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$200 V8 Project

So it made 293K, and I discovered the rear brakes were shot. That's fine and all except I just put them on 16K miles ago. Both sides, calipers weren't sticking but were worn completely out. When I did the rear brakes I put ceramics since I tow with this truck a lot, in excess of a ton on a given day. Did some investigating and asking around, if you slammed on brakes on dirt at 25 MPH, it wouldn't even lock the fronts, or nose dive, I had ONLY rear brakes with minimal fronts.

What I've done to remedy this is the ABS module had some random code, don't remember what it was, I just threw the one off my old V8 donor on it. Bleeding it sucked, but I've got brakes and it does stop really well with the front brakes best I can tell now. Anybody ever seen this before?
 



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I would still wonder about those rear calipers, sticking.

I had rear pads on my "new" 98 wear out in about nine months, both sides. One side was into the metal, ruined the original rotor, and the other side was almost worn through. I bought rebuilt calipers, plus the same EBC green pads, and two new low level OEM rotors(under $20 each from RA). The one rotor that wasn't ruined would not come off(more on that in a second).

That time I kept a closer eye on the rear pads. One side(right, with old rotor still on it), did wear a little fast, after close to a year it was almost shot. I then bought another set of pads, to do that one side, and took the rebuilt caliper back to Autozone. They replaced it no complaints, rebuilds are hit and miss on older vehicles. But the rotor I could not get off, pulling and hammering did nothing. I could get the rotor to flex away from the axle hub, but the center hole was tightly not budging. I decided that this rotor was either defective(hole much too small), or from some other vehicle that was close enough to go on(and the hole too tight). So I pulled out my 12v cut off tool, goggles, and cut the SOB off. It took about ten minutes of careful cuts nest to the axle hub, between the studs, to remove enough metal next to the hub, so it will pry off.

Now after about 15 months or so, the rear pads are worn fairly evenly now, and still okay for 2-3 more months. The calipers were sticking a lot to start with, and one of the rebuilt calipers was a bit also.

Changing calipers is a PITA, but it's worth it if it means the pads life can be doubled and evenly worn. So I'd bet you have calipers that might be part of the wear issue. Watch the hose connections closely, and the steel line fittings, for corrosion that can make them hard to come loose and not twist/break.
 






It's a waiting game at this point, I've checked them several times and there isn't any visible sign of them being stuck. It seems to stop a lot better now, it feels more solid stopping. The calipers I have on the back are the ones from my rust free 99 V8 donor, the originals on this truck were bad for sticking and one ate a rotor to nothing. Time will tell, I haven't checked the ones on my Mountaineer parts truck yet, they look decent looking in through the wheels though.

I'm all aware of rotors being a major pain, the right front when I bought this truck was grooved really deeply and was actually dark blue. I ended up busting it off the hub with a 4 pound sledge to get it off. Not a fun experience. I changed the hub shortly after because it developed play I still attribute to the beating the rotor off.
 






So I didn't make it too far this time before an issue. 300K really shows sometimes.

That said, 10:30 Friday night I made an important discovery the less than good way, and that was the starter not engaging. It just sounded like a grinder free spinning, and following a beating with a hammer and all kinds of efforts to remedy the situation, I had no progress. That was an experience lemme tell you, my friend with a rollback has the flu and getting it towed is expensive, so I opted to change the starter where it was sitting. Changing starters in a parking lot at 1 AM following a fight with your rusty parts truck is no fun. The positive of that is my Mountaineer had a brand new TYC starter on it, and it cranks great compared to before.
 






Price shop for another starter, a spare, they have gone up in the last ten years. I had three rebuilt two years ago, and it was over $45 each, that for OEM starters.

I needed one last Fall about this time, on the job early on my route. The truck wouldn't start, with no click. I found my customer home, borrowed a hammer, and tapped on it a few times(got nice and wet as it was raining lightly). The engine started, and I didn't shut it off for about 4.5 hours when I got back to work. Fortunately it started to leave work, and I changed it at home. It isn't a fun job in good conditions jacked up partly. It's tight getting to the bolts with various socket extensions etc.
 






If it's the original starter I'd rebuild it myself
 






It's not, it's a Remy starter, doesn't have Ford anywhere on it. I did grab a junkyard one with 120K miles that's fully OEM for $20 and stuck that back in my Mountaineer to fill the hole, and it works, and the one I put in my Eddie Bauer is OEM. I normally rebuild my OEM starters since the info on how to do it is plentiful online, and I ain't a fan of china starters, reman or new. I'd had the issue beforehand of the truck, you'd have to hold the key to crank it. It was really far out though, like once every six months though. I doubt the two problems with the Remy are even related, it's just junk.

