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I sincerely want to thank Forest for sending me the running boards I was looking for. He was very friendly, extremely helpful, and stayed in contact with me the whole time via email. As you can see in the picture, he went to quite a bit of effort building a homemade shipping crate so that they would arrive safely. Not only did they arrive, they were in mint condition. It'll be a pleasure having these on my Excursion. Thanks everyone and thank you again Forest.
Old thread, but I have to replace mine. Rusted. Brackets might be ok.
60 miles NW of KC
As has been said above....1999 to 2015 Super Duty step bars will bolt right up to the Excursion. The cabs have not changed since '99. You can dind lots of Superduty options on your local FB Marketplace.
If you like the OEM and favor black, Westin makes aftermarket boards that look a lot like OEM and have the lights. I would recommend replacing the cheap-*** lights with OEM and install LED bulbs.
As has been said above....1999 to 2015 Super Duty step bars will bolt right up to the Excursion. The cabs have not changed since '99. You can dind lots of Superduty options on your local FB Marketplace.
Will only super duty fit? Or do F150 boards also work?
Superduty ones are bolt-on, ones for an F150 would need the mounts adjusted/refabbed to hit the mounting points on the body, Or to fit the running boards to the original mounts.
One set I replaced with superduty nerf/tube style, the other I just put aluminum plate where the original sheetmetal was under the plastic cover.
I like the electric drop down ones, but I cannot justify spending the money in my own head.
Superduty ones are bolt-on, ones for an F150 would need the mounts adjusted/refabbed to hit the mounting points on the body, Or to fit the running boards to the original mounts.
One set I replaced with superduty nerf/tube style, the other I just put aluminum plate where the original sheetmetal was under the plastic cover.
I like the electric drop down ones, but I cannot justify spending the money in my own head.
Yeah I'm looking to do this for $100. The Ex plastic running boards are in good shape minus the fact all the threaded studs broke off. I guess a piece of aluminum could be bolted onto the original brackets and somehow put the plastic atop. If you have plans, let me know.
Will only super duty fit? Or do F150 boards also work?
Superduty
any 1999-2016 running boards will fit. doesn't matter which cab. Obviously only the CrewCab will look right...
The Superduty has a different mount than the Excursion does. They physically bolt up identically. However the Superduty is ~2" longer and has a plastic beuaty shield. Which makes their steps sit lower down than the X does. Which is nice, because it gives you more foot room, and if you're lifted it helps short wives climb up into the cab.
see how the Superduty/X mount is flat
It's not intuitive and many people seem to think they don't cross-over. That's because the X and Superduty have multiple different bolt-up locations on the pinch weld. All you have to do is slide the Superduty mounts down to match the Excursion bolt locations (or vice versa).
F-150
Blanket "they don't fit" statement here. Not hard to make them fit though. If you look at the mounting plate for 2012-current F-150 steps, you'll see how they stagger/offset between the 2 pairs of bolt holes. I'm planning on just using a piece of 1-1.5" square channel to bridge that gap. Then bolt into the pinch like Superduty steps do. If nothing else, I'll just re-use my current mounts with the F-150 bar bolted to them.
see how the mount is offset for the bolts? vice flat like Superduty
Yeah I'm looking to do this for $100. The Ex plastic running boards are in good shape minus the fact all the threaded studs broke off. I guess a piece of aluminum could be bolted onto the original brackets and somehow put the plastic atop. If you have plans, let me know.
I had some aluminum diamond plate laying around I used when I did mine. I did it to the Expedition previously too. Just cut the aluminum plate to the width and length of the original sheet metal under the plastic (about 7 foot 1 inch long by 7 inch wide I think) and bolted it to the original mounts. Then to get the plastic cover to stay in place, had the same issue with most of those plastic nubs for those cheap sheetmetal nuts breaking off, I just used some flush mount carriage style bolts.
You can see the 4 bolt heads, one at each bracket mount, if you stare at the steps but they are hardly noticeable honestly.
I picked up a f250 set of tan plastic with 3 brackets each. I got one tacked on to the old bracket with 2 bolts that lined up with drilling. Now I need to replace the brackets and do it right. Where do I get new bracket-to-rocker panel hardware? Any tips for getting the rusted old stuff out without destroying the rockers? Any suggestions for rust prevention with the new installation?
Crew Cab 1999-2016 Super Duty pickup running boards are not as long as true Excursion running boards.
