Jballard81's 1994 super cab 4.0 4x4 Restore

[jballard81]

Pulled the engine light code today:
172 O2 sensor fault lean

I replaced both O2 sensors less than 200 miles ago. I'm going to recheck all the hose connections again.

Maybe I snagged the sensor connector accidentally as well...

 

[scotts90ranger]

A dirty MAF will show a lean code as well

 

[jballard81]

I'll clean the MAF and check again. I replaced another old air hose but the light still came back.

I don't want to jump to conclusions, but I could've made a mistake reinstalling the upper intake and there's a leak... It's where I last made changes, it's gotta be the most likely culprit.

On a positive note, I'm pretty positive my drive shudder is gone. I drove it with overdrive on today and it performed perfectly!

 

[jballard81]

While I'm still trouble shooting the lean code, my local boneyard got:
2 - 94 rangers
1 - 95 ranger
2 - 94 Mazda b3000
1 - 96 b4000

All within the last couple of days. Grabbed the intake studs off the b4000. I may have mangled mine up some during reinstall bc I didn't have the e-torx.

Not sure if it was a 2.3 or 3.0 but I realized that the air box on the pre-95s look very similar to the 4.0 air box. Would just need to swap out the intake adapter from the 2.3/3.0 to my 4.0. I should have grabbed one bc mines been glued back together one too many times at this point.

Can anyone confirm that btw?

One of the 94 Mazdas had bucket seats, first time I've seen buckets in the wild . They were in passable shape but being in a standard cab they didn't appear to have the fold and slide option on them. I left them for the next guy.

Finally replaced my beat up hood liner:

Gave the new one a quick spray paint:

Very happy with how it turned out.
Also replaced the vacuum reservoir thing that sits on top of the AC box that I recently noticed had the tiny plastic line to the hose T broken.

Not even sure what it does, but the 94 I grabbed the hood liner from had one.

 

[rumblecloud]

likin' the hood liner. I did mine awhile bak as well. I took the liberty of removing the fuse for the underhood light since the hood was always open for some reason or other ...

 

[RobbieD]

I'm liking that hood insulation, too. Makes a huge difference in the engine bay appearance.

You've done really good with that truck. What's it been, not quite a year? You've brought it a LONG way along.


And, thanks for the update posts. I always like seeing an old truck get some love.

 

[jballard81]

I'm liking that hood insulation, too. Makes a huge difference in the engine bay appearance.

You've done really good with that truck. What's it been, not quite a year? You've brought it a LONG way along.


And, thanks for the update posts. I always like seeing an old truck get some love.

Just paid taxes for it again so just over a year. I need to learn how to clean up the engine bay a little better now since the liner looks so much better now

Glad you're enjoying it. Gives me a lot of satisfaction to continue bringing it back. Need to start getting serious about learning about the body work. Would really like to be able to learn how to paint it in the spring.

 

[jballard81]

Trying something different here. I've had very little luck finding replacement power buttons in my trips to the boneyard. It looks like the design of the buttons changed in 95+ and i've never seen a 93-94 ranger with power options (other than mine...). I don't know if explorers from that era would have the same buttons or not. i feel like i saw a 93 once and it had drastically different buttons.

i think when i originally cleaned mine up, i was a bit aggressive with the sand paper and it has resulted in intermittent issues. I've been experimenting with nickel coating and figured this might be a good application. here's my setup:

nickel should coat the bare copper nicely. I'm doing it this way b/c i'm pretty sure i don't want to plate those tiny push connectors on the top of the switch

 

[jballard81]

Ehh.. it plated but looks awful. I touched it with some 400 grit to clean it up. Will reinstall and hope for the best:

I probably should have risked taking the switch completely apart. Will remember that if there's a next time.

 

[jballard81]

Ran into an interesting issue last night while driving. The temperature gauge needle was "bouncing", between pretty low and right around the middle. It felt like it was changing too fast to be anything other than a sensor issue.

I replaced the sensor about a year ago and it's been giving a steady temp reading until now. I checked coolant level and it was fine. I went to remove the connector and it slipped off, definitely not giving a good connection. Weird that its been reliable for almost a year.

I didn't want to try crushing the connector so I put a tiny square of aluminum foil on the sensor side of the connection and that gave it a much better press fit.

Test drive and it's reading correctly again. I appreciate an easy fix every now and then.

 

[jballard81]

Finally decided to buy an aftermarket headlight and side marker kit. Being me, I found the cheapest one I could find on eBay. Was about $53 for the set. They are Eagle Eye brand from Taiwan. They installed pretty easily and are a definite improvement:

Midway through:

Found this bit of overspray from the original paint job on the original 25 year old side marker bulb:

Completed:

Best part of the swap was afterwards I could see that my headlights were pointing way too far down. Old assemblies were so hazed over I couldn't tell. Much better field of vision now.

 

[jballard81]

Been doing a bunch of research but could use a little input:

My speedometer has bounced since I got the truck. It's also about 5 mph fast (reads 55 when actual speed is 50). My research leads me to believe the bounce could be the vehicle speed sensor, which being a 4x4, should be on the back of the transfer case, right?

Question is if my speedo is ~10% fast, should I try to calculate the correct replacement speedo gear (does the A4LD on the 94 have a 7 or 8 tooth drive gear?), or replace the VSS first to see if it fixes the bounce and the 10% variance?

Also, is the VSS the same on the transfer case as it is on the transmission?

 

[RobbieD]

I'm pretty sure that 1994s still ran a mechanical speedometer, cable driven. The bouncing *might* be fixed or reduced by pulling the drive cable, cleaning the old grease off and re-lubricating it. The VSS would be for the PCM, and cruise control if equipped.

And my understanding is that which driven speedo gear used is dependent upon the axle ratio.

 

[jballard81]

I'm pretty sure that 1994s still ran a mechanical speedometer, cable driven. The bouncing *might* be fixed or reduced by pulling the drive cable, cleaning the old grease off and re-lubricating it. The VSS would be for the PCM, and cruise control if equipped.

And my understanding is that which driven speedo gear used is dependent upon the axle ratio.

I'll have to pull the gear and check it. There's a consistent grinding sound from around the dash. Definitely what I would think sounds like a gross, dry cable struggling.

Should be at the TC case still, right?

 

[RobbieD]

If memory serves, the drive cable has to be pulled out from the top, so it involves pulling the cluster.

When I pull a cluster, I crawl under the truck and unclip the speedo cable from a retainer clip on the floor of the cab below the driver seat. Then you can push more cable slack through the firewall. If the cluster's mounting screws are already removed. pushing the speedo cable through the firewall grommet will actually push the cluster out of the dash a little, giving you more room to get your hand behind it to disconnect the two wiring harness plugs (squeeze he skinny ends). Then you just push inward on the square part of the collar to release the speedo cable.

And yes, my understanding on a 4x4 is that the other end of the speedo cable is on the TC (I've only dealt with 2WDs personally, so going by what I've read).