AFBronco235
Crew Chief
I've been on here a few weeks and can't help but notice the lack of a Bronco following. Essepcially on builds. So I thought I'd throw mine out there. I have a link to my build on fullsizebronco.com, but I figure I need one here too, just to fill in for the search function.
I've always been a Ford truck guy. My first was an 85 Ranger. Beautiful condition. I bought it in 2000 for $1200. It only had 6000 (Yes, six THOUSAND) miles on it. The only thing that broke on it was the dry rotted timing belt. It drove like a dream. I used it primarily as a farm truck and go-for vehicle. That is, till it got rear ended by a lady in a van while my dad was driving it.
Next came my 91' F150. I drove that all through college and up until last year. Never gave me any trouble, except for a leaky water pump, which was easy to replace. It had the 4.9 I6 engine. Not as much power as the V8s, but plenty for what I used it for on the farm. But it was still only 2WD. Then last year in January, I came across a Bronco for sale on a used car lot. Bronco's are pretty common in OK, but not so in Indiana. Even so, it's hard to find a Bronco for sale in Oklahoma so I traded in my F150 for something a bit more useful to my needs. I'd enlisted in the air force (No chair force jokes please. I do more work in one day than most bullet catchers do in a week. I've nearly been killed twice and never even deployed!) and didn't need a farm truck anymore. Bronco was stock with 60K miles on it. Interior was rough, but not abused. Just well used. Engine needed some tuning, but the exhaust was shot.
Anyways, when I first got it off the lot, first thing I did was a full tuneup. Plugs, wires, caps, coil and all fluids changed. The base self help auto/hobby shop has lifts for oil changes, so I took the opportunity with it on the lift to look over everything. Exhaust was shot as I mentioned. It looked like it had been broken and rewelded, and not all that well either. Fortunatly, that was the worst of it underneath. Physically, it was in great shape. The only rust problem was on the core support, but that was expected. The mount had rusted right through, probably from a leaky battery.
Next was the electrical system. UGH! Whoever owned it before me fancied himself an electrician. He most certainly was NOT!. My rig came with adjustable air fill shocks. Somehow, he tried to wire in a trailer plug, and I still don't know how, but he spliced the wiring into an AIR LINE! I was literally struck dumb and immobile for several minutes after that discovery. Anyways, I got all the wiring for the lights sorted out and did it the right way with water proof splices and NO VYNIL TAPE! Then came the non functional tranny temp guage. Turns out it was a simple fix. The PO had just reversed the wires. A quick rewire and it was good to go. I was a bit baffled at his use of trailer wire. or I should say, at him using the trailer wire with the PLUG STILL ATTACHED!
There were a few other electrical gremlins I would find later, but those were mostly just loose connections.
Anyways, on to the modifications. The thing I LOVE about Fords is how interchangeable parts are between models and years. Some parts just bolt right in while others need only minor alterations to work.
Tow loops off a Ford Expedition (I have an extra set if anybody is interested.) I did need to drill mounting holes and trim the bumper a bit, but otherwise, you can't tell they're not original.
Next came a custom center consol. The stock "bucket" with cup-holders didn't work so well for me. So I got some 1x12 planks from home depot and built an extension to add to it. Its still a bit of a work in progress. Once I have all that I want mounted to it, I'll line it in vinyl to match the interior.
I also deleted the ash tray and 12v outlet from the dash. I moved the outlet to the old bucket between the cup holders. A simple sheet metal plate covers up the hole. I used the same sheet metal to make a simple control panel too.
I added an auxiliary back up light to the tire rack in back. Now I can see behind me. Comes in handy as a work light too.
I picked up a custom made square tube grill from the junkyard. It was chromed, but badly rusted, so I just sanded it down and painted it matte black. I've added some better lights since this pic.
Next came the exhaust. I decided to go with summit racing pipes with a single cat and easy flow Y-pipe. I left the stock headers after some research showed that swapping out for new wasn't really worth it. Long headers wouldn't fit with the transfer case and front drive axle in the way. Still, it was a definite improvement over the old. I especially like how it growls now!
New vs Old exhaust. I did end up having to trim the exhaust a bit, since it was designed to fit on the loner wheel base F150, but nothing I couldn't handle with a few minutes on the angle grinder (with cutting wheel of course).
Oh, and a quick tweak on the Y-pipe to make it fit, but I was expecting that and came prepared! Redneck exhaust spreader to the rescue.
Anyways, it ran great after that. However, next came my biggest on-going project. What started out as a simple axle seal replacement turned into almost a complete rear end rebuild. Well, the seal was leaking, but in order to replace that, you have to remove the axle. To remove the axle, you have to open the diff case and remove the c-clip holding the axle to the diff. To do THAT, you have to remove the spider gear shaft, and to do that you have to remove a tiny little bolt that holds the shaft in place. Well, the bolt snapped, laving about half of the shaft in the pin. The bolt is only threaded on the upper half while the lower half is all smooth. I couldn't just drill and easy out it. So I eneded up having to cut up the diff housing to remove it! This took place about a week after I discovered the broken bolt, so I had a "new" one lined up. Anyways, I replaced the seal and installed the new diff with old gears. Problem solved right? Wrong. I still don't know what I did, but I ended up screwing up the gears. I guess the shims were put in wrong or something. Anyways, so I ordered a diff rebuild kit from summit racing and got a replacement diff with gears from the jy. All I'd really wanted was the gears, but it turns out they were mounted on a limited slip dif, so I just dropped the whole unit in. Then I took a few hours and shimmed it just right. Backlash was perfect. All new bearings installed (nearly broke the shop press trying to get one of the old bearings off), shimmed up the pinion just right, torqued it all down right and in the right order and finally, I was done with the ********** diff. lol.
