My 96 had the Dana 60 rear as well, and it had the pins and springs.... Don't recall ever having to deal with the bent nails...... and I worked on a fair few fords as well. Granted, that has been quite some time ago.....

 

If you work on Ford vehicles regularly, you will quickly appreciate working on anything else....

Some of Ford's "better ideas" leave you wondering what were they thinking (or smoking/snorting) when they came up with this mess...

 

The pictured hardware kit lists for an '01 Ram 2500 per the OP's experience and application stated in Post #1

 

Ford doesn't have a monopoly on that..... Some of the GM cars I have worked on were *challenging* to put it politely..... Whoever came up with the idea to put a bolt so long, in a position where you had to drop the cradle on front wheel drive cars to change the friggin' water pump should be hung by his toes, and flogged. That was just idiotic. Turn a two hour job into an eight hour job......

But, back in the early 90's, when Ford first came out with their 'new' engines/electronics..... We had one come in for a tune up..... I about had a heart attack when I saw the labor time to change the spark plugs.... 8 hours...... to change 8 plugs... WTF?????

 

The bent nail may be a better idea. Rather than just be a hold down spring, the spring also helps retract the shoes.

 

There was a furd engine to change the injectors you had to remove the head. This was back in the 90's i believe but don't know the details. In the 96 service manual it does show the rear 8 lug brakes to have the round spring not the bent nail. I looked on RA and in 2000 the design changed to the bent nail. Why? The bent nail looks like it would allow the shoe to come out towards the drum where the round spring would hold it to to the backing plate.

 

Circa '86 Ford went to the corporate 10.25 in trucks 3/4t+. I believe it was primarily for RABS, but the E-series kept Dana rears throughout the '90s. No one can say why the heavy duty vans didn't get the Sterling rear OR the craptastic C2 p/s pump (the vans kept the awesome Sag pump, just like 2nd Gens). I can tell you why, though: both the Sterling and C2 pump were vastly inferior.

Calling up kits for both a '90 and '96 E250 still shows bent nails . I didn't bother looking beyond that.