This is kind of a long convoluted story, but it is what it is. I've had this 79 Bronco 2002 or 2003, either way it's been longer than I've had kids. It's survived one divorce, 4 kids and me in my early 20's getting drunk & going out doing young guy dumb stuff.


This picture was taken maybe sometime around 2017.


After almost 20 years of wrenching & slapping bandaids on this thing, I got serious & went through everything but the transmission. Put in a new crate 351m, MSD everything up to and including their craptastic Atomic efi, rebuilt both axles, t-case etc.


Then I was bitten by the jeep bug & sold the Bronco to an a**hole in Oklahoma to do jeep things. A few years go by & out of the blue I get a call from the dudes landlord wanting to know what I wanted to do with the Bronco. It was a WUT HUH moment. Talked to the guy for a while & it turned out that the buyer was a not so good guy domestically & did some bad things, he either skipped town or was in prison for a good long time, I can't remember which. But he never sent in the title & the rig was still in my name, but im an honest man & told him what was up with it, despite the a**hole never paying off what was owed. Which was my fault for being trusting.

Another few months go by & I get a call from the wrecking yard asking me what I wanted done with the Bronco. Still in my name & my plates on it. I related the whole story yet again the the yard owner. I asked him what would likely happen to the truck & he said that he'd most likely just crush ot after he got an abandoned property title or whatever it is they call it in Oklahoma. Well my wife had been upset with me for sell the Bronco to being with, she loves that damn truck. So I asked if I could buy the rig from him once it was legal for him to sell it, he said to give whatever time period is required in Oklahoma for to that legally (and if the a**hole showed up to claim it, but we both knew that wasn't gonna happen) & if I'd cover the lot fees for that time frame, he do it & wave the original tow fee.

So another couple of months go by & then we brought home the Bronco, again. Had to rent rent a uhaul trailers because mine was to narrow & then a uhaul truck because my little Cj5 sure as heck wasn't about to make that tow. Got home & got it legally in my name again.






The dude had been pretty brutal of the truck. Smashed tailgate & rear window, gutted most of the interior, took off most of the MSD parts (not that I blame him when it comes to the Atomic efi). Rode hard & put up wet, very very wet. The front pans were always rusty, but the whole floor sucked badly by this point.

Why take off the delete plate & just leave it open.


Helper dag! She's more like 100 pounds now.



Well I was discouraged by the condition of the rig, so i didnt do anything past getting it running enough to move around the yard. Then we bought some property & moved and I stuck him out in the woods with some other "to do" trucks for a year & after half.




So now the wife's expedition is dieing and ain't worth fixing. So instead of buying something new, she wants my Bronco back on the road. By "my Bronco" she actually means "her Bronco". She love the truck, it was the second vehicle she ever drove.
But the rust has to be fixed & there is crap load of rust.










But somehow ive got good rockers on both sides.




I've bought more than a few dents over the last couple of years & have accumulated a fair stash of parts, some of which are getting used now & some will soon.

My almost 21 year old daughter did most of the work the last couple of days to get him running again, with me helping / supervising. It was a mixed bag, I stole the 4bbl intake last winter for another motor. I sat a factory 2bbl intake on there, but forgot to ever seal it & the #4 cylinder got some water. Just enough rust formed to keep it from turning over completely. We lubed it up & left it for a day while focusing on other endeavors, like getting all the water & sludge out of the pan. That was a real treat by the way. Had a new Edelbrock intake she learned to install, new valve cover gaskets, distributor (that's no where near in time yet). Put on some 33's because she couldnt get her ummmm...... chest between the radius arms and the ground. I didn't realize how much the stupid little 235's depressed me. I'd have probably started in on this a lot sooner if I'd have just changed the tires. We rocked the crank until the rust in #4 cleared (143 psi on the compression gauge) & it spin freely without plugs, that without plugs is important. The flex plate is hosed & I've known it for a while. Soon as there's compression, the starter findes the missing teeth on the ring gear.








Since the flex plate is hosed & I'm lazier than I was at 22, at least when it comes to a C6 & a floor jack. I broke down and got a big boy transmission jack Saturday & a new flex plate.