The length difference between the two is at least 6" (but might be as long as 9", as that is what I seem to remember).
I mounted Excursion running boards to my Crew Cab back in 2001, and they extend past the cab a little ways.
There are three major structural parts to the non tubular (ribbed plastic OEM flat cab steps with lights) running boards:
1. The hat channel formed L brackets
2. The longitudinal steel stiffener plate
3. The plastic step cover itself.
There are other parts, such as the fasteners between the L brackets and the vehicle body, the fasteners between the L brackets and the steel stiffener plate, and the fasteners between the steel stiffener plate and the plastic step cover. For purposes of this discussion, we are ignoring the hardware, harness, lamp fixture, and bracketry at the far ends of the running boards pertaining to the lights.
Suggestions for rust prevention with the new installation:
A. Separate all L brackets from stiffener plate
B. Separate stiffener plate from plastic cover
C. Sandblast, hot dip galvanize, E-Coat, & powder coat the L brackets and stiffener plate (Obviously, this is the kitchen sink approach)
You may choose to just power wire cup brush and rattle can paint the metal brackets and plate... but those mitigations will not be nearly as effective as doing all of "C" immediately above.
As for new hardware to mount the L brackets to the rocker panel of the vehicle, look for U-Nut and Body Bolt ensembles, with tapered, but not necessarily pointed thread tips, flanged head, and a captured swiveling washer.
Ford used metric fasteners, in property class 9.8 (Grade 5), and surprisingly during some model years, I saw PC 10.9 (Grade 8) bolts specified from SHPC.
In production, only 2 bolts per bracket were used to mount the L brackets to the vehicle body rocker, even though both the bracket, and the body, was punched with 4 holes. When I retrofitted Excursion running boards to my Crew Cab, I used all four holes per bracket, and I used all 5 bracket positions. (I hate running board sagging underfoot, hence the use of 5 brackets per side.)
5 brackets x 4 bolts per bracket x 2 sides per vehicle = 40 bolts and 40 U-nuts... which is quite a handful of hardware. I obtained this hardware from Ford, because Ford hardware is coated with anti-corrosion properties, where it is almost impossible to find a U nut, that is metric threaded, in a property class of 9.8 or better, that is also chromate passivated.
Obviously, Ford doesn't manufacture hardware... Ford buys hardware from automotive suppliers. But these suppliers aren't set up to sell to consumers or hardware stores. Their business is to supply OEMs. So at the end of the day, it is easier to obtain the best automotive grade hardware for the application from the OEM who originally specified and commissioned the hardware.
There are automotive hardware suppliers that serve the body shop industry with generic near equivalents, typically in black steel.
When assembling the plastic cover pad onto the steel stiffener plate, it isn't necessary to reuse the same holes in the stiffener plate to match up to the plastic studs formed into the cover. Once can drill new holes in the steel stiffener plate to shift the location of the plastic cover relative to the body. For that matter, one can also shift the location of the steel stiffener plate relative to the L mounting bracket fastening positions, simply by drilling new holes into the stiffening plate in a pattern match for the shifted location.
I made some adjustments like this when fitting the Excursion running boards to my Crew Cab, to "balance" the fit by biasing the longer running board more forward, to reduce the amount of running board extending beyond the cab at the opposite end.
Aluminum body Super Duties (2017 up) and F-150s (2015 up) use an entirely different rocker mounting method (studs instead of holes for bolts), and staggered vertical plane instead of flat vertical plane, so the brackets to the boards of newer Ford trucks will not work with the Excursion, even though with modification, the separated flat step itself can be cobbled onto Excursion / Steel Body Super Duty L brackets, to mate the parts from two dissimilar generations.
The plastic boards I got are 2" shorter. 92" vs 94". They are heavy plastic, the same as my 06 F250, but longer. When I placed them alongside the mounted originals, the two end and center brackets lined up. The original did have 5 brackets, the ones I now have 3. I need to remove the 5 excursion brackets and install the 3 new ones. It looks like from searching, the clip nuts are 10mm. The top of the bracket needs 2 clip nuts, the bottom 2 holes go through the pinch weld. I suppose those could be clip nuts also. The originals are heavily rusted.
I'm thinking to spray on some rust oleum primer along the inside of the pinch, and maybe put a piece of rubber between the pinch and bracket.
