What did you do to your Ranger today? (Part Deux!)

[Rick W]

I replaced the shifter bushings and cap on the shifter in the Road Ranger. I’ve been dreading it, not because the job looked particularly hard, but because of all that CB, brake controller, etc., junk I’ve installed in my “command center“ overhead and below. Fortunately, once I took the four screws out of the bottom of the shift boot housing, I was able to just kind of lay everything over and out of the way without actually having to disconnect anything.

I’ve had that truck something like 30 or 40,000 miles now, and, until a few weeks ago, it shifted the way it shifted when I got it. Wasn’t too bad, so I never thought about it.

I noticed I was having a little more difficulty shifting about the same time as a few of you guys were talking here about upgrading trans fluid in the manual shift transmissions. I got to wondering if the trans fluid had EVER been changed in the 300,000 miles this thing’s been on earth, so I drained the Mercon 5 out and just filled it with fresh Mercon 5. I didn’t see much difference.

A little bit before I went north for the funeral, it seemed to be harder to shift, more sloppy, and I actually ground second gear a couple times. Over the 2200 mile trip it just got worse, so I parked it when I got home and ordered the bushing kit.

I watched all the videos, and I was curious to see how much wear I would find on my washers and bushings and pins compared to the new set. I’ll never know. The pins seemed to be fine, and the bottom thrust washer seemed to be fine. No flat metal washer bushings, no beveled poly bushings, and the top thrust washer split on one side, and actually overlayed itself by about a quarter inch like a spring. I was really hoping to see how much wear there was, so I’d know if I was correct in thinking that was the problem and time to replace them. I decided to go with the new kit anyway.

Haven’t driven it yet, but the range of the shift pattern seems to be about 1/3 of what it was last week. I also found my earbuds, a lost glove, a couple pens and pencils, several screws, a pair of dollar store reading glasses, and a “new” pair of needle nose and pliers I bought about three years ago and used once or twice. They had bright orange handles, which I liked, so I wouldn’t lose them……

Test drive up to the cute little brunette’s house later today.

And go and vote, it matters.

 

[scotts90ranger]

On a similar note last night while loading up after looking for deer I went to turn on the dome light to try to help the neighbor put stuff in the bed and revel at the cargo light that I've never had work before and wouldn't you know it the dang thing turned on... after 7 years I just needed to cycle the switch more and yell at it a little . That sure would have been handy a bunch of times in the past!

The weather this year has been garbage for deer hunting, we saw one doe last night right at dusk, over here no doe just "visible point" deer... there's a dang 3 point or better hanging around but they're only active when I'm not there...

 

[superj]

Towed the bmw gone from Omaha to corpus. 1100 miles of fun. We left at 0700 and got home at 0145 the next morning so 19 hours of cruising.


The ranger did good no trouble at all towing a dolly and having junk in the bed.

I did some go with the flow driving and got 12-14 mpg and then set cruise at 70mpg and got 17 so if you are interested in better mileage while towing, 70mpg still gets decent time and really good gas mileage.

This is us in omaha

And us in corous christi

The dang bmw ran perfect up there but wint start here. I guess it doesnt like the humidity/heat either. It was 55 when we left and 72 when we got home at 0145. And soooo humid and mosquitos everywhere.

 

[Sideflop]

I took the heat shield off of the muffler to measure it. Likely gonna keep it off, it was rattling pretty bad. While I was at it, I oiled and exercised the hinges on the spare tire mount and took the (original) spare out to make it easier for the shop when I get new tires next weekend.

While I was at it, I went and played in the rain for a few hours. It's better to make sure the 4x4 works (which it does) in this weather than to find out when my truck spins into a wall in the next freeze.