46" 1991 Explorer in Iceland.

Hi, My name is Sævar and I´m 22, I live near the capital Reykjavik Iceland and I recently bought a slightly modified 91 Explorer


I have owned a lot of cars in my short yet life, but only 3 american made, first an AMC Eagle 82 and a Cherokee Country 1995, and now this Explorer


Ive mostly had Suzukies in the past, and for the longest time, since 2007 until recently I had a Vitara of which I also modified a little bit, heres a photograph

It has 38" super swampers and toyota pickup axles with locker, toyota transfer box and gearbox and 2.5 turbo diesel intercooled Hyundai engine




my plans with the explorer so far are unknown, Im thinking of finishing it up and using this winter and seeing what needs better finishing, but before that there are a few details of which need sorting such as

Checking the brakes, they have hydro assist, checking leaks, steering fluid is leaking and car has saginaw pump and steering jack so there are a lot of couplings of which could break a leak

finishing the fender flares, their surface is rough and unfinished and they are slightly too narrow for making the car road legal on these tires

the axles are D44 HD front and 14bolt 9.5" GM rear



here are some photos

I hope you come to like this project, at least Im a little excited to try him out but please if there are any comments or suggestions feel free to reply or message me personally


thanks

 

[Sævar Örn]

I admit it, ive been lazy, but today I achieved something...

Seems to fit nice, I put it down as low as I can both for better weight distribution and less angle on the shafts when it comes to that, the cooling fan blade is never going to fit on front of the engine ever again, anyway...

 

[Sævar Örn]

Ok, again i admit Ive been lazy!! but Im starting to see the end of it!

Im at that point where I need to start fabricating drive shafts and connecting auxilary items and clutch and hydraulics etc...

Pickup unit, removed fuel pump which was very rusty and probably would have given problems soon... but one less thing to break down in the wilderness, just a rubber hose and then the engine sucks up the fuel

Some frame modification to fit the cooling fan without interference...

Exhaust half way... Im thinking about moving it under and on the outside of the frame rail to the back, and use the space where there was the original muffler for an auxilary fuel tank..

The idea of using the Musso's fuel tank as auxilary was too good to be true... a little too fat!!

 

[Sævar Örn]

Some small detail work today...

Dashboard removed

Found a rust spot in the firewall, luckily it is exactly where I will put the master cylinder from the donor car

Clutch pedal in the makings...

 

[Rick]

Glad to see it's still coming along nicely

 

[madbutcher]

Just got to love this build

 

[Sævar Örn]

Thanks for the feedback guys, it means a lot, it takes a lot of convincing to go out to the shop after a 10 hour work day to work on the car! lol

I check this site regularly, sadly I havent been able to see much what other people are building, but eventually I will, when I have more time after this one is "finished "

thanks again

 

[Sævar Örn]

Hyundai Galloper 2.5 diesel radiator...

making brackets for the Saginaw...

nice little bracket...

fine fanbelt

newest addition to my garage... a plasmacutter, I love it!

Front mount intercooler, HMMM that could be troublesome!

 

[Sævar Örn]

Getting ready for the front mount intercooler

This intercooler is out of a 2000 hyuundai galloper

Here's pretty much how things are going to be, except I have no idea where I will be keeping 2 batteries and an air filter box, lol

 

[Rick]

Thanks for the update. It's a very ambitious swap

 

[madbutcher]

I would put the batteries in the cargo rom if you don't have space under the hood

 

[chefduane]

It's actually really cool to check in and see your work progress! You are the Magnus Ver Magnusson of the Explorer Forum!!

með styrk Íslandi ! Þetta reddast.

 

[FR-425]

Tiny intercooler.....

I'd delete it and go with water/ethanol injection.

Then you can just stick your air filter directly on the turbo inlet and plumb the output direct to the intake manifold.

 

[Sævar Örn]

This will not be a competition vehicle....


thanks for your input though

the picture does not do justice to the size of things, the radiator is about 30% larger than the stock explorer one, and the intercooler is fairly large also, being in the front it will stay frozen most of the time and probably cool the air enough to give good fuel efficiency, this is what Im mostly looking for, not quarter mile times!


heres an update of todays progress...

It was about a whole days work to fit the intercooler, fasten and connect, I used exhaust pipe material, the flexible rubber hoses are SOOOO expensive here, they cost about the same as half of the parts Ive bought for the swap all together!

It might not be the most beautiful part you've seen, but it's been pressure tested for 120 psi so it will hold up just fine, cheap and simple!

This should provide some cooling, radiator, intercooler, steering line cooler, and motor oil cooler

Im still scratching my forehead about the shifting mechanism, there doesnt seem to be any interchangable part that will bolt on instead of the cable operated system, the T5s in the Mustangs is a little bit different, it might be modifiable, but the cable operated system will have to work for now!

I was a little worried there would have to be some trimming done to the front end, but to my surprise everything went back together beautifully, although there is not an inch of clearance from the grille to the intercooler, lol



Stay dirty!

