My backyard build (56K warning)

[jhammel85]

Thats a beast of a truck. I read your build all the way though, great work!

[dude772]

Originally Posted by jhammel85

Thats a beast of a truck. I read your build all the way though, great work!

Thank you very much, I appreciate that alot.

[dude772]

Well now that I've been driving this beast for quite some time now. Its time for something strange to break in some strange way.

I was on my way out to pick up a plow for the old red explorer, and when I started backing up to unload the crap from the back of the truck it started to make a REALLY loud knocking noise. So I look underneith to investigate and what did I find? The transmission was twisting but the engine was still! there was a huge crack accross the bellhousing, from drivers side to passengers side!









So now its time to swap the internals to a new case and try again. While I am in there I am going to change up a few things about the exhaust to keep it from leaking all the time, going to shoulder the pipes so that they slide into the next one and bolt together with the flange, instead of just the flange and gasket.

Any ideas what may have caused this or how to prevent it again?

[RANGERROD]

Sweet build pretty similar to mine. Ive seen the trannys break like that when the crossmember or motor mounts arnt mounted in a similar manner. Like stock rubber motor mounts and stiff poly tranny mount transmission mount. Good luck!

[jhammel85]

Wow that's a huge break! What's next? Another auto or will you swap for a 5 spd?

[dude772]

Originally Posted by RANGERROD

Sweet build pretty similar to mine. Ive seen the trannys break like that when the crossmember or motor mounts arnt mounted in a similar manner. Like stock rubber motor mounts and stiff poly tranny mount transmission mount. Good luck!

The motor mounts are new and the transmount and crossmember is fine and bolted in solid. I will try replacing the rubber mount as a precaution tho thanks for the tip. The only thing I could think to do is to build a cage around the transmission like an exo-skeleton. But thats a little extreme for a stock engine setup.

Originally Posted by jhammel85

Wow that's a huge break! What's next? Another auto or will you swap for a 5 spd?

Another auto. I just happen to have another AOD in the garage that I bought for the throttle valve cable and brackets for $60. Im glad I held onto it instead of scrap it. If it breaks again I will go to a mazda trans from an f-150.

[dude772]

Broke another 2 bell housings and the only thing left to blame now is the driveshaft.

So. Now that the ranger has sufficiently pissed me off... Its time to gut it! I never thought that I would be able to do it. But I think I am going to break it down and tear it apart after all that work!

I picked up a 2003 Sport Trac that I am going to swap the axles and such into. I am undecided if I want to swap the 5.0 into it also. Or get the ODB2 system and engine from an explorer. For now I need to clean the new truck and get the tree branch dent out of the roof.

[dude772]

Ranger replacement... Sport Trac Stealth Edition



haha

and this is the day after i picked it up...





tags: matte black sport trac, vinyl wrap, flat black wrap

[dude772]

If anyone is still watching this... the ranger replacement is almost fully wrapped in matte black vinyl. Its looking great!

[jhammel85]

That looks really good! I think that's the 1st time that i've ever seen that done on a Sport Trac.

Did you spray it yourself?