1984-1987 I beams on my 1996 ranger?

So I changed my mind about offset and wheels and came up with a better idea!

I plan on going to the junk/scrap yard and getting some forged I beam suspensions off a 83-89 Ranger and extending them 4.5-5 inches on each side and bending them for a 5-5.5 inch lift.

My question is if they are a straight bolt on deal or do I have to get spindles off that year too. Do the ball joints and whatnot all line up?

I've looked pretty hard to find good information on this and all I find is stuff on F-150's and vans, some stuff on rangers but not enough!

Any help would be appreciated!

BPLP said:

So I changed my mind about offset and wheels and came up with a better idea!

I plan on going to the junk/scrap yard and getting some forged I beam suspensions off a 83-89 Ranger and extending them 4.5-5 inches on each side and bending them for a 5-5.5 inch lift.

My question is if they are a straight bolt on deal or do I have to get spindles off that year too. Do the ball joints and whatnot all line up?

I've looked pretty hard to find good information on this and all I find is stuff on F-150's and vans, some stuff on rangers but not enough!

Any help would be appreciated!

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they will bolt into your stock beam pivots yes, if you're planning on extending them you should extend the radius arms too and make mounts for those to help them cycle nicer. the spindles will NOT work though.

see in the early forged beams the ball joints press into the i beam end and then the spindle bolts on to them

in the later beams (90s) the ball joints press into the spindle and then all that bolts on to the beam. so its opposite.

the forged beams are good because you can cut and extend em yourself, but the down side is you cant upgrade to an f150 spindle so you,re limited to a stock ranger hub

theres a pic of my extended beams in my build thread

The other thing to consider when going that route is that the early beams have a much smaller hole where the upper ball joint goes through, and so your potential camber/caster adjustments are severely limited by that design.

My 2wd 87 had been lifted 2 inches (stock 4x4 height) and had 31s put on it by a previous owner. It also had the biggest camber slugs available and I could not get the camber lower than 2 degrees.

adsm08 said:

The other thing to consider when going that route is that the early beams have a much smaller hole where the upper ball joint goes through, and so your potential camber/caster adjustments are severely limited by that design.

My 2wd 87 had been lifted 2 inches (stock 4x4 height) and had 31s put on it by a previous owner. It also had the biggest camber slugs available and I could not get the camber lower than 2 degrees.

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hes gonna bend them for the amount of lift he wants

Thanks guys!!!

So I'm going to need to get the hubs and whatnot off a 80's ranger?

That sucks!

Do the break calipers and whatnot fit on the old hubs from a 1996?

BPLP said:

Thanks guys!!!

So I'm going to need to get the hubs and whatnot off a 80's ranger?

That sucks!

Do the break calipers and whatnot fit on the old hubs from a 1996?

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just prep the hubs often and youll be able to get away with alot! i know i have haha.
as for the brake calipers im not sure on.i have the early style brakes on mine.

I know that its not a good idea to weld the cast iron I beams but has it been done? I'm not planning on jumping this thing... like at all... well maybe a little bit but mainly its just going to be a dune truck and a dirt/gravel road worrior.

Anyway! Is it just a really bad idea or can I get away with it? (I personally wont weld it but my cousin is a pro welder and build manifolds in a shop so I'll have him tig/mig/stick weld them)

JOLENE_THE_RANGER said:

hes gonna bend them for the amount of lift he wants

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Right, and to be fair the lift on that truck was done entirely with coil spring spacers, so there were much better ways to do it.

I am still going with "Keep in mind that the early beams have limited available camber adjustment."

BPLP said:

I know that its not a good idea to weld the cast iron I beams but has it been done? I'm not planning on jumping this thing... like at all... well maybe a little bit but mainly its just going to be a dune truck and a dirt/gravel road worrior.

Anyway! Is it just a really bad idea or can I get away with it? (I personally wont weld it but my cousin is a pro welder and build manifolds in a shop so I'll have him tig/mig/stick weld them)

Click to expand...

yeaaaaaaa dont do that. theyll fail.

BPLP said:

I know that its not a good idea to weld the cast iron I beams but has it been done?

Click to expand...

Welding cast iron is kind of a last ditch thing trying to save something.

It is hard to do, rarely pretty and not a good idea at all for suspension components.

I’m going to have to side with the welding cast iron is a bad idea. I had a pro welder make a temporary drop pitman arm out of a cast one. Looked beefy enough and solid, but the welds failed rather quickly. I’ve since done a lot of reading on the subject and it varies from difficult to near impossible to weld cast for anything beyond temporary repair depending on the type of cast, use, and equipment. Most of the time the cast has to be pre-heated, welded under heat, and cooled extremely slow.


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