveniently positioned distributor, it sits low and buried in a generously sized engine bay.

The mechanical fuel pump, sited behind the carburettor, draws from a tank mounted just aft of the passenger compartment.

The cab itself shows slightly more signs of use than the body, and the vinyl covering of the plain, sprung bench seat could well be the original.

There is a 100mph speedometer sharing a cream-coloured instrument cluster with temperature, oil-pressure, battery and fuel gauges.

The classic Ford F-Series pick-up truck’s clutch and brake pedals

The doors are covered in a piece of body-coloured sheet steel; look down and you’ll see the large, circular clutch and brake pedals emerging from the floor.

Look up, and the headlining is a piece of black cardboard.

You sit quite tall, as in a Range Rover, with the roofline of a Porsche 911 about level with the bottom of the door windows.

The view over the bonnet is beetle-browed, somewhat akin to being behind the wheel of a giant Morris Minor.

Worm-and-roller steering combines with solid axles and leaf springs to limit the Ford F-1’s cornering prowess

There is a distinctively creamy yet slightly offbeat resonance to the flathead Ford V8, with surprisingly eager throttle response.

In terms of straight-line urge this Ford would have been a revelation to drivers of British half-ton load-haulers.

Indeed, this truck’s acceleration would probably have impressed some sports-car drivers, with a smooth, lively flow that feels disproportionate to a top speed that must be geared down to something no greater than 80mph.

The Ford F-Series pick-up’s door trims are simple painted steel

This was the first year of the column shift, a floppy but friendly three-speed affair that requires little of your attention, the aim being to get into top as quickly as possible and exploit the torque, rather than extend too deeply into the modest rev band.

The steering very much requires your attention. It is low-geared to keep the effort required light, but you have to learn to allow it to find its own path.

You do not so much steer the Ford F-Series as provide it with suggestion as to where it might like to go.

The brakes merely require the anticipation you would expect in any vehicle of more than 70 years old.

Does the Ford F-Series pick-up truck best represent the USA’s motoring history?

If the national car of Britain is the Mini, and of Germany the VW Beetle, then the Ford F-Series would get my vote as the vehicle that best encapsulates American expectations in personal transport, even more so now than it did in 1950.

The F-Series began the trend, quietly evolving in the background while bearing witness to the rise and fall of the mighty American motor industry.

From tailfins through the muscle era and way beyond malaise, the Ford pick-up has held true to its original values.

It has been the best-selling American vehicle for the past half a century (700,000 F-Series trucks were sold last year alone) and, to misquote Charlton Heston, it will be out of their ‘cold dead hands’ that it is taken away from the drivers who love them.

Images: Max Edleston

Thanks to: The Classic Motor Hub

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