Well, last weekend, my buddy and I set out to lift my truck with a PA 3 inch body lift. It went on pretty smooth. One bed bolt broke because you can't get in to heat it. And one body mount bolt just spun. Oh, and summit sent me the wrong shifter extension, so I had to notch the floor and make a shift boot out of a sweatshirt. lol There is extremely hot air that comes from that hole in my floor lol Summit said to send the one I got back and they will send me the right one and a bill for the difference in price. Kinda was a bummer, but it'll be here soon enough. Anyhow, here's the pics...

Before...




During...


Half way...


No shifter and a dirty arm rest... ew lol


Lift done and a wash. Had a party to go to that night. So we got it drivable and went partying... lol




Bumpers up...


And yes, I already replaced my wheel cylinder...






Still have to do a few things, but I'm pretty happy with it. I want to get my exhaust redone. I want it out the side still but running it with the body lift is gonna be hard. I'll get it as close as I can. Should be able to get it pretty close to the body. I still need to make up some bed gap guards and get my shifter extension on. Maybe make some kind of rock slider to cover up some of the frame. I'd also like to eventually paint all the grey like a semi gloss black. But for the grill I was thinking about a black billet and a color matched surround. Just to be different. Whats anyone else think? Thanks.

Edit:
Was just looking at the pics and noticed my mirrors. I just talked to a guy today that has a junkyard with a few newer style rangers in it. He says he'll check to see if he has a any XLT mirrors. Those would look pretty good.

 

So how did you get those bolts out that wouldn't come out? I'm doing mine next weekend and want to find out all the little tricks to do. Looks good man.

 

Well, you can get a torch to 5 of the 6 bed bolts, we did that and didn't have a problem. The one we couldn't get a torch on broke. We just pulled the bed off and set it down on the bumper and tires. Then we took a cut off wheel and cut the little "nut" thing that clips on the frame and left the half of bolt in there and threw it out. We just put a nut on the new bolt instead of using the little "nut clip" things. You'll see what I'm talking about when you do it. And for the cab one, it was the drivers side rear. We tryed everything from vice grips to a pipe wrench once I think... lol Anyhow, we ended up taking a torch to it very carefully, not to melt the body bushing things. It came right out after that.

Another big b!tch was the rear bumper. when I put my new brackets on, it was too narrow to fit over the frame rails. So I ended up taking my hitch off to make the frame narrower. I also moved the new brackets on the bumper from the inside of the bar in the bumper, to the outside of it. Again, you'll see what I mean when you do it. lol It was still really tight and we had to bore out the new brackets holes to make it finally fit. It took dang near 5 hours just for the rear bumper. Thats the story as to why I don't have a hitch anymore. The front went real smooth though and was done in an hour tops.

 

Sweet, I gotta get a torch but then I'll be set. Did you use just a rachet or a impact?

 

Looks good. What kinda tires are you running? Size

 

lift looks good!

 

Hmm I fell like I may have had something to do with this....

Looks good!

Did I mention that I got that lift from RangerMuse?

 

looks a heck of alot better!

 

Thanks for the compliments guys. Its not done yet, but its definaly getting closer to finished.

I used a rachet on the bed bolts because I didn't want to risk rounding out the torque heads. You need a T-55 torque bit. I don't know why ford did that, but whatever. lol Then I just used and impact for the cab bolts. I didn't need any ground extensions or gas neck or breather neck extensions. All I did was unhook the brake lines from the clips and let them strech themselves. And instead of lowering my radiatior, I ended up just cutting the shroud. Probly not the best thing to do but it works. And I used the steering extension, which went in really easy. Pretty easy to do, just time consuming. Take your time and use common sence and you'll be fine.

They are Apache Radial A/Ts. They are 33 12.5s on a 15x8 steel wheel. (they either have 4 or 3.75 inches of backspacing) They aren't a big name brand tire but they work pretty good in just about everything. That, and they were cheap. I bought them off a buddy for 160 for all four. They still have lots of life in them.

 

Looks good tyler! Its been a whiles since i've seen any updates with u're truck! But yeah the truck is lookin good. When u gonna come 4 wheelin with us?

 

Nice glad it went smoothly for ya. We stripped out a cab bushing and just got a longer bolt and a lock nut works just as good and actually holds better i think

 

looks good man, nice pics, bout how long did it take?

 

looks good i like it

 

Thanks for the compliments guys!

Well, I live in the middle of no where and there is four wheeling everywhere. lol I'd really like to come down there some weekend but gas is rediculous. Maybe someday though.

Well, we started around 9ish and got done with just the lift (no bumpers) at around 4:30 5ish. So around 7 or 8 hours. Thats including taking almost an hour trying to figure out how to put the wrong shifter extension on my shifter! lol

Oh yeah! And thanks to malydeen for hooking me up with the lift. I would definatly buy from him again. Great seller!

 

Yeah, now you see it really is easy to put on...! The way I describe this lift, and why you dont need a how-to.. is that, If you can bake a cake following instructions, you can do a 3" body lift. It really is simple, and the only "special" tools you need are a T-55 and T-50 Torx Bit

 

Truck looks real good! I need to get around to doing a BL one of these days.

 

Mike you should get one then come over to NC next weekend and help me install mine. I bet we can do 2 trucks in 1 day!

 

haha, already solo'ed my own 3" lift on my truck Took me about 8 hours.. but I had a heck of a time with my bed... Rhino lining over my bed bolts.. Shane saw my picture of one of my steps to remove it.. I won't be able to relink the picture here sadly as I am at work.

 

I was talking about Trigger01 Mike lol

 

Ah ha! I'll just go crawl back into my little den over here then.. LONG day today, its darn slow and just alot of crud to get done =(

 

looks great

 

tyler i drove from allentown to pittsburgh and back in one day only cost me about 160 in gas. . .and i had my foot in it, itd only cost u half that come on now haha

 

Lol, yeah, I believe you when you say you had your foot in it!

The gas and the whole watery mud stuff don't sound real inviting. I learned through my buddies trucks that trucks don't like water at all! lol I need this truck to last me a long time before I get something else. (probly just keep it when that happens) Around here when I'm out in the woods. I try to take it slow through mud, it don't screw as much $hit up that way! lol But someday I'll have to drive down and see what all the fuss is about!