I prefer “patina” when a heavy amount of surface rust isn’t involved, like this regular faded paint. “Silver Metallic” was Ford’s creative name for this color, and you can see that it’s faded differently in various spots around the truck. The seller has this one-family-owned, 4-speed, 1977 Ford F-150 Custom 4×4 listed here on eBay in Tacoma, Washington. The current bid price is $5,800, and there is no reserve!
What a good-looking and solid-looking truck. There’s a bit of surface rust as you can see, and the underside shows the usual surface rust as it would if it lived almost anywhere other than someone’s living room for the last 49 years. The Dentside Ford pickups for the fifth generation were made from 1972 for the 1973 model year until the end of 1979 for the U.S. market. Since it needs tires, I’d get regular steel rims, but that’s just me.
This one checks a lot of boxes for me: it’s a short box, or short bed, model, it has 4WD, a straight-six engine, a 4-speed manual transmission, no rust that I can see, and it’s one that I wouldn’t be afraid to drive, park, or haul things in. The topper / cap / shell on the back is super handy for weekend roughing-it camping, or hauling things in bad weather, or even for tiny motorcycle hauling, which I would use this truck for. There’s a piece of plywood on the floor, but the seller provided great photos, including one showing under the plywood to see the solid bed floor. Well done! They say it could use new tires and a windshield.
The first thing I notice is the 4-speed floor shifter (NP435?), along with the 2-speed (NP205?) transfer case shifter. The new seat cover is beautiful and looks like it would have been there all along. This is a Custom trim level, so that fabric may be a step above, but it looks as perfect as can be, and the whole interior looks great. Well, the pedal pads could maybe be changed, but otherwise, beautiful.
The rugged 300-cu.in. OHV inline-six is known for reliability, and while power brakes were standard, this one appears to have power steering. It keeps getting better! 115 horsepower is sent through that transfer case and manual transmission to all four wheels as needed, and this one is an absolute steal at the current bid price. With no reserve and just over a day left, what’s the winning bid price going to be for this good-looking F-150 4×4? Just as a general reference, Hagerty is at $11,900 for a #4 fair-condition truck in this spec with a long bed; they don’t give a short bed price. I’d have to believe it would be $12,500 at least. Anything under that will be a bargain for this rig.
I really like this generation of F-Series trucks. Overall this basic example looks solid, it’s not a rusty mess. Needs paint (obviously), wheels and tires, windshield, and a few other things I suspect. I’m fine with the bulletproof straight six/ 4-speed powertrain; you could even go crazy and detail underhood– there is lots of room to work.
Just from the looks of the paint, I’d actually say it has had reasonable care. Because the silvers and metallic light blues of the day simply went away, worse than this one shows. My in-laws had a 1979 Fairmont in this color which sat outside and needed repainted when it was only four years old. They went back with a non-metallic light gray.
I wonder if at the Paint Naming Department at Ford, it was 4pm on a Friday afternoon when it came time to name this color. So they quickly decided on Silver Metallic and headed for the door.
Prices for these have exploded in recent years.
Thanks Scotty, good work as always.
That’s not just faded, poor truck has Measles
Sweet truck. I got my heart set on a big block 72 F 250 4 speed, 4 wheel drive. The 71/72 F class were industructable IMO.
These short bed fleetside 4×4’s are hard to find, the condition is pretty good for a nearly 50 year old truck. The last few hours of the auction should be interesting, it would be surprising if it doesn’t go up significantly from its current $5,800 high bid. There will be interest in it by people looking for a platform to modify, those guys are generally more willing to spend money than purists. This was a good find and nice to see this featured on this site.
Steve R
This looks like a solid and honest pickup. I used to do the plywood on the bed thing too in order to protect the paint. Bob_In_Tn touched on the paint. It seems that Ford, GM, and Chrysler corp all had the same issues with silver and the silver blue, and blue colors. Looking at this one, it’s actually pretty good especially if its original. The chrome grill and front bumper look great too. Truth be told. I would have absolutely bought this exact truck as a young guy in the 1990’s used, and as a young guy, I would have put these wagon wheels and oversized tires on. Today, as an older guy, I would STILL absolutely buy this truck, but I would really like to have OEM white steel wheels, maybe chrome lug nuts to dress it up a bit. That 300 straight six will probably outlive me lol along with the granny gear 4 speed. Also, huge compliments on the carpet and seat cover too, even if it was vinyl when new, I’d do the same thing. Bidding is still at 5800 bucks as of Sunday morning.
My first new vehicle was a ’77 F150 SWB 4×4. Mine had the 351M V8 engine, 4 speed manual, PS and PB. I put a camper shell on mine as well. Sticker price at Tiger Motors in Auburn, Alabama was $6300.
I was driving a ’66 Chevy C10 at the time. It had a 283, with the three-on-the-tree and a camper shell. It had 90,000 miles on it and it smoked (valve guides worn out). The dealership allowed me $1300 trade-in!!! I financed $5000 for 3 years. IIRC, monthly payments were under $170 a month.
Wish I still had that truck!
The Barn Find crew is doing an excellent job of introducing the car world people to the great world of antique / historical trucks!!!! Keep up the good work!!! Again a beautiful hobby entry level vehicle. It would fit into both car and truck shows. I would keep this truck as is, probably change the rims, see if it will clean up or need a paint job. This truck will make someone a great everyday driver / weekend work horse / something to make the neighbors envious / be able to show off.
This is what I remember a truck being while cars still dominated the scene. As cars became smaller and less powerful people looked towards trucks and here we are today. I like the equipment and the aftermarket mirrors and wagon wheels fit right in. Someone gets a pretty sweet truck.
Sold on 1/4/2026 for a high bid of $9,000, there were 10 bidders with 32 bids.
Steve R
If you buy a 300 Ford 6 cylinder engine.
The first thing you do is grab the carburetor and give it a test twist. Very common for the screws holding the base throttle plate to come loose from the carburetor bowl.
The second thing you do is check to make sure all the manifold nuts and studs are present. If the nuts are missing, then chances are the studs stretched and the nuts vibrated off. Replace all the studs, nuts and gasket. These things are renown for long life. BUT, the best thing to ever happen to this engine is Fuel injection. Some late ’86 models and all the following years had sequential fuel injection. No longer middle cylinders getting rich and the outer cylinders being lean. This caused uneven engine/manifold temperatures causing minor temporarily manifold warfare which caused the stud stretch. Besides the smoother running engine
You drive a carbureted 300 and then get in one with fuel injection and the difference is day and night. These and slant six Chrysler engines and maybe the 258 AMC are just bullet proof engines of days gone by. And the 230-250-292 Chevy engines also. But I have seen 300 Fords live through hell and were none the worse for wear.