Cleaning up the filler for the front. Pepe's original was damaged in the accident so this is off another truck.
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A friend stopped by and we put him to work stripping the driver door. There was no damage from the accident, but a large shallow dent at hip level. Ranger's have a sleeve over the door latch to help the door close. However. when the plastic sleeve breaks, hip checking the door works well to close it. And leaves a shallow dent, if repeated often enough.
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A stud gun and puller was used to remove as much of the dents on the back of the cab as possible.
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The doner front fender had a few minor dings.
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The large dent is prepped. The smaller circle is from welding up the oversized mirror holes that will no longer be needed for the stock mirrors.
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To smooth out the back of the cab, we had to use putty. This was roughed in for now.
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Unfortunately, this is as far as Pepe got in 2014. Life interrupted. Our son wanted a daily driver vehicle, since the Ranchero was going to take much longer than anticipated. So he bought a friend's used 1994 2 Door Cherokee. Most of the work had already been done, including a paint job that we had helped spray a year or so ago. It was a very nice, used, daily driver. Unfortunatley, it was T-boned at the A-piller 3 weeks later in a hit an run by a dark blue Dodge 1500. The police never found the truck. That accident shoved the unibody A-piller into the passenger cabin 8". So we were back to shopping for another vehicle for him. Several weeks later he found another 1994 2 Door Cherokee. The current owner thought it was road worthy enough to make the 3 hr drive home. It was a cold, wet day and Dad didn't drop underneath to take a look and instead relied on the overview of a desperate, but limber, teenager. They brought it home, then pulled back the driver carpet to expose - the concrete floor of the garage. There was no floorpan. The sheet metal had all rotted away. The driver rocker panel had been filled with cardboard, then puttied over and painted. So the next several months were spent rebuilding that Cherokee, borrowing as many parts off the first one as possible. It was June 2015 when we finally got back to Pepe.
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Unfortunately, just as the Cherokee was finishing, our son also was in an accident in the replacement '92 Ranger. Only this time, the crumple zones of the frame gave and it was totaled due to frame damage. The only pieces not damaged were the doors and the drive train.
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The accident was another 4 car in which the Ranger was again car #2, the first car hit. Only this time, car #1 went underneath the back end of the Ranger, doing even more damage. But luckily the engine and transmission survived intact. Those were the only essential parts that we had planned to keep.
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June found the original passenger door prepped and ready.
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The doner front fender is prepped and ready.
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The front cowl had minor dings in both front corners.
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At on point, a vandal or thief tried to remove the driver side wiper, potentially causing the ding in the cowl by the wiper area.
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The original driver fender is prepped and ready.
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The original driver door, finally prepped and ready.
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The back of the cab on the driver side dressed out very easily.
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The passenger side was harder to dress out and ended up expanding into the next panel over just a touch. In sanding the area, the very shallow dent showed up.
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We took a break on the body work to prep the frame for a coat of protectant. Note the new shocks, complete with a 2" lift kit installed.
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The frame was sprayed with POR 15.
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The 3.0 V6 was opened to check the condition. There was not even a lip deep enough to catch a fingernail on at the top of the cylinders. The minimal carbon on the top of the pistons was "fluffy" and cleaned off easily.
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The heads had no buildup of carbon or other deposits.
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The new rebuilt transmission was installed. The old one from the '92 Ranger was already having issues with 5th gear before the accident, so it became the core.
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Dad prepped the 6cyl engine from the '92, going through it and replacing anything that needed it, which wasn't much. A new full gasket set should keep the engine from leaking.
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The engine bay was prepped for the "new" engine.
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The 6 cyl engine was transplanted into Pepe. Despite the increase in horsepower, the size and weight didn't increase much.
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Ever tried to reach the top 2 bolts from the transmission to the engine? Sometimes you just have to get into an awkward position.
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New motor mounts were installed for the 6cyl and the engine was finally settled. We still had to hook up all the hose, wires, cables, etc., but now we could get back to the dusty bodywork since the engine was sealed up.
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The 3.0 V6 installed in the engine bay.
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Too bad most of this will be covered by all the modern plastic parts, cables, hoses, etc.
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The driver side cab drip rail with the rust holes. We will need a doner piece will fix this area.
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Dad cut out a doner piece from the damaged '92 cab to repair Pepe.
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The rust was cut out of the roof over the driver door.
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The replacement piece was trimmed to fit, then partially welded and partially panel bonded into place for a better overall finish.
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Oddly, as the roof was sanded, two large shallow dents appeared. When we asked where did these come from we were finally told about trips around the college campus where she would sit on the edge of the cab and lean back onto the roof, bracing herself with her hands. Argh.
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The other shallow dent. Never sit anything heavy on the roof of a Ranger. But it's nice to se
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Clamps held the patch panel in place until the panel bonding set up.
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The dressed out passenger side back of the cab. Just a large shallow area that we couldn't pull out any more with the stud gun and slide hammer.
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The underneath side of the hood was prepped for body color. We had to do some research, but we found that the Rangers with automatic transmissions had the hood insulation while the Rangers with manuals did not. Something about deadening the sound of the automatic. Since Pepe was being converted to a 6cyl and the old insulation was torn and nasty, it was removed.
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So we asked our daughter what color she wanted to paint Pepe and she said she was tired of the turquoise. I took her to our local paint store, and showed her the paint books. A half hour later of flipping pages she grew bored and a friend and I pitched in to find something based on her description of a bright blue. What we found dad swore at and just shook his head, but agreed to paint it anyway - a medium, bright blue metallic. The painting process is on the next page.
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