Lill Mule 89 BII

[shawn.m]

12v power to the seats tonight, used a spare light harness. - my son spent 5 minutes just going uppp bbbbbaaacck, ffooorrwward, lumber ooouutt, luumber iiiinnn, seat wings iiiiinn, seat wings oooouuutt.

also hooked up a 3 pot 12v supply to the cigar lighter on a power switch. Stuck it with double sided tape to the dash.

also bought a rear view mirror and put it on. nice to see out the back. Windshield moved when i put it on the windshield so need to get that taken care of.

time for pictures.

 

[shawn.m]

did the zip tie trick to the gas pedal. truck is much more responsive. kudos to the board

pulled the console out of the exploder and put it in the bronco. might put the sun shades also as they are the two piece ones and I have the one piece ones.

getting closer to pulling the motor and M50d out of the exploder. researching to see what is allowable wear to the Mazda 5 speed. the shifter forks do have some wear to the forks. Only a little whine out of the mazda 5 speed.

 

[shawn.m]

pic of explorer seats and console in bronco

have to take a picture of the LED lits in the cab - bought another set of strips for the rear.

Noticed as I was crawling around under the bronco in prep for tranny. that the stock tranny is pulling away from the bell housing. HOLY CRUD! good thing i spotted this now instead of the on the trail.

motor ready to pull out of the exploder - anybody want a explorer shell?

 

[shawn.m]

m50d with the transfer case is on the floor next to the bronco!

Clutch looks real good on the 4.0 that I pulled out. Any comments on reusing the throwout bearing?

pic of the Leds in the cab

pic of the remote 12v power station with usb charging and a on/off switch

pic of the front headlights after polishing them up

 

[shawn.m]

picked up a set of Rancho 9012 with 13" of travel at a garage school for $20. also picked up a set of Rancho air adjustable 91118 and 9115 with Rancho compressor for $35 at the local swap meet.
ordered a set of Ford F250 shock towers so that I could put in the 9012 in front. Local guy with another chopped B2 has a set of wild horses 5.5 progressive front springs that he will trade for my auto motor off the transfer case

 

[shawn.m]

did a small project last weekend.
I have been driving without a swaybar since I bought the Bronco and really not liking it on the twisting mountain roads where I live.

so I picked up a sway bar with all brackets at the local junkyard.

I needed to drop the mounting points with the 6" lift and did not like the 4" drop brackets that are available. So I cut some 3" tall metal square tube that I had sitting around and bolted it up using Grade 5 bolts.
Mixed results - Drives great on the road but with any flex the tie roads hit the sway bar.

so I had the sway bar end links from the explorer that I parted. they are 1.5 longer than the bronco 2 ones. Bolted these up - New problem the sway bar ends hit the springs.

Ok so now I took the sway bar mounts that mount to the bracket and moved them forward about3/4 inch. Did this by grinding about 1/4 off the front of the sway bar mounts. Then drilled new holes in the sway bar mount bracket to move the whole bar forward.

drove it again and have less sway driving on road. Also did a off road loop on my property and nothing hit. :icon_thumby:

Now I just need to get some tractor hitch pins to replace the bottom bolts for the sway bar links. This will make it a quick disconnect. also need to make a bracket on the frame to hold the sway bar when it is disconnected up and out of the way

Now I just need to find some cheap Jeep 4" lift coils and swap out the coils. maybe call the guy that I meet back in May about swapping springs.

Also found a piece of 1" think steel that is 6" long and 3" tall. if I get motivated I can move the center link points down by 2" as suggested else where.

 

[Ranger Kip]

nice truck

 

[shawn.m]

thanks
also moved headlights to below the light bar in the front for better visibility on trail in tight situations. small things really help

 

[disciplerocks]

All that work and no SAS? I think that should be next on the list.

Nice truck btw.

 

[shawn.m]

SAS is on the list - unemployed for last 5 months makes things tough.

It flexs pretty good right now. I think I can add jeep coils, f250 shock brackets-i have them-, 9012 front shocks -have them- should give me 20 inch of flex in front. For pretty cheap price.

