History Lesson
Somebody asked, so I thought that I would provide a little bit of history on my truck. The pictures are not all sequential, but are intended to highlight the different modifications that are mentioned.
I bought this truck in 2003 from an elderly gentleman in Sun City, AZ. It was immaculate and only had 31,000 miles on the clock, 4 wheel drive and an open 8.8 with 4:10 gears. He had also added his fair share of bolt on modifications which included: a bug deflector, fiberglass body matching steps, a black locking tonneau cover, a rubber bed mat, and sheep skin seat covers. I have been looking for pictures of my truck in this state but have not been able to find any. I will edit them in later if I come across them.
Modification 1:
My first modification was to remove the seat covers and install an Alpine head unit that supported Ipod use. At this point I was happy with the truck and it stayed remained in this state for several months.
Modification 2:
In mid 2004 I took my truck on a camping trip. Access to the camp site was over a poorly maintained forest road. Overnight it rained heavily and filled the rocky, clay road with several large (2'-3') deep puddles. There was a certain spot on the road where there were two large puddles back to back. I was afraid that I would become stuck in the soft clay if I did not carry some speed through the puddles. As I left the first puddle, the suspension extended. Before I could clear the hump between the two puddles the suspension settled and the truck came down hard on the driver side fiberglass step. The force folded the step in half but the step saved my rocker panel from sustaining any damage. When I returned home from that trip, I removed both fiberglass steps and realized that the truck looked better and taller without them installed. Once again I was happy with my truck.
Modification 3:
In 2006, my family and I moved from Phoenix to Tucson, AZ. Within a few months of my move I met a new friend that was serious about off roading. To this point my idea of going off road was driving to campsites and trail heads on maintained forest roads. My new friend drove a lifted Toyota Land Cruiser that was very capable. As we started to explore some of the Tucson back country together, we decided that we needed to be able to communicate between our vehicles. Thus modification number 3, the addition of a Cobra CB radio unit. I chose a single din sized radio that had an integrated front firing speaker. Because of the size, I was able to install the radio in my dash directly below my Alpine deck. The install was/is very clean, but the radio has never functioned to my expectation level.
Modification 4:
Towards the end of 2007, with work and family absorbing most of my free time, the only opportunity that I had to integrate 4-wheeling was to make night runs. Well, it did not take long before I determined that my stock headlights were insufficient for the technical driving that was required on these night runs. So I enlisted the help of a friend of mine that owned a metal shop and we worked for a couple of nights and designed a prerunner style bumper that would mount around the factory bumper. To meet my lighting needs I purchased two Lightforce 240 HID lamps and mounted them to the new bumper.
Placement of axillary switches:
Modification 5:
As time progressed, the trails that we were running were becoming more technical and rocky. Since I was still running on stock sized AT tires without any sort of lift, I became increasingly concerned about protecting my rocker panels. After all, my second modification was a direct result of rocker panel type damage. To this end, in February 2008, I enlisted the help of Rocky Road Outfitters to make a custom set of "super sliders" for my truck. At first they were not overly interested since they did not see a strong marked for the Ranger platform. When I reminded them that their web page mentioned that they would support all makes and models, they made time on their schedule and used my truck as a prototype for their Ford Ranger Super Sliders. They turned out quite nice and have served me well.
Modification 6:
In mid 2008 after much deliberation, I decided that it was time to jump to 33" tires and a lift. I knew that I did not want to run a body lift, and was not happy with the current torsion bar ride, so I was left with RCD as my only remaining option (at this point, I had ruled out DBR because of the cost). So, I selected a local shop to perform the install and ordered the kit. I also ordered 5 33X10.50 BFG MT KM tires on Black Unique Steel Wheels. I chose the 10.50 size because I wanted to limit the adverse impact of the larger tires to the degree possible. This proved to be a successful combination and I made several off road trips with this setup.
Modification 7:
When I went to the larger 33" tires, I discovered that I no longer had the ability to mount my spare under the bed. Since I did not want to have my spare and other off road equipment floating free within my bed, I decided to put my CAD skill to the test and design a one-off bed rack for my Ranger. This took several weeks of thought and friend that is a much better fabricator than myself to pull off. In the end it turned out pretty cool.
Here is a copy of a build thread that I did for this rack:
http://www.ranger-forums.com/forum2/f6/f42/68804-bed-rack-2000-stepside-ranger.html
In the fall of 2008, I met up with a friend of mine that is an editor for Off-Road Magazine and 4 Wheel Drive and Sport Utility Magazine to do some off roading in Flagstaff and Sedona, AZ. This trip led to him writing a feature article on my truck for April 2009 issue of 4 Wheel Drive and Sport Utility Magazine. That issue even had a 2-page picture of my truck on the magazine index sheets. The article was titled "2000 Ford Ranger Supercab - The Ford Side of Life" and can be found at the following link.
http://www.4wdandsportutility.com/features/0904_4wd_2000_ford_ranger_supercab/index.html
My truck showed up again in the same magazine a few months later in a followup article that discussed the trip that we had taken. That article was titled: "Sedona, Arizona - Red Rocks, Pink Jeeps, And New Age Dogs
4Running Northern Arizona" and can be found at the following link.
http://www.4wdandsportutility.com/adventures/southwest/0909_4wd_sedona_arizona/index.html
Here are a few additional pictures from the same photo shoot:
Anyway, to wrap this up. In early 2008 I was invited to help provide pit support for the Greer Brothers Trophy Truck at the 2008 BITD Parker 425. This was my first introduction to desert racing. Over the last couple of years my interest in desert racing and prerunning has increased dramatically. As a result my end vision of my truck has also changed. While I still want to explore the back country of Arizona, I also want to be able to play on the desert courses as well. To this end, I decided to abandon the RCD kit and install the Dixon Brothers long travel kit. That takes us to the where I started page one of this thread. Hopefully you have enjoyed this walk down my memory lane. It is amazing to reflect and see how much things have changed over the past couple of years with this truck. Here is looking to the future.