Recent content by Erland

What an improved ride.

So I don't know about the 5100's, but the standard Shocks & Bilsteins are acting as the extended travel/droop limiters. However there's only about another 1.5" of wheel-travel remaining before everything binds up in a ruin-your-ball-joint and upper-arm-hitting-the-frame way. That works out to be...

I'll have to take another look at the front suspension. I had thought the droop was only limited by the shock. I noticed one company, Wulf, had their own shocks with a shortened rod section on their lift kit so they could have a longer stroke. That way they have a similar to stock compressed...

So I pulled off those helpers in the rear and figured I'd try winding up the stock adjusters. Is it normal for the adjusters to be quite different left to right? The passenger side adjuster is barely turned in with about 1.56" of bolt remaining, while the driver side is cranked in most of the...

That's kind of what I figured, helper springs, but they look to be as old as the rest of the leafs so I wasn't sure if they were a factory item or an aftermarket helper installed by the original owner. I might pull those out then and add a longer shackle if needed to bring the height back up...

I'm looking for a bit of advice because none of the usual parts suppliers seem to have my model in their system or they insist on trying to sell me the wrong front shocks which leaves me questioning their recommendations for the rear; the usual "well the computer tells me that's what all the...

As for loads, I need to be able to trailer home the occasional car from a state or two away. Stock with the towing package, my Ranger is already rated to tow 3850lbs, it's just slow going over some of the passes. My Ranger is the right size for taking into town or the mountains, it's paid for...

I've been lurking/reading for some time & haven't had much luck finding an existing thread to answer my questions, so I'm hoping some of you might be able to help. My Ranger is an '03 with the 4.0L V6, automatic, and FX4 package with low miles (66k) and is in really good shape and well...

I'm a mechanical engineer with a small machine shop and in a former career, an ASE master technician. I've got a relatively pristine '03 Ranger FX4 that I use as my daily run-about. It has only 66k miles on it and has lived it's life in our dry climate, so completely rust free. I figured it was...