2000 Mercury Mountaineer Build
Posted: Mon Mar 21, 2016 10:04 pm
I have these grand (dumb) plans of converting my 2WD A-arm Mountaineer to a 4WD TTB dual-purpose truck. I've been lurking around for a while but recently made an intro thread in hopes of gaining some knowledge and hopefully finding some parts, but got a lot of interest in my truck in its current (perfectly functional) state, so I figured I'd just start a thread and catch everyone up before the nonsense starts.
It's a 2000 with the 5.0 liter, and it currently has a 4.5"+ front kit I pieced together.
Specs of the kit are: 1" upper and lower uniballs with the upper arms pivoting on 7/8" heims, 3" Pro Comp lift spindles, full heim steering, and 2.5x8" Swayaway coil overs and 2.0x2" King hydro bumpstops. I also adapted some used Dixon Bros. shock hoops and built my own cross brace over the motor.
The rear is a full-size Bronco 8.8 with the stock Mountaineer disc brakes, 4.56 gears, Eaton L/S, and Blue Torch Fab truss/diff cover combo. Suspension consists of custom Deaver leafs and 12" shackles with relocated pivots in the frame, and 2.5x12" Swayaways mounted outside of the frame rails.
The interior is pretty much stock except for the Icom race radio, iPhone Ram Mount, and a couple of fire extinguishers. I'm a sure a cage will come eventually.
This thing is incredibly fun off road and does okay with just 12" of suspension travel front and rear, but I've always wished it were 4WD and I also dream of even more suspension travel. For 3 years I've been going with friends on an annual Rubicon trip and decided I don't want to be a passenger anymore, so I will soon be ripping the entire front end off in favor of TTB. I chose TTB because I saw a 4x4 LT Ranger in person and it was just too low for my liking, and the only manual hub option is a weak stock-replacement that I have no faith in, unless I go with a full-on BTF race kit, which is tempting but I will still have the low ground clearance. I chose the D35 specifically because of the lighter-weight 3rd. And I got a good deal on an entire front end.
I've been gathering quite a few parts, including an entire D35 front end with D44 outers, 4.5" extended, trussed and tigged by Solo Motorsports, with a geared and locked 3rd. A friend helped me amputate the front frame of a junkyard 1st gen Explorer, and at this point I think I'll be able to graft the crossmember onto my frame rails. If not I can use the crossmember and beam mounts as a jig to build something on my own. Also scored the steering box at the junkyard, and have purchased a 4WD transmission, front and rear driveshafts, all the heims for steering, uniballs for the beam ends, a selection of coilover springs, 5 Alcoas, radius arm brackets, and other misc. parts. My rear 12" shocks will become the front coilovers, and I'm still undecided on what to do to upgrade the rear. The rear currently only gets 12" of travel and I want more, so I bought some 18" piggyback SAWs for the rear, but I'm not sure I want to cut into the body for them, so I also have some cantilever arms I may use with some shorter shocks instead. (Pat's Bronco has been a bad influence)
So the next Rubicon trip is mid-September, and I will probably be doing one last trip with my truck for my birthday in April, so that won't leave me much time. To add to that, the shop I will be working at is 1.5 hours away so I will be limited to weekends only. I don't have high hopes of my truck making the Rubicon this year, but I'm going to try my best.
I'm still in need of a quite a few things. I'm currently looking for everything from the knuckles out, and I'm looking into my manual hub options, so if anyone has recommendations, please help! As much as I've read about hubs, I'm still a bit confused about everything I need between hubs, lockouts, and brakes. I also need 14" SAW secondary front shocks (figure I should build the engine cage once the way I want it), and things like skid plates, shift kit, new rear rotors, oil filter relocation, maybe a new oil pan, TUBING, bearings, u-joints, etc.