I think i need a doubler before a SAS

 

[shawn.m]

mitis 5 speed pulled and m50d is right next to it. only broke 1 bolt on the cat.
Did break a T30 bit inside the front bolt for the U Joint strap. That really made be unhappy. broke right at the bolt face so I can not get the bit out. Might have to drop the whole D35 pig out. The D35 looks like it needs to come out as it is leaking from the gasket area. good steady drip. Might as well do it all at once.

Looks like I am also going to pull motor and swap it with the one from the explorer. The lifters are having problems staying pumped up plus if it sits for a while it starts blowing white smoke.

Only thing would have to do is swap the top end electrical harness. the harness are really close - only thing different is that the explorer has 1 O2 sensor compared to the 2 O2 sensors from the Ranger.
Their is oil coming down the backside of the motor from the intake manifold. I can also see the rebuild stickers on the heads.
the biggest thing I am going to regret is that the AC system is filled up and going to release all that r12.

went looking at the manual 1350 transfer case at the junkyard for $125. Really not sure I want to go to the slip yoke front. I know that several people have said that they had no problems going to the 1350 slip yoke from the fixed of the 1354E. Just not sure I want to go that route if I am thinking of a D44 in the future.

 

[shawn.m]

pics of transmission and the 4 studs that moved

Only thing preventing the bellhousing from moving more was the throwout bearing.

Old and new Transmission. I have already taken the bell housing off and put the studs back in tight to the tranny. Tighten everything up and throw it on Craigs list plus here to get rid of it.

 

[shawn.m]

Alright popped motor out - it looks like it has a leaking head gasket. Can see water on the passenger side of the block between the head and block.

can also see lots of oil coming from the intake manifold and heads

and a empty engine bay!

 

[smash9002]

Glad I finally caught up to your build! It looks like my old BII has gone to the right person. Really interesting and cool that your using it for search and rescue, I am a wilderness first responder.. If you ever need someone to tag along on a trip let me know!

I cant believe the transmission separated like that.. when I first bought the bronco the trans was howling, so I swapped it with a trans from a parts BII I had. So the rivets must have come loose because of the 4.0 power.. +1 for not using the mitsu trans behind the 4.0!

The rear leaf springs should be Skyjacker 6"

Nice work- keep it up and keep the updates and pics coming!

 

[shawn.m]

picked up jeep front coils that are supposed to be 4" lift with 2 inch blocks today for $45 may have to pull coil buckets and weld on the new shock towers. will post a pic - dont look long enough.

smash9002 do you remember what locker was in front?

 

[smash9002]

stock ford trac-loc is what I was told.

 

[shawn.m]

thanks - should have pics of it inards as need to drop it to redo the gaskets

 

[shawn.m]

ok measured the new springs
they are .400 wider on outside
same amounts of coils
diameter of coils is .725 on SkyJacker springs , .655 on new ones

Put one of them in to test. sag is 1 inch more, also wheel goes into wheel well almost 3 inchs more just by jacking up side of arm.

Looks like about 16 inches of travel at the outside edge of the wheel with another 2 inches before I hit the bump stop.

I will need to find a way to hold the spring in the upper pocket. Perhaps with a simple piece of strap steel. Has me thinking of a bucket on the bottom to let the arm travel down more past the spring. I would have to run limiter straps to make sure it does not travel past the shocks. Fairly cheap. kinda like a upside down Zimmerman bucket mod

That is about what I want - little more stuff in the front to make it more compliant. The real test will be once I put the motor and tranny back in. For the moment it looks like I will gain 3 more inches of up travel with a more supple ride.

Also I can keep the same length shocks with this setup. If the front comes down a inch or so I dont mind. That will keep it all level. I might swap in the Rancho 9000 adjustable shocks that I picked up couple of months ago as they are the same length compressed and extended. Would really like to use the air adjustable feature.

Will post all the pictures tomorrow.

 

[shawn.m]

http://www.engineersedge.com/calculators/comp_spring_k_pop.htm
says the new springs are 235lb in which sounds about right - think it has been mentioned the grand cherorkee springs are 250lb ib

it also says the skyjackers are right around 450in lb which the stock rate.

 

[shawn.m]

I was reading the 130 pages of rookieshoters build
http://www.explorerforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=134735
and it has me thinking of what weight I can ditch or move around. batteries in the back sounds like a easy thing to do.