Jen's 03 Sport | Page 15 | Ford Explorer Forums - Serious Explorations

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Jen's 03 Sport

Hello all...

To celebrate the final payment of my beast, I thought I should finally make a registry for it, with pictures and all!!!

When I was in college, I really wanted a 2door SUV that was relatively new and looked cool as well... Obviously that led me to the Explorer, as Jeeps are cool and all, but not all that practical as my daily driver. Sooo, the search was on! I wanted a black one, the newest year I could get for the Sport, with the fewest miles, with leather and a sunroof! :D

Eventually my searches pulled up my exact specs, but in South Dakota. I lived in Iowa at the time, so no big deal. I bothered the people at the dealership with my excessive questions to make sure it was worth the drive there to look at it. And luckily, it was! Mom and I drove out to look at it, and I ended up buying it. My first (nice) purchased car. It had 16,x.. on the clock, was a certified pre-owned from some old man so it was pretty nice, other than that saggy rear end.

First thing I did was swap out the stereo, and figured out how to wire it to the factory sub thanks to the forum! Then, add a leafs were next. I had the next several years mapped out for it when the tires would wear out and I was outta college and could finally have some money!!! I took off the step bars and added a Yakima rack and drove it like that until I moved to CO. That's when the magic started to happen, ;).

I knew I wanted to lift it from the day I bought it. When I started my big kid job out here in CO, I was able to buy new wheels, tires, shackles, and body lift to get it started! Thanks to the awesome boys from this forum (hokie, nssj2, sparkyXplorer) they got it on for me. I was of no use as I had just had shoulder surgery, but they made sure to get my on the right track :thumbsup:

Awesome! Now I'm good to go. Cranked up the torsion bars a lil, time to hit the trails!!! Got my feet wet in Ouray with the group. And by feet wet, I mean I almost peed myself on Black Bear pass, haha

Since then, I've upgraded my exhaust to 2.5 pipes from the cats back, Flowmaster 50 muffler (kinda quiet :rolleyes:) and a MAC intake. Changed out the plugs and wires at the same time, put on Motorcraft plugs and JBA cables...I also added a Yakima load warrior basket that is pretty quick to take off that holds my snowboard racks and my spare.

Mods to come ---- upgrading gears to 4.56, adding an Aussie locker (or something of that sort depending on my $$), removed gray plastic body panels to paint black, thus discovering rust on my doors GRRRRRR, need rock sliders, skid plates, and on and on.
 

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finally got it painted up between trying to dodge the afternoon rainstorms we get up here... the swing away part needs another coat of paint since it was getting dark when i was finishing it up but otherwise i'm pretty happy with out it looks. i used a self-etching primer and then followed with some rustoleum bedliner rattlecan. i just need to get some lug nuts for the spare tire and i'm set! here are a few pics -
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Took off my side moulding and found my driver side rocker starting to rust pretty bad... I guess that will be my next project. It never ends!
 



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Looking good Jenn awesome build
 






Sweet! :thumbsup:

Jen, can you do me a favor please? After you get your spare mounted, can you measure the gap between the hatch/glass to the backside of the tire.

I just messaged James about getting a tire carrier just like yours. :D
 












The hatch/glass-tire distance will be dependent on the wheel offset.

Yep.
3.75" to 4.00" is about what everybody runs on these rigs.

I don't care if it is a 1/4" off, it gets me in the ballpark for something else I'm wanting to do.;)
 






Looks awesome.
 






Sweet! :thumbsup:

Jen, can you do me a favor please? After you get your spare mounted, can you measure the gap between the hatch/glass to the backside of the tire.

I just messaged James about getting a tire carrier just like yours. :D

no problem - ran around some trails this weekend with the spare mounted, works great. I will take some pics of the tire mounted for you to see...i'm pretty sure my spare is 3.75 bs, but it doesn't match my other wheels so I could be wrong - i could open the rear glass and barely clear the tire carrier without the tire mounted...I'm pretty happy with it. Just watch out and not pinch your skin on the latch if you aren't paying attention :eek: just a little blood right??

Looks awesome.
thanks! it doesn't mess up my view out the rearview mirror too much... well until the mirror fell off the windshield on a rocky trail the other day anyway :D
 






Yep.
3.75" to 4.00" is about what everybody runs on these rigs.