And yes, I used LS additive.
And that was it for all the reliability fixes. Next up, the upgrades!
I've always been a Ford truck guy. My first was an 85 Ranger. Beautiful condition. I bought it in 2000 for $1200. It only had 6000 (Yes, six THOUSAND) miles on it. The only thing that broke on it was the dry rotted timing belt. It drove like a dream. I used it primarily as a farm truck and go-for vehicle. That is, till it got rear ended by a lady in a van while my dad was driving it.
Next came my 91' F150. I drove that all through college and up until last year. Never gave me any trouble, except for a leaky water pump, which was easy to replace. It had the 4.9 I6 engine. Not as much power as the V8s, but plenty for what I used it for on the farm. But it was still only 2WD. Then last year in January, I came across a Bronco for sale on a used car lot. Bronco's are pretty common in OK, but not so in Indiana. Even so, it's hard to find a Bronco for sale in Oklahoma so I traded in my F150 for something a bit more useful to my needs. I'd enlisted in the air force (No chair force jokes please. I do more work in one day than most bullet catchers do in a week. I've nearly been killed twice and never even deployed!) and didn't need a farm truck anymore. Bronco was stock with 60K miles on it. Interior was rough, but not abused. Just well used. Engine needed some tuning, but the exhaust was shot. Anyways, when I first got it off the lot, first thing I did was a full tuneup. Plugs, wires, caps, coil and all fluids changed. The base self help auto/hobby shop has lifts for oil changes, so I took the opportunity with it on the lift to look over everything. Exhaust was shot as I mentioned. It looked like it had been broken and rewelded, and not all that well either. Fortunatly, that was the worst of it underneath. Physically, it was in great shape. The only rust problem was on the core support, but that was expected. The mount had rusted right through, probably from a leaky battery.
Next was the electrical system. UGH! Whoever owned it before me fancied himself an electrician. He most certainly was NOT!. My rig came with adjustable air fill shocks. Somehow, he tried to wire in a trailer plug, and I still don't know how, but he spliced the wiring into an AIR LINE! I was literally struck dumb and immobile for several minutes after that discovery. Anyways, I got all the wiring for the lights sorted out and did it the right way with water proof splices and NO VYNIL TAPE! Then came the non functional tranny temp guage. Turns out it was a simple fix. The PO had just reversed the wires. A quick rewire and it was good to go. I was a bit baffled at his use of trailer wire. or I should say, at him using the trailer wire with the PLUG STILL ATTACHED!
There were a few other electrical gremlins I would find later, but those were mostly just loose connections.
Anyways, on to the modifications. The thing I LOVE about Fords is how interchangeable parts are between models and years. Some parts just bolt right in while others need only minor alterations to work.
Tow loops off a Ford Expedition (I have an extra set if anybody is interested.) I did need to drill mounting holes and trim the bumper a bit, but otherwise, you can't tell they're not original.
Next came a custom center consol. The stock "bucket" with cup-holders didn't work so well for me. So I got some 1x12 planks from home depot and built an extension to add to it. Its still a bit of a work in progress. Once I have all that I want mounted to it, I'll line it in vinyl to match the interior.
I also deleted the ash tray and 12v outlet from the dash. I moved the outlet to the old bucket between the cup holders. A simple sheet metal plate covers up the hole. I used the same sheet metal to make a simple control panel too.
I added an auxiliary back up light to the tire rack in back. Now I can see behind me. Comes in handy as a work light too.
I picked up a custom made square tube grill from the junkyard. It was chromed, but badly rusted, so I just sanded it down and painted it matte black. I've added some better lights since this pic.
Next came the exhaust. I decided to go with summit racing pipes with a single cat and easy flow Y-pipe. I left the stock headers after some research showed that swapping out for new wasn't really worth it. Long headers wouldn't fit with the transfer case and front drive axle in the way. Still, it was a definite improvement over the old. I especially like how it growls now!
New vs Old exhaust. I did end up having to trim the exhaust a bit, since it was designed to fit on the loner wheel base F150, but nothing I couldn't handle with a few minutes on the angle grinder (with cutting wheel of course).
Oh, and a quick tweak on the Y-pipe to make it fit, but I was expecting that and came prepared! Redneck exhaust spreader to the rescue.
Anyways, it ran great after that. However, next came my biggest on-going project. What started out as a simple axle seal replacement turned into almost a complete rear end rebuild. Well, the seal was leaking, but in order to replace that, you have to remove the axle. To remove the axle, you have to open the diff case and remove the c-clip holding the axle to the diff. To do THAT, you have to remove the spider gear shaft, and to do that you have to remove a tiny little bolt that holds the shaft in place. Well, the bolt snapped, laving about half of the shaft in the pin. The bolt is only threaded on the upper half while the lower half is all smooth. I couldn't just drill and easy out it. So I eneded up having to cut up the diff housing to remove it! This took place about a week after I discovered the broken bolt, so I had a "new" one lined up. Anyways, I replaced the seal and installed the new diff with old gears. Problem solved right? Wrong. I still don't know what I did, but I ended up screwing up the gears. I guess the shims were put in wrong or something. Anyways, so I ordered a diff rebuild kit from summit racing and got a replacement diff with gears from the jy. All I'd really wanted was the gears, but it turns out they were mounted on a limited slip dif, so I just dropped the whole unit in. Then I took a few hours and shimmed it just right. Backlash was perfect. All new bearings installed (nearly broke the shop press trying to get one of the old bearings off), shimmed up the pinion just right, torqued it all down right and in the right order and finally, I was done with the ********** diff. lol.
And yes, I used LS additive.
And that was it for all the reliability fixes. Next up, the upgrades!
