i didnt even hook up the wiring.. as long as i know where im at its all good

 

I got lucky and had to run into the neighboring town on business, which is also the same town my buddies Ford dealership is at. I got all my tail shaft, transfer case gasket, and the spare RCM cover. Like an idiot I forgot to ask about theT-case pigtail though. I'm keeping my fingers crossed I have the right stuff at home as I do have a lot of spare wiring harnesses around and a lot of stuff to build weather pack connectors. When I get home I'll see if its something I have.

I might be able to grab the carpet from the truck but I honestly don't know if its any good or not and I'd really prefer to stay with the rubber flooring. Don't think I haven't thought about just going with the lvl 2 carpet as it would make life really simple for me. I've been looking at the flooring you posted and it looks good but I hate that its not 100% correct. The OEM has those weird circles in the pattern where your feet go. That aftermarket stuff does not. So now I must either go with lvl 2 carpet or go with the aftermarket flooring thats not OEM looking. Right now I'm still leaning toward the rubber though as if you've ever had sand continually worked into your carpet you know you'll NEVER get it back out.

Thats high but it would be worth it to get the correct setup.

I might run without the wiring for a little bit but I definitely want to have it hooked up. I've just spent a fair amount of money to get all the correct lvl 2 stuff, I really want lights on the dash work as well.

 

Nice thing about the manual swap, you know where it's at in the t-case... If you can't read... Well.... You've got issues lol

 

Update.....

I've gotten the old t-case out and the new tail shaft installed. I was getting pretty worried when the first tail shaft bolt fought my brand new 600ft/lb impact out the whole way. I was so afraid the bolt was going to snap off but there wasn't much I could do about it as I had already sprayed penetrating oil in the back of the hole and threaded the bolt in and out a bit. (That sounds like something out of a porno) lol. I got the bolt out and it had pulled a thread or two from the tranny case where the steel and aluminum "welded" itself together. At that point I was having major second thoughts on if I should be doing this swap or not. The rest of the bolts all popped right out and the tail shaft came off easy. I spent about 30 mins making sure the mounting surfaces were clean and I stuck the new tail shaft on with a good coat of "indian head" gasket shellac and thats where I decided to call it a night.

I think I'm on the down hill side now but I have a few questions.
1. Does the FX4 lvl II run a different speed sensor than a regular 4wd truck? Since the new tail shaft turns the speed sensor about 30 degrees clockwise the plug wants to hit the housing before I can get the bolt in the bracket. I'm going to have to enlarge the hole on the bracket quite a bit to get the sensor to bolt in.
2. What kind of fluid does the tranny and transfer case take? I believe its ATF but do I need to put in a certain kind? I can't believe how black the oil was coming out of both the Tranny and my old T-case. Its only got 60k on it but it sure was in need of a change.
3. The tail shaft is installed so its kind of late to ask this but was there anything special I needed to do when I installed it? I put oil in the bosses of the new tail shaft where the shafts ran. I also took that plastic cup thing off the (cluster gear I think wasn't paying that much attention) and put it in the tail shaft then stuck the tail shaft on to the tranny. I think that just about covers it but want to double check before I fire her up.

I'm debating on if I should install new seals on the lvl II case as its leak free and in absolute mint condition. (supposed to have 70k on it) Anyone think this is a bad idea? Its not a money issue or anything I just don't want to crack open something that isn't leaking right now and create a leak.

When I get off work tomorrow I have a few crappy pics I'll post up. It should finish up mid afternoon tomorrow.

 

I wouldnt mess with the new case, you know "if it aint broke dont fix it"

 

You shouldn't have to modify either the sensor or the tails housing. Mine bolted right up no problem.

 

Apparently mine is a hair different then. I'm going to enlarge that hole in the bracket then it'll be good to go. I just took a few random pictures I guess to show what was involved in the swap. Here they are.



Me saying good bye to the flashing 4x4 light.



Standard 4x4 tail shaft vs lvl II tail shaft



Tranny minus tail shaft



Tranny back together waiting for the T-case.

Thats where I finished up last night. I've filled the Tranny with fluid and will start the reassembly work. Hopefully here in 3 hours or so I'll be done.

