I have a cracked head on my 1996 2WD ranger 3.0L and have questions.

[Chris M]

My problem started when I was stuck in a traffic jam on the New Jersey Turnpike on the way home Friday. Temp gage started to rise. The only way to keep the temp in operating range was to put the truck in neutral and hold the RPM at 2000. Yesterday I performed a cooling system check and flushed the system. The Thermostat is working correctly no visible leaks in system. What tipped me off that there was a problem with the heads was exhaust gases bubbling up into the overflow tank. The oil is clean no coolant there.

1) Will I need both an IN. LBS and FT. LBS tork wrench to complete this job.

2) Has anybody had any experience with J&C enterprises on E-bay as they have a set of remanufactured heads listed for a buy it now price of $199.00 (There posting worries me as it states that the guides are replaced only if out of speck.)

3) Clearwater Cylinder Head has new heads for $210.00 each on E-Bay. This item is listed as an aftermarket unit that is thicker in critical areas than factory units. Does any one have any experience with this vendor?

Any and all feed back will be greatly appreciated. As I need to make a decide how to proceed either do this myself and collect all that is needed or have a shop do the work.

As always the very best regards
Chris M.

 

[Ranger44]

I just went through this crap.

What you'll need is a head gasket set ( includes head gaskets plus upper intake set) from your local autoparts store. Fel-Pro.

New head bolts. I'd get fel-pro.

A good quality torque wrench (click style). I didn't use mine when i did the work. I ended up using my friends mil-spec wrench. Worked great and everything has been working fine for the past almost month. But something around the craftsman quality range should do fine. Avoid the $25 cheapies.

I'm actually running a set of J & C heads and I highly reccomend them. The quality was great and come completely assembled.

The biggest problems I ran into were broken bolts.....exhaust.

 

[Chris M]

Ranger44,

Thanks for the feedback. So J&C it will be then. Knew about the head bolts and gasket set. Exhaust bolts lots of p-oil to get them off and then I was thinking of replaceing all the exhaust manifold bolts to the head.
I will hove to go get a new (click style) torque wrench as the last time I use my old one was over 20 years ago.

As always the very best regards
Chris M

 

[Chris M]

Good day to all,

Is there a torque spec for the lower intake manifold to the heads.

 

[Geeshik]

Heads.

I had mine pressure checked at a local machine shop and one of mine was cracked. I looked around a while, but I recommend Dover Cylinder Heads. i think i got both heads assembled off of Ebay for about $200 through them without a core charge or exchange. My '93 3.0 is now running '99 cylinder heads, but they are totally interchangeable as long as you replace them in a set.