Detroit-area Junkyard Rangers - extremely pic-heavy

[kishy]

Call me crazy or wierd, but out of everything you posted, I want that fuel door. I am still trying to understand that one variance on these first gen Rangers. Nearly every Ranger had a raised bump to hook with a finger and open the fuel door. At some point on the first gens they did not have it and it was flat like what is seen here. My 84 was of the flat variety, both the 86 and 85 I've had since were of the "hooked" variety. For some reason that is one of the things that has stood out to me as unique on the 84 and I'd like to carry over to the current 85 build. Problem is that I need two of those doors (dual tank Ranger) to pull it off and I haven't been able to find any.

I'm impressed you fought your way through quoting that one image.

I hate to throw a wrench in things, but I'm almost positive the pictured truck is actually an 88. I believe that's the one I took the fuel sending unit from to do my EFI engine swap, and I distinctly remember that I took that part from an 88, in that yard, which was facing that direction.

Of course, there's no way to be sure it had its original bed or fuel door. My 85 has the bump. And now looking at that photo closer, the intake tube has me thinking it might be older.

 

[JoshT]

Quoting that was super easy, barely an inconvenience.

Yeah that is why I'm having trouble figuring out that one little difference. My 84 had it and it was original to the truck, since dad bought it in 87 or 88. I've only ever seen it on a few first gens, but I couldn't get a year off most of them and wouldn't know the history if I did.

I can't say anything about the intake of that red truck, but it's a 2.3L EFI, and 86 or newer according to the instrument cluster.

Just one of those little differences most wouldn't notice, but I do. It bugs me a little that I can't find it documented, or figure out a reason for it. Was it a trim thing? I doubt it, mine was a base model and I don't know about the othes. Was it a year thing? That wouldn't explain the separation in years of the examples I've seen. Was it a plant of origin thing? I don't remember where mine was built, but if that were the case, I'd expect to see a lot more of them.

 

[RobbieD]

I'm betting that ones without the finger bump have the Power Gas Door Release option.

Seriously, I don't know when the bump was added. My '84 doesn't have one, and its build date was 09/83.

 

[PlumCrazy]

My service bed came out of a Detroit area (Sterling Heights) junkyard circus 2017. Drove up from Columbus, Ohio to pull it myself and drag it back home.

 

[kishy]

That's a sweet little service body. Not a huge fan of that yard but every once in a rare while they get something neat.

Alright, you folks win.





Quite imperfect, but neat regardless. I went back on Sunday for that and the toolbox in the bed, but the toolbox was gone. I have a half-baked plan to chop up a toolbox so it will work inside my cap, and in order for this plan to work it needs to be the style that is hinged on the front. I also want it to be quite shallow so the full bed length is available below it.

While there I grabbed a couple things to try to up-option my work van, which is a '21 Transit Connect. Obviously not doing anything invasive to my employer's vehicle, but little things like the visors with vanity mirrors (running into a meeting with crazy hair is the motivator here) and the dome light with optional map lights. I'll be talking to our fleet people about FORscan and possibly trying to enable cruise, since I grabbed the wheel with the buttons. That is probably crossing a line they won't like, but you never know, and the wheel was 9 bucks so I'm not concerned if they say no.



This was in the parking lot:



Since the wagon gets some love here, I'll mention that on Saturday I drove 2.5 hrs each way to go visit a station wagon being parted out as a derby car. I scored some things I need to make mine a little better. Mostly interior plastics, and one extremely rare out of production weatherstrip.





I'll keep this primarily RBV-related but will drop the occasional other vehicle of note, if there are no objections.

 

[kishy]

The local junkyards have been pretty short on vehicles of interest to me since May, and since in May I didn't find any Rangers, I didn't post anything here.

Since then, I bought a Plymouth Acclaim (perhaps an odd choice, but I have my reasons), and have been on the hunt for a grille for it. Ryan's Pick-a-Part in Detroit got an Acclaim, so I headed over. I found a couple neat 80s Chryslers and an F-150 7700 (the high-GVW variant) powered by CNG. I also found a Bronco II.

All photos of the day at this link, or here are select angles of the BII, in all its truck-bed-lined beauty:

It's remarkably unrusty underneath. Bedliner aside, this was solid enough to deserve a better fate.

 

[rubydist]

Ah yes, the old days when you pushed the end of the turn signal stalk to make the horn blow. That was not one of their "better ideas".

 

[kishy]

I wouldn't want my silence to suggest I've either stopped going to junkyards, or stopped doing car stuff.

