Peter Griffin’s 1988 Ford Bronco II
When Peter Griffin bought his 1988 Ford Bronco II, he knew he had some work ahead of him. What he didn’t know was just how much of that work would involve chasing cooling problems through an Arizona summer, replacing things that had been poorly installed by previous owners, and repeatedly finding new problems just when he thought he was getting close to the finish line.
But Peter had a plan from the beginning.
He wanted a reliable Bronco II that he could use on the street and in the desert of extreme southwest Arizona, where summer temperatures can climb well above 110 degrees. And he decided that if he was going to build it, he was going to document the entire process — the successes, the mistakes and everything in between.
As he put it when he started his build thread, he wanted to keep himself “honest and on point” and was going to do it “warts and all.”
That turned out to be exactly what he did.
Starting With a 35-Year-Old Bronco II
The Bronco II had about 88,000 miles when Peter bought it from a neighbor who was retiring from the Army and moving back home. The body was remarkably solid and largely rust-free, but the paint was badly worn and the truck had accumulated plenty of questionable repairs and modifications over its 35-plus years.
The power steering pump was making terrible noises. The air conditioning had been disabled because of a failing compressor — something that simply wasn’t going to work in Peter’s part of Arizona. The exhaust had been modified with the catalytic converter removed and a Cherry Bomb muffler installed ahead of the rear wheel.
There was also a partially disabled alarm system causing a battery drain, poorly installed roof lights, an unsecured aftermarket stereo and plenty of other evidence that previous owners had taken a less-than-careful approach to the truck.
Peter wasn’t interested in simply making it look good.
His first priority was mechanical reliability.
He worked his way through the fuel system, power steering, exhaust, cooling system and other mechanical problems before moving on to the interior and exterior. Along the way, he found plenty of surprises, including a broken thermostat housing bolt, incorrectly configured radiator hoses, homemade spacers made from stacked washers, missing hardware and, at one point, a piece of PVC pipe that fell out of the lower radiator hose.
The Bronco II was teaching him that there was no shortage of things to fix.
Learning as He Went
One of the things that stands out when reading Peter’s build thread is how openly he approached the process.
He wasn’t presenting himself as an expert who already knew everything. He asked questions, tried things, sometimes got them wrong, and came back to the forum to figure out what happened.
Early in the build he specifically thanked Uncle Gump, ecgreen, RumPunch and others for inspiring him with their builds, and Shran for helping with technical questions.
He also referenced the TRS Tech Library throughout the build.
That became a two-way relationship. Peter wasn’t simply coming to The Ranger Station to find answers and disappearing again. He was documenting what he learned so that the next person working on a Bronco II might have an easier time.
That included some of the smallest details.
When his speedometer was reading several miles per hour slow after changing the tires and gearing, Peter used a TRS Tech Library article on changing the speedometer gear. He did the math, ordered the correct green gear and had the speedometer within about one mile per hour of GPS.
He also used one of Jim Oaks’ how-to articles when mounting a rear-view camera to the spare tire carrier.
Those are the kinds of things that make an enthusiast forum valuable. One person figures something out, documents it, and years later somebody else doesn’t have to start from scratch.
The Arizona Cooling Problem
Cooling the Bronco II — and the people inside it — became one of the biggest challenges of the entire build.
Peter had made it clear from the beginning that the extreme southwest Arizona heat made the cooling system a priority. That concern proved to be justified.
The truck had already been fitted with an aftermarket aluminum radiator, but Peter found a number of problems with the cooling system, including an incorrect or missing thermostat, questionable hoses and a cooling system that needed a thorough cleaning.
He flushed the system repeatedly, replaced hoses and the thermostat, installed another radiator, experimented with fan and shroud arrangements and eventually moved to a Dakota Digital fan controller and electric fans.
It wasn’t a straight line to success.
There were problems with the fan installation, temperature sensors, wiring and even the direction the fans were moving air. One fan turned out to be defective and was pulling nearly 50 amps. At one point Peter was chasing temperatures that climbed during extended idling while the A/C became increasingly ineffective.
But he kept working at it.
Eventually he found the combination that worked. With the defective fan removed from the equation and the remaining fan operating in the correct direction, the Bronco II could sit and idle with the A/C running in 108-degree temperatures while maintaining coolant temperatures around the thermostat setting.
The A/C was finally ice cold.
A compression test also showed 136–145 psi across the cylinders, giving Peter some welcome news about the condition of the original 2.9-liter engine.
After all the chasing, experimenting and frustration, he could finally say that the goal he had established when he started the build had been met: the engine stayed cool and the occupants stayed cool.
Turning It Into His Bronco II
Once the mechanical problems were under control, Peter could concentrate on turning the tired old Bronco II into something that reflected what he wanted.
