had a productive couple days.

finally got tired of my lower door trim looking like heck, so i took them off and repainted them with some grey bumper paint from the local auto body supply store. worked awesome!

these were in really bad shape (have to take my word for it because i don't really have any 'before' pics)





i just did between the wheel wells as they were the worst. notice the back bumper is much more "black" the previous owner tried to paint the driver's side and rear bumper with some kind of black paint. it looked like heck and was really rough. i actually had to wet sand the driver's side with 600grit paper in order to get it good enough to repaint. they turned out really nice. nice enough that i'm considering doing the rest of it (which is what i figured would happen).

i also did a two-for-one project as well. my radio display hasn't worked since i bought the truck so i thought i'd try to fix it. I've read about this method elsewhere https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/1...dim-fixed.html so i gave it a try.
it worked!!!! full radio display brightness!!!!

while i was in there, i chased down the switched power and dimmer wires so i could finally get my transmission temperature gauge installed.



i really like this B&M kit. i had one in my explorer too, comes with the gauge, sender, pod, some connectors and a couple Tee fittings to install the sender in the cooler lines. From past experience, and from Mark K's advice, i opted to install the sender in the pressure test port, rather than cut into the cooler return like the instructions suggest.

anyway ... no big deal ... just a couple of projects i've been trying to get done for over a year. all in all, a productive weekend.

 

Very neat fitment on the gauge. I'm jealous that I don't have a console.

 

That trans temp is a good idea. I've got a brand new auto meter , oil pressure, water temp, & volt gauge in the closet. I've thought about adding them to the expedition since I tow with it a lot. May add the trans temp as well.

 

Not bad. I've been using Torque on Android with a OBD bluetooth dongle connected. Works great!

I've been contemplating getting a mechanical oil pressure gauge for the engine though, since the idiot gauge Ford put in the dashboard is a useful as a red oil pressure light. If you didn't know, the "oil pressure gauge" in the dashboard only has two positions, "normal" and "low", it doesn't have any pressure sender on the engine, just a standard old oil pressure on/off switch like any other car..

 

well, the trans temp gauge works, and shows me what I pretty much already knew, which is that in colder temps one need not worry much about transmission temperature. These were taken after my 20 mile drive into work this morning.




Off




Cooking at 100°


This mimics what I would see in my explorer in this type of weather rarely would it exceed 100° in cool weather. it was upper 40's this morning, so if you use the old "ambient +50°" then it seems to make sense. As I recall, my explorer (4r70w) would run about 160° in the summer heat (90's), so we'll see.


mostly for what I tow it is completely un needed, but still nice to have.


Also ... my radio works awesome! I haven't seen the display for almost a year! not bad for free!



yes, I listen to AM ... I'm a very old 37