I do plan even with that to pick up a new one just to have on the shelf, since they're still available new. I'm either going to go that route or snag another junkyard one and have it rebuilt, the shops here do really well with rebuilding them, never had a complaint.

Changing this one wasn't that hard, I use 7" of 3/8 extensions, a flexhead craftsman ratchet and a deepwell socket, works fine. The bottom bolt is easy, the top one sucks. I was happy as I could possibly be that the top one came out on my Mountaineer, I was dreading rounding it off.
 






Ditto, getting the top one loose without rounding the bolt head of is the rub. Well done.
 






Thank you, I've always been pretty decent at getting that top bolt, it takes patience though to not round. This truck sometimes, I swear. It's got a hesitation and misfire on WOT from a standstill now. I pulled the codes and there wasn't anything for the O2s or lean codes. It'll kickdown on the highway just fine too but struggles gaining speed very well. It'll still run as fast as anybody needs it to though. Fuel pump? I've actually never done it, when I bought it the relay was bad, and it's never given much sign of having a problem although I'd bet it's OEM.
 






So changed the oil, I discovered holding it to prime it that it doesn't make oil pressure enough to trip the sensor, so that's not really what I'd call good news, but at 293K miles I suppose it's expected. It also needs both front hub bearings, they're worn out, quiet but worn out, both trip the ABS sensor codes. It could use a whole rebuild up front soon. The light misfire I believe to be a dead coil, it's not smooth sitting in gear at a stop. It had plugs done at 272K miles so I'm doubtful they're any kind of problem.

In my effort weighing my options on what's quickly becoming a vehicle I don't trust as much as I did, I had found a motor, guy wants $425 for it, my problem with that price is it's got 216K on it, which isn't passing that problem far if anywhere. I don't plan on using my Mountaineer's motor in this truck, I have other plans for it ;). There's a county surplus auction of every impounded and retired county vehicle next month on the 23rd, I plan on looking at what's there, and either buying likely another V8 Explorer, or F150, or driving my 96 before long, retiring this truck.
 






It surrendered, left home and got two miles up the road from home and the flex plate broke loose from the engine, meaning the engine is now freewheeling disconnected from the transmission. The starter won't engage again either, leading me to believe the issue was apparent months ago with the AC clutch saga, and the other starter is fine but just not engaging due to likely wear. With that said, pulling the whole transmission with no clue if the pump survived, replacing the flex plate, reason for cracking unknown, on this truck?

I have no present plans to fix it, I don't believe the issue to be related to the transmission about two years ago that broke the bell housing, I inspected the flex plate then and had no cracks anywhere on it. This truck has near 300K miles, R&R the trans for what? 10K miles? 20K? Basically a year at best. This truck, among the radio issue, misfire and electrical issue causing the headlights to flicker sitting still it was developing, is simply put not worth it. It's been my friend, I built my Eddie Bauer in part because of it.

It's been a fun ride, I do plan on retaining the truck unless someone makes a good offer, but I don't see that happening on a glorified parts truck. I plan on transferring to my 96 this week and my Eddie Bauer for my nice truck.
 






That sounds like it needs some regular work on it, several issues all going on at the same time. It sounds like time to divest from it, or get ready to spend lots of time and money on it.

I could use a solid 98-01 302 truck short term, for work, but I haven't had time to look for one. Time flies.
 






I've been pouring money in it since mid July, when the alternator went bad, it just went downhill from there. I love the truck to death, it's been honestly my friend, everybody knows me by that cracked manifold which is now on the shelf until I need that motor for something. I'm looking at that white V8 Eddie Bauer I mentioned still, and I've also explored a full restoration on this truck, which since I did on Eddie, will go fast if I go that route. That trick is finding a donor though, since I delegated my Mountaineer parts truck with exceptionally low miles to Eddie parts duty for years to come.
 






Since my Eddie Bauer is pretty well complete, closer than most people realize since I haven't updated that thread in forever, I have decided to at least tear this truck down and verify it was the flex plate, although with the no crank issue again and free wheeling converter I'm sure it is. Part of me got tempted to go through it and fix a lot of what's wrong, for no reason other than it's been my friend a long time, and I miss the thing for whatever reason. I still have the manifold and now the EGR tube and valve in the shed in the boxes. It's a rusty old V8 but it's my V8.

