Welcome Visitor! Please take a few seconds and 
Slowly but surely
New Member
- Joined
- Oct 30, 2023
- Messages
- 7
- Reaction score
- 6
- Points
- 3
- Location
- alberta, canada
- Vehicle Year
- 2007
- Make / Model
- Ford Ranger
- Transmission
- Manual
Good afternoon ,
Already have found some great tips off this site. New to Rangers and Ford actually. Kids now driving and my cheap little commuter car is always gone now so needed a cheap "Dadmobile" for getting to work and stuff and I found a 2007 Ranger 3.0 Sport 2wd 5 spd. Was in so-so shape but super cheap and everything it needed was doable in my garage plus scrapyards here have prob 8 Rangers in there on any day for parts. Truck ran "OK" but at 200,000km or 125,000 miles it needed a refresh and everything he didn't have records of doing I assumed was due. Mine was owned since new by a older fella in his late 80's so it was babied but he drove dirt roads and the gravel really beats up the rear of truck and box was rusted bad. Found a matching box on exact same truck in scrapyard with zero rust for $175 and snagged it. Since I had box off I stripped rust off frame, bumper etc and put on POR 15 where I could and Fluid Film elsewhere. Also put in a new Fuel Pump/Filter since that was the time to do it with box off. New Spring Shackles , New shocks, New U-Joints, New Rear diff fluid/gasket/cover and rear Park Brake Cables as old ones were sticking. Couldn't save the tire carrier, what a poor design to make a tray out of steel that is literally a bowl to catch water and dirt and expect it to not rot?? I had some good steel around and welded up a very solid bracket/brace to replace Tire carrier and modded it to have brackets for evap to mount to. Will prob make a wheel lift later and mount to frame, for now the spare rides in box. In the front half very little rust just regular age and wear so flushed ALL fluids, amazing how quiet the power steering got after flushing the fluid. New Autolite dbl Plat Plugs (boy that dbl spark really does a job on plugs on half the plugs eh, old nickel ones worn so bad I have no idea how truck ran with crazy gap in some plugs). He had replaced clutch and slave only 25,000 miles ago so I just flushed the transmission and shifting/clutch both work perfect. Also got to play with Torsion Bars for first time as I redid the front end and replaced wheel bearings, upper control arms, lower arm bushings, ball joints, tie rod ends and shocks.( I should be getting an Xmas card from Rock Auto this year for sure, lol) Anyways what a difference in ride! Interior was pretty filthy so pulled seats out and plastic panels off everything but roof and cleaned up years of dirt and tightened loose nuts, sprayed a bit of rust protect film etc. Door sensor was gummed up with dirt/oil etc and after cleaning and tweaking things they work perfect now, yup dome comes on when open/off when door closed like supposed to. Friends have commented the interior looks like it just came off the lot now. On the outside I decided I wanted to fend off rust and didn't care if it looked non stock so I prepped paint and applied boxliner on lower panels, around wheel wells and on tailgate. The black matches truck and will see how it holds up to fading from sun. Truck ran fantastic for months but idle would be rough now and then. Then one day I got the check engine lite and put my reader on it. Cyl #1 misfire. I had read on here that Ranger rough idle is pretty common and some guys have gone to great extent and expense to to solve and some have done one simple change and it solved it. I had been expecting the engine light and had ordered a new Camshaft Synchro with sensor cap. Installed it and truck appeared to run better right away and good idle/no codes for a month. Then it started again this week. So when time allows I guess I will join the club of hunting for solution and testing things as I have heard can be caused by everything from Ign coil/Plugs/wires to Cam Shaft Synchro to Vac Hoses to dirty MAF/Throttle body to valve seats to head gasket or even various sensors. That is a lot of garage time chasing possibles when truck still runs fine other than rough idle sometimes. May be something that is just normal and you live with in Ranger 3.0's? Anyways so far I am liking this little Ranger, I got it cheap knowing it needed work and servicing and even after doing it all this thing is so cheap compared almost anything else comparable and cost me all in now prob an 8th of what a new one is. Plus it has the stock antitheft feature of manual tranny so prob most of younger gen can't drive it. cheers. Steve
