1980's Ford ranger- I need info

roamingaz

Explorer
I have been looking at Ford rangers and found a several of the older 80's style for cheap, one is a king cab 2wd another is a 2wd diesel and so far my favorite is a long bed 4wd 1983, looks good for the year and has a lot of new parts and appears to have factory dual tanks? 4 cyl. engine should be good mpg how reliable are they. So give me your input good or bad on these trucks, I did a search on here and didn't find anything, just curious why they are not a popular truck.
 

02TahoeMD

Explorer
I got to drive an 80s Ranger as a parts truck back then and I remember it as being pretty woefully underpowered with the 4 cyl engine. I dunno where the technology stands with the 80s Rangers but Travis certainly has done a tremendous job with his early 2000's Ranger.
 

chasespeed

Explorer
The 2.3 is a great engine, while it wont win you any races, its reliable, and efficient, and parts are available. Its pretty easy to swap a 302 into these as well.

The 4wd, well, there are a TON of parts available for these. For reliability and simplicity, I would contact AutoFab.

If you want more info than that, look around on the Rangerstation, or RDC.

Chase
 

tommudd

Explorer
I had two Rangers back during that time, first one went 75000 without any problems, then motor issues, last one had three motors in 50,000 miles ( 4 cyl.) so I gave up and went back to full size Fords and Jeeps
 

ExplorerExplorer

Adventurer
I had two Rangers back during that time, first one went 75000 without any problems, then motor issues, last one had three motors in 50,000 miles ( 4 cyl.) so I gave up and went back to full size Fords and Jeeps

I'm the opposite, with one 2.3 that went 250k, and a 2.5 that currently has 200k... Never had any problems...
 

1leg

Explorer
It all depend on how the PO took care of it. I wouldn't expect great MPG out of it. Unless you drive slow, it will feel way underpowered, this will cause you to over compensate by putting the pedal to the floor. A friend had one and the best he ever got was around 15mpg (this was a few year back), but he floored it from every light and screamed down the hwy as fast he could.

So plan on a new/rebuilt motor in the future, Change the oil religiously (with good oil), and don’t drive it like a rental and it should last forever.
 

Digger

New member
Rangers have always been a solid platform. That being said, the best years of these trucks were '86-97 (fuel injected engines with TTB suspension) with the '93-97's being the highest level of refinement while still maintaining off-road capability in stock form. The '93-'97s were available with the big 4.0L V6, stronger manual transmission, Dana 35 TTB front axle and 8.8 rear axle. These trucks were also easy to modify with a straight axle front end.

The 83-'85 models had a decent drivetrain, but they suffered the same problems of most vehicles from those years, underpowered/over-complicated carbureted engines.

After '97, the Rangers switched to the SLA suspension, which was not as rugged off-road and tends to eat ball joints by comparison to the TTB.
 

roamingaz

Explorer
Great info thanks everyone!

The one I was looking at needs alot minor work, it did have factory 2 fuel tanks kinda a odd feature in a 4 cyl truck. Still looking
 

ntsqd

Heretic Car Camper
Just in case you're entertaining the idea, yes the turbo 2.3L SVO Mustang & XR4Ti engines fit where the std. 2.3L is sitting. You just loose most of the heater box if you keep the stock turbo position. Two friends have done this.
 

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