I am in the middle of a big desision!! I need to do a brake upgrade and some suspension work on this Dinosaur. I had a brain fart and I figured that instead of body work I am going to do some suspension and brake upgrades instead . I have been looking for brake conversions and Have found a few, but the price of these kits are in the 300-500 range. I was thinking of doing a frame swap on this truck but I am having trouble finding the dimensions of the wheel base and what other kinds of truck would be a simple swap. Here is the reasoning behind my tinking. 1... If I go with a newer frame I would gain independent front suspension instead of a solid axel in the front. 2... If i can find a newer frame I would gain disk brakes and would not have to deal with the conversion to disks. 3.... Steering!! now this truck has the old driver assisted power sterring, and the newer frame and sterring would already be equiped with the newer power serring front. But here is the question?????? what truck would be an Ideal conversion for what I am doing? I understand that there would be some modificatins involved but I dont want to have to stretch/shrink the body/ new frame to fit the wheel base. Does anyone know if there is a truck out there with the same wheel base that would make this transition? Thanks Joel

Go visit a big shopping mall parking lot and bring your tape measure.

seen a 50 ford P/U on a late model ford ranger frame w/a 5.0 in it. He said it was an easy fit along with late model suspension & power disc brakes. Now the 52's may have a wider frame so what I would do is measure the width of the front suspension from where the rims bolt to the rotor ( this way you get a TRUE width) & the wheelbase & go from there. I have also heard of folks using Dakota frames also. As for lenghtening or shortening a frame if you had to its no big deal. BUT if you afraid of all that, lots of companies make cross members to put mustang2, dakota, and other front suspensions under these old trucks............joe