Behold! The power of the Ranger!

[pocket-rocket]

Ok, so it's weak and underpowered. But that didn't stop it from pulling this home from a few miles away :P





What is it? It is a 97 Chevy Tahoe that should be pulling my truck instead. Mods to my truck so far? Everything is stock with the exception of the Centerforce clutch. My truck also has 168?k miles on it, around 110k on the tranny, and ~15k on the clutch. I hate to say it, but that truck surprises me because of it's size and lack of power, yet it could pull this truck home with no problems. I only averaged 25mph, but that was because the front end of the Tahoe liked to sway if I went much past that.

[SappySE107]

Lets put the SHO motor in it.

[pocket-rocket]

Lol. I was honestly thinking turbo it which would be easy because it's the same block as the Turbo Coupe and SVO turbo Mustangs, or go 3.8 SC from a SC Tbird. There is no way I would disgrace my poor little truck and drop an L67 in there.... V8 swaps are a dime a dozen, and with the gas prices anymore.... no thanks.

[logikfive]

I don't think towing a vehicle on a dolly with the steer wheels off the dolly is such a great idea...

[ForcedFirebird]

I don't think towing a vehicle on a dolly with the steer wheels off the dolly is such a great idea...

That's why it was swaying.


When I bought my Firebird, I pulled it ~250 miles on a U-Haul car carrier. The U-Haul peeps told me I had to sigh a waiver because the car/trailer outweighed my truck (1998 F150 4.6). I pulled it all the way averaging 75mph (80 or more across the Alligator Alley), got 11mpg

I happen to like Ford trucks - can't seem to kill mine. That tow took place with about 175k miles on the clock.

I say you put a GM 60* in the Ranger, FTW!

[loner666]

That's why it was swaying.


When I bought my Firebird, I pulled it ~250 miles on a U-Haul car carrier. The U-Haul peeps told me I had to sigh a waiver because the car/trailer outweighed my truck (1998 F150 4.6). I pulled it all the way averaging 75mph (80 or more across the Alligator Alley), got 11mpg

I happen to like Ford trucks - can't seem to kill mine. That tow took place with about 175k miles on the clock.

I say you put a GM 60* in the Ranger, FTW!

Assholes at Uhaul wouldnt let me use a Ranger to pull my car home. Mostly because it only has a bumper hitch on it that isnt rated for that much I guess

BTW if that Ranger is the 3.0 its a 60* just not a GM like it needs to be..lol

[ForcedFirebird]

That's why I said "GM60*"

Yeah, bumper hitches are usually only rated to 500lbs.

[loner666]

I dunno. They told me it was rated for 2500 but the dolly and car over did it so i had to rent a damn 10' box truck and dolly to get my car home when the trans went

[pocket-rocket]

The way it was parked, I had no choice but to leave the front down. I would rather have had the back down and the front on the dolly. No, it isn't a v6 at all. It's the 2.3l? dual plug inline 4 rated at 98hp. I felt silly when I went last fall for plugs and asked for 8 plugs for my 4 cylinder truck, but the guys at Advance knew I wasn't crazy. I have the largest hitch I can get for it on there. There is no way I would have pulled that with a bumper hitch. I think the hitch is a class 4? (rated at 6k lbs) I have a friend that works Drawtite/Reese, so the normally $120 hitch cost 47 after getting the drop part for the ball. The people that owned the van I worked on got it for me as part of the deal for the work I did, along with giving me the dolly that has trailer brakes, so I need to get a brake controller and the round 7 way connector. For the size of that engine, I was shocked I could get up to 25. It took a bit, but wasn't overworking the engine, and I could have gone faster, but I didn't want to chance it, and I was taking back roads home so I wasn't tying up tons of traffic. The size comparison on the side shot still cracks me up though. It should have been the other way around.

[pocket-rocket]

I say you put a GM 60* in the Ranger, FTW!

Well after I part out the 91, I will have 3 DOHC sitting around here. Believe me, it had crossed my mind a while back I have a friend that was going to put a 350 in a Ranger and have valve covers made that said "Built Ford Tuff with Chevy Stuff".

