Get the 5Star tunes, they make a world of difference in how the transmission performs! :-X22. Personally on my dedicated tow rig EX I only use the Performance tunes as I like how they will hold OD better on hills vs how quickly the Tow tunes are to downshift. Many other do prefer the Tow tunes for towing, get both flavor s to decide for yourself. I really don't think that you need a shift kit, get the custom tunes!
The 6.0 cooler upgrade is what you want, it uses the large trans cooler from the 6.0 to replace the factory medium V-10 cooler (7.3s came with the small cooler). I have the Dorman version of the 6.0 cooler waiting in my garage to go on my rig. But with 30,000 plus towing miles (9,500lb TH or 11K TT) I've been good with the factory V-10 cooler and have only seen 210 degrees twice briefly. The bigger cooler is just for the added protection for future Western trips.
The deep trans pan will not do anything for you other than require more fluid. The air around it under the vehicle is hotter than you want the fluid to be. Change (flush) your ATF every 30K miles and keep it cool with the bigger 6.0 cooler and you will be all set.
Someone else has mentioned the SPD Y pipe, if your V-10 has the horrible T shaped Y pipe then look into replacing it. I went with Banks long tube headers which come with a very good Y pipe, they did improve its performance a bit over the entire RPM range.
I'm assuming that your RWD V-10 has the 3.73 gears, I don't ever recall seeing an RWD with the factory optioned 4.30 towing gears. But if this is going to be your towing rig I would say to give it few trips then decide if you are happy with how it is handling the trailer weight and trip terrain. If you then decide that you want better pulling performance either look for a complete 4.30 rear axle housing to swap in or have the gears in yours swapped out for 4.30s (or 4.56s }>). The mighty V-10 makes its best power at higher RPMs than the 3.73s will have it turning on the highway. Between my 35" tires and 4.88 gears my effective ratio is 4.39 and that does pretty well when towing our 11,000+ lb TT all over the Eastern states. What is the weight of your enclosed trailer and car?
I've never used a hood bug/wind deflector, so advice there. Between the EX, big trailer and lots of night towing I've killed plenty of bugs. :-X18

Was planning on looking into the 5startuning when I have this all figured out. Just looked and I have the dreaded "T" pipe.

I did a bit of research here before I purchased the EX, and before I joined. This will end up being my daily driver and tow rig. Luckily I'm retired at 56 so my daily driving is not much. I'm guesstimating that my loaded trailer is around 7-8k lbs. I've already been pulling it locally (Miami-Orlando) with the Navigator which has the TritonV8, 4R100 trans and the 3.73 gears. It did OK getting about 8 mpg @ 65 mph. I am going to keep the stock type suspension on the EX, so no issues with larger tires. My Trans pan is the Derale Transmission Cooling Pan. It holds an extra 7 quarts of fluid, nothing bad about having more fluid except when you have to change it. The Nav's transmission boiled over on my 1st trip and this helped solve this issue. The factory air intake already looks OK, not sure how much better a cold air intake would do.

Mark K is a member here who used to work for Ford as an engineer in the transmission cooling field, he has shared data that shows a trans pan would be unable to help cool the fluid as the air around it is hotter than the fluid. The additional fluid really isn't helping either, it takes longer to get the trans up to normal temps and if you do get it hot then it takes that much longer to cool it back down. Not trying to bust your stones, just sharing what has already been discussed here many times before. :-X22
If you upgraded the Navi's pan and cooler at the same time the good work the new cooler did was masking the nuetral or possible negative effects of the deep pan. But some of the deep pans do look very cool, and has to count for something. ;)
The V-10 comes from the factory with a decent cold air intake that can outflow the engine at redline. An aftermarket CAI will provide more noise on acceleration but not much else, other than more hot air from under the hood with some of them! }>

When I regeared I had two nearly identical trips to/from Philly/SC to compare. Same route, trailer, weight, speeds, weather...pretty much everything except for the gears. The trailer was a 9500 lb TH and we traveled with 6 in the EX and got 6.5/7 MPG with the stock 3.73 gears (the EX was still 100% stock back then), with only the gear change to 4.88s we saw a solid 9 MPG on the next trip. And where it used to downshift if it ran over a shadow it held OD the entire highway portion of the trip with the new gears without a single drop out of OD. :-X06. Now with the bigger tires, 4" lift, headers, muffler and tunes pulling a bigger 11,000lb TT it gets 8/9.5 MPG on our mostly highway trips. The deeper gears are without question the single biggest performance mod I've done to my EX, made it a completely different vehicle! :-drink

If you followed the link, the pan is not pretty. Summit Racing and its reviewers also state that it helps reduce temps. Maybe I'll add a real temp gauge (the one I put in the Nav) and see what an average is including warm up time, then switch in the pan and see how it compares. Cant hurt, I already own it.