I don't care if it is a 1/4" off, it gets me in the ballpark for something else I'm wanting to do.;)

here are some quick pics, i didn't have a tape measure on me when i took them - i can get a pic with the tape measure on there for ya this afternoon
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ooh you can see my nice new pinstriping job from saturday's excursion..hahaah

i moved my license plate into the spare tire, not lighted at the moment but i figure it's better than it hiding behind the spare for now.

i'm getting some wobbling of the spare tire when driving, i tightened the castle nut again last night and it's still there... i might need to find some sort of rubber bumper to put under the swing away part, maybe that will help. doesn't look like it's going anywhere but i've read reports of those spindles breaking (not bumpers from RLC but those spindles in general) so i don't want that to happen.
 












It looks really good and meaner with that bumper. Makes me want to get one much sooner than I had planned, but money is still an issue so it has to wait either way haha. I want to get one but have the bumper wrap around the body so I can cut off that sheet metal holding the last piece of tupper ware on the corners.
 






pretty serious bumper jen .whats the reason you went this way with your spare ?
does that have special bolts to hold the tire on to guard from theft?

i miss my sport .maybe one day i buy another one .
 






It looks really good and meaner with that bumper. Makes me want to get one much sooner than I had planned, but money is still an issue so it has to wait either way haha. I want to get one but have the bumper wrap around the body so I can cut off that sheet metal holding the last piece of tupper ware on the corners.

ain't that the truth, money always seems to be the big issue, same here!!! i debated having it wrap around behind the wheels too... wasn't sure if i was ready to cut off sheetmetal yet, but i think i would've really liked how it looked!

pretty serious bumper jen .whats the reason you went this way with your spare ?
does that have special bolts to hold the tire on to guard from theft?

i miss my sport .maybe one day i buy another one .

my spare is a big ol 33, doesn't fit underneath anymore obviously, had it on a roof rack for awhile but it makes it even taller and impossible to get in the garage, not to mention a pain to get down! i've had it in the cargo area most of the time or the floor of the garage with my fingers crossed i don't get a flat... again neither of those are very good compromises either. and i like how it looks back there too in addition to the utility, a win win for my use anyway :)

i thought about getting some locking lugnuts to hold it on, where i live i'm not too worried about theft, but i'll probably throw a cable lock around it when i'm down in the city just in case. it is a cheap wheel and tire so not the end of the world i suppose if i got jacked. however, next time i buy tires i'm going to buy 5 so i'll have to find something more secure!
 






i figured that was the case . good to see you still working on her ,makes me miss mine every time i come here .
 






holy crap [MENTION=87244]gmanpaint[/MENTION] i totally left you hanging! just snapped these with my trusty work ruler, if you need any exact measurements with a tape measure let me know... might be hard to tell with the ruler depending on the angle in these pics. hope it gives you an idea anyway...
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Thank you Jenny! :biggthump

It's a lot closer to the lower hatch then I thought it would be. Which is a good thing to me. I would rather have it tight, for a better departure angle, then worry about the glass access.

I might ask James, to make the post on the carrier a little shorter, to tuck it back a bit more even.

:chug:
 






I agree, I wanted it in nice and tight. I think the post could be shorter, that wheel is 15x8 3.75bs with a 33x12.5 tire on it as well. The bottom of the tire is pretty close to the vertical support part of the holder but i think there is a few inches there to play with...I'm sure he could make it for whatever size your spare is and have it as close as possible.

I'm pretty happy with it, the spare wobbles a bit on the road but nothing bad... i have the spindle tightened down quite a bit maybe I need to torque it a bit more. I think the problem though is one of my bumper holes on my frame rail was messed up, my ex bf helped me put the bumper back on after the body lift and he butchered that part back there I'm not sure what the hell he did. I'm going to have to reinforce it with some more bolts I think to make it really secure.

My next project is getting this beast prepped for an application of Monstaliner! I've been researching it like crazy, it's super popular in the jeeper world. My paint is looking utterly destroyed, and with some good prep this stuff turns out great.
Just choosing what color is tough though!!! It's not worth getting a proper paint job and spending that much money just for it to get destroyed by the environment here and whenever I go off-road. It's UV resistant so it seems to hold up well. I know it's not for everybody but for my needs it'll work out great...especially since I don't ever plan on trading the exploder in or anything.

http://www.monstaliner.com/monstaliner_photos_video.htm
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Interesting. My paint is also pretty well thoroughly pin striped. It hasn't really been on my radar to do anything about it though.

Definitely something to look into if you wanted to change it up... it can be rolled on or sprayed. My pinstripes didn't bother me so much, it was the paint on the roof that was cracking down to the bare metal that got me looking into it more. It's not starting to happen all over the body as well, and especially on the fender that the Ford dealership replaced and painted after I hit the deer at the end of 2013. It looks terrible - and I religiously waxed and took good care of it for all but the last few years. Disappointing to say the least, but at least there is an affordable fix for me.
 






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