[ForcedFirebird]

Well after I part out the 91, I will have 3 DOHC sitting around here. Believe me, it had crossed my mind a while back I have a friend that was going to put a 350 in a Ranger and have valve covers made that said "Built Ford Tuff with Chevy Stuff".

My friends and I built a 355/th400-powered Mustang about 10-12yrs ago. Painted it Chevy orange, ran 11.8x all motor and 10.3x on spray.

I need something smaller to put one of my 60*'s in

[pocket-rocket]

The MGB Ben is doing is cool. I've been considering a J body, but I've wanted to do small, light and rwd too. Years ago I wanted to do a Chevette, and I have seen a couple on here. It's starting to rekindle that idea again... I remember when I told my wife about it years ago, she said you wouldn't catch her dead in one even though her first car was one. That's fine, they don't allow passengers in cars at the local drag strip anyways How many Mustang guys did you guys piss off with that car? That's pretty funny, I love it!

[pocket-rocket]

Ok, I am renaming this thread:

"TO HELL WITH THE CHEVY 350 VORTEC!"

Wow, where do I start with this overgrown heavy weight turd of a vehicle taking up my garage? Should I start at the plastic fuel sending unit that got caught on the frame of the truck, breaking the quick disconnect spout? How about the way they had ribs between them, so I had to disassemble my quick disconnect tool to remove the one that didn't break off? Or how about how after I got the pump taken care of after spending $200 on a new sending unit/fuel pump assembly the thing ran like crap! I kept pulling a P0305 which is cyl. 5 misfire. So then I got the honor of diagnosing this turd burglar. I had fuel now, obviously because it was running. So I started basic. I decided to ohm out the injectors. One problem... WTF are they?!? Oh, GM was on a meth binge that day and put them INSIDE the intake... Smooth move, GM. So, trying to avoid pulling the intake apart unless necessary, I got creative. I unhooked the coil, and cranked it a couple times for a total of about 10-15 seconds. Then I started pulling plugs to see which ones were soaked and which ones werent to make sure injectors were firing. Wow 4/8 were wet. Impressive... So I had 4 dead injectors, just spiffy. Then I made a circuit to check to make sure the PCM was firing all 8. It consisted of a bridge rectifier (so I didn't have to worry about polarity), 2 resistors (I had ones that were twice the resistance I wanted for brightness, so I ran them in parallel to drop the resistance in half), and an LED. I used an LED because I didn't want to have to buy this guy a new ECM because I pulled too much current on the injector drivers and blew them. Then I checked all of the injector outputs on the PCM. Just fine, 8/8. So then I knew it was a problem with the injectors themselves. I then jumpered the fuel pump relay which was located in the engine bay, making it easy to bump line pressure back up when needed. My cordless DeWalt screw gun is 12v., so I plugged my multimeter leads on it, and started hitting injectors 1 at a time listening for them opening. All 8 opened, but only 4 made a sound like fuel flowing, so 4 were plugged/stuck. So then I was faced with pulling the intake, so I got down to business. When you look at this engine, as far as fuel is concerned, all you see is the supply and return lines going into the top of the intake, and disappear. Well inside the intake, there is a block called a "fuel meter" something or other. Basically it's a plastic fuel rail with the injectors INSIDE that even. Well how does the fuel get to the cylinders? I'm so very glad you asked. It travels by way of a small tube to the intake ports on the heads.... Ingenious, isn't it? Long story short, I took the injectors out of the block and messed with them, put it back together and had 6/8 firing when I hooked it up to my compressor with a regulator on it. Then I took the remaining stuck 2 out, gave them a good beating on the side of my bench, reassembled, got fuel spray on the crotch of my pants, but that was ok. It was from the 2 that had started working again. I put it back together and all is well now.

Injector output tester (used the left over box from my max232 chips) :












Now pics of the retarded crack head setup on the Tahoe:








Fuel meter deal


FPR sits inside the intake too, so no worries about leaving a hose off of it


Comparison of a LQ1 TB and the Vortec 350 TB


And the Vortec TB going down on my LQ1 TB



In closing, The fuel injection design on the Vortec 350 to me is just as bad as answering all problems by dropping an L67 in everything.

[Rhedalert]

fuck.that.shit.

[Canyonero]

In Portland, I once saw an early 90's Honda Accord towing a Ranger.