1999 Ford Ranger Solid Axle Swap

[Josh40601]

he's been gone for a few months. Like to see how his truck is doing now.

Yea, same here

 

[Boggin]

love the work! sad about the bronco tho, whats the chances you kept the lift out of it and have it for sale lol

 

[Andres629]

Yeah, I'd like to see how it's holding out too. Where ya at??

 

[bilzy7]

I look at it a little differently.....

Take a 1999 Jeep Wrangler for example. For a 4.0 5 speed 4wd, your going to spend around 10K for one of these. The rigs are very able and can go almost anywhere. Key word in that is ALMOST. People spend oober amounts of money fixing these rigs up.

Now lets take your truck....

1999 Ranger ext. cab 4wd. Blue book values these around 6900 and thats retail. You can usually pick up a 99 Ranger 4by for around 3-6K. add 7 grand for all the parts and kick assness, and you have a WAY more capable rig for the same price or a little more than a Jeep. Then you add the fact its a Ford, and it makes it even better.

Got my 99 for 1500, of course with 197k but at 207k now engine still runs strong cept my trannygrinds first gear. It came with brand new 265/75/16 bf goodrich allterrain ta's. Love the look of your ranger in black. Mines green...puke green. Ya I've alrdy invested 4 grand into this thing and that was to repair damage previous owner did.
Are you keepingyour current ride height? Or gonna go higher?

 

[bozone802]

I look at it a little differently.....

Take a 1999 Jeep Wrangler for example. For a 4.0 5 speed 4wd, your going to spend around 10K for one of these. The rigs are very able and can go almost anywhere. Key word in that is ALMOST. People spend oober amounts of money fixing these rigs up.

Now lets take your truck....

1999 Ranger ext. cab 4wd. Blue book values these around 6900 and thats retail. You can usually pick up a 99 Ranger 4by for around 3-6K. add 7 grand for all the parts and kick assness, and you have a WAY more capable rig for the same price or a little more than a Jeep. Then you add the fact its a Ford, and it makes it even better.

Got my 99 for 1500, of course with 197k but at 207k now engine still runs strong cept my trannygrinds first gear. It came with brand new 265/75/16 bf goodrich allterrain ta's. Love the look of your ranger in black. Mines green...puke green. Ya I've alrdy invested 4 grand into this thing and that was to repair damage previous owner did.
Are you keepingyour current ride height? Or gonna go higher?

sorry but remind me again what you are talking about.....
and ill never go higher, i will be lowering the front to match the rear cause it still looks like its taking a shit

 

[bozone802]

love the work! sad about the bronco tho, whats the chances you kept the lift out of it and have it for sale lol

first of all...thanks!

and like i just said above, i will be lowering the front to match the rear. that means ill be taking off and getting rid of the 4" full size bronco lift springs on the front. cant tell you when exactly that will be, but hit me back if you really want em and they're yours when i take em off.

 

[bozone802]

Yeah, I'd like to see how it's holding out too. Where ya at??

alright so its been forever.... last time i put something up i think it was about breaking off my track bar. so ill do my best to remember everything since then, but it hasnt been a whole heck of a lot...

i havent been keeping up with taking pictures, but i went out and snapped a few to give ya an idea of the last couple months...

first off, i put the track bar back on. this time i cut the stock bronco shock/trackbar mount in half to get rid of the shock mount so i could use the bottom part.

got a high lift hooked up on the toolbox. first outing with it i got to use it cause i tore a sidewall.

next up i finally got shock bushings burly enough to not get ripped apart...

i did a really shity job originally mounting my rear shocks. the way i mounted them put so much stress on the frame that it cracked all the way through. i didnt get any pictures of the cracks, but heres the fix, just some 10ga slapped over the frame after i welded the crack itself.

so i boxed the frame around the crack fixes and put a 1.75X.120 tube crossmember in to mount the shocks on. i cut some 2X4 rectangle tube in half and put bolts through to mount the shocks to the tube.

i also got a new muffler which makes my truck drive surprisingly better. its a flowmaster delta 60 series.

i also picked up a 1996 exploder with a 302 that will hopefully end up in the ranger someday. for now its pretty good for gettn around town.

 

[bozone802]

recently i started a bumper, this is all i have for pictures so far:
stock bumper off

tranny cooler off to be relocated

warn 8274 straight outta 1970!

as of now the winch is on and ive started with the tube. i dont have pics of that yet cause its not done and i just had to go wheeln the other day. it was a good thing i did cause the little ranger with its new winch saved the day. the funniest part though is that i had to winch a dodge 2500 and when i first hooked up to it, i just towed my own truck, to i had to have my friends FJ60 hook up to my rear bumper to give me enough weight to winch the dodge out.
so basically it stood up to the ultimate test of yanking out an incredibly stuck 3/4 ton full size, im feeln pretty good about it!!

 

[Josh40601]

he's back!! Glad to see ya back and active again buddy! How's the ol gal treaten ya?

 

[bozone802]

****n thing tried to kill me yesterday... just driving along down the road at 60mph, all of a sudden my front left just drops and i thought my tire blew out and went flat. then i look out my window to my left and see my tire bouncing along down the highway next to my truck... i pull over to the shoulder only to watch my tire bounce down the highway, over a fence, and 300 yds out into a field.
it was so wierd, my wheel never wobbled or shook and nothing out of the ordinary happened until the wheel just fell off. all 5 lugs just unscrewed themselves, nothing was bent, broken or stripped. took my brake rotor down a bit though...

had to run out into the field, grab my tire, then run it back to the truck. stupid high lift it too short to use on my new bumper so i had to flag someone down on the road to borrow a cell phone (no i dont have one) so i could call a friend to come get me.
he picked me up off the side of the road so i could go back to my house to grab my floor jack.
got back to the truck and i couldnt get my floor jack under my axle, so i ended up having to use the highjack after all to get my axle a few inches off the ground so i could slide the floor jack under.
jacked her up, threw the wheel back on with 2 extra lugs i had and stole one from my other front wheel.
drove it right home into the garage and it made the worst metal on metal squeaking/scratching noise the whole way.

 

[bozone802]

took more pics of what i got done on my bumper:

this is where i relocated the tranny cooler to:

i also built sliders last fall which i still have yet to finish. covered them with 3/8" plate with "ski the cold smoke" cut out for bridger bowl, mt. they have the logo of the shop who plasma cut the plate, Dark Horse Customs in bozeman, mt.

 

[bozone802]

more pics to come when i get around to finishing stuff...

 

[Josh40601]

sliders are cool as hell.

 

[bozone802]

sliders are cool as hell.

thanks, those lights are not permanent though. i just threw some up there for the picture, but i wanna install some up there eventually

 

[Andres629]

Good to see ya back round here! And yeah, dig the sliders for sure.