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Finished up a 2500-mile road trip with my DD, fully loaded bed and a small trailer, testing out the air-assist lift kit I installed 2 months ago. It passed with flying colors with each side pumped up to 60psi. Even with all the camping gear in the bed and the weight of the trailer, the truck maintained it's factory ride height with zero issues. For the week I was camping in the sticks, I dropped them to 30psi as most of the weight was not on the truck. Once loaded back up, I aired back up to 60psi with the OBA and had an equally pleasurable drive home, not worrying about dragging the trailer hitch pulling into a gas station.
Finally got my bucket seats and center consol installed. I've wanted a floor shifter in this rig for about 3 years now. I kept putting it off. We'll my local salvage yard had a 40% off sale this weekend for members, so a shopping I did go. After 3 hours going through all the vehicles and finding everything I wanted, I got too work. Here are some "just after install" pictures. The hardest part was changing only the lower part of the seat sliders.i learned that ford had absolutely no intention of anybody separating these. And rerouting the shift cable and getting it to sit right so the shifter pulls correctly was a task.. Only other thing I ran into is the air bag light is on after swapping seats. I installed the factory seat belt buckles and plugged them in. I didn't realize they are pressure sensitive, so I may have to remove the dash light or hunt down the issue. I'll post another one after I get the cosmetic work completed and cb mounted.
Last edited by WebsterA; Aug 31, 2024 at 11:57 PM.
Got it all pretty much done. I'll figure out filling the gap around the cb one day. But for now, I'm happy. Got o/d button wired to shifter handle. Was a nice feature it came with. Shifts good. Seats are so much more comfortable. It's like driving a whole other Ranger.
In the 4th and 5th photos in the post before last, is that a "chrome vanadium personal protection piece"?
Its just some diamond plate i had laying around from other projects. It's thin, so I can mold it to to fit about anywhere. I also used a piece to block off the colom shifter after I removed it. One day I'll probably remove it and mold in a plastic piece so I can use it for a switch panel or mini guages.
In the 4th and 5th photos in the post before last, is that a "chrome vanadium personal protection piece"?
oh, lmao, the wrench..... so sorry for missing the "protection" part. I switch my hitch ***** frequently and keep it there so I don't have to undo my tonneau cover to access my in bed tool box every time.
Got new door lock tumblers in today. Simplest thing I've ever done with this truck. Absolutely no tools required. Lubed tail gate latch system. Yearly ritual. Now I'm fighting getting the odor out of the truck. After 3-5 years of back slider leaking and soaking Carpet and padding, it smells worse than salvage yard cars. I really don't want to pull everything to replace those, so I'll keep spraying freshener in it. I should just pay a couple hundred and have it professionally cleaned.
Got new door lock tumblers in today. Simplest thing I've ever done with this truck. Absolutely no tools required. Lubed tail gate latch system. Yearly ritual. Now I'm fighting getting the odor out of the truck. After 3-5 years of back slider leaking and soaking Carpet and padding, it smells worse than salvage yard cars. I really don't want to pull everything to replace those, so I'll keep spraying freshener in it. I should just pay a couple hundred and have it professionally cleaned.
Have you verified it's the slider itself? The reason I ask is that both deals on the rear window and third brake light had failed on mine. About 90 minutes and $30 in gaskets resolved the issue.
Yeah, the window was bad. It was filling the lower channel, flowing inside behind the plastics and filled both front and rear floor pans every time it rained. Old seals had swelled from algy and crud, rusted the steel internals. The center slider was the worst. Tried disassembling it all and cleaning it up, but eventually just sold it after I replaced it with a solid pane window. I had replaced the third brake light months prior thinking that was it also. Took me almost a year to track it down. I did some posts on it prior to this one a while back.
Water leaking in driver side front floorboard, 2003 Ranger xlt.(General Ford Ranger Discussion)Hey all. I'm getting frustrated. For the past 2 years, my drivers side front floorboard has been getting wet every rain. I'm getting a new windshield this Friday, with new trim seal as it's shrunk...01-16-2024 by WebsterA
Last edited by WebsterA; Sep 29, 2024 at 08:52 PM.
Finally found an Edge vinyl floor for my lowered Ranger. I hate carpet and so the XLT stuff had to go. I'm making this truck a pseudo-Edge so no carpet and no chrome allowed.
For reference and those who may discover this post years from now, the vinyl floor is technically the same between 2 door and 4 door Supercabs. The back of the floor is stamped "2 DR SCAB Edge, 4 DR SCAB Edge, 2 DR SCAB Tremor, 4 DR SCAB Tremor", which means they all start life as the same vinyl floor. The difference is in how they are trimmed to fit the cabs. The 2 DR versions are trimmed to fit the seat belt hardware. The 4 DR versions are trimmed for the rocker panel trim molding clips on the floor, as well as the rear jump seats and jack assembly. Using a 4 DR vinyl floor in a 2 DR Supercab truck will leave pretty large holes in the flooring below the rear cab wall unless covered up. Using the 2 DR version on a 4DR truck results in a few places where the vinyl floor has visible slits that may allow dirt and muck to get under the floor unless you seal them up. You would also need to trim the rear for the jump seats and jack assembly. Bucket seat trucks are trimmed in the center for the shorty console mounts, while the 60/40 seat trucks won't have any trimming in the center between the seats.
The vinyl floor shown below is from a 2 DR truck, and it's now in a 4 DR truck. I'm not cutting the jump seat sections out as I am running a custom "shelf" back there so there's no need to trim those areas.
Prepping my DD for a 1800-mi round trip to visit family for Turkey Day. Oil changed, tire pressure checked, all fluids fine except for radiator. A bit low on coolant. So topped it off and noticed the gasket on the cap was quite rough. So off to the auto parts store to get a replacement.
Trying to get a few more years out of this thing. Entire parts have rusted away but the important pieces holding it together remain solid. (Wisconsin)
i poured a quart of rust reformer into a sprayer and did the under body. The paint is so thick that I couldn’t get it to really go on thick so this is a pilot. It is just a thin layer.
It looks really great
you really need to remove surface rust or its waste of time. I wonder if spraying a gallon of pure reformer would seal it better but that would be extremely expensive experiment.
Replaced the gas struts on my topper. 2 per window, 6 total. The passenger side was fine, but the rear window worked only when it's warm, and the drivers side had totally failed.
LOL, I bought the truck about a month ago and have been doing all the maintenance that was NEVER done. New tires tomorrow to replace the ones on it that are 13 years old and its 25 miles to Discount Tire, so using my Superduty to haul them in.
The Magic Brown Truck dropped of a package on my porch this afternoon.
New headlights for my DD.
Old ones are likely factory, and had started to show tiny cracks as well as starting to get foggy. So I ordered a whole new set, this time with DRLs in them.
Since my truck never had DRLs, it's missing the module for that. So I had to rewire the supplied harness and connect them manually. An easy fix as I already had the wiring to them installed.
