InTheGarageMedia.com
Scott Thurston’s ’69 Ranger
e all have a story about the one that got away. For Scott Thurston, that was a ’68 Ford Ranger. “My dad had one—black with red guts—that he let me drive in high school,” he remembers. “I grew up with that truck camping, hauling hay and wood, and doing whatever else we needed to do. I always dreamed of what it would be like to have it lowered and in a short-wide configuration.”
Scott looked locally for about four months. “All we could find were rusted-up trucks.” But a conversation with a friend changed everything. “He suggested I broaden my search,” Scott says. He cast his net over the San Francisco Bay Area, about a 1,500-mile jaunt south of the crunchy critters he was finding in Seattle. Within a fortnight he found the truck: a black, big-block, short-wide ’69 Ford F-100 Ranger with red guts and no rust. “I had to have it,” he says. “I called the guy, discussed the truck, and knew I wanted it, but it was a long way to go to be disappointed.” As luck would have it, the seller lived a few blocks from one of Scott’s coworkers. “I reached out to Mike Graham and asked if he could give me an hour on his Saturday to look at this truck.” Sure enough, it was as nice as advertised. So nice, in fact, Mike said he’d consider buying it for himself.
“I offered to send him money, but he wouldn’t have it,” he continues. “I dropped the name of every person I knew in the hobby, hoping to find some connection that could vouch for me.” They found a distant-but-personal connection. “From there I must have reached out every day with a question or status update just to make sure it wasn’t sold out from under me.” Scott left Seattle on a Friday morning, drove non-stop to the Bay, crashing in a no-tell motel for about three hours until daylight broke, and made the deal early Saturday morning. “We loaded the truck up and headed back home just in time for work on Monday.”
Spokane’s A.J. Kautzman built it with flat-top pistons, a combination that yields 10.5:1 static compression ratio with the 70cc chambers in the Edelbrock Performer RPM heads. Kautzman followed the known Edelbrock power combination and used the matching camshaft and intake manifold, but broke rank by using a 750-cfm Holley Brawler. Jim Boorman modified a Duraspark distributor to take a GM HEI module, then tuned it for the application. With 1 7/8-inch Stan’s Headers, it made 475 lb-ft of torque at 4,500 rpm and 460 hp at 6,000 rpm.
Rather than using a roll pan to finish off the back of the bed, Scott used one as a backdrop for a Dodge D100 bumper. On the yonder end, Scott used everything Ford, the only exception was a set of Lucas Tri-bar headlights.
The stock rear leaves and axle went back in place, albeit this time with a Fatman Fabrications flip kit. That axle sports 3.89:1 gears on a limited-slip carrier with 31-spline Currie Enterprises shafts. The ends mount a Currie disc conversion kit with 11 1/2-inch Powerstop rotors and ’99 Mustang SVO calipers. Ford equipped the Crown Vic clip with 12-inch rotors and two-piston calipers, which Scott left well enough alone.
Mike Curtis at Curtis Speed assembled a set of Armor-series 17×8 and 18×10 wheels with 5.5- and 4.75-inch backspace, respectively. They mount 235/45ZR17 and 295/45ZR18 Nitto NT555 G2 tires.
High Tech Rick at High Tech Upholstery, in Auburn, Washington, trimmed the dash, door cards, and factory seat in leather—red, just like dear ol’ dad’s truck. Auto Custom Carpets made the molded cut-pile rug. Scott wired the pickup with an American Autowire Classic Update harness. He replaced the column with a ’79 tilt unit and topped that with a GT Performance GT9 steering wheel. Dakota Digital VHX gauges replace the analog pieces. A RetroSound Laguna Beach head unit and Alpine speakers replace the wheezy AM audio system.
These days Scott holds tightly to his ’69 Ford Ranger. And who can blame him? The one that inspired him got away decades ago, he had a hard time finding another one like it solid enough to build, and he damn near couldn’t seal the deal once he found it. And even once he finished it exactly as he wanted it, it just about ended up on its top at the side of the road! So don’t take it personally if he doesn’t entertain offers. Good memories are getting harder and harder to replace.