 

Looks good man! Jealous of that tailhousing though!

Please don't tell me you used gear oil or motor oil in the trans... It looks quite dark! Royal Purple ATF FTW!

 

Looks good. You should add all your pics to the manual case group.

 

That fluid that came out is what was originally in there when I got the truck. It came out as black as motor oil but was very thin. So I'm not sure what the hell was in there. My stock T-case was the same way. I put Mercon 5 back in there. I'm familar with the use of ATF in a manual tranny. I'm from the old school as my 69 Mach 1 takes gear oil and when I found out the T-56 in my Camaro took ATF that was a trip.

Update.... I have to run to work for about 30 mins but so far the lvl 2 transfer case is in, the drive shafts are hooked up and the linkage is bolted up for the twin sticks is just hand tight. I'm just wondering are you supposed to completely tighten the big bolt for the T-case linkage? It seems like that might make it tougher to shift, but if you're supposed to crank her down hard then thats what I'll do. I believe all I have left is to change fluid in the transfer case, put on the rear counter weight, then put the interior back together. Another hour or so of good hard work will get it done. I'll just keep my fingers crossed this work crap goes quickly.

 

Looking good man! It's coming along nicely!

 

Its done! Well as done as it can be until I get some more parts but functionally its done. The things I have left to do are to wire up the 4x4 light but I'll need to source a pigtail before that can be done. Then I'm going to get a junk electric shift motor and cut the plug off of it in order to make a block off to protect the chassis harness plug from corrosion. I'm not sure what I'll do on the flooring. As the gap around the bezel isn't really all that bad. It's very frustrating that the bezel isn't a hair bigger or the hole in the floor a hair smaller because its so close to covering it all. I know in my earlier days I probably wouldn't even of driven it much with the gap but I'm not as picky as I use to be. Well here are the pics for now as I'm heading out for the evening. Some of them are just kind of random but they might help explain some stuff to people who don't have a clue about the swap. (Kind of like me about 2 weeks ago.)









The drivers seat isn't trashed its actually Mint condition. Thats why I have a seat cover over it to keep it looking that way.

Oh and after looking at the pics I have one more thing I need to find, and thats the radio bezel for fog lights but no 4wd switch. Anyone got one they want to let go of?

 

Try to find one from a 2001~2003 2WD V6 XLT with fogs. It should have the same layout as the hard-to-find 02/03 FX4 manual bezel. There are probably other years with a similar arrangement that would work just as well.

 

Went pretty quick considering it took me several months to get all the parts I needed for my swap.

 

Ok I will do! Bob is your bezel silver or black? I'd like to find another silver one but I'm not sure how they decided which vehicles got the silver.

Yeah I was planning on having to spend forever searching for parts but then I found that complete lvl 2 setup for $400 and I thought it was too good of a deal to pass up. I'm in love with the setup. I took her on an 80 mile drive last night and she's just like before except with instant 4wd engagement. I may decide to change the tranny fluid to that syncromesh stuff that everyone praises as she doesn't shift as smooth as before. It could be the feelinf of the new shifter or the fact that the temperature dropped from the 60's to the 20's in the last day. If I get the wiring taken care of the radio bezel so its 100% like stock I'll be pretty dang happy with it.

As for the wiring I found this posted by Bob.
"Go to the 4WD Electric Shift Control Module in the driver side rear corner of the cab. It can be identified by the 3 connectors going to it (two 8-pin and one 5-pin).

Pick out the connector with 5 pins and unplug it. It will remain unplugged after the mod. In that 5 pin connector, the 4WD lights are controlled by the brown/white and gray wires.

Cut each of those wires and extend the HARNESS SIDE of each down to the transfer case and connect them independently to the two pins at the 4x4 switch on the front of the manual case. You'll have a 50-50 chance of getting it right the first time. If the lights are not working correctly, just swap the wires at the switch."

Now I'm wondering do you really have to run new wires from the cab down to the T-case? Isn't the Brown/white wire and the Gray wire already run down there for the electric shift motor? Obviously originally it was sending a signal from the transfer case to light up the light on the dash, couldn't I just use that wiring? If so then I could just get a spare shift motor plug and extend those to wires to the transfer case and it would plug right in and be very clean. Just a thought.

