What did you do to your Ranger today? (Part Deux!)

[Killakittie]

So it's been an interesting past week or so. I finally brought the truck into American Tire and had it road force balanced. 1 tire was at 21lbs, another at 41lbs and two around 13lbs, all brought down to around 8-10 lbs. This completely eliminated the wobble vibration I was experiencing on the freeway. Then a couple days later we experienced our first heat wave with temps around 104 degrees. The truck started running at the upper portion of the temp gauge while sitting in traffic with the AC on, following the advice I found on here I replaced my fan clutch with a heavy duty one but the problem persisted. Decided to buy a new radiator and upon pulling the old one and holding them together I noticed the original radiator weighed about 5-10lbs more then the new one. Removed the drain petcock on the old radiator and hit it with pressurized water and a shit ton of red scale looking debri started pouring out...Got it all back together with the new radiator installed and the truck is not going above the "N" on the gauge, with the AC blasting sitting at a stop.

So now the last few days i've been driving 75-80mph everywhere burning much larger amounts of fuel and enjoying my loud ass HD clutch making my truck sound like a semi...Good times. Wouldn't change a damn thing.

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

Well, I started tearing the Green Ranger apart. Trans pan is off, I did pretty good about containing the mess but I hate not having a drain plug. The new pan that’s going on has a drain plug. So it’s currently dripping. Tomorrow the front axle comes out and I’ll get the valve body down.

 

[Jazzer]

Put aftermarket ovals on the’07. New wipers and replaced pinstriping.

 

[Rick W]

I love Craigslist/marketplace….

I picked up two dusty, but like new, 10 inch 3,500# trailer brake assemblies, two dusty, but like new, brake drums, and one used drum in great shape for the third axle on the Road Ranger. A two drum set for one axle retails for $175 to $200 With these, I have everything I need to put the electric brakes on the truck and the two trailer axles with the exception of one magnet arm for a 7 inch drum for the trailer.

The deal included 1 random leaf spring, 8 or 9 three inch axle U bolts, and a Tekonsha Voyager brake controller with the Ford plug (retail around $100-120). I already have a brake controller mounted on a bracket right below the shift knob in the Road Ranger, so I’ll probably use this one for the F250.

All for $100 & $5 gas.

I’ve realized with the swing arm third axle on the truck, which does not carry any road weight from the truck - only the trailer, if the trailer is loaded at all and I hit a curve, the whole thing is ripe for a jackknife. When I removed the weight of the bed and the rear bumper, spare tire, etc., the drive axle also has less weight on the road. I won’t have time to do it before the Ford nationals (but I kind of think of brakes as a crutch anyway), but it will be nice to get it all done when I get back.

 

[Ab_Reed]

I finally got my ranger registered so I will be driving it legally later this evening. I took one short road test a week ago but its been sitting until i got it registered. It will get an alignment tomorrow. Had the title transferred over to Mass from CT and into my name. Cant wait to start dailying it and taking road trips in it. Camper shell will be tossed in the scrap yard later today too.

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

Surgery has begun…

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

For those not aware of how things have progressed with the green Ranger… frame is broken in the front. On the inside. Above the front axle. So axle is coming out to get to the damaged area.

Valve body is out for a combination Jmod and TransGo Stage 2 shift kit.

I’m also going to try doing something about getting the front end lowered the rest of the way and squash some more bugs that have poked up since the build. Need to build a new front bumper yet and get the rear bumper painted. Probably new shocks all around.

 

[Curious Hound]

For those not aware of how things have progressed with the green Ranger… frame is broken in the front. On the inside. Above the front axle. So axle is coming out to get to the damaged area.

Valve body is out for a combination Jmod and TransGo Stage 2 shift kit.

I’m also going to try doing something about getting the front end lowered the rest of the way and squash some more bugs that have poked up since the build. Need to build a new front bumper yet and get the rear bumper painted. Probably new shocks all around.

And that's just for ONE member of your fleet. You don't have time to post on here. Get to work!

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

And that's just for ONE member of your fleet. You don't have time to post on here. Get to work!

Of positive note is that once I get all the issues worked out, the green Ranger should be pretty solid for the next 5 years or so.

Choptop is running good, it just needs finished.

The rest all need work. A lot of work.

