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I am the proud owner of a 1979 Ford F-100. This is my first truck. Right now it only has a weak 351M with only 125000 miles, a C6 3-speed Automatic, and a Dana 44 with 2.10 gears. It also has factory A/C, p/s, p/b. One day it will be a "daily driven" show truck that will see drag time on occasion. My idea right no is stroke to 400, bore .030 over, Edel. aluminum heads and air-gap manifold when they come out, Holley 950 ECU TBI, performace AOD, Ford 9" with 4.56 gears, and a 460 sized aluminum radiator.

Welcome to CHR 1979

4:56 for a daily driver? Not hwy. daily drivin' I hope?

Welcome to CHR. With those gears, you'll be cranking up that engine over 5,000RPM at 65MPH, but great for racing.

Yeah I agree, with them 4:56's ya might want to go with a OD trans

Welcome to the club. In case you're interrested in pullin a few stumps with that truck, I have an extra set of 5.43's for a 9" Ford.

Welcome to the club 1979f_100

I knew it would be reving high with 4.56s but I didn't know it would be that high. What would you guys reccomend.

How about 3:55. They still give alot of grunt at both low and high end. You can make those tires smoke at the line and when your crusing at 70, the tach will read about 3200 RPM.

Is that running in 1.00:1.00 on the trans? Don't forget, I do plan on getting an AOD.

Originally posted by 1979f_100
I knew it would be reving high with 4.56s but I didn't know it would be that high. What would you guys reccomend.

I think 4:10 is about as far as I would push it for street gears. If it's a daily driver probably higher or as viking stated ... use an O.D. tranny. Tall tires will help too. It's hard to build a multi-purpose vehicle without sacrificing.
A daily driven street car won't be "competitive fast". A drag car will get too dirty to be a true show car. A show cars quality will be hard to maintain with a daily driver. So, you end up with a sorta' fast. Sorta' clean, daily driver. Nothin' at all wrong with that. I've had a couple myself.

Welcome to CHR. Sounds like you got a lot on your hands there. Just build 3 seperate trucks, one for drag, one for show and one for daily. heh just messing about that but I know what you mean, I am trying to build one for the same thing in a way but I don't need mine to be some full out drag car that can go on the street I just wanna hit up the strip once in a while because to me the whole point of hot rodding is driving it around, taking it to shows and going to the strip to have some fun. Good luck with your project.

Welcome to CHR

Since you asked for recomendations, as a matter of personal preference, I would go with 3.73's since you are using an O.D. Tranny. That combination really seems like the perfect set-up (read Trade Off) for "street muscle"......to me. Chevy mentioned 3.55's which there would be absolutely nothing wrong with either, just a little less aggressive than I personally like.

Bottom line: Do what you want; but to me, 4.56's would be fun for about the first 20 minutes and then I would be cussing them for the higher RPMs required to run 'em down the highway.

I also think ProZ definitely got it right, the mythical 9 second in the 1/4, daily driver, 1000 point show car, is exactly that....a myth. So, you can either build 'em to run really fast light to light, cruize down the highway or ride in an enclosed trailer. The choice is your's because everything else in-between is a trade-off of somekind or another. Finding the ultimate trade-off (which for you could be very different than it is for me) is really what it's all about.

Cheers, and good luck with the project.

Harmonics Streets? heh I looked up for my car with a 700 OD tranny and all and people told me if I plan to take it on a strip and street then don't go any higher than 4.11's. Go here, www.ckperformance.com and talk to a guy named Chris. Some people refered me to him and is supposedly a really great help and can tell you what gears to run, stall converter, etc. 3.73's sounds good to me though, that is what we had in the C20 at one time and they are great for highway use.

Originally posted by Firechicken


Bottom line: Do what you want; but to me, 4.56's would be fun for about the first 20 minutes and then I would be cussing them for the higher RPMs required to run 'em down the highway.

Welcome aboard. You bet Firechicken is right. My younger brother (he's 49) built a Chevy Luv that I built a 400 SBC for him. He put in 5.34s (on a spool no less) and is cussing it for ever. He's currently running 15 inch monster mudders on the rear just to be able to drive it around without listening the motor trying to self destruct. I think they're 33 inches tall.