Photo: barnfinds.com classifieds (edited by autoevolution)
There are a few unwritten house rules among restomod builders. Number one, on a long enough timeline, every car gets an LS swap. Two, if you use anything but a Ford nine-inch rear end, you're basically a chump, and three, don't shove a Japanese engine under the hood of an old American car. Plenty of people break that last rule, but even fewer do as nice of a job as 1937 Ford Model 77 half-ton truck.
In the days before Ford's cars and trucks were formally differentiated from each other after World War II, the average 1937 Ford Sedan you saw tootling around town utilized the same basic engine and chassis you'd find in a Ford half-ton truck. With the option of two Ford Flathead V8s of 136 cubic inches (2.2 L) or 221 cubic inches (3.3-L), these early pickups were relatively capable work vehicles with nice low-end torque and robust chassis to handle all the stress.
While these engines were fine for the day, we've done better in the last eight decades. Well, at least most engines have gravitated away from the same pushrod engines this Ford truck was familiar with in its heyday. Try a four-liter Toyota 1UZ-FE V8 on for size. Though only 700 ccs bigger than the 3.3-liter Ford Flathead, modern exploits like four valves per cylinder, dual overhead cams, and variable valve timing, the tech native to the 1UZ encompasses everything a V8 engine's become since the old Flathead helped popularize the breed.
With a stock tune, these 1UZ V8s jetted 250 horsepower. That might not sound like a lot, but there's definitely more grunt to be found in this landmark Japanese engine. With the right set of mods, like forged cams, chunkier injectors, and an ECU flash, these motors can crank out 500 horses all day long before forced induction is needed to squeeze even more out of it. In the case of this Ford truck, the engine is paired to a Toyota A341 four-speed found in the mid-to-late 90s Lexus LS400 and even the Toyota Sequoia, so there's plenty of muscle in the drivetrain to keep the fun going for years and years of trouble-free.
Elsewhere around the vehicle, you could never tell the engine under the hood of this truck came from anything other than an American factory. With glossy red body paint, contrasting black fender paint, and Foose alloy wheels, people are only liable to say how sweet it looks before their jaw hits the floor upon popping the hood. If we had to guess, the reaction to the engine reveal must be pure theater ten times out of ten. For an asking price of $42,000 via the barnfinds.com classifieds, you could probably be a certified pre-owned Lexus for that money.
While these engines were fine for the day, we've done better in the last eight decades. Well, at least most engines have gravitated away from the same pushrod engines this Ford truck was familiar with in its heyday. Try a four-liter Toyota 1UZ-FE V8 on for size. Though only 700 ccs bigger than the 3.3-liter Ford Flathead, modern exploits like four valves per cylinder, dual overhead cams, and variable valve timing, the tech native to the 1UZ encompasses everything a V8 engine's become since the old Flathead helped popularize the breed.
With a stock tune, these 1UZ V8s jetted 250 horsepower. That might not sound like a lot, but there's definitely more grunt to be found in this landmark Japanese engine. With the right set of mods, like forged cams, chunkier injectors, and an ECU flash, these motors can crank out 500 horses all day long before forced induction is needed to squeeze even more out of it. In the case of this Ford truck, the engine is paired to a Toyota A341 four-speed found in the mid-to-late 90s Lexus LS400 and even the Toyota Sequoia, so there's plenty of muscle in the drivetrain to keep the fun going for years and years of trouble-free.
Elsewhere around the vehicle, you could never tell the engine under the hood of this truck came from anything other than an American factory. With glossy red body paint, contrasting black fender paint, and Foose alloy wheels, people are only liable to say how sweet it looks before their jaw hits the floor upon popping the hood. If we had to guess, the reaction to the engine reveal must be pure theater ten times out of ten. For an asking price of $42,000 via the barnfinds.com classifieds, you could probably be a certified pre-owned Lexus for that money.
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