Project Life Support.

Hey guys. It's about time my little fixer upper got it's own project thread.

Here's a little back story to get you up to date.

October 2007. This was when I bought the truck, caps ugly eh? We got it home and it "died" in the driveway. Shifter linkage snapped. Man was I pissed.

A few days later it was up and running again. Wired the linkage back together and it's held, so far. Found out right after that that it has a bad oil leak, about a quart every 100 miles or so. Didn't know about that until my oil light came on, real nice people I bought it from. But hey, what can you expect for 900? I also ended up changing out the tires, since A/T's shouldn't be slick. Bought a set of Goodyear Wrangler RT/S's. Mounted them myself. So the ranger was finally back to being drivable. A little while after that once winter hit my father decided to sweep snow off my truck with a broom. Ended up breaking my bug shield (twice) so I stitched it back together, since I liked the look of the shield and I like it even more with stitches. Stupid thing to do, though, as it rubbed the paint off.

I also did the home depot grill. Thinking about color matching it redish.

I started to learn how to drive better after that winter so I could take my road test. Ended up with a smashed in bumper. Dunno how that happened.


I picked up a new one off a Ranger in the JY for about 30 bucks. You all know what a stock chrome bumper looks like, so I won't need to post up pics. I ended up swapping the black plastic portions because it was so faded and nasty looking on the new one I couldn't stand it. I'll dig up a picture I have comparing the old to the new one sometime and edit it in if I remember. Big difference.
Not much happened from then until the next winter started up. I got a stereo from my brother, and put it in. Pioneer DEH-1600 I believe. Nice little stereo. I also discovered that camber sucks, as you can see in the picture.

I thought bad ball joints, turned out to be bad springs and shocks. Ball joints were new and fine. I also needed brakes REAL bad apparently. Took me around winter to get to fixing that. Thanks to my girlfriends Father. He had breaks and shocks put on my truck for Christmas. Cost him a pretty penny. I'm real great full for that. Never would have been able to afford to keep it otherwise. Prior to that, I put the poor truck in the ditch. Slid driving home one day with a tad bit of snow on the ground. Decided I needed to put some snow tires on after that. I ended up finding a pair of new Hercules Polar Trax that my brother wasn't going to use, he gave them to my father a while back for free. Nice tires, but they're 16". I had to go out to the JY and search for a pair of rims that had the Ranger bolt pattern and were 16 inch, sadly I couldn't locate a pair of steel rims so I opted for a pair of aluminums at a 40 dollar price increase. Came off a 1993 Dodge Intrepid.

Looks odd with those two tires in the back and a pair of old American Racing rims in the front. Oh well. After all that, we're pretty much up to date. I have a few things going on with it at the moment though.

I finally found a pair of springs for the front, thanks to EPA from Ranger Power Sports. Paid 60 dollars shipped for a pair of used skyjacker leveling coils. How much stiffer should I expect these to be from regular ranger coils? Not that it matters, my springs are bad anyway so I don't know what regular springs feel like.

That damn camera makes everything look pink, even my truck. The springs are a skyjacker red. Not pink.

I also will be putting on some rear shocks when the warm weather hits. I'm getting them from my brother, he has a pair laying around from his old truck that should fit. New, in box.

That about sums it up. I also have to fix my leaks sometime this spring as well. Oil, power steering, and transmission are all leaking. The power steering will be the easiest fix, since it's just leaking out the nut. I'll probably just JB weld the crap out of it, I probably will never need to drain it.

The one day that it was warm enough to do the work, I had school and a FFA meeting.

Hopefully another warm day will come up soon.

I did however, get a cap put on the other day. Only temporary though, I needed it so bags of plastic bottles wouldn't go flying out the back of my bed.

looks like a good start koda just be safe in that thing till you get everything fixed..

I've taken it as a learning experience, on how to check my fluids.

There have been times I've had my temp gauge go way hot and had to stop to find some fluids real quick, and times when I've had my oil light come on. Thankfully the radiator was just a loose nut..

I'm going to get some pics tomorrow, of the truck with the cap off my brothers Nissan and Dodge Intrepid rims. Oh how the Ford gods hate me.

