whats the best ranger combo to get to tow with

[ranger to be]

what is the best ranger combo to get to tow with? best motor, trans, gears.
IS a manual better than an auto?
Whats are the differences between gear?
Does 4wd help with towing.

 

[bilzy7]

4wd changes gears, alot say unlock hubs and put it in 4lo for more power, but dont go fast or high rev!!! 4.0 has enough for what ranger can handle unless you wanna swap a new engine in. manual is just better for choosing gear you want. any of the engines can tow how well is a diff story.

 

[bilzy7]

ohh and gears.... tech section has that based on tire size...

 

[ranger to be]

ok thanks.

 

[85_Ranger4x4]

A 4.0 with however deep of gears you can get. The automatic is rated heavier than the manual, I would leave it to personal preferance.

4wd is handy but probably not required, it really depends on what you are doing. I have found myself with the added weight of what I am towing needing 4wd on off-pavement towing adventures. If you are towing a boat, it can come in very handy on the ramp as well.

 

[ranger to be]

ok thanks I don't know if I will be doing much off road towing,but when I buy a ranger I want to make sure I get the right combo. I have also saw that the manuals are just as strong but company do not want to replace clutches of inexpedience tower so the rate the auto more. Also I think most stock gears are 3.55 and 3.73 are these good for small amounts of towing and for daily driving?

 

[racsan]

i prefer the 3.73 ratio myself. i do use 4L when moving a load in tight areas and backing, also helpfull if you have a heavy trailer of firewood and you have some distance between where you loaded up and the paved road. while i do prefer a manual to tow with i do see why some would want a automatic, its mostly a personal preferance thing. the bigger the motor, the better. my '88 with a 2.3 got awesome milage but lacked torque to make it up a long upgrade while running empty, always had to downshift. the 4.0 i have now doesnt do as well on fuel but has the pwer to get the job done without downshifting and holding it to the floor in 3rd like i had to with the 2.3 , 4wd isnt always needed, but those time you do need it, you will be glad you have it.

 

[Sasquatch_Ryda]

A 2wd will have a higher towing rating than a 4x4 truck as it is lighter.

2wd 4.0L with 3.73's (or 4.10's if you can get them) with an auto is the best bet.

 

[ronclark]

I have to say i love my 4.0 for towing. i can say it will pull way more than you will want to pull with a ranger.
last week i moved my mustang on a tow dolly i forgot i was even pulling down the freeway.
How every i did notice when i pulled a long bed ranger with 1300lbs in its bed a few hundred in my ranger bed.

 

[Tonka]

In 2003 I moved my parents 35 miles to a farm. I moved everything they own with my 89 Ranger pulling a 5x8 utility trailer. With my stock axle, which was a 3.45, it was great. 2500 RPM at 65 mph in 5th gear, 3000 RPM in 4th.

The truck has a 2.9L V6, 5 speed mazda trans, and an open 3.45 diff with stock 14" rims. The heaviest I ever towed was a 1976 Ford F-100 pickup with a towbar. I was going to pull it to the new place with the ranger, but when I pulled it around the neighborhood it scared the crap outta me. The ranger would have had the power to do it if I took it easy and didn't floor it and strain the truck, but I had almost no braking ability and even creeping around a corner it felt like it was going to rip the axle out from under the truck, like it was bending the leaf springs sideways as the F-100 was trying to go straight when my ranger was trying to make it turn a corner. I ended up towing it with my dad's old 1979 piece of Chevy because even though it was an underpowered turd with a 250-6 and a 3-on-the-tree, it was a bigger truck, beefier leaf springs, more powerful brakes, etc.
At highway speeds, the most I've ever towed was this setup here, the 3500 lb camper plus 7 or 8 hundred pound ATV in the back. It did ok, not sure what my "zero to 60" would have been though because I babied it, never got over half throttle. On the hills, I purposely let the speed drop down til I was able to use 3rd and only give it half throttle or so. People probably thought I was towing with a 4 cylinder but I was just taking it easy on the truck because it was a hot day and my water temp gauge doesn't work.

 

[Will]

what is the best ranger combo to get to tow with? best motor, trans, gears.
IS a manual better than an auto?
Whats are the differences between gear?
Does 4wd help with towing.

The best motor is the biggest motor. The 4.0 is very good--either pushrod or SOHC.

