01 STrunner's Sport Trac | Page 9 | Ford Explorer Forums - Serious Explorations

  • Register Today It's free!

01 STrunner's Sport Trac

My name is Patrick and now that I've finally done some work I'll start a registry to keep track of where it's been and where it's going. I'll try to organize it chronologically as best I can.

I got the truck in June of 2008 with 70,000 miles on it.

Newest Setup: SAS/SOA, 3" BL, Warrior Shackles for ~12" total lift.

ddcc19f1-0420-4342-a05b-6c699b3803ec_zps2d83b7bb.jpg


Some quick stats:
2001 Explorer Sport Trac
4X4
4.88 Gears
LP Dana 44HD Front Axle with leaf springs
SOA Stock 8.8 in the rear
35x12.50 BFG KM2s
17x9 Cragar Soft8 wheels
6x5.5 bolt pattern all 4 corners
Advantage Hard Hat bed cover

Here she is the day we brought her home

PJ-vehicle.jpg


And of course it had to be approved by our skilled research team

AngelinPJvehicle.jpg


The first thing I did to it was add a little ford emblem over the door badging. This pic is pretty recent but the best closeup I have of it. And when you're 15 stickers are still fricken sweet haha.

photo-2-1.jpg


Another pic after a nice bath and detailing

0307001756a.jpg


My backyard; well sorta. Shenandoah National Forest is about 20 or 30 min away. I really like the view

1011101421-1.jpg


This is a mountain bike park my buddies and I hit up a lot. The sun was at a cool angle so I snapped a quick picture.

1106101246-1.jpg


Next thing (About a year and a half later) was a new set of shoes as beach driving was in the very near future and I needed a tire I wouldn't get stuck with. Got a set of Hercules Terra Trac A/T's in the stock size yet again. Before the beach trip I added a CB since we were traveling with RV's as a little group to OBX. That was just mounted on the passenger side of the console and the antenna was run under the carpet to the magnet mount antenna on the roof.

And the best way to go to the beach:

photo1-7.jpg


photo4-4.jpg


After the beach trip I decided I needed a little extra light in the back for hooking up trailers and just for more light whenever I wanted. Or to tell someone behind me to shut their damn high beams off. So I went down to Autozone and for $20 picked up a cheap pair of 3X5 Pilot Aux lights and hooked them up to a switch that I put down on the side of the console.

0818101229.jpg


Also that was after a little fun with friends in an old park I found near my high school. Also from this next pic you can see how worn out the old shocks are. They were creaking over every little bump. Ended up having a local shop replace all 4 - Monroe Sensa-Tracs on the front and Monroe air adjustable shocks in the rear so it could be leveled out under heavy loads.

0818101230-1.jpg


Heres a somewhat side shot with the new shock. Easily an inch or 2 higher. Before I learned mud was the devil...

11061012131.jpg


A pic of the air shocks getting a workout. The setup is about 6000-6500 lbs. - Little overloaded but at the time it was our only choice for a tow vehicle since we got rid of our 3/4 ton with the 8.1 liter Vortec. Truck did fine the temp gauge didn't even rise but she didn't like overdrive at all.

1121101523.jpg


My friends and I are big into snowboarding. Since the bed is so small, had to put the board up on the roof. So a Yakima rack was added on top.

That sunbleached gray cladding just wasn't cutting it anymore and I started to see guys on here that painted theirs black and I loved the way it looked. After researching a little I found Krylon Fusion to be the main paint everyone used. Got a few cans and started the project.

0219111052.jpg

0219111052a.jpg


And After:
IMG_0006.jpg

IMG_0009.jpg

IMG_0003.jpg


For a year and a half the truck really didn't change. I was too busy with school, sports and helping remodel the entire house to really think about it.

I then got into Clemson University and joined the Offroad club. There was already a sport trace in it!! although it was stock. But hey 2's better than 1.
We took a couple trips but I've really only got pictures from Uwharrie Nat'l Forest just outside Charlotte.

c64c3a64.jpg

fd260e82.jpg

ce156402.jpg


Decided while I was there to get my wheels repainted dirt brown. Still haven't learned my lesson about mud
33eb3979.jpg

bf1fee91.jpg


I went to the wrong state to want college and coming home to VA only gave me a little hope before our annual trip to Snowshoe WV. And yes we're dumb enough to men bike in a couple inches of snow.

photo-2.jpg


Back at school I was starting to go crazy not bing able to do work on my truck after looking over projects on here all winter. I got a small fix when Offtrac said there was a guy selling a brush guard which I had been looking for. He also threw in some clear corner lamps for nothin!

photo2.jpg


Finally finals week was done and I could start working on the TT/Shackle Lift

Heres a picture of it before the lift:

100_0752.jpg


I was experimenting with the front bumper and was too lazy to put it back on for the picture.


Like Lono I put the jack stands on the frame right in front of the wheel wells and used the bottle jack to push the leaf springs down so i could put the bolts in.

100_0753.jpg




With the shackles only: the stupid bolt killed what daylight I had left so the torsion keys had to wait for the next day.

100_0754.jpg



After the TT so its all done! And now the cladding is off to be painted minus the front bumper. I wanted to see what it looked like.

photo1-1.jpg


photo2-1.jpg


photo4.jpg


Finally looking like a truck

After that the body lift was next:

100_0752.jpg


TT/Shackles:

photo4.jpg


And after body lift:

photo1-5.jpg

photo2-5.jpg

photo3-4.jpg

photo4-3.jpg

photo1-6.jpg


There wasn't a terrible amount of trimming to do. Still waiting to see how it all flexes out. It took me long enough. After 4 years of owning the Trac and almost 60,000 miles later its barely the same as when I bought it home from the dealer. It took about 2 and a half years before I even started looking to do anything. I really have to thank everyone on here for their help and guidance. Now she sits high but there's always room for improvement and I'll update as I go along.
 



