The Ford C-Series truck was one of those vocational workhorses that labored in quiet obscurity for its entire service life. They were the vocational jack of all trades, finding work in refuse removal, construction, firefighting, food & beverage and parcel & freight delivery.
From the Model T on, Ford Motor Company has had a long and inglorious history of building a strong class-leading product, then proceeding to allow it to stagnate, as the competition passed it by. The Ford C-series was very much the Ranger pickup of medium duty commercial vehicles with a 33 year reign from 1957 until being retired in 1990. For longest heavy-duty truck production run, only the 39-year run of the Mack Model R can surpass it.
By the mid 60s, engine options covered the spectrum of Fords gas engines from the 300 CI straight 6, Y-Block 8s with the big block super duty 534 as the Big Kahuna of gasoline motors. The HD small block 8s came with stronger heads and valves to withstand the heavy use that many trucks receive.
On the compression ignition side of the house, Ford offered their own inline 4 and 6 motors, Cummins C and N series as well as a special order turbocharged 1673 1160 V-8 Caterpillar. Later in the production run Cat would become the engine of choice for fire apparatus.
Courtesy Cragin Spring
Transmission choices included a 5 speed manual combined with a 2 speed rear end, an 8 speed Roadranger as well as a 6 speed automatic. Spring rates and axle sizes also were variable. Marmon-Herrington 4 and 6 wheel drive conversions were available too. The total possible permutations of drivetrains is only slightly smaller than your choices at Starbucks.
The C-Series also had a whole family of badge-engineered doppelgangers. In Canada it was re-tagged Mercury along with the M-Series pickup. The tooling was designed and owned by Ford but manufacturing was outsourced to Budd; other truck OEMs used both the entire cab and portions thereof with approval. Mack used the Cab for their N Model, FWD and Walther used portions of the cab for their airport fire apparatus.
While the COE went extinct as a Class 8 tractor they remain popular in the middleweight categories. In a two axle configuration placing the load in front of the steer axle creates better weight distribution and allows for a larger cargo area and heavier payloads on a given wheelbase. Placing the driver at the front also has the fortunate side effect of giving the driver much smaller blind spots. The shorter wheelbase allows the equipment to squeeze into spots where the extra 4 to 6 feet of conventional truck with a hood could not fit.
When Ford announced they were discontinuing the C-Series many long time customers grumbled. The Cargo model that was slated to replace it was a flop, with the Isuzu, Mitsubishi and Hino (Toyota) grabbing most of the middleweight tilt cab market. Today you can still find many C Series trucks still on the job. For a smaller roofer or landscaper they offer a lot of utility at a low price and like most vehicles of that era, are shade tree wrenching friendly. Outside of the Rust Belt they can be kept alive and working almost indefinitely.
Thanks for this tribute to the C-Series. It’s hard to describe how incredibly common these once were; it’s as if Ford had a monopoly on every garbage truck in the country. And I just saw one the other day, a garbage truck, still working.
This is rare among the commercial vehicles that get posted here… but I have actually rode in the cab of one of these.
My Dad’s boss (whose John Deere dealership happened to be located on the site of a former Ford dealership) had a habit of picking up vehicles at auctions and other sales that had little to do with his main business but if the vehicle was cheap enough he thought it would be handy to have around.
He had a Ford C-Series dump truck that was a pretty short unit, wheelbase appeared to be about the size of the one in the drawing above showing the mechanic accessing the engine. It was good for hauling a few tons of stone and the boss was always good about letting his employees borrow things.
When I was about 12 to 14 years old dad borrowed the dump truck to haul a few tons of stone for our driveway from the local quarry. I’m fairly certain that it was gas powered and I remember vinyl seats, no AC, and a stiff jerky clutch action (although dad never seems to be smooth with any clutch cept a sports car). Slow, ponderous, LOUD, and worked like a mule with nary a complaint. Somebody had sprayed the cab John Deere green and put “Henry Implement, Continental, OH” on the side so there would be no doubt to the ownership.
Hot day in July, helping dad keep up the maintenance on the property… pretty much describes my summers till I went off to college.
As with so many segments of the automotive industry, it is difficult to understand why Ford would simply give up on a market it had a virtual monopoly. These trucks used to be everywhere and now they have been replaced by Hino and Isuzu.
Maybe someone who has a connection to Ford can find out. Sure would be interesting to know the reasoning.
Don’t forget International (back when they was known as International Harvester) who also got their cabover trucks until the late 1980s. They was common as well when they was used as beer trucks by Molson, O’Keefe and Labatt.
It just amazes me how Ford frittered away their market share in heavy trucks. In applications such as Refuse, Concrete and Fire where the upfitting costs run 2-3X the cost of the underlying vehicle the customers want to purchase the same vehicle forever. My employer is on its 3rd decade of purchasing Pete 320 Front-loaders with Cummins power.
After decades of neglect they sold the truck business to Daimler in 1997 to chase the Crack Rock Profits of jumbo SUVs.
Sadly they are making the same mistakes again discontinuing the P71 Panthers when a mild refresh would have maintained 80%+ share of the Police Cruiser market for another decade.