As mentioned, I still have a ways to go to get a baseline before I go changing things. I do appreciate the insight though.

Thanks and keep the replies coming.

Shoot, I didn't see that it specified a side... I'll leave the interchange answer to someone more knowledgeable, but they sure look like they're the same.

I'll pull the right side off and see if it fits on the left. I see how the cable is supposed to work, so maybe I can make something as I do not see a left handle or cable anyplace.

Got the front bumper off. I was trying to take too many bolts out. Did not realize the two acorn bolts at the tow rings were the ones I needed to take out. Also did not realize that the lower bent part is actually part of the bumper. Now I'll have to mount it back up and carefully pull that area back out. The bumper cover, covers all that area so it does not need to be perfect. I also found the two empty plugs for the driving lights and removed the broken attaching points w/black plastic from the lights. Rock Auto has the complete light (left and right) for $23.79 each.

My photos seem to be too large to upload so I had to steal this one. But this is the area of damage on mine. Both lights broken off leaving the 3 tabs on each side

Had the front bumper off, then put it back on again and parked it behind the Navi. Attached the winch to the Navi and using a 2x4 behind the EX's bumper and an axel strap around all that, pulled the middle lower bumper out making it fairly straight. Took it back off and used a pair of crescent wrenches to bend some of the edges back where they belong and then used a hammer & dolly to finish the edges. The bottom is still a little high but it looks better. There are still some dents on the lower edges of the middle wide opening, but the plastic cover will hide most of that. Other than a few bent fins on the A/C condenser and trans cooler there is no damage behind the bumper. The front bumper has been repainted before and now there is new damage including a long scratch down the side of the bumper. Not sure if I want to paint it again or just leave it as it is. Sorry, will have to start a photo gallery on my server and link the photos as they are too large to upload here.

Photos!

http://redshost.com/2004excursion/th...213_150908.jpg http://redshost.com/2004excursion/th...213_151323.jpg http://redshost.com/2004excursion/th...215_114129.jpg http://redshost.com/2004excursion/th...215_114200.jpg
http://redshost.com/2004excursion/th...215_154327.jpg

Whats this across the top of the windshield?
http://redshost.com/2004excursion/th...215_114348.jpg

I noticed the cracks on your armrest.
Here's a free mod, remove the cover from each and use the drivers side on passenger side and reverse.

I noticed that the bottom seat outer panel on both driver and passenger side looked and felt different than the rest of the seat. Seems the PO had them repaired. As it is something that will come off, I'm going to have the drivers armrest repaired as well. Its the only one so it won't be that expensive. But had not thought about turning them over and swapping them. Good call!

I read the thread about the backup sensor and checked mine. Seems my speaker is bad. My Volt/Ohm meter shows no resistance at the speaker. Going to look for a replacement on-line.
http://redshost.com/2004excursion/th...216_123735.jpg

Any idea what these three wires are that are taped back at the firewall harness?
http://redshost.com/2004excursion/th...216_123822.jpg

On my overhead console, my trip computer is not working. Will have to pull it down and see what I can see.
http://redshost.com/2004excursion/th...216_121817.jpg

Here are the LED's I have used to replace the T10 style incandescents. My 3rd brake light had one of its 3 bulbs burning its socket. LED's will take care of that. And now my running boards have white lights instead of yellow. I had to use the smaller LED's in there as the larger ones hit the lens. You can see the 3rd brake light bulbs had turned silver reducing their light output.
http://redshost.com/2004excursion/th...216_124037.jpg

Overhead displays frequently suffer from cold/loose/failed solder joints on some of the chip resistors. Care work with a pencil style soldering iron will fix then right up most times. :-X22

Those taped up wires under the hood were put there by Ford as customer access wires to be used for whatever accessories you like, their other ends are up under the dash waiting for you. Handy feature that saves you from fishing wires through the firewall! :)

I just noticed that you have the larger towing mirrors, do you know which gears it has?

I removed the fuse box panel cover and looked up under the dash and did not see the wires. Did find the brake control plug. Wires are still in the glove box. I can also see the back of the flasher relays. If I can figure how to remove the cover to them I can change them out (for the LED lights) without taking the dash apart or removing the radio.

I have the more common 3.73's So I will not go up in tire size/diameter.