Join the Elite Explorers for $20 each year.
Elite Explorer members see no advertisements, no banner ads, no double underlined links,.
Add an avatar, upload photo attachments, and more!
.





You definitely need bigger tires :eek: I'm thinking 42"s

Maybe 38s. I doubt bigger than that. 42s would blow up the 44. For those I'd need 1 tons.
 



Join the Elite Explorers for $20 each year.
Elite Explorer members see no advertisements, no banner ads, no double underlined links,.
Add an avatar, upload photo attachments, and more!
.





yea for sure. 37s is pushing it. hubs are readily available to me so im aiming for those to be my weakness. should be alright. anything above that start thinking tons for sure.

http://norfolk.craigslist.org/cto/3631738919.html
this guys got 44" hawgs on a d44! his old pics i saw i swear it was an 8 lug, but still a d44. its been for sale for over two years lol
 






I always feel like mud trucks are poorly thought out. They always seem to have tires way to big for their suspension or something like that. I saw a video of a new silverado 2500 on 46s with a 14" lift. His t-bars were dropped so far down along with the IFS components it just looked dumb.
 












Hey, any idea what the measurements are between your leaf springs? It almost looks like your leafs are directly below the frame, most i've seen run an outrigger pushing the leaves to where the inside of the shackle is towards the outside of the frame rail.

Do you have any pics of where your leaf springs are mounted front and rear?

Are you running your shackles in the front or the rear of the leaf?

Sorry for asking so many questions on here... i'm designing all the parts for my swap now, and gathering the parts i'll be needing.
 






No problem with the questions man. That's what this place is for. I don't know the distance between perches but the rear mounts are mounted on the outside of the frame rails. I'll see if I can't find a picture of it tomorrow. And yes my shackles are in the rear. Don't run front shackles. I've seen them break way to many times on YJs on the trails to even consider it. You're definitely good getting all the parts before you start. My schedule for this got jumped up several months and waiting on parts to get here is really killing the timeframe of the project itself. Steering is mostly the holdup for me as far as waiting on parts.
 






Dolbs, check out Chad's SAS build thread, there's detailed pitures of both front and rear leaf shackles and mounts.
 






I've got every picture from chads build saved to my computer (as well as all of these). It looks like the standard is 31.5" centers on the leafs... That's what the stock wagoner axles came with. I'm using a 76 bronco d44 with the wedges shaved off and running leafs on it...
 






On my thread about the '77 Dana 44 there's a link that shows every measurement for all Dana axles, keylime something, I'm on the road right now so I can't link it.
 






And Mr. N's website has a ton of axle info as well. (Just google Mr. N)

Little bit of an update. The drag link and tie rod are just leaving CA today. They were supposed to be here today but instead I just got a tracking number. I'm a bit upset with them right now. The front driveshaft is going to be a pain because of the existing crossmember. The rear should be ok. We'll see when the time comes.
 






What crossmember? Torsion bar bracket crossmember gets removed from what I can see in everyone else's builds. The ifs front crossmember gets cut out too.
 






I'm not exactly sure. Just relaying that bit. I don't remember seeing anything in the way when I was up looking at it the other weekend. On the plus side I can pitch the rear axle carrier so the rear shaft should work alright. The front will have to be lengthened though like Chad did with his.
 






Chad had his Superlift front driveshaft modified. I'm not sure if we can use the ST driveshaft yoke, might need to get the GW yoke and elf it to the ST shaft, haven't looked into it yet.
 






Hey think I can run 35s instead of 33s been thinking about it 3"BL and TT schakles with trimming
 






Yep, it can be done, that's what Hugh and Patrick did with their's.
 






Yeah there's something about having to make it work with the u joint. I'm not too sure on that part. The shafts and steering are too complicated for me.
 






Maybe 38s. I doubt bigger than that. 42s would blow up the 44. For those I'd need 1 tons.

Haha I was joking

37's are a good size for just about everything. Not to many guys run bigger than a 37 on our size trucks. 42's are for the full size trucks/mudders
 






And Mr. N's website has a ton of axle info as well. (Just google Mr. N)

Little bit of an update. The drag link and tie rod are just leaving CA today. They were supposed to be here today but instead I just got a tracking number. I'm a bit upset with them right now. The front driveshaft is going to be a pain because of the existing crossmember. The rear should be ok. We'll see when the time comes.

Hey, sent ya a pm yesterday or the day before.

Was wondering what drag link/tie rod you ended up using? custom made or something stock?

where did you order it from?

Would a kit like this work? http://www.tmrcustoms.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=143_208&products_id=1588
 






Hey man sorry I didn't answer back. Work and practice has been crazy recently. I sent you a PM back! For the company, I don't remember the name right now but they royally F'd up my order (shipped it 4 weeks late so the truck's been sitting at a standstill for 3 weeks) and I don't suggest using them. I'll get the name of the company and measurements sometime next week probably. Im in SC and the shop guys went to Daytona for Bike Week so no one's there this week.
 



Join the Elite Explorers for $20 each year.
Elite Explorer members see no advertisements, no banner ads, no double underlined links,.
Add an avatar, upload photo attachments, and more!
.





Haha I was joking

37's are a good size for just about everything. Not to many guys run bigger than a 37 on our size trucks. 42's are for the full size trucks/mudders

I do realllly like JJ's ranger build that he's finishing up that's on 40s. I'm glad he dropped it 7" from what it was at and now its a friggin awesome rig.
 






Back
Top