brianjwilson: January '08 Featured Truck

Well I've been sort of a lurker here for a while with my Ranger, but I just picked up an 05 sport trac a few days ago, so I thought I would introduce myself.
I've been over at offroadrangers.com for a few years with my 98 Ranger.
The ranger is an XLT Supercab 4x4 4.0L manual tranny with a 3" body lift, TT, shackles, bilstiens, manual hubs, moog upper and lower balljoints and tierod ends, custom bumper, canopy, 15x8's and 33x12.50's. She has been a great truck (140k miles now) and now I'm replacing her with the Sport Trac. I'll be very said to see the Ranger go away.
My wife drives a 97 Explorer XLT 4.0L 4x4 auto, fully loaded on 31x10.50's with around 107k miles on it.
The Sport Trac is a 2005 XLT 4x4, standard options (cloth, a/c, cd, tilt, cruise, power stuff, fog lights). All I have done so far is install a Pioneer CD/mp3 player, and tint the windows (13% driver and passenger, 6% everything behind that). My plans are a 3" bodylift (was supposed to arrive today) with 33x12.50's on 15x8's, 4.56 gears with a locker perhaps, and an xcal2 from doug and bama or rouge performance.
My wife and I live outside the Portland Oregon area. She's finishing up her bachelor in Psychology and I'm a helicopter flight instructor. I like to tinker with stuff (wiring and radios too) and makes my trucks/bikes a little different from the others around. I look forward to picking up new ideas from the people on here and sharing some of my own. Let me share a few pictures of our trucks...

The 97 Explorer; (now has M/T's)

And finally the new (to me) Sport Trac;

Here's a quick sample
No body lift yet, just a test fit for the wheels

Snapped a few quick pictures of the sport trac. Worked all weekend on the body lift (what a pain some of that was!), put the wheels and tires on today. Had to trim a fair amount of plastic in the front wheel wells but all seems clear now!
So far;
3" body lift
33x12.50 cooper stt's on 15x8's
Warrior front and rear sway bar disconnects
Window tint & Ventshades
A.R.E. fiberglass bed cover (great deal, used)
Aussie locker for the rear (not yet installed)
Still contemplating the Camburg "4x4" upgrade" and front and rear hitches
Soon ordering an xcal 2 tuner from rouge performance
I have Warrior shackles, but it looks like it needs a torsion bar adjustment just to sit level. Maybe the shackles will go on the wife's Explorer...

Here's the trimming. No before photos. There is some metal removed (just did it) so it needs a little cleaning, but you get the idea.

Oh and here are a couple of the swaybar discos..
Front

Rear (link removed)

I already bought an xcal2 from james, thanks! Works great. I can adjust for axle ratios, tire size and a bunch of other stuff that I don't understand . Definitely helped performance a bit and improved shifting.

I disconnect the swaybars for a smoother ride and more wheel travel (see pictures). I've been leaving the rear disconnected and the front on most of the time.
The truck is a four wheel drive. I ordered the bodylift, swaybar disconnects and the shackles from tellico4x4.com. I actually just took off the front quick disconnects and put the stock end links back on, I didn't like the design of the disconnects so I'm going to through them back on ebay or something. I find its actually easier to just carry a 16mm and 15mm socket and remove one endlink.
I haven't installed the shackles yet. I might use them on my wifes explorer.

Sway bars disconnected;

Info threads:
http://www.explorerforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=194747
http://www.explorerforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=195855
http://www.explorerforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=196263

 

[Paraphoe]

I have 4 - 8" round Delta foglights in black casings with 130 watt bulbs sitting in the garage.
I haven't mounted them yet, because I always hit trees and stuff with my rack as it is, don't want to break the lights. So I'm trying to figure out an easy way to make the lights tilt back out of the way before I wire them up. Then I'll run a cheap small rectangle fog light on each side (facing sideways) and two on the back.

Nice. That should look awesome. Are you sure they're fogs though? You might not want to mount fogs on a roof rack. You'd be much better off with driving lights up there.

 

[brianjwilson]

Yes I know that now, lol.
I wasn't sure what the light pattern was going to look like, but I bought them for $70, used. I hooked one up to a 12v battery I have laying around the other night and it is a really wide pattern (good), but a really slim profile (not so good)...
I'd really like 2 wide angle fog/flood lights on the outside, and two driving lights in the middle. But this is what I have for now. I just spent almost $100 on a new winch disconnect and some other recovery stuff, money is too tight for new lights right now. It's hard to tell what they will look like until I mount them up there and turn them on anyway. I might make a temp wiring harness and throw them on the roof at night just to see how it looks.

Here's a crappy photoshop job I did a while back with the lights, slightly out of scale though..

I don't want to mount them in a fixed position any higher than that, but I also don't want to break all the lenses with tree branches. I still might mount them higher, and make them fold back into the basket out of side and out of the way. Either that or make some sort of quick disconnect mount and mount them like they are in the picture.

 

[Paraphoe]

Not sure how off the sizing is with the photoshop job, but they look HUGE! Haha

 

[dkchrist]

just wondering where did the bumper come from on the ranger?

 

[brianjwilson]

just wondering where did the bumper come from on the ranger?

It was a custom job from badlandbumpers.com in Seattle

 

[Burns]

Very nice man


Hope it stays looking great for a long time

 

[brazzle]

gorgeous.

i wish i had the guts (or skills, or brains) to mod my '02 Ex

 

[Rusty]

for some reason i am not able to see any pics... nothing shows up!? is it me or is there none actually there?

 

[FlyBoyCoe]

Beautiful SportTrac Brian! I'm going to have to show your pics to a buddy of mine with a ST for inspiration. You've got yourself a very good looking truck there. Congrats!

 

[brianjwilson]

Thanks for the compliments. My server has short lapses where it won't display pictures. Should be good now