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Got the Bronco all back together. Cost a bit more than I wanted to spend........but I guess that's par for the course on a 25 year old vehicle!
New head gaskets, all upper gaskets, distributor, new Motorcraft wires, cap and rotor, spark plugs, fuel injectors. Fixed some of the vacuum lines.
Running good!!
Got the Bronco all done but had the chirp, chirp, chirp of the serpentine belt. I noticed the Motorsports air pump delete pulley wasn't quite lining up right. Causing the belt to ride one rib off the crank pulley. re-routed the belt as pictured and no more chirp! It was a 97" belt. A bit tight, but finally got it on!!
Took a wire wheel to the back in preparation for painting with Rust Bullet, then Raptor roll-on bed liner. Stopped by the local steel yard for a price on a sheet of diamond plate to cut replacements for the ratty old cardboard side panels.
94 XLT 351/E40d w/ tow package and leather. 263,000+ miles young.
Today I decided to rotate tires, check brakes, investigate cause of sloppy steering and general clunkiness. Needs all new steering joints but turns out front end is in better shape than I thought! No ball joint play but radius arm bushings are a bit tired and there is a slight amount of play in drivers side wheel bearings. Of course the shackle bushings are shot in the rear as well.
Also removed tailgate access to clean out gunk and spray half a can can of rocket oil on literally everything including window actuators, track, all linkage linkage and coated the bottom inside third to help prevent rusting from leaky window sweep. The rear window goes up and down effortlessly now!!! Also did some body work with a rubber BFH on bent up tailgate from PO backing spare tire into something.
Need tires and exhaust pretty badly, found nail in the 1 "bad" tire that is trashed from never being rotated. It's not losing air so I didn't waste a tire plug on it as It will be getting new rubber soon. I hope I can find some decent used 16" rims so I can go with 33x10.50x16 tires. I'm pretty sure the pizza cutters will fit as it came stock with 31s. Maybe I'll settle for 32s as it has .355 gearing. Can't stand wide tires in the snow, and we get a LOT of snow here. No mud for hundreds of miles so they will probably be BFG ATKOs. I have had multiple sets of the originals and swore by them. When the ATKO2s came out, I went with another brand (Nokian Rotiva) on my Ranger due to the smoking deal I got on them. I am happy with the grip on ice and snow but they are a little too soft for my tastes handling and wear wise. Will probably try the KO2s for the first time, this time.
All in all she's a little rough around the edges but it has almost zero rust and I still feel like I got a really good deal. In a few years, this thing is going to be Sweeeettt! It's a great runner now, but I'm gonna put my heart into this one and make it real nice. Got to go scour the JY for new door cards, a passenger lock solenoid, and some other missing trim. Eventually will do the JBG master rubber kit when we paint it this summer or next. She is a beautiful shade of blotchy faded out silver and I would like to go 2 tone but keeping the silver as the main color to make it easier to paint in a garage. Need to figure out a good contrasting color and a uniqueish pattern. It's a fairly nice ride now but it will be a Modern classic eventually!
I think I'll burn through another set of tires and fix most of the nagging little stuff before dropping money on a BDS 4" kit in a year or 2. After all, all 6 shocks seem to be in great shape. They are dark blue with no branding. I'm thinking they may be Gabriel but that doesn't really matter as they seem to be pretty new.
Finally got the transfer case shifter installed and operational. Since the ZF swap I've just driven it around town. Now it's heading to the deer lease so needs to shift from 4H to 4L from inside. When I bought the ZF it didn't come with the transfer case shifter but I found the complete shifter/detent/linkage/et al. on the FTE classifieds a while back. Had to cut a hole in the transmission tunnel and cut/weld two linkages into one rather long linkage (truck has an NP208 and the shifter was from a BW 1356, I think), but otherwise pretty plug-and-play.
Spent several hours today troubleshooting the nefarious tailgate window operation to find out my motor is still fine but the wiring is hosed from front to rear. So got the window up by hot wiring it, so next will be to figure out how to make it work from the switches again. It’s not been right since a friend used it so I won’t be loaning it out again.
The little blond suggested I let the middle son and his wife borrow it when they come up for visit this summer, that was a resounding no. Like she thinks I need to sell it, I’ve had this since before we even met so I don’t think so.
The little blond suggested I let the middle son and his wife borrow it when they come up for visit this summer, that was a resounding no. Like she thinks I need to sell it, I’ve had this since before we even met so I don’t think so.
Wife (girlfr, fiancee, whatever) / Bronco?
Wife? / bronco?
Wife? / Bronco?
Don't need to do THAT often...
I just did it w/a house I had 4 near 20 yrs.
We all know which won...
Last edited by chrlsful; 04-14-2018 at 07:51 PM.
Reason: spellin
I installed a window channel kit, I have to admit I did not think it would take me 4 hours!! I had a really hard time with the Glass Run Channel ((the part that runs on the top of the door)) It keeps coming off. I looked up a bunch of videos and no one used adhesive. I really don't know what will keep it in...... anyone have any suggestions? Should I use adhesive? I will be working on the passenger door tomorrow. If anyone has any helpful tips please feel free to share, I need all the help I can get.
I also had an "ah ha" moment when I took off the door panel, I realized I should of planned the whole thing better. I could have ordered the vent window seal, vent window retainer, vent window lock, window handle set, etc... good to know for next time I work on it (or is this the nature of restoring an old truck, as soon as you start something ... you find so much more to do?))
((I removed the old seal, removed the glass (cleaned it off and scrapped off old tint), vacuumed the inside of the door ((found a vice grip in the door holding the mirror up LMAO)), removed the vent window (not sure why.))
02-18-2018, 08:51 AM
gettin closer C sig below