Currently slurping coffee to build some motivation for the day. Lisa is coming out to help with mowing and cleaning up my property today. Since it’s now supposed to rain the next 6 frigging days. But the valve body is on the bench in my shop so I’ll have something to work on when it’s raining

 

[sgtsandman]

Time is closing in for Ford Nationals (gosh, I feel like I was just there last week), so I went around the truck to fix the dings and touchup the paint.

Right front fender was bent when I bought the truck, and in hindsight, I should’ve bought a clean one out of the scrapyard and replaced it, but each time I fix it a little bit better. I was surprised when I found out I could get a clean one for like $35. I think keeping the original fender, keeping the truck as original as possible, it’s always important. Plus, my fender has to be worth a whole lot more, I mean it has at least $150 of Bondo in it!

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I dug out some of the old Bondo, some of it is pre-Rick Bondo, then loaded it up pretty good and shaped it with a 60 grit paper on my palm sander. Then I went down to 80, and then finally fine finished with 100 grit. The 100 grit was also a wet sand - I did it the exact same way, but I had a beer in my other hand.

I always chip up the very outside edge of the four rear fenders, when I’m leaning over to take stuff in and out, bumping the edge or just scraping it with my belt buckle. But that was a quick sand and touchup.

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Every year one of the sequencing Amber turn signals act up, so I fixed that, and I finished up straightening the corners of the aluminum on the inside at the top where it’s been scuffing the pin assembly as I turn. Then I touched up the black. I cleaned the light assembly really well, for some reason that first coat of semi gloss black flaked off a little bit. I tried to scuff it up a little bit with a little wire brush before the latest coating.

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and finally, the vinyl tread step I put on top of my air tank blew off at Highway speeds.

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I had used the vinyl glue like when you glue down the vinyl floor tiles. The wind caught the edge. So I cleaned it all off and sanded it down, and I stuck down a new piece with E 6000. I still have to touch up the Silver, but that’s always the last thing I do all the way around the truck

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somewhere I have one of those 6 foot or 8 foot long hose clamp ribbons. I may put a couple straps around the whole tank to hold it down, but I think it would also look cool. Project for another day.

I've found that the only way to get paint to stick well on aluminum and galvanized steel is to use self etching primer. Some say you should spray regular primer over the self etching primer before painting. That has not been my experience, but the paint has stuck well and never flaked.

 

[Rick W]

I've found that the only way to get paint to stick well on aluminum and galvanized steel is to use self etching primer. Some say you should spray regular primer over the self etching primer before painting. That has not been my experience, but the paint has stuck well and never flaked.

Good advice.

If you remember, those light assemblies were cut out of a Crossbody toolbox that would drop in a pick up truck bed. That was work I did when I was still pretty sick and pretty feeble on my legs. I know I would have washed them before I painted them, but I doubt I did any kind of preparation. The Aluminum was probably clear coated as well, I don’t know how that would affect it.

Rust oleum cures with a pretty thick hard coat. That’s why I felt a little wire, brushing, to create some micro grooves, might solve the problem. For now, I’m still happy grabbing one of my dollar store brushes and by 20 year old can of black rustoleum and touching it up…

 

[holyford86]

After having my previous EEC suffer a fatal capacitor failure (electrolyte leaked and shorted the board) I replaced all 3 of the capacitors on the replacement one to head that off. All of them were already leaking, so I removed all 3, cleaned the board with alcohol and soldered in new caps. Not sure if its confirmation bias or not, but idle seems smoother and throttle response seems better.

 

[Killakittie]

After having my previous EEC suffer a fatal capacitor failure (electrolyte leaked and shorted the board) I replaced all 3 of the capacitors on the replacement one to head that off. All of them were already leaking, so I removed all 3, cleaned the board with alcohol and soldered in new caps. Not sure if its confirmation bias or not, but idle seems smoother and throttle response seems better.

Where did you buy the new caps from?

 

[holyford86]

Where did you buy the new caps from?

Digikey

 

[97RangerXLT]

I used it to uproot two ornamental trees on either side of the garage. One was leaning 60 degrees from a storm last year, the other one was overcrowding the house. Logging chain, spare tire to make the chain pull upwards on the tree to uproot it.

Had David make sure the tire stayed upright and the chain stayed on top of the tire until I took the slack out of the chain, then he got out the way of any any possible flying chain or tree parts when I pulled the tree out. Worked well.

Another note.. 202k miles and the limited slip still spins both rear tires.