Need to sand down the front bumper this spring and repaint. It's got some rust issues, looks like birdshit when salt gets on it. I'm thinking semi-gloss black. I'll do the grill/valance too so it will match. I need a new valance, so if anyone has one (foglight) let me know. Oh well. I need to get my new license plate bracket on the front too, sick of it being zip-tied on.




Dunno why I took this, I think I used it to photoshop the cap onto it to see how it would look. You can sort of see the intrepid rims on this one. The one on the other side is backwards, since they both came from the same side of the car. Oops.



I wish I was driving this. (brothers truck) Makes my little Ranger look bad.

keep it coming i will be watching. when your experiences catches your enthusiasm you will be one hell of a ranger man

Been checking the Trans fluid alot lately, after I dumped a quart in a month agp I haven't noticed it go down any. Maybe it was one of those elusive "once in a while leaks."

Driving my father to a lung doc appointment about 40 miles away tomorrow, so I'll check it then, maybe the trans just hasn't been getting warm enough in my 15 minute trips. Hopefully the leaks gone, but it's possible that it isn't.

I have two options, I can patch the line (metal one from the trans->rad) with some rubber hose and hose clamps, rip one that looks in decent condition off one in a yard, or patch it with brake line. No clue how I would do the last one, but my father did it on his Dodge so he says it would work on the Ranger. The JY one would be hard to find, not alot of auto 3.0's in the junk yards. Probably the hose would be the easiest (and already done to the forward portion) but I have no clue if it would last. What do you think?

Use the hose...it'll hold unless the leak is on a bend in the line. In that case replace the line. You will want to use something a lot bigger than brake line, something like 1/4 or 3/8 steel line. I think you could get a flaring tool and splice in a new piece with some fittings or possibly use compression fittings like you'd use for copper water pipe if there are some made for that size tubing.

Looks like you've got yourself a good project going there...rust sucks though huh?

Shran said:

Use the hose...it'll hold unless the leak is on a bend in the line.
Looks like you've got yourself a good project going there...rust sucks though huh?

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Got it, I'll probably go with the hose. I'll post a picture up of the old fix on there in the forward part, the new leak is back farther. Eventually it will have to be replaced though.

And I got lucky with rust, it's mostly underneath, on the suspension parts, and on the bumpers. I have a few stray spots but not bad.

It's crazy how it snows around here. Haven't been able to get out to take some pics, but yeah.

I'm definitely not liking the effects of 225-75-R16 tires on my MPG and hill climbing ability. So I'll be switching to 215-60-R15 tires this spring. Hopefully my MPG will improve. Based on my price limitations, I'll probably go with Uniroyal Liberators if I can find a pair in my size. I like those tires..

Cool truck. It's nice to drive an old beater, as I have one also. No car payments, or the worry about scratches/dents, or mud in the interior etc. I kinda like to know I've fixed something back to good.

ati190 said:

Cool truck. It's nice to drive an old beater, as I have one also. No car payments, or the worry about scratches/dents, or mud in the interior etc. I kinda like to know I've fixed something back to good.

Click to expand...

Exactly how I feel, minus the mud. I love a clean interior.

Now if it was a 4x4.. it would be muddy as hell.

Finally got a chance to take pics.

Here she is with the cap on. The colors off, but it looks nice and keeps the snow out of my bed.



And the 50 thousand mile POS it came off from.. now with my old cap.



Last, but not least a comparison of my wheels before adding new shocks, and prior to them.

Before:

After:

and then I'll add in another when I get the springs put on, and have it aligned.

Finally got those pics of the trans line patch work. This is the first patch, I noticed there is one behind it a little ways as well.



It's not leaking there, so I guess I'll copy what they did..

Another thing, does anyone else think this is dangerous? This is my shift linkage from the cab to the transmission. It's wired together..

I don't think it is dangerous, but is something that would be on my list of things to fix. I mean if it was on your steering or something, yeah, dangerous. If it fails, what, you won't be able to put it in gear, not too big of a deal.

BTW, good work with your truck so far, I have been watching.