1993 Splash in SC

[85_Ranger4x4]

One thing that was brought to my attention with the flag deal, some parks require the flag to be on the front of the truck. Badlands just happens to not care as long as it is 2' above the the truck. So if you come up with a good way to do it you might be farther ahead mounting it towards the front of the truck for running in other parks down the road.

Rules | Badlands Off Road Park | Attica Indiana

Badlands Off Road Park is a 1400+ acres of diverse terrain in Attica, IN. Offering Rentals and Lodging near Covington, Wingate, West Point, and Carbondale

badlandsoffroad.com

I am just going to stick mine on my spare tire carrier hopefully. When I build a new front bumper I might move the mount up there but I don't know how many more trail rides my '85 is going to go on.

 

[sgtsandman]

I’ll have to take a look at the front bumpers on both for that. I think the bumper on the 2011 is a cover over steel, which may complicate things. I haven’t paid that close of attention to the bumper on the 2019.

 

[ericbphoto]

Took care of the steering issue with the defective traverse bar. I machined a piece to weld on the bottom. I'm happy with the way it turned out. I'll do an alignment tomorrow.

Traverse bar with new piece almost ready to weld on.

Traverse bar repaired/modified and ready for the tie rods to be attached.

Ready for alignment. Tie rod geometry is much better now, too.

 

[ericbphoto]

Steering sure can be a pain. If it wasn't so important, I'd ignore it. After the trail ride, my steering felt really loose and free on the road. Don't know why considering how I babied the truck in Indiana. Anyway, I took a look at things and discovered one of the rag joints torn to 50% strength or less. Hmm. I had read an article on TRS a while back that mentioned a certain year(s) of Explorer having regular u-joints for the intermediate steering shaft. Had also read about buying brand new u-joints.

Well, brand new Borgeson needle bearing u-joints run just over $75. Ouch. What about that Explorer thing? I looked up the article and it said they were on early 1990 Explorers. Ha-ha! There are no 1990 Explorers, sort-of. The Explorer came out in 1990 for the 1991 model year. My local junk yard reported having 2. So I went junkyarding. I looked at the one 1991 Explorer they had and a bunch of other Explorers, Rangers of various years, even a couple Mustangs and F150's. It's amazing how many different designs they have used on those vehicles for a part that really could have been identical all along. The 1991 Explorer's intermediate shaft had a telescoping double D shaft with what appears to be a needle bearing u-joint at the top and a rag joint at the bottom.

So I took it home and dissected my original shaft and the Explorer shaft and started measuring stuff and looking at Borgeson's catalog. In the end, I used the Explorer shaft, minus the rag joint and ordered a Borgeson #013449 joint for the bottom. So I only had to buy one $75 u-joint and one $22 intermediate shaft assembly. Here Is the article in the tech section. Here's how I put mine together.

Here is the Explorer shaft with most of the lower rag joint removed.

The last piece of the rag joint is staked to the inner piece of the telescoping shaft like this. A side grinder or cutoff wheel removes it easily.

I cleaned up the shaft pieces and installed the new Borgeson joint. I used anti-sieze for most of the assembly and on threaded fasteners. Check your overall length of the assembly. I cut between 1/2" and 3/4" off the outer tube of the telescoping shaft so that I could slide the parts together and make it short enough to install in the truck. You will see that the inner shaft piece had a plastic sleeve and curved spring to take up play between the pieces. I slathered the inner shaft piece with bearing grease prior to assembly. I also re-used this nice boot that was on it.

Here it is. Installed. and all fasteners tight. Without the rag joints, I may feel more road vibration. But I can accept that, knowing that I have something more solid that a rubber disc connecting my steering wheel to the steering box.

 

[ericbphoto]

Next is to replace the squeaky distributor. I haven't found a Motorcraft part at Rock Auto or several other parts stores. Is Cardone ok?

I've never messed with replacing or adjusting a distributor before. So I need to find a good procedure. I don't want to end up with timing issues.

 

[ericbphoto]

Is this hole (where the screwdriver is pointing) the place where I'm supposed to drip some oil periodically to try to extend the life of the upper distributor bearing? Thinking I'll put some in there to pre-lube it while I'm preparing for the distributor replacement today.

