Learn me Ranger..

How hard is it to make a Ranger like this handle?: http://philadelphia.craigslist.org/cto/1913785126.html

I would love to do an autocrossy tracky pickup. Not like this:

But like this Syclone:

I'm sorry that I have nothing productive to tell you.

Camber gain is your enemy. Excessive lowering adds lots of unneeded negative camber. You can probably get into the 5-5.5^ caster without getting drastic. Dump the rear springs for something way softer. Run the biggest bars you can find. Add weight bars to the rear.

Oh and don't forget to add some damn power, like a total of 300rwhp worth. Or you just end up with a European-esqe slug.

Brian

I won't swear to it but I think that truck has the I-beam font suspension. If so any adjustment for camber will be well nigh impossible short of bending the I-Beams. A quick read says the double wishbone front end came out in '98.

Look here.

Yep, that one is twin I beam. Tough as nails but crappy for handling. As lowered as that one is, there's no way you could bend the I beams enough to get the camber good. I'd look at a similar era Nissan, Toyota or S10 for a 'handling' truck.

98+ has a-arms up front.

(which will need ball joints prematurely, but that's another rant.)

4cyl...meh. Had one, hated it. They probably make dropped I beams like they do for the full size trucks but those are predictably expensive.

Toyman01 wrote: I won't swear to it but I think that truck has the I-beam font suspension. If so any adjustment for camber will be well nigh impossible short of bending the I-Beams. A quick read says the double wishbone front end came out in '98. Look here.

That's what Ranger50 was talkin' 'bout with the camber gain. The M2 A-arm sounds pretty good, if you can get around the blasted HUGE crossmember that the Twin I Beam uses. That would probably take a custom x-member. I would love to see it done, though!

I just wish someone made a, what I would call a, "+3" I-beam. You can easily get some positive camber back through an alignment and offset bushings at about 5" of drop, but it's pushing it. Once you put in the 3" springs, you can never get back below 1^ negative camber. So the I-beam itself needs to have some positive camber added to get back to somewhere alignable. If i had the facilities, I would already have made a set.

This is the one reason why I said find and run the biggest swaybars you can make/buy. You will wear out the inner tire edge no matter what alignment setting you run. So you will have to restrict the compression and extension to avoid wearing out the edge even sooner.

JMO here, but twin I-beams will work as a decent performance suspension. It just needs some additional work, like less overall vehicle weight, some tires closer to performance sizes (245/45R17 front/275/40R17 rear) and big bars, and additional power to make it work effectively.

Brian

Ford actually tried to sell a "sporty" Ranger in the late '80s. YES, '80s, it was called the Ranger GT and had a slightly lowered suspension...or maybe it only looked that way because it was the first truck that came from the factory with an "areo package". They sold it for about a year and a half and then dropped it, preferring, instead to sell Rangers called "Sport" but in paint job only.

As others have said, you can't get a pre-'98 Ranger to handle (Ford, what is it with you guys, you give us a Fox-based Mustang that can't easily be made to handle and you tempt us with a small, sporty-looking truck).

Actually, if you are willing to put up with some noise a Fox body can easily be made to handle reasonably well. The secret: the stock rear suspension bushings don't allow the axle to articulate in the body, leading to all kinds of weirdness. The fix: loosen the rear control arm bolts enough so the bushing rotates around the bolt, it now becomes a noisy bearing. Worked well for our LeMons T bird, which handled VERY well right up till the motor blew.

Jensenman wrote: ...Worked well for our LeMons T bird, which handled VERY well right up till the motor blew.

Again.

I had a 1989 Ranger. It was the STX model. It came witha 2.9L V6 5 speed. It was lower then the standard Ranger and having owned a Mustand GT before buying the Ranger i think it handled quite well. I added a rear sway bar and traction bars to the rear. I ran 215/70X14 tires and I surprised many a so called sporty car with it. I also had a friend who worked for Kenny Brown back in the last 80's, who at the time was crew chief for Salien Racing. They were running Mustangs and Rangers PU's in a two different Pro showroom stock race series in SCCA. My friend worked with Ford engineers in finding the best combination of parts to may the Rangers handle. Most people in their 20's won't remember the PRO mini PU truck road race series that SCCA used as a support race to their Trans Am race series back then.