And that's where he stands at the moment. Right now it's more just getting running & road worthy, but in the not so distant future. How I said I've been collecting crap, well here's the over all plan. Gonna be built for towing.

First is a 460.



Next up is a Dana 60 rear & that'll mean going 8 lug up front. I've got a buddy with a 8 D44 leaf spring Ford front axle who needs it to be 5 lug front & is trading me everything from the knuckles out for my 5 lug knuckles out. Including those hard to get heavy duty dual piston caliper brackets. Not sure what gears I'm gonna use yet.


Then to go with the front suspension, I bought this rig for cheap, because I needed the donor cab on the rear & the rest of the truck came with it. But it happened to have the heavy duty half ton front suspension. Quad shocks and the associated fiddly bits. I'll be putting that under the Bronco.



Complete rewire. I was an electrical hack at best in my 20's, so it's a mess in there. American autowire to the rescue.


Hydro boost brakes & a Saginaw power steering pump. I put this on my 79 F350 with 37's & absolutely love it. And since my 460 has a Saginaw, I only got to do the hydro boost.





Sometimes this week my painful order from the Bronco Graveyard should show up. New tailgate, floor pans, B pillar repair panels, bed repair panels, rear wheel arches & other assorted sheet metal. I'll be cutting the A/C delete panel out of one of my parts cabs & I've got a few non a/c dashes on hand as well.

Lots to do & get done.

 

The Lords work.

 

The big box of goodies has arrived.




To bad I drive a truck & will be out for another few days. I really hate my job sometimes, I wanna go home & play with stuff.

 

Gotta pay to play though so that job thing is a necessity unfortunately. Unless you hit the big lottery or get a huge inheritance.

At least with your trucking job, the company probably won't choose to relocate your position 1200 miles away, give you a week to decide and require you're moved by Sept. On the upside, starting in August I am going to have a whole bunch of free time to work on my projects

 

I rarely play the lottery & while my family has lots of money, i don't get along with any of them well enough to be let any of it. Not particularly sure I'd want any of it if one of them did. So it looks like I get to keep up the work thing.

Trucking can be a pretty brutal industry. Companies pop up & go bust constantly & it's only gotten worse with the large numbers government subsidized foreigners that have gotten into the industry over the last decade.

Sucks to hear about you job doing you that way. Had one I'd been at for almost 10 years do it to me. Just without the week to think about it. Had to decide on the spot right then & there, I gave em the old two finger salute and went on my way. Worked out in the end, I make almost 3 times as much now & should be hopefully be debt free in another few years. The I to will have a how lot more time to work on my projects.

 

Ya, I don't play the lottery either or get along with most of my family.

Been 18 years at this job. They're not completely leaving me out in the cold unlike the last place I worked at before here where they called me in one Friday afternoon and said bye! At least this go around I they're trying to ease the transition. Such is life...

I've heard trucking has got brutal in recent years, especially for owner/operators, but even at the big companies. I have a few friends in that industry.

As they saying goes, when one door closes another opens.

Anyway, thread hijack over...

Looks like you have a nice project (of many) going on with that bronco.

 

So I bought one of the damaged half priced tailgates from bronco graveyard. I went over this thing for a couple of hours & couldn't find the damage.

 

Bronco runs, sorta. On carb cleaner at least.

I feel kinda stupid. Spent a bunch of money on a transmission jack and a new flex plate & all I needed was a $40 dollar heli coil. Noticed the starter was jumping out of the trans & discovered that the bottom bolt hole was stripped out. Put in a heli coil & a different starter out of the stack & he fires off.


I'll drain the tank since that gas has been in there for a few years.

 

Transmission Jack's good to own. And the flexplate won't go stale. Win win. New tools. Spare parts.

 

Today's mission was to get him started & running. It was a pain in the a$$, but accomplished.

Not one, but two juck starters. I eventually gave up of the factory brick & went a different route. Starter for a 92 F250 with a 460 & automatic transmission.


Slight change in wiring. Snagged the wiring diagram from Full Size Bronco forum.





Starter works great, but my Chineseium distributor was junk. I found an old motorcraft in the parts box & it works. Then my beater 4160 finally gave up the ghost & started leaking out of everywhere, granted I did drive over it with a truck once. I've got a 670cfm Holley Offroad Avenger new in the box, but I don't want to use it. So I've got another 4160 on the way.