 

[85_Ranger4x4]

Never heard of such a thing, especially on that new of an engine.

 

[ericbphoto]

Never heard of such a thing, especially on that new of an engine.

You're funny. Your fancy 8-cylinder engine must have a way of forcing oil to the upper distributor shaft bearing while it's running.

 

[85_Ranger4x4]

You're funny. Your fancy 8-cylinder engine must have a way of forcing oil to the upper distributor shaft bearing while it's running.

Off to google I go...

 

[ericbphoto]

Distributors and cam shaft syncs on several different Ranger engines. Upper bearing gets no lube. Eventually wears out. Identufied by sqeak/squealing noise when failing. Some people drip oil in a hole somewhere annually or at oil changes to try to lube it and extend life.

There are a bunch if threads about it here on TRS. Might not be in your radar if it's not an issue for 302's.

 

[85_Ranger4x4]

Distributors and cam shaft syncs on several different Ranger engines. Upper bearing gets no lube. Eventually wears out. Identufied by sqeak/squealing noise when failing. Some people drip oil in a hole somewhere annually or at oil changes to try to lube it and extend life.

There are a bunch if threads about it here on TRS. Might not be in your radar if it's not an issue for 302's.

I am weak on 3.0 knowledge just because I have never been around one, it didn't sound like a routine "don't forget to drip oil in this hole of your distributor per the manual" kind of a thing.

Pre '64 SBF dizzys had a wick in the center of the shaft under the rotor to lube the advance plates. I can't find anything after that aside from using moly grease when you rebuild them. Everybody says they are lubed badly but apparently nobody has cared enough in 60 years to look into doing anything about it... or maybe it doesn't really matter (bushings are bronze for what that is worth)

 

[ericbphoto]

I don't know. Just thought its worth doing something before I install it. While it's out in the open and easy to work on. The plan is to retire this engine soon anyway. But you know how "plans" go. I thought that would have been nearing completion by now and I really haven't done anything significant towards starting, except to acquire a donor engine and do some research.

So. This appears to be the lubrication hole. I pulled the tiny little metal plug and found a hole going straight in with a felt wick at the other end. I have filled the passage with oil a few times and tapped the outer end to accept a 5/16"-24tpi setscrew I had that made a nice plug. Would love to plumb up a remote access fill line attached to that hole.

 

[MikeG]

Felt wicks are commonly used on machine tools to hold/distribute oil (lathes, mills, etc.). So that would be a completely logical reason to make sure it got some oil.

Whether it should be getting oil by some other mechanism (splashing?), I have no idea. Bronze on steel tends to wear pretty well... but it really ought to have a touch of oil, at a minimum.

 

[ericbphoto]

Felt wicks are commonly used on machine tools to hold/distribute oil (lathes, mills, etc.). So that would be a completely logical reason to make sure it got some oil.

Whether it should be getting oil by some other mechanism (splashing?), I have no idea. Bronze on steel tends to wear pretty well... but it really ought to have a touch of oil, at a minimum.

Thats all true. This has all been hashed out in other threads. I was just documenting it in my build thread. Plus, I was not sure where the lubrication needed to be applied until I found that hole with the wick in the bottom. That confirmed that I had found the correct location.
As for splash lubrication or forced lubrication to that bearing, there is none. I have another 3.0l vulcan block torn down and have confirmed that there is no way for the engine’s lubricating system to reach that. That bearing exists above the block. It stands to reason that after 27 tears and 168,000 miles, that felt dried out long ago. Proactively adding some oil every year is probably a very wise choice.

I have the new distributor in. I just need to hook up the plug wires, start the engine, and once it’s warm, fine tune the timing. I ordered a timing light from Summit last night. It should be here in the next couple hours. Seriously. I get great delivery service from Summit. It’s almost as if they grab the item off a shelf, hand it to little Jimmy and say “Drive this over to Eric’s house quick. Would you?” And give Jimmy my address.

Edit; Just got an update. Little Jimmy won't get here til tomorrow.

 

[MikeG]

I'd be tempted to put an oil cup on it, if possible. Have seen pictures of car parts from the 1930s with oil cups on them.