Is the Rat a good edition of a Ranger?

[Andy D]

As beat up as the Rat is, it hasn't stranded me yet. Its a '94 XLT long cab. 125" wheel base. 5sp, manual hubs . Because it has a 4.0, it has a 8.8 with 10" brakes and 3.27 open diffs. No AC, manual doors. Slider. 15" deer foot alloys.

I see all these posts about cracked heads, loose manifolds, short lived automatics. What can I expect in the future ? It just turned 130 K. It has a few leaks underneath, but nothing major.Runs great , except for a high idle, which I think, may be a bad throttle cable. Having 2 stripped and one headless wheel stud on the LF doesnt inspire me with confidence in Ford's steel.
I never in my life had studs mess up, And I've been changing wheels for 50 yrs. For sure , some meat head over torqued the nuts with an air wrench. Stretched them on the RH too. Even with re threading the studs on the RH, the nuts go on hard. When I get done with the left hub, I'm gonna replace them on the RF. Fix Or Repair Daily

 

[adsm08]

Don't be too quick to knock Ford over your damaged wheel studs. 130K miles and 20 years old, I'll bet those rotors have been replaced at least once, probably with non-OEM parts. When Ranger rotors get replaced the studs get replaced too.

 

[jhammel85]

Just think about how you'd feel if you didn't have all the horror stories from the internet at your beckon call. If you didn't know about issues Rangers have (and every other car out there!), Would you still think it's a good truck? Based on it's age and milage?

Personally, when it comes to my truck, It's 27-28 yrs old and has almost 200k on it now. If it just quit one day, I wouldn't chalk it up to a bad design or whatever, it'd be "ahh, it's an old truck...An old truck that still sits outside and see's daily duty...No wonder that happened"

 

[racsan]

high idle could be a vacuum leak, as far as the heads go, id say most cracked heads are due to overheating, ive heard of high-milage 4.0's having a ticking noise due to pushrod/rocker arm wear, but at 164K my 4.0 hasnt done that yet. automatics? sometimes they go and go, sometimes they die, i personally prefer a manual, but if a auto is maintained and not overheated then sometimes they will be reliable. on your wheel studs, sometimes ive seen lugnuts be the problem, after you put some good studs on, get some good lugnuts, mcguard is a excellent choice, they aint cheap, but ive had mine on and off and on 2 seperate trucks to boot for a combined milage of over 150K and they still go on and off like they should, ive had cheap aftermaket lugs (like "gorrila" brand) that after a few times of on/off were junk, the threads just werent as precise, maybe not as deep. now yes, there are some things to be on the watch for, the rear leaf spring hangers for one, if yours havent been replaced yet, then they are probly about shot, the front core support is another problem rust area, your gering is a little taller than what id prefer, but with a auto its probly not bad with stock tires. you wanna read up on a vechicle chassis with issues, read about the gm S-blazers...... about the time im happy with how my wife's vechile has been doing, it goes stupid and needs a new $50 cap/rotor again or some seal starts leaking or it just decides to not start...every make/model will have a few problem children and like wise there are some vehilces that are very good and issues are few. but i will say that both my rangers have done evrything ive ever asked of them, and though ive had a few issues here and there, id defitly have another ranger, cant say id ever want another S-blazer...

 

[Andy D]

I know it didnt happen on the Rangers, but wabbout The F 150s blowing spark plugs?

The frame rot has been dealt with except for a punky bottom rail. The rear spring hangers have been replaced. It has been crudely repaired by a PO. The front clip has been re-attached . I fixed the LF cab support/ frame rot.already. The bed and the tank hafta go to clear up the other spot. I think the rear section may be off another truck. The bed is on crooked with only 2 bolts. The rear bumper is hanging off the bottom of the frame ends which stick out about 4 inches from the tail gate. . I hauled a 300 lb engine 600 miles without it falling out. It isnt a daily driver, so until something gets worse, it doesn't get better. Meanwhile the collection of mangled fastenings in the dash well grows

 

[BLOODBANE]

My 94 Explorer has the 4.0 and is clocking 230k. It also has the auto, and other than some ticking while accelerating hard, its still a strong runner. I have taken care of the auto though and have an extra cooler on it. mine gets wheeled pretty hard as well (specs are in my sig)

 

[Andy D]

My daily drivers are a pair of 26 yr old BMWs. They don't break metal unless horribly abused. That includes driving it until the timing belt breaks. They are enjoyable to wrench on compared to the Rat.The urgent help had Ron D talking about a TSB about loose valve seats in Vulcan3.0s, WTF? Even Jeep didn't have that on the clunkiest V8 it ever made.

Sure,some of the problem is the poor condition of the underside. I got a 1/2 bucket of fine white sand out of a fender edging. So it was a beach buggy at some point. That explains a lot. Plus I'm a noob to the truck. I have discovered an ugly truth,though. Ford has no regard for replacing parts. They simply aren't designed to be fixed. The design is heavily biased toward assembly considerations.

 

[adsm08]

Ford has no regard for replacing parts. They simply aren't designed to be fixed. The design is heavily biased toward assembly considerations.

This is true. Ford engineers do work under the delusion that the things they design only need to be put together once, and never taken apart.