I have owned a 1995 Jeep Wrangler since it was new and only broke down one time on vacation 300 miles away from home and fixed the power steering pump after waiting 6 hours at the parts store to get it there. I attribute this to good maintenance.

I recently placed an ad on craigslist for a sell/trade for a truck. The Wrangler served me well with 132,000 miles.

After 1 day I received a call from a young man that had a 1994 Ford F150 4X4 5.0, short bed.

I immediately started to research this vehicle and found this site had most of the answers I was looking for that would identify the problems I would encounter with a 14 year old truck.

I have owned 2 other Ford trucks in the past; 1949-pulled from my uncles field in the country kept for 2 months and sold in 1986 for $200.00, and a 1985 Ford Ranger 2 wheel drive 4-cyl, I bought in 1987 from a dealer.

Against my wife’s wishes I traded the Jeep for the Ford, as I want to do some landscaping and other improvement around the house and can’t use a Wrangler to do so.

After the trade took placed I began to notice problems.

1 The V-8 did not have no more power than the I-4 I just got rid of

2 The stereo was not mounted in the dash causing it to move and even fly out

3 The door panels were flopping every time I opened or closed the door and the courtesy lights did not work

4 The third brake light and cargo light did not work

5 There was loud popping from underneath on stopping and take-off

6 The exhaust was leaking, rattling and loose

7 There were various noises coming from under the hood (possible exhaust leak)

The solution to these and other items:

1. I found 3 vacuum lines cracked, or deteriorated from age. (no difference in power)

2. I had to find a DIN to mount the stereo. (no more flying stereo)

3. I went to Advance Auto to buy trim screws and bulbs for the courtesy lights.(easy fix)

4. The assembly for the break light had melted and would take some persuasion to get out, I went to the local salvage yard and bought an assembly and again to Advance Auto to buy the bulbs.(easy fix)

5. I looked underneath at all of the bushings, ball joints, connections and mounts to find the transmission mount so loose I could turn the bolts with my fingers. I tightened the bolts and most of the loud popping went away. (easy fix)

6. I bought a tail pipe as the hanger brackets were rusted off and there was no connection at any joint from the cat back. I also bought 2 clamps and a straight piece of pipe to bypass the muffler (took that idea from this site), or what was left of it. Put everything together. (easy fix)

7. Last evening I was concerned about the loss of power and could hear an exhaust leak under the hood that had me worried about the rusty bolts I had seen on the manifolds and the fact that the oil dipstick tube bracket had rusted off at one of the bolts. I began by checking the distributer cap, rotor button, random spark plugs, and for any vacuum/air leaks in the system. Everything checked out fine. I then began to look closer at the manifold to find carbon around the front of the #1 plug and the head. I bought a gasket set and new bolts from Advance Auto (5 out of the 8 rusted bolts broke off; luckily I was able to double bolt them and take them the rest of the way out). I also found a hole in the tube from the converter had a hole in it, brazed some old sheet metal lying around the garage to cover the hole. (exhaust leak , noise and power problem fixed after computer reset)

I also had a day where we had snow and when I locked the hubs there was popping and cracking coming from the front end, turns out the driver’s side hub had exploded internally and the pieces had ate up the bearings and seals on the rotor. Went to the local Ford dealer to find automatic hubs were $107.00 each. Advance Auto offered a set of Warn hubs for $69.95. Plus the cost of a new rotor, seals and bearings. After the driver’s side was completed I started on the passenger’s side, all went well until I tried to put the 6 bolts on the hub to find they were too small, (for another vehicle). Back to Advance Auto where they exchanged the screws. (fixed the popping and cracking in the front)

As I am writing this my wife states that I have spend more time alone in the past month with this truck than I have with her. What can I say I love the truck.

I just wanted to share some information with the rest of you that try to help out so many with questions to their problems.

Bottom line is truck runs good now, I hope to keep it for a long time yet to come, and thanks to the people on this site I was able to diagnose and fix problems quick and without too much difficulty.

I hope in the future that I can somehow repay the information gained on this site by helping others with problems they encounter.

 

Welcome to the site. If this isn't a success story, I don't know what is! Excelent article. Glad to have you here.

 

Most people are not too good at keeping up on vehicle maintenance, but yet they still curse the thing when it no longer operates properly. Good to hear you found and fixed your problems, doesn't sound like most of them were very hard to deal with, and the truck should be a solid workhorse for many years to come. Also welcome to the site and the Ford truck owners club.

 

Wow, nice job on that truck. That's the kind of mess you end up with when a previous owner *doesn't* maintain their vehicle. I hope the truck serves you well.

 

" As I am writing this my wife states that I have spend more time alone in the past month with this truck than I have with her. What can I say I love the truck. "

glad you got the truck mostly figured out.

now go show the wife that you really love her more.

 

Take her for a ride and let her know that much of this could have been avoided had the previous owner taken care of it properly.

I work on all 3 of my vehicles and my wife understands its necessary at times to spend time doing things right.


PM (preventive maintenence) now saves TLC (time and lotsa cash) later.

 

Between the truck the bike, work, etc...etc...etc... she come in somewhere about 10th in line.
Just kidding she knows, that I can't let things rest that need to be fixed.
I love my wife very much and we have spent the last week together at home, due to some vacation time I had to take or lose.