So early summer of last year (2018) the previous owner's friends bought back my beloved 1996 CC 7.3 (aptly named Lucipher's Hay Wagon, or Lucipher for short) to redo for his family as a tribute. Timing is everything, right? I bought a boat (first time captain). I liked how my F350 towed. I did NOT like how my escalade towed, let alone pulled the boat and trailer out the boat launch. So I needed something to haul the gear, the fam, and the boat, all while serving as my BOV, DD, and general lust for overkill (plus a good excuse to "punt" on the escalade.)

Lucky for me, an Excursion fits the bill, to a "T". Just wanted to be sure it was a 7.3 (personal preference).
Guess what, they are not giving these things away, especially with a 7.3.

But I found one, a 2001 Limited. The trans was already rebuilt. The lift kit (6") was already installed. Along with a myriad of other goodies (more to come, as always). Long story short, since this is my everything, everyday, everywhere vehicle, I will be doing other upgrades to it (some have been done). I will share my journey with you so you too will know my pain, and love (BDSM much?) with the affectionately named "War Dog".

First off, this is (was) Lucipher's HayWagon. The cruise and the A/C still worked, as did everything else.


Now Lucipher wasn't the straightest, the cleanest, nor the quietest, But he did everything and did it well!

But first off, it didn't happen if there wasn't any pictures. So here we go. I will also include my latest upgrade picture towards the end of this initial post.

2001 Ford Excursion Limited, lovingly named War Dog (Girlfriend objected to War Pig, so here we are).





To the right of the picture below, you can see my new , mildly retarded, 100% always, pains in my *** Huskies named Myshka and Kimber.



So that is how I received War Dog.
6" lift with aging rancho shocks (6 total), 2 aging rancho steering dampener shocks, 4 near new 35 inch tires (complete with ball bearing balancers), one brand new spare 35 inch, wired with quick connect for winch in the rear, plus some other obvious stuff (HD lights, functioning A/C, VCR with drop down television) and wired for sound (just no sub box..yet).

So this has taken a hot moment to post. So I will do more posting later, not now.

BTW, yes Eleanor is still on the front burner. Just running out of room, time, and patience.

 

great looking rig, a sweet start to building your new dream ride.

post a pic of the front and rear suspension, I am always curious to see how people have modified the suspensions

 

Those are some good lookin huskies!
Also, the truck is nice too I guess.

 

I will get those posted up by Sunday. It finally has decided to stop raining. I just had new BDS shocks put on, so I will get everything up (pictures).

 

Nice looking "puppers" you got there. Mine are pretty good now that they are over a year old. But they still think they are "infantry" and continue to dig fox holes in my back 40.

 

Apology to those that replied. Work has me super busy. As does life. Thus the delay in response. But have no fear, I am either screwing with the boat, the classic car, tweaking War Dog, or reading wiring schematics for Eleanor, and will answer whatever questions I can as I share my experience with my first (and last?) Excursion.

So the grill was factory, and is in good shape. But what it lacked was some additional lighting to help cast away evil spirits at night (deer), or at least allow me to legally spread more light to see them faster.

So here's the old grill:



I found this bad boy, and fifteen minutes later had it installed (yes, I am aware its black, not chrome nor body colored). I will worry about the color differentiation later. For right now its function over form.




Then, since there was no instructions with the brand new grill, I spent 15 minutes wiring it independently so I can run the grill boobies while the brights are on, or off, in conjunction with or without the fog lights/driving lights.

Be gone Evil Spirits, or at the very least, be visible! Think these lights will work just fine.

 

Ha, I actually debated buying that style aftermarket grill before I chose the one I now have. Something about it I kinda like.
Reminds me of the 80 Continental auxiliary driving lights.

 

so its been a minute. Got many updates to share, and many new and exciting (to me) changes. And one not so exciting change.

In the midst of a pandemic, I pulled the trigger on many ideas and also boosted up progress on some projects.

First off, my apologies to those that actually take the time to read posts here, like mine.

War Dog is good. Very good. Made some modifications. And improvements.
Having said that, I will be posting pictures detailing what has been done, the reasoning why, and also how they will transition over to my "new excursion", Captain Tripps. War Dog won't be too far away. More on that later.

 

Despite my lack of sharing the upgrades here, I will definitely be making up for lost time.

Until then, here's the "completed" War Dog putting in some light duty, bringing Gator Pops home.

 

Nice rig. This was Kays last trip to Ouray 😪 stupid cancer took her in Feb. Rocky rescued us after Kaya passed

 

I am so sorry to hear that about your puppers. Cancer sucks overall. Looks like the puppers lived a good life, which is really all we can do for them in the short time we are blessed by their presence.

 

Craigslist is always a mixed back of s!@# and fire sales.

I honestly don't remember why I was or what I was looking for, but I found an already assembled roof rack on a local excursion for sale.

Yes, it's homebuilt.
Yes those are some fantastically dumpster fire looking lights it came with.
but it came with an axe, a shovel, some serious long sealed PVC piping painted black with fishing rigs inside.
And it had already proved its combat worth. The PO drove to Alaska 2x a year, in his excursion, with this rack, to hunt and fish over the course of 5 years.
So I bought it.
Put it on, anddddddddd..... then I realized that 6 inches of lift with 35" tires makes it a bit difficult to reach up.

Thank goodness my buddy who fabricated the mounts for Eleanor's baja roll bar likes money.
So we "engineered" a ladder set up.








Now I realize in these photos, it is in need of some painting, coating, etc. But today was not the day.
Made an appointment to get it all powder coated (Rack and ladders).

 

Pretty cool rack you got there, and for sure need the ladders. How close are they to the body? Can you get your foot on there reasonably so as to not slip off when climbing up? They look a bit close in the pictures...

 

It is as close as it looks. My size 12's are not built for narrow steps. But in a pinch, it works fantastic.

Side note, will be adding grip/grit tape to each step down the road.

 

I must confess. War Dog is my first excursion, but after all that we have done in it, and everywhere we have gone, I think this will be my only DD. Now, maybe not this one, but I will always have some version of this.

Immediately, War Dog was put to use.
Towed the boat to the lake of the ozarks.
Went pew pew practicing up north
Went everywhere. In all weather.

The biggest part is my youngest loves the truck. As he keeps growing, he finds the space for him and his gear. Snowboarding, quad riding, etc.


The weirdest part is that this truck makes most stuff look tiny. Case in point, my kids quad below.

But War Dog never misses a beat and keep us moving as a family.


Random Husky madness picture.


Kimber on the top of my "fatman" chair, Myshka on the bottom.