 

[Sævar Örn]

one battery in, huge battery, should do the job just fine on its own!

Tomorrow has to be cleanup day!!! oh my freaking god what a mess

 

[RockRanger]

I hope you come to like this project, at least Im a little excited to try him out but please if there are any comments or suggestions feel free to reply or message me personally


thanks

Do you have any more pictures of the power steering pump bracket in this picture? It looks like it s on the 4.0 right.

 

[Sævar Örn]

yea its on the 4.0 v6 there, just a home made mock up really... but ill see if i can find better photos



this is the best one i can find... see attachment




I modified the bracket to fit the Merc. diesel engine, see here

 

[Sævar Örn]

this is the status after today

put the clusters side by side, they are amazingly similar, and fitting the musso cluster in place of the ford one, shouldnt be much of a chore...!

laid the cluster roughly where it should be and connected the 15(ACC) wire and ground to the all the meters, some sensors are yet to be connected, as is the alternator diode


https://www.facebook.com/egerbestur...deos/10154446354162907/?l=4827279687304905586

connected the glow plug computer and wired everything around it, started her up for the first time with the body on, sounds like a rock chipper but thats OK!

 

[Sævar Örn]

Wellll, ive been doing a few things over the last days, but mostly small things, but small things count too! like bracketing the oil cooler, fastening the gear shifter and cable linkage, I had the most trouble with the 4wd computer out of the SSangyong, but I finally got it to work after about 15 man hours of scratching my head!

Cross bar for the panhard bar, this is a famous fail in iceland, cars drive in snow so usually there is not much side to side forces going on, but sometimes we will drive into old frozen tracks and the car will bounce around, and this mount will break clean off the frame, no matter how hard it is welded, so this is to secure it more, although I could have welded it better, but my socket is only 16 amp, so im waiting for a 32 amp electrical socket so I can put my welder to work!

Hmmmm, oil cooler with adjustable height??? hmmmmm

Raised the center console and got the shifter in clean and nice


Took him for a little ride, used all of his 120 horsepowers, and was actually pretty surprised, the difference from the V6 isnt so horribly great, so I'm very happy and excited to see how he works with 46" tires

https://www.facebook.com/egerbestur...deos/10154462854652907/?l=1617485376667625477

Launching and shifting, 1 2 3 og 4

End speed c.a. 70kmh(40mph)

https://www.facebook.com/egerbestur...deos/10154462856602907/?l=7573897041002371804

Rolling start and shifting 2 3 4 og 5

End speed ca. 90kmh+15 (65mph)

90kmh, ca. 52mph is the maximum allowed road speed in iceland, so Im trying not to brag about breaking the law, lol



please leave a comment if there are any questions, i will be happy to explain or chat with you!

 

[Sævar Örn]

merry christmas and everything...!

I broke the fender flare moving the car around without an engine in the autumn, so now its time to repair it

Put a pre-filter for the fuel pump, because there is no pre-filter in the fuel tank anymore

Sprayed the flare, the color code was easy to find... Autozone mat black... lol

The hard part was the metallic tone, a bunch of dust and leaking, but I think I did OK ...!

Lengthened and shortened drive shafts, all new UVs and 2 spares in the car at all times

Put on the big boy tires

Some stretching after a long autumn on the operation table..!

Making a new inner fender

Fender flare like new,,,, or at least like the rest of the car!

Dash is beginning to settle in, the musso cluster fits just fine..!

Bearings and outer UVs, just the usual...

Fuel tank was leaking when filled, so I removed it again and found that it was around the O ring seal at the sending unit, So I removed it and glued it all in place, no leaks anymore

Takes 24 seconds from stop to 60mph on the 46" tires.. which is very reasonable taking in to account the high gear ratio, feels best to cruise in 3rd gear at 3000 rpm, which is not good use of the gearbox, 4 and 5 gear are useless in HI, but the low range is perfect, 2.48:1

But I need to do something to lower the high range also... and Im not sure lowering from 4.56:1 to 5.13:1 will make much difference... maybe half a gear?


Measured the fuel milage lightly, filled to the cap and drove 50 kms by GPS, filled again to the cap, got 6 liters in, now if I convert this to MPG it sounds something like this

12 liters per 100 km

19,6 MPG, which I find very reasonable, in this there was only in city driving, and a lot of idling... probably a full hour of idling.





But this isnt a flawless measurement, it will be clearer soon

Turbo is boosting 15 psi at 3000 rpm, according to a chinese boost gauge, it could be 20 psi because the needle is so wrong on the gauge... -_-

But never any black diesel smoke, so there is probably some more power to be made, but the torque at idle is amazing, much better than with the V6 where I would have to hold it at 2500 rpm and burn the clutch to get it to move in 1 hi, now I can drop the clutch at idle and it just takes off!





Any comments or questions? i really like any input!

 

[Rick]

What a beast! 0-60 in 24seconds is probably what a stock Suzuki Samurai would pull

Very cool to hear that it's on the road again