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14TR
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Nov 28, 2023
- Messages
- 45
- Reaction score
- 37
- Location
- Pennsylvania
- Vehicle Year
- 1988
- Make / Model
- Bronco 2
- Transmission
- Manual
Hello all,
I have a thread on the engine swap sub forum but I thought this might be a better spot to cover the build, since the engine swap is only a small portion of the build.
I’ve been on and off involved in short course off road racing for 15 years through the EC4WDA. It’s basically similar to tuff truck style courses but “smoother”, not designed to break your rig. There’s also 100yard dirt drags, hill climbs, and figure 8’s. The vast majority of racers are Jeep based vehicles, though you do see all sorts of rigs out there.
I had plans for over a decade to build a bronco 2 or ranger with a 2.3 turbo as at the time the point factor for a turbo wasn’t as heavy as it became in later years due to rule changes.
in March of 2024 I decided to look for a good candidate ranger for the build. Only concerns I had were it had to be 4wd and have a solid frame. I ended up finding a 1999 ext cab step side, 3.0, auto. It was only 90 minutes from my house and, while it didn’t run, it had a pretty decent frame and was only $500.
Once I got it home I confirmed the fuel pump was dead and quickly replaced it with an eBay special for $20. That got the truck running and mobile which is all I needed.
Next step was stripping the interior, which I was only too happy to do since mice had been living in there and peeing on everything for god knows how long.
The safety requirements per the rule book are the removal of all the glass, a proper roll cage, driveshaft loops, 5 point harness, helmet, extinguisher, and master battery/kill switch at the rear of the vehicle.
I started pricing out roll cages from the various manufacturers but quickly found out the $600 cage would need the ext cab upgrade, the A pillar to front frame etc. add in the freight charges and the $600 cage was looking more like a $1500 cage.
That prompted me to look into making my own cage. I discussed it with one of my buddies who has been racing for 40 years with the organization and he has always made his own, though he uses one of the Harbor Freight tubing “kinkers” and I was predicting plenty of wasted DOM in my future. I found dxf files for a manual bender similar to a JD Squared style bender. I tweaked the files slightly to work with the Grizzly brand dies since they are more affordable than the JD ones. Once I cut all the parts cut on the plasma table, I assembled it and mounted it to the garage floor.
Two bends. That’s how many I got done before I realized this was not going to work. The DOM wasn’t anything crazy. 1 5/8” .120 wall, but something seemed to be off as it was taking a 4 foot cheater bar to make the bends and even then it took everything I had. My guess is the placement of the holes on the fulcrum part of the bender was giving me a bad ratio. Something had to have gotten screwed up when I was rescaling and modifying the files is my guess. I was discussing it with another friend of mine who owns a body shop and towing company. He went in the back and came out with a 120 volt hydraulic pump. He said he wasn’t sure if it worked, but it was mine if I wanted it. This was a huge score because aside from hydraulics making the bends obviously much easier, the idea of the bender mounted on a rolling cart was far better than having to bolt it to the concrete anchors in the middle of my shop every time I wanted to use it!
What a world of difference this bender made! I got to work on the main hoop and only slightly screwed it up (the degree wheel wasn’t mounted properly and was moving during the bend! That was corrected by the time I got around to the A pillars). I knew I wanted to have some wiggle room from my body to the cage, but I also didn’t want to cut into the roof structure of the cab because it offers some protection on its own, and didn’t just want a tuna can lid flopping in the breeze.
I have a thread on the engine swap sub forum but I thought this might be a better spot to cover the build, since the engine swap is only a small portion of the build.
I’ve been on and off involved in short course off road racing for 15 years through the EC4WDA. It’s basically similar to tuff truck style courses but “smoother”, not designed to break your rig. There’s also 100yard dirt drags, hill climbs, and figure 8’s. The vast majority of racers are Jeep based vehicles, though you do see all sorts of rigs out there.
I had plans for over a decade to build a bronco 2 or ranger with a 2.3 turbo as at the time the point factor for a turbo wasn’t as heavy as it became in later years due to rule changes.
in March of 2024 I decided to look for a good candidate ranger for the build. Only concerns I had were it had to be 4wd and have a solid frame. I ended up finding a 1999 ext cab step side, 3.0, auto. It was only 90 minutes from my house and, while it didn’t run, it had a pretty decent frame and was only $500.
Once I got it home I confirmed the fuel pump was dead and quickly replaced it with an eBay special for $20. That got the truck running and mobile which is all I needed.
Next step was stripping the interior, which I was only too happy to do since mice had been living in there and peeing on everything for god knows how long.
The safety requirements per the rule book are the removal of all the glass, a proper roll cage, driveshaft loops, 5 point harness, helmet, extinguisher, and master battery/kill switch at the rear of the vehicle.
I started pricing out roll cages from the various manufacturers but quickly found out the $600 cage would need the ext cab upgrade, the A pillar to front frame etc. add in the freight charges and the $600 cage was looking more like a $1500 cage.
That prompted me to look into making my own cage. I discussed it with one of my buddies who has been racing for 40 years with the organization and he has always made his own, though he uses one of the Harbor Freight tubing “kinkers” and I was predicting plenty of wasted DOM in my future. I found dxf files for a manual bender similar to a JD Squared style bender. I tweaked the files slightly to work with the Grizzly brand dies since they are more affordable than the JD ones. Once I cut all the parts cut on the plasma table, I assembled it and mounted it to the garage floor.
Two bends. That’s how many I got done before I realized this was not going to work. The DOM wasn’t anything crazy. 1 5/8” .120 wall, but something seemed to be off as it was taking a 4 foot cheater bar to make the bends and even then it took everything I had. My guess is the placement of the holes on the fulcrum part of the bender was giving me a bad ratio. Something had to have gotten screwed up when I was rescaling and modifying the files is my guess. I was discussing it with another friend of mine who owns a body shop and towing company. He went in the back and came out with a 120 volt hydraulic pump. He said he wasn’t sure if it worked, but it was mine if I wanted it. This was a huge score because aside from hydraulics making the bends obviously much easier, the idea of the bender mounted on a rolling cart was far better than having to bolt it to the concrete anchors in the middle of my shop every time I wanted to use it!
What a world of difference this bender made! I got to work on the main hoop and only slightly screwed it up (the degree wheel wasn’t mounted properly and was moving during the bend! That was corrected by the time I got around to the A pillars). I knew I wanted to have some wiggle room from my body to the cage, but I also didn’t want to cut into the roof structure of the cab because it offers some protection on its own, and didn’t just want a tuna can lid flopping in the breeze.
