This last summer I was given this truck. My grandpa bought it brand new and he can no longer drive. I was very excited to get a truck not only becasue my Dodge Omni had not been very reliable lately, but I think I have always been a pickup man.
I took a quick inspection of this truck and I knew I had to replace the shocks front and rear so before I ever took a very close look at what I was dealing with I purchased a flip kit from DJM and shocks for the front and rear. When I was able to finally go drive the truck to my house I knew I had to get these installed before driving it anymore. I started with replacing the front shocks and everything was going smoothly until I moved to the rear.

The Flip kit was WAY more than i bargained for. See this is the first time I ever worked on any type of truck so I really didn't know the work involved when I bought these parts. The first sign of a headache was the rear leaf spring hanger on the drivers side was basically gone and it was resting on the bed. I figured this was pretty much the reason for the crappy suspension so I purchased a bracket on ebay. To make a long story short I ended up taking off the bed and found that I was in for a long summer.


This is what the frame looked like. I cut the bracket off but that's the way the frame looked.


I then cut off all the bad, rusted metal and then I got my hands on an I beam.

This was actually not the hardest part of fixing this truck.

This is the repair piece fully welded on and then bolted to good frame.


I bought a brand new hanger kit and then repaired the rear crossmember with the rest of the I-beam.

Ironically this was the hardest part of the repair is fabbing up a new crossmember to supprot the gas tank. I was able to use the passenger side half but the drivers side half was totally rusted off.


I took everything off and then painted the frame so I wouldn't have to deal with this crap for a long time.



This is a mandrel bent Dynomax tailpipe with a welded stainless tip. The muffler is a SS Borla and I love it!



This is what it looked like a few days after it was finished.

I still have to put on rear cab mounts becasue go figure they are rusted out.

I purchased a mustang Traction lock rear end and will install it as soon a spring rolls around, when I get new drums, shoes, and add-a-leafs (My leafs are pretty shot)

 

looks like a lot of work but good job on the repair are you gonna drop the front anymore?

 

That's pretty nasty! looks a lot better.

 

way to save a truck bound for the scrap yard. Do you have a sound clip of the exhaust?

 

very nice save!!!! keep us updated on the progress

 

Just found some time on my Winter break and installed the new cab brackets.

A great product I found on ebay from Parker Metal Products.

Just search for "Ford Ranger pickup steel frame Bracket rust repair" or "290197436783"

Here are pics of the brackets installed

 

Well I had the truck up on a lift 3 weeks ago to check out some brake issues and as the truck was coming up one of my buddies said "Hey what the hell is hangin off your truck?" Low and behold it was my rear shock that had busted off of the mounting bracket. Weird another mounting bracket issue. So yesterday I started fab work on a mounting bracket and right now I'm killing time while the paint is drying. I did not take pics during the fab but I will post pics of the finished painted bracket. Not pretty but it is strong as hell.

 

nice project you got goin there. i got a 94 ext cab ranger with the 4.0 and a4ld tranny that im fixing up and i wanted to start the same place you did and clean up the frame. gotta save up the cash to get started though.

Im also starting a website to track and post the progress of my restoration. and also as a part of my website i will allow people to email me photos of there projects before , during and after there restoration with a little story about it on my website as well. so if ya want your project posted on my site, i will do so.