Can I put the body panels of a 1st gen on the front of my second gen?

[Vademastwe]

my hood and fenders are all messed up and dented on my 98 explorer but the rest is all good and I have a wrecked 92 that has a good front end on it. So I was wondering if I could put the fenders and hood and grill of the 1st gen on the second gen?

 

[Rick]

I have 2nd gen fenders on my 1st gen. They do not line up properly with the doors. The fender support structure is different on the 2nd gen.

I had an entire 2nd gen swap kit with fiberglass fenders and hood. The fenders had 4" flares and I couldn't see the tire when I was rock crawling so I bought a set of 2nd gen steel fenders, stock replacements. That is when I realized they had taken the changes into consideration when they built the fiberglass fenders.

The lower shot shows the misalignment issue with the steel fender. The hood is also lower than the edges of the fenders.

 

[Josh P]

That is a sexy Explorer!

 

[410Fortune]

I would just go find some gen ii body parts probably in the same color (paint code) as your 98

A hood and two fenders can be had in about 30 minutes and that’s only because the fenders have one stupid
10mm that goes into the header panel
. Junk yard or private seller would likely be $100 for those parts

Or

Fix up the 92! They are tanks and the ttb is better