Did you know you can get bigger front brakes by swapping in the entire spindle, rotor, caliper and sway bar end links from a 95 or 96 Crown Vic or Town Car ? Same rims will fit both. Go with the Ford Super Duty brake pads made for Taxi, Limo, & Police use and you have some killer front brakes using stock parts.
Way to GO!!! Progress, I love it... "I love it when a plan comes together" Looking good PAUL!!! Makes me really itchy to get busy on Rusty... I did drive her yeserday, moved her and the boat outta the of grass cutting... You GO Boy!!!
Will look into that in the future, got it home on Saturday, now time to really get crackin' until the cold season comes around
Sadly no, had to put my attention to other projects and increased overtime through the summer. Am looking forward to the thaw or at least warmer days.
That's a lot of progress, actually. That BMW tank looks like it's about to fall off that cart , and; is there really no crossmembers between the rails on these Ranchero's? If you were to really build a strong motor, would you install some?
With the frame so wide, the body stiffens it up a lot. A cross member really doesn't resist frame flexing anyway, you need to 3D the frame to accomplish that.
The BMW tank is for my dad's '54 R50 (it has since been moved to a safer place). My step mother wanted us to get his toys running and organized in the garage for her but have to clean the rust out of this tank. He passed a year and a half ago so it's been a few years since it anything has been run, it has been an undertaking. The Ranchero is only getting a 1st gen 4.6l, no plans to beef this one up, just a dependable driver.
Full boxed frame rails for strength channeled body does not leave room for much on the way of cross members
Painted the under box area and frame channels, also set the frame back under the body,good to only take up one stall again!!
Not much but update none the less!! I finally got my body mounts, going the 2008ish Crown Vic mounts, they are about 1/4" taller than factory but I am not going to cut them down as recommended on the gts.org, I think they should work fine just need to shim up the pads that go under the door area. Won't tackle it until the weather warms up but am excited as this has been the hold up for 2 years.
I hadn't seen this thread yet, and I like the fact you're doing a Mod motor swap. Obviously, you've tackled the 4.6's rear sump vs. the '79-and-older pushrod engine's front sump pans. I saw the post about the '91 truck steering column, and if you like, I can give you some instructions on how I rebuilt and upgraded my column and rag joint. The reason you need to do this is the column's mountings and body length require a reuse of the '72-'79 body while using the '91s head end. Also, it's no sweat to go ahead and install a '70s automatic floor shifter rather than hold out for an auto shift column.
