I'm going to lok at one to morrow, looks like a nice truck... good price. Automatic trans so I dont have to shift with my bum shoulder.
it says it has;
6 cyl
power everything... nice color.

I have a 65 f250 thats just to tough on my arm and gas to enjoy and use, so that will probably go up for sale.
Pity, I love that old thing...
anyhow, 65 era ford... I know about.
88 era ford rangers I am a babe inthe woods.

How do you rate the 88 6cyl? good runner? noisy? forgiving? expensive to fix? gas mileage? any peculiar traits to "watch out for" ?

hey this is a good thread to praise your 88, and if one burned you curse your 88.... I can use all the input I can gather before tomorrow afternoon!

so far i read mostly praise and positive vibes for the old 88s.... I'm interested in all those little details you dont discover til ya own one for a year.

come on boys and girls help me out!


oh yeah it has 100K on it... I havent seen it in person so i dunno about how it sounds/compression/ect.
just fishing for info to keep in mind while looking.

lets go.. praise it or curse it, whats your opinion?

 

The 2.9s are known for cracking haeds if overheated, coolant ends up in the oil.

 

I had a 89 w a 2.9 and about 160K when I traded it for my 91 4.0. The 2.9 was never a race truck and with the A4LD it couldn't get out of its own way but it started everyday and made countless trips to Vegas and back. It was a 2wd so dont know about the 4x4. The auto usually only lasts about 100K between rebuilds. good luck

 

I went to check it out... nice pretty truck , nice interior.
electric door locks dont work..
passangers side power window doesnt work...
frame is solid all around, no major leaks, no real rust to speak of.

the auto transmission cant possibly be that crappy so i will assume the trans is shot. the parking pin must be gone because "park" doesnt mean "stay put" and it drifts back or forward with a grinding jerky melody.
about halfway thru the test ride either the trans started slipping or the injectors started kicking off and on, i cant tell... at that point I was hoping to get back to the car lot.

the electro-one touch 4wd did work fine...

it had a peculiar noise in the top end, sounded intermittently somwhat like...

rattling broken glass in a large tin can... very weird.

it was not a $1600 truck...
600 I might have thought about it for a while... I'm sure I was looking at about 1600 in parts to fix its ills.

other than that, the 88 ranger is a really nice little truck... definitely on my list of trucks to look out for.

I didnt bother to give it a compression test...

 

I wouldnt either if it was as you described. sounds like a junker to me. a truck for me is one that goes gives me trouble only once or twice in a blue moon, and will last me till either (a) I total it. or (b) I wear it out and buy something newer.

 

if it was a 4wd maybe 1600 but not if the tranny was gone! my 88 2.9 auto tranny went out at 18000 but also pull a 1700lb boat with it! the motor was good till 262000 then it started to use water so i had it rebuilt! now have 288000 still going!

 

that rattleing noise you described was most likley pinging, timing is off or a pluthera of other things.......

 

Sounds like you made the right decision - that truck sounds like nothing but trouble.

I have an '87 V-6 Ranger, 2.9 auto, 2-wheel drive. I've had it for 6 years. I don't drive it a lot, and have had quite a few problems for the amount of miles I've put on it. But then again it is 18 years old now and probably has about 140k miles on it (don't know for sure since the speedo didn't work for about 4 years). Honestly, I wouldn't buy another one. The next truck is going to probably be 3/4 ton diesel. But in those 6 years I've put maybe 40k miles on the Ranger and here's what I've had to do to it in that time:

Transmission front seal replaced (A4LD)
Transmission rebuild (2 years after seal replaced)
Replaced front/rear fuel tank switching valve
Replaced O2 sensor
Replaced catalytic converters
Replaced radiator
Replaced alternator
Replaced intake manifold gasket
Coolant in the oil (temporarily fixed with stop leak, will need to replace engine probably)
A/C freon leak (not fixed yet)
Speedo broken (fixed with tranny rebuild)
Replaced starter
The usual stuff (battery, brakes, tires, etc.)

As far as gas mileage, I've always gotten 18-19mpg.

One suggestion, if you don't mind. If you're going to buy a vehicle that old, you might want to look for stripped down models - no "fully loaded" vehicles, or you'll be asking for trouble. As you saw on that '88, auto door locks and window motors go out. To me that stuff is just trouble waiting to happen. Give me cranks and levers over electronics any day, at least when considering old vehicles. Good luck.

 

owned one very similar was a good truck for many years got me through a lot of tough times and you had to love the gas mielage but with what you said about this one it sounds like you made the right decision

 

yeah all the electro switched gadgets was not a draw for me.
well the ones that worked, anyway.

oh the AC didnt work either.

the longer I look the more I save up so the better/newer truck I can afford.

if I look around for about 3 more yrs i can buy a brand new one.
lol

 

sound like what i shoulda done :P lol

 

keep your 65, buy a 300 6 cyl for it with an auto tranny.......if you can get a carburated get that the swap is easier.....
You know what you have....you know what you need.

Your 65 can pull the 85 ranger in any gear and you wouldn't even feel it......
good luck and let me know what you do....

 

just keeping the 65 for a second set of wheels to haul with was my first idea...
I putter around in an aspire @ 38mpg, so just not being cheap and paying the extra 60+/- for insurance on the truck per month wouldnt be very economical on the surface BUT....
since its just been put back together with a set of good heads and new seals all around, the mantainance cost would be almost zero....

an "unkown" new truck to replace them both will end up costing me more than that per month for a year beating the bugs out of it.

I'll keep reading the archives here and scratching my head as I look around and save my pennies.

 

I have an '88 Ranger Custom, 2.9L, tho nothing custom about it..all stock and basic. No power anything, except the 2.9.
I have added some custom stuff..like a carpet from a 1st gen f150, glove box and ashtray lite. But Im running the MTX tranny. No problems. Got 131000km's on her now. Got it with 117000km. Good little truck, my 1st truck. Just had the canopy painted. Runs good and a pretty solid truck, just not that comfortable in the cabin.
From what I gather, the mtx is better than the atx's....

 

for better comfort swap in some buckets out of an explorer..... WoW big difference!