I just got this truck last weekend, and I am on a limited budget, but I will gradually be modifying it as time goes on. This is my first ford truck (had a tore ***/taurus, and a lincoln town car.. guess which one I actually liked.)
I've owned a lot of other vehicles, chevys, VWs, hondas ETC.. I'm not totally unfamiliar with a wrench.

I don't like the ergonomics much in the ranger, the shifter is too far to reach with the seat where I like it... and I am not going to spend $200 on a hurst shifter.
When I am still sitting cozy I can get the shifter under my first knuckle, that won't do!

So far this is all I have done for it:



What you are looking at is just a test fit of a custom layback shifter I fabricated for the truck. This part is almost done now, and it took all of 3 or 4 hours total.. I guess I just made $50 an hour lol.

I cut the original shifter off the base, welded a threaded section of hex stock on, then threaded, tapered and bent a piece of aluminum to suit my needs.

I'll be putting the stock cupholder and shift boot back on the rod, so I didn't bother to make it pretty.

I also found an oldschool momo ergonomic **** kicking around in a box in the garage, so I have redyed the leather and I will put that on it until I decide on what I want to fabricate instead.

More to come eventually.

 

Subscribing! Wanna watch your progress. And is that a tow bar or part of a push bar hanging off the front?

 

Its a tow bar. If the previous owner doesn't want it back I'll put it up for sale... Some of the 20k on this truck were towed miles behind an R.V.

The bummer is they cut the bumper skirt to install the bar, so I don't know what I'm going to do about that quite yet. I was thinking of adding a spoiler of some sort since the skirt is already Fubared.

 

Or I can sell ya my lower valance but shipping would prob be killer Lol. Im switching to the 08+ front bumper hopefully soon

 

Yeah shipping would be killer on that. I can probably junkyard one.

I might just wait to decide until after I lower it, it'd be pretty funny to have to modify it again later.

 

WOW THAT thing looks super clean... I would love to have a 4cyl XLT like that... hard to find that low kms.. good score

I have always liked the 01-03 chrome front end parts..

I was actually hunting for a 2.3 5spd just like that before I found my STX