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Just got a new Ford Explorer...

Todd82TA

Well-Known Member
Joined
June 21, 2009
Messages
173
Reaction score
11
City, State
South Florida
Year, Model & Trim Level
2002 Explorer Sport 4x2
Well, not new... but it's new to me.

I donated my old 2002 Ford Explorer Sport (2-door) w/ 4.0L about 7 months ago. I gave it to a kid in the neighborhood that was just getting his license, had straight As, and needed a car. He totally buffed it out, and cleaned it up. It had 183k miles on it when I gave it to him, but it didn't smoke, didn't have the timing chain death rattle, or any other issues. I'd also totally rebuilt the suspension, new brakes, and kept up on all the maintenance, even things like flushing out the break lines and such. I could never get to that 1 spark plug though, haha...

Anyway, this is my "new" car. I was on a business trip for 6 months so I didn't get around to getting anything until now. It's a 2009 Ford Explorer Sport. It has 50,8XX miles on it as it sits. New tires, new battery, all maintenance done. It's in really good shape. It doesn't have a lot of options, but does have the important ones... like a powered sunroof, and the cool paint and wheel package.

Not sure exactly what I want to do with it... but I may add 4x4 hardware to it down the line if I can find a donor car, and probably swap in the powered seats... as well as heated seats if that's an option. In the mean time, I'll just drive it and take care of it.

Also... welcome back to me! haha...

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Sweet. Didn't even know they made a Sport model but I like the wheels and the blacked out accents. The gauges are from the Eddie Bauer.
 






Those are much nicer than the 20 explorers. They are so hard to find here in decent shape. I've seen ones so beat to death, but a few days later, it was sold :lol:
 






That is one sharp looking, clean low mileage 4th gen Explorer. I like the wheels and color.
 






Very nice. The blacked out grille really caught my eye.
 






Thanks guys, I appreciate the comments.

I'm looking to upgrade the car, but don't want to change it too much. I'm not really familiar with this year, but I'm curious what kind of performance parts are available. I know with a lot of Ford vehicles, there's always that "1 year only" part that's better than the other model years, like something stupid like an intake tube that doesn't have baffles and adds 1 million horsepower or something, hahaha...

I know with my 2002 Crown Victoria LX, there were all kinds of parts between the various years that you could add a combination from the varying years, and more realistically add another ~5 horsepower or so with a throttle body from this year, intake tube from another year, MAF from another year. Is there anything like this?

On my 2002 Explorer Sport, I had swapped out the catalytic converter with one from Magnaflow that was all mandrel bent and a slightly larger CFM, which improved my fuel economy on the highway by almost 2mpg. Just looking for the common simple bolt-ons. The motor has so few miles on it that it's not worth it for me to mess with, or even swap out the cams. I'm not looking for any real performance improvement... just looking to make the engine more efficient, and improve fuel economy and driveability.

For the Crown Victoria crowd, we have this: Pontiac Performance - Crown Victoria Year-to-Year Model Changes

Is there anything like this for the 4th gen Explorer? I'd like to fill some of those button slots that don't have anything with them and add features where reasonably possible. Like heated seats, power seat frames, and even memory seats if that's a thing for this model.

Last question, is the mileage stored in the gauge cluster, and is it tied to the ECM / BCM? I'd like to add the better gauge cluster with the larger display (so I can add the INFO / SETUP / RESET buttons). And... is that tied to the radio? Or just the gauge cluster?


Thanks! Sorry for all the questions...
 






I think one thing you should do is paint the wheels to match the trim. I had mine powder coated.
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Very nice Explorer. I bought my 07 fourteen months ago with 90k miles on it. Just turned over 100k and love it.
 






Are those wheels native to that trim package..i dig them..a lot.

Never seen em before, I'd definitely put a set on my 06 EB if I could find 'em for sale..
 






8L2Z-1007-A is the part number. Retail is $983.86 each. I found mine at a junkyard for $40 each and I had them redone. And they are the factory wheel with the Sport package. They were also optional on the other models, like my Limited.
 






These rims were on my Mountaineer from the dealer. They are 20" and take a pretty low profile tire for a SUV. IMO, they are definitely not for those that do any off roading at all. Also, when I put new tires on mine I had to have them road force balanced to get them right. I had to do the same thing on my Steeda Mustang that has 275/40/18 tires. Maybe this is a thing with a lot of low profile tires?
 






I have 265/50R20 tires on mine. No problem balancing. And nowadays, a 50 series tire is not really considered a low profile tire.
 






I found it odd that the sets on both the Mountaineer and Mustang needed this to resolve mild balance issues. The ride quality of both vehicles is quite amazing. Especially the Mountaineer. Plus, the fee for this wasn't all that bad for what they do. The SUV was $110 and the Mustang was only $63 for all four tires.
 






Oh, they're 20" wheels..?

Count me out lol. I'll stick with my 17 inchers...I live in the country..a nice wheel like that would get ****ted up... :(

But they sure are slick!
 






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