In the model year 2000 Ford will sell nearly 750,000 F-Series trucks (from the F150, 250, 350, etc. line). That's a huge number, especially for just one model year. Trucks are an incredibly popular vehicle with Ford and Chevy trucks as the number one and two selling vehicles for nearly the last decade.
Forty-two year old Chet Adriano of Long Beach, California is one of these truck lovers. His is a 1997 F150 extra cab. In fact, he likes his truck so much that he's part of an F150-only truck club called F150world.com. This massive Web site features industry news, locals news, a model guide, chat rooms, classifieds and even their own on-line features.
Chet is happy with his F150 and drives it only on the weekends. According to Chet, "I never drive it in the rain; I wash it every weekend; and it's always garaged." If he ever sells it he can't exactly use the old salesman's phrase, "It was driven by a little old lady who only took it to church every Sunday," but that's pretty close.
The truck is totally custom as well. The requisite So Cal lowering was done with an Eibach kit (2 inches front and 4 inches rear). From there he added massive Momo 18 x 9-inch wheels wrapped with equally monstrous BFG 295/45/18 tires that are guaranteed to follow the ruts in the road.
Upgraded cosmetics include an SVT Lightning front grill and bumper cover, a Gaylord hard Tonnoeau cover, Cord Design wheel flares and white faced gauges in the dash. Under the hood is the optional 5.4 liter V8 plus a Jet air intake modification. On the back side of the motor is a Jardine cat-back exhaust system. To take advantage of the breathing mods, a Jet power module computer upgrade was installed.
F150world.com has local rallies to promote itself and get all its members together. Chet really likes to take the truck out to these rallies - it's the new people and the new ideas. What better way to find out what to customize on your ride, and how to do it? It was through the course of these truck events that Chet mentally put together his F150.
Chet likes to listen to Jazz and R&B music for the most part. Some of his favorite bands or musicians include Joyce Cooling and Earl Klugh. Right now in Chet's CD changer are Peter White, Bobby Caldwell and Joyce Cooling. And when he's not listening to Jazz or R&B, he'll take in a little of the oldies or maybe switch to some Top 40.
Looking around the rallies and in the pages of CAE, he also noticed that video systems are becoming a big part of today's car audio installations. A video screen was going to be needed as well. Chet has a good friend on CAE, contributing editor, Al Patel, who was working at Competition Soundworks at the time. Al helped Chet out quite a bit when it came to the design and layout of the system. Then later when Al left Competition Soundworks, it was Al's garage that became the installation bay for the F150.
One of the key issues for Chet was to keep a factory appearance and to not cut up doors or interior panels if it could be helped. With so many F150s on the road, this wasn't too big a challenge as you'll see. In the dash, a Metra dash kit combined with a Metra wiring kit (so you don't have to cut any of the wires in the factory harness) was the first step.
In place of the factory deck is an Alpine CVA-1005. This awesome little unit combines a slide out color monitor, an AM/FM tuner, CD changer control and even 45 watts of power for up to four speakers. Turned off and with screen tucked away inside, it looks right at home.