F Y I - spare tire

[fireftr]

I have a '92 EB w/186k on it. Still runs good; oil & filter every 3k, rotate tires at 5k, trans fluid periodically. Just a little less pep than when purchased at 36k. Getting to the point - I dropped my spare tire ( key phrase here) to check the pressure prior to a trip, and was amazed to find that it was being supported by only one strand of the cable! I shudder to think what would have happened if it had completely let go. Salt and corrosion had eaten the cable where it joins and goes thru a T shaped metal piece. Think Ford could be named in a law suit where someone got killed by a stray tire crashing thru their windshield? I don't know, but I fixed mine by removing the corroded cable from the piece, reinserting the end thru it, then looped around a bolt, securing with a common cable cinch and some JB Weld for good measure. Thankfully, my story has a happy ending. Hope no one else ever lost their tire, or looses it in front of me!

 

[RTStork]

Thanks for the tip! We should all go check for a corroded cable.

 

[bigDerk]

Seems like it would mainly be an issue for the northern Explorer owners, since us southern folks don't have to throw salt all over the darn roads

 

[Byrd91]

On my old 91 I actually did lose mine. The bad thing is that I didn't even know when it happened. I was looking underneath at the shackles or shocks one time and realized it wasn't there. I asked my dad (previous owner) if there was a spare, he said yeah, I said not anymore. The corroded cable was also the culprit. I keep an eye on it now.