newb 00' mountaineer 5.0 AWD

[drifte]

Hello, Ive been lurking here for a long time as I was deciding what I wanted for a fun/practical vehicle. I picked up this 2000 mountaineer Monterey 5.0 awd for cheap with 204k on it. Now the serp belt or a bearing squeels, and the power steering whines. But other than that seems to work fine.

Wondering what major maintanance I should catch up? Trans flush, diff fluids?

I picked it up monday and did tires on tuesday. Wheels will be ordered soon too, just want to make sure it wont just suddenly die after a grand in rubber and rims.

first night

second night with 265-75-15 hercules terra tracs

Tonight I started the plasti-dip process. Spray on flat black plasti dip on everything thats tan. IDK if I'll like it, but it peels off if I dont.

wish list: safari rack, working door handles all around, prerunner bumper, lots of lights. I imagine a little exhaust work and these sound pretty good, I have yet to see how it does off road though. Hopefully...not terrible. If anyone else has an awd model off road let me know how it did. Tranny is another concern, 200k, I dont trust it one bit.

 

[1Aauto]

Welcome to the site

 

[BrooklynBay]

Welcome to this forum!

 

[drifte]

Looks like my photos stopped working.

Heres a picture after I plasti-dipped the lower section that was tan:

Heres a shot from a trail:

Had an idea for a small push bar and threw that together on saturday morning.

Idea is to mount it behind the bumper brackets and still utilize the factory bumper. You can see I also painted the chrome grill black.

Tig welding together 1" 16gauge
10 degree angle, coming together

 

[drifte]

Welding the tube to square stock, and welding the square stock to the frame. Brackets would work...but this is faster.

Stick welding to the frame

Completing the installation

As you can see its not incredibly strong without adding some triangulation. Which later we may go ahead and make a full custom bumper. IMO it looks better without the stock bumper on, but didnt have time to make a full bumper.

 

[00EBV8]

Looking good!

 

[drifte]

Couple shots pulling out of a river bed. Had to have a couple guys sit on the hood as I let it eat and saw'd back and forth.

And here my friend stopped at an inconvenient spot and sank a good 2 feet. I managed to pull him out, and he reattempted with significant speed and actually managed to get air born.