| 02-16-2012 |
Today, after finally attempting to get the overdrive working on the '57 to no avail, I headed to the pull-a-part in Nashville to get a rear end for April's car. Yes, I have been making "April's rear end" jokes all day and no it never gets old to me. When I went to get a yoke for her transmission I scoped out all the Ford Explorers while I was there. There were a bunch of them there.
From 1995-2001 Ford Explorers had an 8.8, 32 spline rear end with disc brakes. Before these years were drum brakes and after these years were independent rear suspensions. There were about 15-20 of them in this year range. The pre-95 Explorers could be had with a 3:08 rear end. This is what I wanted but after quite a bit of research I found that the highest rear end available in the 95-01 was a 3:27, which is a code 41 on the build plate. I had already done the leg work previously, having made a list of the Explorers with the right rear end and that looked like good candidates. This narrowed the list down to about 4 or 5. I checked around and after looking I narrowed it down to about 3 of them. All of the gauges had been removed so it was impossible to tell what kind of mileage they had.
This one had a pretty decent rear end, but it was covered in thick surface rust:
I looked quite a bit at this one but finally decided against it after seeing it had clearly had a trailer hitch and had been used as a towing vehicle:
This wound up being our lucky candidate:
As you can see it's never had a trailer hitch and the tow hook area appears to have never had a chain on it:
The green one had obviously been used and abused:
It wasn't much to go on, but after crawling under and trying to feel the end play it seemed to be the best choice. I had just talked to a fellow near by about how choosing a rear end seems to be playing the odds and he said it was a crap shoot and then as soon as I got on the ground and started to crawl under "my" Explorer I looked down and saw this. I hope it's not an omen, hehe:
Everything went pretty smooth. No rusted or stuck bolts. I think the hardest part was cutting through the emergency brake cable. Since the back of the Explorer was supported by the rear springs I was a bit leery of what would happen when I unbolted the front of them. As I suspected it did shift the weight of the vehicle but it didn't fall off the stands and I was as far away as I could get as I pulled the last spring bolt out.
I learned my lesson here. There were a few wheelbarrows with two wheels up front and I should have gotten one of those. As I was trying to load the rear end by myself I believe my foot slipped. I was standing between the two large handles on the big wheelbarrow and when the weight of the rear end got right over the one wheel the load shifted and like a giant pair of deadly chopsticks it took me to the ground and pinned my leg under it. The only real danger was to my pride, which luckily is still intact due to no spectators at that moment. A guy came by not long after that and helped me sit it square in the wheelbarrow.
This junkyard has some of the prettiest surrounding mountains
I couldn't help but take time to stroll through the antique section. Many of these had already been crushed since I was here just a month ago.
The old Fox Body Mustang had one of the crazy disco-era graphics of a Cobra on the hood, which someone had also cut a giant hole in
It seemed like 100 miles back to the front office with that wheelbarrow to check out. Finally got loaded up and headed home.