I think the Panther could be modernised and kept on the market but the present model is definitely due for a major overhaul. An independent rear suspension, modern transmission and new engines top the list.
I have caught myself fantasizing about what the Crown Vic would be like with the Mustangs 3.7V6 and six speed auto. 30mpg would have been easy.
Exactly.
Give it a current V6 with a 6sp auto and mild hybrid system. I’d keep the rear axle though as its cheap and rugged. As long as the hard points for up-fitting are kept the same they could jack up the price $6-8k over the current model and still keep market share.
Also, make it unibody like virtually every other car on the market. The replacement could share a lot of components with the Mustang platform and challenge the Chrysler LX cars.
Call it the Falcon.
Nice work! These trucks are amazing, and I should do an article on the 73 Ford ex-phone company F-500 bucket truck my American Legion Post owns….
These were a good, honest truck. They were designed in an age when driver comfort was an afterthought at best though. The best way to describe the noise and ride would be “an all-day explosion” in the words of one of our old time employees. They were tough, easy to maintain and repair and used parts and components that were easy to find. I don’t know for sure why Ford quit making them.
The replacement Cargo was indeed a flop, and deserved to be. Brazilian engines, quirky brake systems, wiring problems, expensive/impossible to source parts and so on.
The later ones were better but still a pain. In the fleet business, simple is good and the C-series was a winner. It is too bad Ford walked away from this market.
As some who has operated fleets, I couldn’t agree more: simple is best! However, gear heads will never grasp this concept.
A friend of mine owns a wash / detail business and has one of these as a wastewater collection truck. His has the Caterpillar engine.
I rode in it once. I felt like a pair of socks in a dryer.
For me there`s something unbelievable about this truck – gas engines. That`s almost impossible here in Europe. And gas engines can still be found in medium-duty Ford trucks – wow!
Gas engines were king back in the day espically in fire trucks as you can’t afford to not be able to turn the key and hammer the throttle something you just could do with the old diesels. Garbage trucks were often gas since they were a lot quieter they were less likely to wake customers. Th gas engine did have a short hiatus in the MD line but they were recently reintroduced due to popular demand due to their much lower overall cost. UPS and FedEx are going back to gas powered stepvans again, at least in my area, due to the overall lower cost. The minimal fuel savings are way more than eaten up by the much higher initial, maintenance and repair cost.
Gas is the way to go with anything less than five ton. The new diesels with their particulate burning systems use much more fuel than the older models and diesels are very sensitive to poor fuel quality.
I see in Canuckistan UPS going back to LPG for their step-vans. LPG sells for about $0.70 a litre in these parts, vs $1.40 for gas. Definitely worth it since LPG has much lower long term costs than even gasoline.
Here in the US Schwans runs Ford and GM big blocks converted to LPG.
From the early 90s until 2006 Diesel had the advantage on economy and longevity. With all the 2007+ stuff mandated for emissions compliance its easier to go back to a gas job for must duty cycles. For comparison the two 6.4 Ford Diesels we have at my work get ~60% of the fuel economy of the previous 7.3s and 6.0s and were utter hangar queens for the 1st year of their service lives with the DPFs constantly clogging.
There is a small cottage industry here converting small Isuzu trucks with blown-up diesel engines to V8′s on LPG, due to the cost of diesel rebuilds even without being direct injection & not having DPF.
You got to keep in mind that a lot of those left the factory with the good old SBC.
I beleive these were introduced in 1957, not 1965 (which matches with the 33-year production run mentioned).
I think that was a typo; I’ve fixed it. Thanks.
I rented a 24′ International COE in 1980 to schlep a bunch of stuff from Hayward, CA to the Mission District in San Fran. Had to go over the Bay Bridge. Scared the living crap out of me. It was a good thing that there were lap belts because that was the roughest riding vehicle I have ever driven. The key was letting yourself bounce up and down without affecting your loud pedal foot.
Ford did not intend to abandon the CF market the Cargo was supposed to continue to dominate the market. They did try to reenter the market with the old second place company International but that flopped too despite having many points where the were far superior to the Isuzu.
Unknown model here our Ford trucks were all UK designed and faded away by the 80s when American trucks and heavy duty European trucks arrived. The last Fords we had were the Louieville models which have nearly disappeared from mainstream use now and the idea of petrol engines in trucks was dropped decades ago. Cab noise is something that been done away with in modern trucks and generally driver comfort has a much higher priority now than when I first drove professionally my current night ride is as quiet as my car and even though sitting directly above a 480hp diesel its vurtually in audible.
This could be why Ford finally abandonned this model as the cost of upgrading the truck to modern standards would have cost too much.
Not all UK designed, we did get the Louisville trucks in Australia at least if not NZ, before they sold those to Daimler. Did the US get the D-series or was that UK only? I don’t think I’ve seen a Ford C-series.
I agree with comments about the Cargo, I think the ones we had here had engines from the usual manufacturers but the trucks had a few problems.