The best transmission is the 5-speed manual. A good automatic is the best, but Rangers don't come with good automatics unless you buy one built within the last 10 years. I've heard they corrected the converter bushing issues, but I can't confirm it. The A4LD or A5whatever is based off the C3 and made in France. I can recommend the old C5 off a 2.8, it can be built strong enough to live behind a 460. It lacks overdrive and a lock-up converter. Also, the 2.8 converter behind a 4.0 means you need deep gears because it's a racing converter with that much more motor in front of it. Loose and the motor needs some rpm to make sure it isn't churning fluid at cruise speed.

You need the deepest gear you can live with. 4.10s and 235/75-15s are really good with a 4.0 5-speed. The more gear you have, the less you have to do with your cooling system and anything in front of the axle. The thing that makes heat is torque developed by the engine. Going from 3.55s to 4.10s means 15% less torque is required from the engine. Let the gears do the work. That's less clutch wear too.

I like 4wd with a trailer just so you have a better chance of getting free when you get stuck. Otherwise, it doesn't matter.

 

[Tonka]

With a 4.10 and a 235/75-15 and a 5 speed, what kind of RPMs is he gonna be looking at at 65 mph in 4th & 5th gear?

My dad's old 77 F-100 is geared like a farm tractor. I think it's got a 4.11 or something. I was just under there the other day when I was on one of my obsessive compulsive fits with the grease gun, greasing every zerk fitting on every machine and vehicle on the farm with synthetic grease, but I didn't think to look to see if that diff's got a tag on it.

(That reminds me: why the F does my Ranger's rear u-joint have a zerk fitting but the front doesn't???)

But the dang F-100 will pull down a house with all that power but I'm afraid to get it over 55 mph cuz it sounds like that 300-6 is screaming, and there's no tach. I use it for local heavy-hauls sometimes but I'd never take it on the highway.

 

[Will]

He'll see 2500 in 5th and 3100 in 4th. I pulled a Casita 16' travel trailer and a bed full of campfire wood with that setup and you never really needed 4th. It would hold cruise pretty much anywhere. The 4.0 is pretty strong at 2500rpm.

I also used an old-school Mazda B2600i with an auto and that was a great motor for towing. And I used an old Pathfiner with a SOHC 3.0 which had a 4500rpm torque peak and even with 4.63 gears that thing spent most of its time in 4th and 3rd in these southern Indiana hills. A good truck if you like to shift gears and don't want to drive a semi.

I had a '76 F100 with a 3 on the tree (I put in a Hurst on the floor) and a Dana 44 rear axle. That is a strong motor. With that long stroke it's got a lot of air moving through it to burn fuel with at low engine speeds. Runs out of breath quick on the highway--it's like 120hp--but it's a great motor for shrugging loads around. I used mine to move howitzers to the washrack when we had to work weekends to get ready for an inspection. Didn't have much for rear springs though.

 

[Tonka]

My Ranger's tach says the same. 2500 in 5th and 3100 in 4th. That's the way the trans is set up. The speedometer runs off the trans. I was talking about actual road speed though. Are your numbers still correct when referring to what a GPS or a radar gun would say your speed is?

My stock Ranger with it's 3.45 would run those RPMs at 65 mph accurately, with 215/70-14's.

If my calculations are correct (I used the calculators in this site's tech pages) if I drop to a 3.73, I don't really know what my RPMs will be but my road speed will be slow by about 5 mph. But I can compensate for that with 235/70-15's. My idea is to go with the bigger tires, the 3.73 axle, and it'll run like I've got my stock 3.45 if I'm running the bigger tires. However when I pull something heavy like my camper, I can put my 14's back on the truck and run it at "70 mph" which will be an actual road speed of 64.75 mph. Or 3000 RPM, whichever is slower.

For some reason my 2.9L seems to vibrate a lot above 3000 RPM. The rear seal is leaking and the trans is also leaking from the top, so if I keep it under 3 grand, I won't have to add as much oil. It's a PITA adding fluid in through that little hole on the side of the trans too.

 

[Will]

The numbers I used are calculated from tire size, transmission type and axle gear. They are accurate to actual road speed, if the tires were new, so they should read correctly with a GPS.

This is the spreadsheet I use--though this one was posted so long ago that I don't know if I own any of the vehicles on it anymore.

Edit: after opening, I see that it's one I did for one of 4x4Junkie's trucks, not the one I thought it was. You can change it to suit yours.

http://therangerstation.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=672&d=1207741751