Picture overload, here's how it currently looks:
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... lvs2gc.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... z0hgkn.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... iocevv.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... qbclbu.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... mha9xz.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... z0hgkn.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... bosbkp.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... t5xdy2.jpghttp://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... ku6wn6.jpghttp://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... zb2kgf.jpghttp://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... 226dd5.jpg
It's a 2000 with the 5.0 liter, and it currently has a 4.5"+ front kit I pieced together.
Specs of the kit are: 1" upper and lower uniballs with the upper arms pivoting on 7/8" heims, 3" Pro Comp lift spindles, full heim steering, and 2.5x8" Swayaway coil overs and 2.0x2" King hydro bumpstops. I also adapted some used Dixon Bros. shock hoops and built my own cross brace over the motor.
The rear is a full-size Bronco 8.8 with the stock Mountaineer disc brakes, 4.56 gears, Eaton L/S, and Blue Torch Fab truss/diff cover combo. Suspension consists of custom Deaver leafs and 12" shackles with relocated pivots in the frame, and 2.5x12" Swayaways mounted outside of the frame rails.
The interior is pretty much stock except for the Icom race radio, iPhone Ram Mount, and a couple of fire extinguishers. I'm a sure a cage will come eventually.
This thing is incredibly fun off road and does okay with just 12" of suspension travel front and rear, but I've always wished it were 4WD and I also dream of even more suspension travel. For 3 years I've been going with friends on an annual Rubicon trip and decided I don't want to be a passenger anymore, so I will soon be ripping the entire front end off in favor of TTB. I chose TTB because I saw a 4x4 LT Ranger in person and it was just too low for my liking, and the only manual hub option is a weak stock-replacement that I have no faith in, unless I go with a full-on BTF race kit, which is tempting but I will still have the low ground clearance. I chose the D35 specifically because of the lighter-weight 3rd. And I got a good deal on an entire front end.
I've been gathering quite a few parts, including an entire D35 front end with D44 outers, 4.5" extended, trussed and tigged by Solo Motorsports, with a geared and locked 3rd. A friend helped me amputate the front frame of a junkyard 1st gen Explorer, and at this point I think I'll be able to graft the crossmember onto my frame rails. If not I can use the crossmember and beam mounts as a jig to build something on my own. Also scored the steering box at the junkyard, and have purchased a 4WD transmission, front and rear driveshafts, all the heims for steering, uniballs for the beam ends, a selection of coilover springs, 5 Alcoas, radius arm brackets, and other misc. parts. My rear 12" shocks will become the front coilovers, and I'm still undecided on what to do to upgrade the rear. The rear currently only gets 12" of travel and I want more, so I bought some 18" piggyback SAWs for the rear, but I'm not sure I want to cut into the body for them, so I also have some cantilever arms I may use with some shorter shocks instead. (Pat's Bronco has been a bad influence)
So the next Rubicon trip is mid-September, and I will probably be doing one last trip with my truck for my birthday in April, so that won't leave me much time. To add to that, the shop I will be working at is 1.5 hours away so I will be limited to weekends only. I don't have high hopes of my truck making the Rubicon this year, but I'm going to try my best.
I'm still in need of a quite a few things. I'm currently looking for everything from the knuckles out, and I'm looking into my manual hub options, so if anyone has recommendations, please help! As much as I've read about hubs, I'm still a bit confused about everything I need between hubs, lockouts, and brakes. I also need 14" SAW secondary front shocks (figure I should build the engine cage once the way I want it), and things like skid plates, shift kit, new rear rotors, oil filter relocation, maybe a new oil pan, TUBING, bearings, u-joints, etc.
Picture overload, here's how it currently looks:
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... lvs2gc.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... z0hgkn.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... iocevv.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... qbclbu.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... mha9xz.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... z0hgkn.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... bosbkp.jpg
http://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... t5xdy2.jpghttp://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... ku6wn6.jpghttp://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... zb2kgf.jpghttp://i167.photobucket.com/albums/u122 ... 226dd5.jpg