I've heard speculation (no more) that it may be possible to graft a recent Explorer's independent rear suspension onto a Ranger. But that could lead into yet another IRS vs. live axle argument...

The only reason to get a 4-cyl version is if you intend to replace that motor with something that'll actually get the truck out of its own way.

I don't know if this is helpful but I have friend who's a State Trooper here in Michigan and he states hands down he sees more single vehicle accidents involving small pick ups (Ranger, S10 or whatever it's called now) than any other make. Make of that what ever you will. Does it mean that they handle awful or do the drivers tend to be young and stupid?

I've had four Rangers and never felt the slightest inclination to make one handle. They're great trucks for basic errands/hauling crap, though.

speedblind wrote: I've had four Rangers and never felt the slightest inclination to make one handle. They're great trucks for basic errands/hauling crap, though.

amen.

if anything, I've been tempted to throw thunderbird tc parts at them.

Ranger50 wrote: Camber gain is your enemy. Excessive lowering adds lots of unneeded negative camber. You can probably get into the 5-5.5^ caster without getting drastic. Dump the rear springs for something way softer. Run the biggest bars you can find. Add weight bars to the rear. Brian

Just stay off the pavement.

Excessive camber gain and why they work better in the dirt:

I know I'm not helping, I just like desert race trucks

thatsnowinnebago wrote:

Ranger50 wrote: Camber gain is your enemy. Excessive lowering adds lots of unneeded negative camber. You can probably get into the 5-5.5^ caster without getting drastic. Dump the rear springs for something way softer. Run the biggest bars you can find. Add weight bars to the rear. Brian

Just stay off the pavement. Excessive camber gain and why they work better in the dirt: I know I'm not helping, I just like desert race trucks

Excessive camber gain is not why they work better in the dirt. They work well for two reasons. The I-beam front suspension is sturdy and it is cheap to get gobs of travel out of it.

On the road or off the road it is a horrible suspension design... It has some benefits of a solid axle(sturdiness) and some of the benefits of true IFS rolled up into this weird package that does OK at many things but nothing well.

ignorant wrote:

thatsnowinnebago wrote:

Ranger50 wrote: Camber gain is your enemy. Excessive lowering adds lots of unneeded negative camber. You can probably get into the 5-5.5^ caster without getting drastic. Dump the rear springs for something way softer. Run the biggest bars you can find. Add weight bars to the rear. Brian

Just stay off the pavement. Excessive camber gain and why they work better in the dirt: I know I'm not helping, I just like desert race trucks

Excessive camber gain is not why they work better in the dirt. They work well for two reasons. The I-beam front suspension is sturdy and it is cheap to get gobs of travel out of it. On the road or off the road it is a horrible suspension design... It has some benefits of a solid axle(sturdiness) and some of the benefits of true IFS rolled up into this weird package that does OK at many things but nothing well.

I was going for the massive travel they can pull and how strong they are. The picture also shows the ridiculous camber curve. Looks like I need to rethink my sentence structure and maybe seperate distinct thoughts with periods

Feedyurhed wrote: I don't know if this is helpful but I have friend who's a State Trooper here in Michigan and he states hands down he sees more single vehicle accidents involving small pick ups (Ranger, S10 or whatever it's called now) than any other make. Make of that what ever you will. Does it mean that they handle awful or do the drivers tend to be young and stupid?

Prolly a lot of the drivers ARE young 'n' dumb, but I'd bet it's more that the trucks get overloaded for their chassis and get top-heavy. That's a hard combo to take the stupid out of.

On the other hand...Rangers are great for errands/work rigs and such. Just don't overload them. When my wife's family moved to MT, my (future) FIL worked for a rancher that insisted because Datsun rated their teensy pickup at 1 ton (), it should haul that all the time. The owner b:tched lots about having to make repairs, and lousy mileage, but FIL couldn't convince to just buy the proper sized pickup.