He replaced the original three-inch body lift with a two-inch lift and went through the suspension, using Skyjacker components and replacing worn bushings and other components. After dealing with some parts problems along the way, he eventually got the proper drop brackets installed and had the truck aligned.
With 31-inch tires, new wheels and the suspension sorted out, the Bronco II became remarkably stable on the interstate for a 35-year-old short-wheelbase truck.
The interior received just as much attention.
Peter stripped and cleaned the interior, treated the floor, added sound deadening and insulation, installed new carpet and headliner materials, refurbished the dash and installed Coverlay components. He upgraded the lighting, added an Alpine head unit and Infinity speakers, and installed a powered subwoofer.
The doors were rebuilt with new glass, weatherstripping and wipes, and Peter spent hours getting the details right.
Outside, the truck received a desert-inspired finish with Raptor liner, black trim, bumpers and other refinements. The result wasn’t intended to be a concours restoration. It was a Bronco II built to be used.
And Peter wasn’t afraid to point out the imperfections along the way.
He would spend hours getting something right, only to discover that he had forgotten a small piece during reassembly. He’d fix one problem and create another. Parts wouldn’t fit. Fans wouldn’t cooperate. A/C problems would send him back to the shop.
And he’d document all of it.
The Community Was Part of the Build
That’s really what makes Peter’s build stand out.
There are plenty of Bronco II builds that can show you a finished truck. Peter’s thread showed you how he got there.
Members helped him find parts. They answered questions. They offered suggestions when he ran into problems. Some even provided parts at no cost beyond shipping.
Peter repeatedly acknowledged that help throughout the build.
At one point he wrote that this was the first build of this magnitude he’d undertaken and that he had gotten answers to every question he asked, with several members coming to his rescue with needed parts.
He didn’t take that help for granted.
In fact, when the build was essentially finished, Peter turned around and offered some of his leftover parts to other members for nothing more than the cost of shipping. He specifically said he was offering them to the TRS community first because of the help and encouragement everyone had given him.
That’s the kind of thing that makes a build thread more than a collection of pictures and parts lists.
Truck of the Month
By the time the Bronco II was finished, it had become a very different truck from the one Peter bought.
It was reliable, cool-running, comfortable, quiet and capable of handling the environment it was built for. Peter even took it back out into the extreme southwest Arizona desert to photograph it in its natural environment.
Then came another milestone.
The Bronco II was selected as The Ranger Station’s September 2024 Truck of the Month.
Peter was genuinely appreciative of the recognition. But even then, he was quick to give credit back to the community.
He wrote that he was “very humbled and grateful” to see his Bronco II appearing as Truck of the Month and said that without the help of the people on the forum, he was pretty sure it wouldn’t have happened.
He later summed it up even more simply:
“Woo hoo!!! TOTM, thanks y’all, I very much appreciate it and couldn’t have done of lot of my build without everyone’s help here….”
For Peter, TOTM wasn’t just recognition of the finished Bronco II. It was recognition of the people who helped him get there.
And Then He Sold It
There is one more twist to Peter’s story.
After more than a year of work and nearly $25,000 invested in the Bronco II — not counting his labor — someone made him an offer he couldn’t refuse.
Peter had been considering a fresh engine build that could have added another $5,000 or so to the project, but he realized that having roughly $30,000 tied up in a 35-year-old Bronco II was more than he was comfortable with.
So he sold it.
That might have been the end of the story for the Bronco II, but it wasn’t the end of Peter’s relationship with The Ranger Station.
His final post in the build thread says a lot about what the project had become for him:
“I’m profoundly grateful for all the help I received from folks here, and will definitely hang around as a potential project would have me right back here, so I’m not going away mad or otherwise!”
And then:
“Thanks again y’all!”
That’s a pretty fitting way to end a build thread.
Peter started with an old Bronco II that needed just about everything. He came to the forum looking for information, asked questions, learned from other members, documented what he discovered and shared the results.
Along the way, other members learned from him, too.
The truck is gone now, but the information Peter left behind isn’t.
That’s what makes a build like this worth documenting.
Build – Document – Inspire.
Build Thread
Check out his build thread at:
MY build thread…’88 Bronco II Desert Rat Patrol Edition
Photo Gallery
About The Author
Jim Oaks is the founder of TheRangerStation.com, the longest-running Ford Ranger resource online since 1999. With over 25 years of hands-on experience building and modifying Ford Rangers — including magazine-featured builds like Project Transformer — Jim has become one of the most trusted authorities in the Ford Ranger off-road and enthusiast space.
Since launching TheRangerStation.com, Jim has documented thousands of real-world Ranger builds, technical repairs, drivetrain swaps, suspension modifications, and off-road adventures contributed by owners worldwide. TheRangerStation.com has been referenced in print, video and online by enthusiasts, mechanics, and off-road builders looking for practical, and experience-based information.
