Your not kidding on that. I needed to replace the nuts that the bed bolts went into on a 1988 Ranger 2.9 EFI.
Dealer wanted $12.00+ each. I stopped at the local industrial fastener supply house and got all 6 for about
a total of $7.00 + sales tax. The real kicker was the nut that the dealer was supplying me with was not even
the J-nut type. It was just a regular 10mm or 12mm flange nut. That was way back in 2001. So it was not even
like I was using something with a different hex size. What the dealer pulled out to show me looked like something
you would find at Lowes or Home Depot if they had stuff that large in metric stock.

How is the project going?

I did have a thought if you do pull the cam do you have something to use to index the cam to crank?
If not I do have the tool and would be happy to take photos and make some measurements if you need.

 

Thanks Sean. I’ll give that some thought if/when I get to that point.

Still pondering. I’ve got 30 minutes to figure out if I want to drive 6 hours to go look at a Ranger today. The other one is only 3, in another direction.

We both have Ranger pasts. When I first transferred to vehicle testing from compounding I got deep into the initial Ranger launch. We supplied the Rangers OE friction material the entire time I worked for the company, until 2008. I’ve been all over the country with the platform running tests. Owned two.

I didn’t open an LA facility until the mid 90s so all the LA work was done out of Bill Stroppes facility, who also ran Ford test work and took care of their magazine cars. And he was running BaJa Rangers for them. So I got to see them building Rangers, running the motors screaming on the back dyno, all sorts of neat things. He had one of his Broncos up in the attic.

All the employees were still with him even though they were in their 60s to still walking. I swear the painter who did all the work on mag and racing vehicles was in his 80s. With Rangers and the other things we ran I could be in the shop from the time they left in the am until they returned at night, so I got to talk to Bill a lot and he was a very interesting guy. I have a signed copy of his book.

One day we were building up a truck for the next day and the mechanic (late 60s) stepped away from building up a brake to talk to a guy who walked in. Actually a few guys walked over. I’m torqued because the truck is not getting built, so I step in to continue building it up. About 15 minutes later the mechanic comes back. It turned out the guy walking in was Parnelli Jones. And I kept my head in a wheelwell.

So getting another Ranger would be a homecoming.

 

“And what are you guys suggesting air testing?“

The injector “O” ring kits I bought were from Ford. It did not have top “O” ring in the kit. I looked closely at the old ones and they “Looked” good. After I put the engine in of course I had a leak. If I would have air tested I would have found the leak while I had engine out. Also if I would have bought the Alliant kits I wouldn’t have the problem either. My next one I will air test.

Yes I do create a lot of my own problems.

 

We all often create our own problems. I’ve got the Ford kits too.

 

Since the turbo sat unspun for 6-8 months thought I should open it to check for corrosion. This turbo was put in 2 years ago when I though the injector smoke was turbo seal smoke. Anyway, it was free and just touched up with wire wheel lightly after the picture.

 

Jack you just gave me a thought. A person that knows that a truck is going to
sit night benefit from a can of fogging oil into places like the turbo. But they
would have to pull a pipe to get into the exhaust side of the turbo.

 

What I thought was interesting is this was a wet summer for us, plus for my roof size our gutter is a tad undersize. When we get a heavy rail it spills over right in front of the truck. I really thought it was going to be a problem going back on so I pulled it down.

Anyway, thought I'd show it's interior for that reason, there's plenty of turbo cleaning threads out there.

 

2003 Stand pipes ....

I'm trying to remove my first and I'm way exceeding my comfort level of exceeding the torque that it was installed with, maybe by double. To the point I think movement is twisting or bending.

Has anyone who had pulled these come across the same thing?

Nevermind.

I pulled the back cover so I could watch what was happening. I did have to pull mightily on my long 1/2" drive, but the tube was acting like a wheel lug torque stick, rotating and absorbing some of the twist until break-a-way was achieved.

 

All these parts keep coming out ....



and it don't look any different. (Gets closed up for the night).



Popped the cork.



This poor seal for it's 75k miles of service never leaked. It's life was too short......






Everything gets labeled or dotted yellow (white and green was builder) and photo'd so if I run out of CoQ10 I can put it back together. Items for each cylinder get their own baggy and labeled.

 

Keep the pictures coming. I am enjoying your build. Your engine stand looks like it worked out great!!!

 

It has. The bracket positions are a little low, by about 1/4”, so it’s a tad top heavy with the heads on, and probably bottom heavy heads off. Maybe that's the sweet spot. But being able to rotate nose or tail down allowed me to fully drain coolant, oil, and fuel in the heads. I also should have moved the drivers side pillow block out 1/2” so the crank handle cleared on rotation, but I initially thought I would only be using an electric drill. I should finish posting about it in the lifts and stands thread.

I’m not really taking a lot of pics or vids of what I’m doing, I think there’s enough out there and I’ll get a little boring.

 

I'm enjoying the show of meticulousness. Thanks Jack.

 

Sitting on one of my calibration weights .... Yeah, the tube got a little torqued coming out.

 

Any way you can get that workbench with all the crap all over it, out of the way of what would be a nice picture?!

Keep up the good work Jack,
Scott

 

Well, it's a little cramped here, I've got stuff hanging from the ceiling. I prefer a more spacious area to spread everything out.


And ain't got time for meticulousness.