 

Did not have a very agreeable weekend wrenching on the Bronco. But decision have been made.

Got him going & running good enough to test drive down some of the roads around the house. Granted I can drive for a couple of hours without hitting pavement, but I didn't get that brave, for reasons.

This motor is a steaming pile of poop & i remember why I hated it before. Massive lack of power, falls on its face, hard to start & probably couldn't pull itself out of a wet paper bag. Timing issues most likely. But the bigger issue that really kills it right, the blue cloud of dooooooooooom. Rings or stems, I don't know & don't particularly care right now. Plus it won't start reliably either.

To bad it ain't skeeter season yet. I would've smoked them all out.

Issue два или три, my beloved C6 is very very unhappy. Hit the brakes & loose the gear! Come to a stop & you may or may not have 1st. Bear in mind that I rodded the snot out of this transmission for a good 15 years & the it sat for many more years. I'm not surprised in the least that it's in need of some love.

So it's all very fixable issues. But we're not gonna do any of that. What we are gonna do is kick the can down the road & swap the the 400 / T-18 & Np205 out of my 79 F350 which the wife rolled into the Bronco. It's been a great motor & trans & it'll be a while before my truck gets done fixed & back on the road anyway (that whole needs a new body thing). I'll shove one of the 429 /460 blocks back in, with the spare Np435 / Np205 behind it.

We got the front clip pulled off the F350 & the engine / trans mostly prepped for pulling. Hope to get the front clip off the Bronco this weekend & rod the fiddly bits out of one of the manual parts trucks. Won't get to pull any engines because I get to replace the flex plate in the 3/4 ton. Which passes me off immensely, it is brand new &less than two months since install. Damn cheap China crap. Spent the money on a heavy duty TCI replacement. Hopefully it's better than Chinese for the cost of the thing.


Now I've a mental fight going on since we're going 4 speed manual. Gearing, leave em or change em. It's currently 3.50 something gears, which I'm perfectly happy with, behind a 3 speed C6. I've got a set of 4.10 gears I could use, but there's a caveat. I'd have to shove in the 8 lug dana 60 in the rear & then change the front carrier out of a spare D44 & rob the F350 front axle from the knuckles out to match the 8 lug rear. Then probably rob the 4" - 6" lift out of the Frankenford. But new rubber or take the 37's off the F350. I'm pretty sure that the D60 is a limited slip differential, ain't looked in a while. Probably need a new rear driveshaft, as I'm pretty sure it's a bigger U-joint. I know I've got some full size truck shafts I could shorten, just don't know what size U-joints they've got.

Opinions on going big rubber?

 

Guess it all depends on how you intend to use it most of the time.

If I had the parts to do so, I'd be swapping D60 rear and axles and knuckles out on my F150. I wouldn't run 37s though simply because I have no need for that large of a tire. I drive mostly on the street & county maintained dirt roads. Off-road will amount to forestry service roads and old logging roads searching for a campsite or firewood. If I had deep mud or fording water to deal with that would be a different story. I would use 33s but with a 6 inch lift 35s would look better.

 

35" to look ok with small lift. 37" if your neck red. 42" if you want to play in the mud. Now excuse me. Gotta have my Skoal Mountain Dew Ranch Chicken wrap value meal off of my bald Eagle plates.

 

Here's something I've not seen in a very very long time. Every light working including the dash, excluding the dome.








Had to replace a couple of the light sockets & the taillight housings. The factory housings came out in a few pieces each. New ones came from Amazon and aren't that bad.







For whatever reason the engine has decided to start cooperating & is probably staying put for the time being. Not smoking out the exhaust like a son of a gun at least. Valve cover gaskets are leaking like crazy. Got some cork gaskets on the way. May try for an inspection and plates next week.

 

So of course as soon as I made my last post, that engine want to poop & I fought with it for a couple months. Couple that with a death in the immediate family & I haven't gotten much done. I finally gave up on the engine a couple of weeks ago & pulled it last weekend. So before the new engine goes in, its time to fix some stuff. I yanked the a/c box a long time ago. Cut a chunk out of a junk cab. Big hole.


No more.


Snip snip.



Glued in.