 

Hey mike, I'll buy that radio bezel from you! Turned out so nice! So jealous! I did however get my RCM cover in from Bob last night :) My swap starts soon lol

 

You want my stock electric 4x4 shift bezel?

Well if you need any help on the swap just hit me up. Its pretty straight forward actually. I had a lot of questions but thats usually cause I'd rather ask first than screw something up, but it really was a pretty simple deal. First transfer case I've ever messed with actually. :)

 

Nah, between Shane and myself, we've got it down pretty good... He has like 3 split open 1354's in his shop right now lol I can have my case out and everything unbolted in 15 mins :)

I do I do! How much shipped to 97080? I'll probably PM you my number and you can just gimmie a call when you're ready to sell the bezel.. I've been on the look out for a silver electric with fog light radio bezel in good shape for a long time!

 

Trev. i put money down that we could do that swap in under 40 mins!!!

 

The 2003+ Level II's had the silver bezel but only the 2003 LII manual did not have the electric 4x4 switch. Most, if not all, other 95+ Rangers, including the 2002 FX4, had black bezels.


My instructions that you quoted were for a different year so they don't apply exactly to your situation. Your 2004 4x4 Module is in the dash to the left of the radio. The color codes for the indicators are gray (4x4) and light blue/black (4x4 Low).

None of the wires at the electric t-case was originally used for controlling the dash lights. Control of those lights was done by the 4x4 Module based on positioning info from the shift motor encoder. So you can't just grab the wires there and plug them into the switch on the manual box.

You do bring up a good point about the wiring though. There are 7 wires going from the 4x4 Module to the t-case motor on the electric version that won't be used with the manual case. So it should be easy to reuse any 2 of those 7 to extend the indicator light wires from the 4x4 Module connector down to the switch on the manual t-case. The color codes won't match but that's no big deal.

 

Bob, your knowledge is remarkable...

 

It's all in the Ford Wiring Manuals. I highly recommend them.

 

So if I'm following you Bob, I can just take any two wires that originally went to the electric motor and hook them up to my Manual T-case switch. Then unplug the harness from the 4x4 module and then I need to add some wires from that harness to where?????

 

Keeping in mind that I have looked only at the schematic, not a 2004 truck, here's how I see it.

There are 2 wires leading from the cluster to the connector at the 4WD Module in the dash. Each of these will light one of the 4WD indicator lights when grounded with the key on. The switch in the newly-installed manual transfer case can ground none, one or both depending on the shifted position in the case. The problem is that the pair of ground wires for the indicators are not only not connected to the switch but are also not anywhere near it.

However, if the 2 indicator light wires were cut near the connector for the 4x4 Module and then connected independently to any 2 wires of the 7 that lead from the connector at the 4x4 Module down to the connector for the shift motor of the original t-case, this would create two electrical paths from the cluster indicators to the t-case without routing any new wires.

As an example, I would try this:

• Disconnect the negative battery cable.
• Disconnect the two connectors from the 4x4 Module. These would not be reconnected again.
• Cut the brown/white (pin 7) and the orange/white (pin 13) near the 4x4 Module's gray connector. Then connect one of those independently to the light blue/black (pin9) and the other to the solid gray (pin6), both of those also cut from the same gray connector at the 4x4 module.
• Use a repair connector or junkyard pigtail to connect the shift motor ends of the BN/WH and OG/WH independently to the two pins of the position switch in the manual case. This gives continuity on each of the wires all the way from its indicator lamp to its switch pin. At this point, the lamps should indicate when the shifter engages the 4WD positions.
• If the lights are indicating the wrong functions (4x4 vs 4x4 LOW), it would simply require reversing the wire connections to the two switch pins. Ultimately, these need to be in the right place because the ground for the 4x4 LOW light also tells the PCM to readjust the speedometer input to correct for the 2.48:1 gear reduction in low range.

 

Ok thanks Bob, thats simple enough. I just went out and did a quick test, the blue/black wire runs the 4x4 low and the gray does the 4x4 light. Now is going to be the hard part and thats trying to find some factory type plug so I can make a jumper harness. (Yes I'm that OCD that I don't want to cut my wiring up just to splice in two wires.