The Cargo was an upgrade of the older D series but Ford and Nissan shared a truck at one point in the 6×4 category then they became Iveco/Ford
The D was never sold in North America. Cargos (Called the “CF” series here) for the US and Canada were originally sourced from Brazil and at the time (1986) it was described as the European Cargo cab mounted on a medium-duty (600-800 series) F-series chassis. Cargo production for North America was moved to the Louisville, KY plant in 1990 after C-series production ended.
During my brief stint as a volunteer fire fighter, we got a C series set up as an urban interface rig (think structure protection where hydrants don’t go). Gas engine, automatic, and 4 wheel drive. It didn’t help that the carb needed a rebuild from the ethanol in the fuel and that the rig was a shoehorn fit in our fire hall.
Not my favorite truck. I’d much prefer the M37 6 x 6. There’s an urban interface version of that beast which would be nice to use.
I guess Ford have a tendency to dominate a market then fail them entirely with a product succession that strayed far from what makes its predecessor successful. Now they’re doing it again with police vehicles.
I drove them going back as far as the early 70′s at Roadway. I swear the real reason their production continued as late as it did was because of Roadway (and many other LTL carriers). Without Roadway, the C-series would have died at least ten years earlier.
Ironically, Roadway did not get the last C-series built. I was told that the final C was built as a fire apparatus chassis.
Roadway considered the C the “gold standard” for city trucks. One of the straight trucks has been enshrined inthe Henry Ford museum.
The C-Model was indeed a long lived and much loved truck. I was told that Ford discontinued them, among other reasons, because the stamping dies were too worn for continued use and they didn’t want to replace them.
As a kid back in the ’60′s my best friend’s Dad had a bright yellow Ford C with a grain body that he hauled feed for his chicken hatchery/egg operation with. We made a couple runs with him, riding shotgun on the big wide bench.
In the early 90′s as a Roadway Express city P&D driver I came to really love the “tilt cabs” as they were called. I had run P&D for Advance United back in the ’70′s driving Internationals and Macks but the Ford C’s were my hands down favorite. I could put a C with a 28′ pup trailer into places where only straight trucks usually went, I could do a 180* in the middle of a narrow street and I loved both the ride and the great visibility. Few of the Roadway tractors had power steering but even so the C’s weren’t bad to handle. Some of those Fords were so worn you had to move the shifter back and forth in the nuetral gate a couple times between shifts. As a casual I didn’t have an assigned truck but would always ask the dispatcher for one of the Ford C’s. When they were all gone I would usually, much to the amazement of the dispatcher, request one of the IH tilt cabs (Mpls had two of them, 795 and 797) in preference to one of those big, clumsy road tractors they liked to hand out. The IH’s REALLY had stiff steering but were at least manuverable.
Given a Ford C-model, a pup full of freight and a fistfull of bills and I was one happy camper! Looking at the Roadway shot above really brings back memories!
Also, don’t forget it had a big brother that we used to call a Two Floor Falcon.
timstrucks.site.aplus.net/FordHandC.jpg
Thats interesting, its like the C-series cab with another truck stuck underneath it and FORD nameplate filling the grille.
I’m actually surprised 1990 was the final year for these, I remember seeing them regularly up until probably 10 ten years ago or so. I’m always fascinated by long running truck lines like this.
My county had a 1988 C8000 as a trash truck that they got at least 20 years out of.
Yes, I also remember these being the “generic grimy garbage truck” until about 5-10 years ago.
Ahh the mighty 300 six. Like Michael Freeman and his Land Rovers, I have a sick obsession with the big six. Even though I have a much more modern, comfortable, and rather fun truck I still catch myself browsing eBay for cherry condition ’92-’96 Ford F-150 XL’s with the big six.
Ford did build some awesome vehicles. I hate to see that those days are gone mainly in the name of catering to the dude ranches.
These things looked so modern, “just right”, when I was a kid in the 1950′s and ’60′s, especially compared to the 1930′s designed generation of COE trucks that proceeded them. The only COE truck I ever drove was an Isuzu diesel, and extremely loud workhorse.
One thing to note is that Large trucks, including Semi trucks, Earth Movers, and heavy equipment were not popular or considered “cool” in the early 1900′s- which is why GM never really publicized there Euclid Heavy Industry division. However in the later part of the 20th century circa- 1970 large trucks were starting to gain popularity. GM produced the first ever commercial about Earth Movers and Mining equipment featuring Championship golfer Jack Nicklaus showcasing the Largest Truck In The World, at the time- Terex Titan.
Does anyone remember the TV show “CHiPs”? In almost every highway accident scene there is a RustOleum blue Ford C series pulling a silver trailer jackknifing in the middle of it.
Hello
I really need your help. model cars is my hobby. and I really want to make a model of 1/10. but I can not find drawings of the cab of the truck. If you have the desire and the opportunity to send them to me by e-mail pricep@hotmail.ru , I will be very grateful.
thank you
I bought a C-600 About 2 years ago just because I thought it was the coolest thing I’d ever seen and wanted to just drive it. Best $900 bucks I’ve ever spent!