I found a 2000 Eddie Bauer V8 AWD I should go get instead, it's white and V8 and I'd likely get attached to it easy, since I always do with these trucks. Decisions decisions.
 






So I for the heck of it, and since I miss my truck, priced the flexplate at the yard my buddy hass. For my price, It's $50 if the trans has to come out, $10 if the trans is out. I found a 99 with no trans, plate is perfect and there's even an OEM starter. Miles? 124,522. That's less than 200 difference from it and my Mountaineer parts truck. That said, despite the other issues I'd have to deal with, it's in my mind, I bought the plate at least. If I took the trans out the collector bolts are easy to get to, I could do the manifold and make the light misfire disappear permanently. I've walked myself through it several times, it's time to just think and see what pops up with the 5.0 in it.
 






Nope, can't let the truck die. I dunno why considering there's nothing to save except a questionable trans, a worn 302 and the body, which needs the radiator support. Since Eddie is getting ready to hit the roads, I'm pulling this one in there to at least tear into it. I crawled underneath it, flex plate is very much broken off the motor.
 






That's very odd to break a flexplate, and especially two different times.
 






OP - I'm curious. This thread has been going on for nearly 2 years and as I recall there was at least one other thread that began your Explorer journey. I've lost track, exactly how many Explorers and Mountaineers have you owned in your quest to make one good V8 EB? IIRC it all started when you wrecked your first one.
 






@koda2000 I keep threads on all the different trucks, mostly to track what I lose the notes for. I actually have my Eddie Bauer now, it's done excluding putting the exhaust underneath it and getting the AC working. Originally the plan was to just have another V8, but I ended up wanting my Eddie Bauer a V8 instead since I loved everything about that truck except the SOHC. It actually runs, has for a while now, it's by far been worth building, I love the truck a lot more than I thought I would as a V8. I just use it for a nice ride instead of a daily.

To answer your question simply put, I had my 99 V8 Explorer, I turned it over, I then bought my 01 Eddie Bauer Explorer, which I loved excluding the lack of V8, THEN I bought this truck, for $200, off the basis of it being a V8. THEN, I wasn't happy with that because the Eddie Bauer is loaded, so I took the V8 from my 99, a transmission off Craigslist, and a bunch of parts and put a V8 in my Eddie Bauer. In the meanwhile due to work and one thing and another and simply hunting up stuff that's hard to find, time's gone by. I bought a Mountaineer to fix my 2000 with, but ended up thinking that through and deciding to not put essentially a whole new truck in a 300K mile work truck, but kept it in storage for my Eddie Bauer down the road. I then bought my 96 for $200 as a spare vehicle. Flash forward to now, I'm currently putting the finishing tidbits on my Eddie Bauer and driving my 96.


The reasoning behind actually three threads is to try to keep them separate to some extent, since the plan is to have a work truck and a nice truck. I keep the threads as logs to an extent. Smarter plan would be to probably make a YouTube channel and monetize it and get paid whatever it's worth to video these things instead of type them out. To answer the original comment, I do in fact have my V8 swap done basically, full fledged V8 AWD 01 Eddie Bauer with 131K miles on the donor. I've just kinda gotten into messing with these trucks.

@CDW6212R Well this is the first time it's broken the plate, the first time the trans was out, it cracked the bell housing and broke the shaft for the front pump. I removed and inspected the plate then and found no signs of cracking, and reinstalled it. I find it odd that well over 25K miles later it finally broke, seems like a long time.
 



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@RandomNerd2000 - Yeah, I figured it had to be around 5 trucks total by now. I'm glad you finally assembled what you really wanted. How about some pics of the final result?

If/when i finally get my POS Sport Trac back on the road I'm not sure what I'll do with. My original plan was to give it to my daughter as her '00 Mountaineer 5.0L RWD, while still running/driving perfectly, is getting long in the tooth at nearly 300,000 miles and it's looking a bit rough paint & body wise. Right now she's driving a cream-puff, loaded, low mileage 2009 Ford Fusion SEL 3.0L V6 I picked up recently and she loves it. So the ST may end up either returning to daily driver status for me, just being a spare vehicle, or I might sell it and be SOHC free. My minty-fresh '01 EB 5.0L is still my fav vehicle and I have no plans of replacing it. It's just the perfect vehicle for me (a recent pic below).

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Recent pics of the status of my ST below...
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