Since December, I have been to junkyards a handful of times - about 18 times - but have encountered very few Rangers or Bronco IIs (bearing in mind I only pay much attention to the pre-93 stuff).

edit after multiple edits: imgur album linking is broken at the moment. XenForo tries to automatically parse the links to embed a preview rather than just a text link, but Imgur has changed the format of their links so the functionality is broken. Workaround to prevent the automatic parsing is to make a text link whose display text is different than the URL itself.

Visits with no Rangers or BIIs (I had to sift through them to find the Rangers anyway, so might as well drop the links):

2024-01-06 US Auto of Sterling Heights
2024-01-10 US Auto of Sterling Heights
2024-01-10 Fox Auto U-Pull
2024-01-13 Kenny U-Pull Windsor
2024-01-20 Kenny U-Pull Windsor
2024-01-20 Fox Auto U-Pull
2024-01-27 Taylor Auto Salvage https://imgur.com/a/2XBeVDP
2024-04-06 Parts Galore
2024-04-07 Parts Galore
2024-06-02 US Auto
2024-06-09 US Auto
2024-06-09 Ryan's Pick-a-Part
2024-07-01 Parts Galore
2024-07-07 Kenny U-Pull Windsor
2024-07-14 Ryan's Pick-a-Part - Notable because I photographed every single "old stuff" car.

Visits with early Rangers, among other stuff:
2024-02-18 US Auto

2024-04-07 US Auto
I went for the fenders off this, based on a thumbnail photo making them look potentially good. Seeing things at "native resolution" made the condition more apparent.
302 swap in this one.

2024-07-20 U-Pull & Save
Found by chance while picking up some Mopar wheels for the aforementioned Acclaim, which is now under the knife to hopefully be able to hit the road this summer.

Pour one out for Fox Auto, the latest victim in the widespread death of self-serve junkyards. They claimed their conversion to full-serve was to be better for their customers, but in doing so, they've ruled me out as a customer, so that kinda sucks.

Ah yes, the old days when you pushed the end of the turn signal stalk to make the horn blow. That was not one of their "better ideas".

I own a couple other Fords with this arrangement, and I actually prefer it quite a bit over any steering wheel-mounted horn option. It's way easier to modulate the length of a honk - e.g. two quick taps rather than unintentionally making one long blast - and I don't find that it takes any longer to operate (other than when I switch back and forth between vehicles and honk the horn the wrong way the first time).

I've encountered absolutely nobody who agrees with me about this so I'm sure I'm in the minority, but I really wish it had caught on and become the standard.

 

[kishy]

Visits with no Rangers:
2024-08-11 Parts Galore Detroit MI
2024-09-14 Kenny U-Pull Windsor ON
2024-10-26 U Pull R Parts Toledo OH
2024-10-26 Parts Galore Detroit MI
2024-10-31 US Auto Sterling Heights MI
2024-11-03 Parts Galore Detroit MI - lots of old domestics in here
2024-11-29 U-Pull & Save Pontiac MI
2024-11-29 Ryan's Pick-a-Part Detroit MI
2024-12-28 Parts Galore Detroit MI
2025-01-12 Ryan's Pick-a-Part Detroit MI
2025-01-18 Ryan's Pick-a-Part Detroit MI
2025-01-25 Kenny U-Pull London ON

Relevant to Rangers:
2025-01-31 purchased new-old-stock-aftermarket items from Blenkhorn's Auto Recycling in Truro, NS.
89 Ranger items $10/ea - that wasn't their list price/buy only one price, but for the whole set plus the grille they cut me a deal.
Wasn't even looking for those, but when I found the Acclaim grille there for cheap, I asked about all my other vehicles and they had the Ranger lights.

2025-02-01 Ryan's Pick-a-Part Detroit MI
Found a 1989 regular cab long box Ranger. 2.9 manual RWD. Has some form of aftermarket/dealer-add-on cruise. Took the right side mirror as a spare.
More photos at the link above.

 

[kishy]

Not a Ranger, but a 94 Explorer Eddie Bauer:

Rest of photos (primarily other vehicles than this one) at this link.

 

[901wd#2]

Relevant to Rangers:
2

Stupid shipping, I need a set of those seats.

 

[kishy]

Found this at Andy's Auto Wreckers in London, ON. Not as close to Detroit as I usually am, but I was there so it gets mentioned.

Other photos from the trip here, nothing else being Rangers.

 

[rumblecloud]

US Auto of Sterling Heights is my got-to. You must roll across the Blue Water into Port Huron. Running across 69, you are about 5 miles fomr me.
Nice puics. Thanks for sharing.

 

[Jim Oaks]

You guys ever run across lift kits on any of these Rangers?