Already have found some great tips off this site. New to Rangers and Ford actually. Kids now driving and my cheap little commuter car is always gone now so needed a cheap "Dadmobile" for getting to work and stuff and I found a 2007 Ranger 3.0 Sport 2wd 5 spd. Was in so-so shape but super cheap and everything it needed was doable in my garage plus scrapyards here have prob 8 Rangers in there on any day for parts. Truck ran "OK" but at 200,000km or 125,000 miles it needed a refresh and everything he didn't have records of doing I assumed was due. Mine was owned since new by a older fella in his late 80's so it was babied but he drove dirt roads and the gravel really beats up the rear of truck and box was rusted bad. Found a matching box on exact same truck in scrapyard with zero rust for $175 and snagged it. Since I had box off I stripped rust off frame, bumper etc and put on POR 15 where I could and Fluid Film elsewhere. Also put in a new Fuel Pump/Filter since that was the time to do it with box off. New Spring Shackles , New shocks, New U-Joints, New Rear diff fluid/gasket/cover and rear Park Brake Cables as old ones were sticking. Couldn't save the tire carrier, what a poor design to make a tray out of steel that is literally a bowl to catch water and dirt and expect it to not rot?? I had some good steel around and welded up a very solid bracket/brace to replace Tire carrier and modded it to have brackets for evap to mount to. Will prob make a wheel lift later and mount to frame, for now the spare rides in box. In the front half very little rust just regular age and wear so flushed ALL fluids, amazing how quiet the power steering got after flushing the fluid. New Autolite dbl Plat Plugs (boy that dbl spark really does a job on plugs on half the plugs eh, old nickel ones worn so bad I have no idea how truck ran with crazy gap in some plugs). He had replaced clutch and slave only 25,000 miles ago so I just flushed the transmission and shifting/clutch both work perfect. Also got to play with Torsion Bars for first time as I redid the front end and replaced wheel bearings, upper control arms, lower arm bushings, ball joints, tie rod ends and shocks.( I should be getting an Xmas card from Rock Auto this year for sure, lol) Anyways what a difference in ride! Interior was pretty filthy so pulled seats out and plastic panels off everything but roof and cleaned up years of dirt and tightened loose nuts, sprayed a bit of rust protect film etc. Door sensor was gummed up with dirt/oil etc and after cleaning and tweaking things they work perfect now, yup dome comes on when open/off when door closed like supposed to. Friends have commented the interior looks like it just came off the lot now. On the outside I decided I wanted to fend off rust and didn't care if it looked non stock so I prepped paint and applied boxliner on lower panels, around wheel wells and on tailgate. The black matches truck and will see how it holds up to fading from sun. Truck ran fantastic for months but idle would be rough now and then. Then one day I got the check engine lite and put my reader on it. Cyl #1 misfire. I had read on here that Ranger rough idle is pretty common and some guys have gone to great extent and expense to to solve and some have done one simple change and it solved it. I had been expecting the engine light and had ordered a new Camshaft Synchro with sensor cap. Installed it and truck appeared to run better right away and good idle/no codes for a month. Then it started again this week. So when time allows I guess I will join the club of hunting for solution and testing things as I have heard can be caused by everything from Ign coil/Plugs/wires to Cam Shaft Synchro to Vac Hoses to dirty MAF/Throttle body to valve seats to head gasket or even various sensors. That is a lot of garage time chasing possibles when truck still runs fine other than rough idle sometimes. May be something that is just normal and you live with in Ranger 3.0's? Anyways so far I am liking this little Ranger, I got it cheap knowing it needed work and servicing and even after doing it all this thing is so cheap compared almost anything else comparable and cost me all in now prob an 8th of what a new one is. Plus it has the stock antitheft feature of manual tranny so prob most of younger gen can't drive it. cheers. Steve
Welcome to TRS man 
I think i got 15mpg this weekend when i drove the 98 from sc to ky.
