Snow Plow on my '97 F-150?

I've got a 7 1/2' meyer mdII on my 2001 f150 4x4 supercab 7700 series. I got lucky that being the 7700 series (previously known as 250 light duty), it can handle a personal plow, but not commercial use. I usually will carry about 1000lbs on sand in the bed as ballast and for traction. It works ok. john

"JR" wrote in news:Sf5uc.3873$ snipped-for-privacy@newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net:

you can do it, but as a general rule the 150s are not able to handle a plow very well. the truck just isnt built heavy enough. you will have front end and trany problems. KB

Park your F-150 next to a F-250 and crawl under and do a visual comparison, the difference is drastic, and that is just the parts and pieces you can see. Although You could put a plow on your 1/2 ton truck, the suspension and drive components are NOT strong enough to survive the severe duty for long...

I have installed literally hundreds of snow plows on half-ton trucks. We (the company I work for) currently still have two eleven year old half ton fords still pushing full time. The only thing is they need beefed up springs in the front. Those that recommend against it obviously have either a. Never done it. or B. Abused one till it failed them and them blamed the truck.

A friend has been using his ~1987 F150 for plowing snow on his property in Nova Scotia for over ten years. He gets a hell of a lot of snow and he says it works just fine.

It should be fine for the limited duty JR is talking about.

Stephen

Can you find out what kind of plow he uses & what mods (if any) he made to his truck?

-- JR

Can you provide any advice as to

- type of plow (make, size)

- how to beef up springs (& by how much)

I say either a Boss (

) or a Western ( ). I used to swear by Meyers, but not anymore. And as for a Fisher or a HINDEKER... pure junk. Kind of depends on how much you want to spend and whether you need the added expense of a "Vee" plow. As for the springs, well the best thing to do is get a pair of lifetime guaranteed Moog Cargo Coils and just replace them annually. That's what we've been doing to the two '93's we have for 8 years now. It only takes about 2 hours to replace both the springs and they being free each year, well why not?

yep. They do get sagged out carrying that plow around. Pop a new set in each year just before plow season, and we're back up 2 - 2.5 inches.

My friend wrote back about his F150/plow combo. Hope it helps:

Here are the truck details;

Year of production 1986. SWB 8 cylinder, 5.0L EFI, 302 CID. automatic. Fischer plough 8 foot [approx 7.5 along the blade]. The hydraulic system has an integral cooler.

This plough has given me very good service with one exception- if the snow is a little heavy and deep the blade may lift so if you are brought to an abrupt stop with the truck anchored and unable to back off. The only option is the shovel. I did not modify the vehicle for ploughwork in any way.

JR wrote:

Thanks much for the info. I appreciate you going to this trouble to get an answer for me.