HOMEGROWN HIGHBOY

A 1973 F-250 DRIVEN BY A 7.3L POWER STROKE

What do you get when you combine a ’73 F-250 with an early Super Duty? How about a one-of-a-kind Highboy with modern creature comforts, a stouter frame and axles, and a 7.3L Power Stroke under the hood? As a fan of both the ’73-79 Ford body style and the robustness of the Super Duty platform, Steve Burris set out to create something truly unique when he embarked on his Highboy build. “I’ve had my fair share of Highboys in the past as well as Super Duties—and this is my hybrid,” he tells us. “It’s the best of both worlds.”

What did it take to pull off the feat? Try 10 donor trucks (six ’73-79s and four Super Duties), smart parts hunting, and six months of spare time. Luckily, as a self-taught auto body guru, a competent fabricator, and being an electrician by trade, Burris was able to perform all the work himself—literally from the ground up.

Solid Foundation

With plans to outfit the truck with a diesel, a heavy-duty transmission, and eventually tow with it, Burris chose to use the Super Duty frame, axles, and suspension for the Highboy’s running gear. But because the ’99 chassis he’d obtained was of an extended-cab, longbed configuration, making the four-door cab and 8-foot bed work meant that another 8 inches had to be added to the frame. Burris opted to stretch the frame between the fourth and fifth cross members, just behind where the cab sits. The frame, axles, and suspension were glass bead media blasted and wear a coat of semigloss black undercoating.

Custom Crew Cab

As you can imagine, more than 40 winters combined with years of abandonment weren’t very kind to the sheet metal on the ’73 model year crew cab, but Burris felt everything could be salvaged aside from the floor. As the truck sits now, the floorboard forward of the front seats is out of a ’99 Super Duty (with its transmission tunnel facilitating the use of a ZF-6 transmission), while the rear half is a custom piece Burris fabricated. Other modifications made to the original cab include the utilization of a Super Duty firewall to accommodate the clutch pedal and hydroboost brake system, and the dilapidated A-pillars being replaced with sections from a rust-free donor truck.

’73, ’74, and ’79 Parts

To keep the truck’s body as close to original as possible, Burris sourced most of his rust-free replacement