Rebirth of a Ranchero

I have been lurking here for many months now and decided that now is as good a time as any to jump on in. I have a 1975 Ford Ranchero Squire that I have sunk considerable money into and unfortunalty I wrecked it this past Valentines Day.



I was able to walk away compleatly unscathed. Also I managed not to hit anybody when the ass end stepped out on me.

So now I have a 73 parts car with a fairly rusty body. The bed is rotted out in many places and the floor pans are bad also. The frame however is good. So what I am working on now is getting the the bodys popped off and the frames swapped. I have only just begun this process and just this past week end I managed to get the power pack out of the 73. As I am working full time during the weekdays and the cars are out in the boon docks I am only able to put in work on Saturday and a half day on Sunday. Progress will be slow but I will post continous updates. I have also promised Mike a write up on the 5-speed conversion I did on my car, so that will be forth coming in the next 2 months. Gonna get some better pics to throw in.







Would this discoloration of the metal on the exhauste ports and the manifolds mean the engine was over heated in the past?



Anybody intrested in a Big Block C-6? Shifted perfectly when I drove the car up to my buddys place.

Here are some pics of the Chero over the time that I have owned her.


Right after I bought her



Right after I rebuilt the engine, I have since dumped the billet dizzy. It kept eating the roll pins on the cam gear.



New wheels and rubber.



Right after putting the new carpet and the console in. Also this was taken after the 5-speed conversion. The stick-N-Peal crap is going to come off. After several months on it still reaks to high heaven when I open the door. Plus the fumes cant be good for my health.


Here are some more shots of the damage done to the car. I was taking a over pass on Valentines day this year and it had been raining most of the morning. Needless to say the ass end starts doing a square dance while Im still in the middle of the bridge. I end up going nose in on the concrete barrier at roughly 40-50 MPH. How I managed not to hit anybody I dont know but except for my car hitting the wall nobody else was hurt or crashed.




The reason Im going the frame swap. I asked around and the consensuse was that its either a frame swap of cutting out the bad and welding in the new, no way in hell I have the money to pay for this so that brings me to the 73.

Down behind my mother in laws house in Maryville, TN there is a guy that has a ton of old cars in a field and there is a Ranchero there that looks just like yours and it is complete ( as well as I could tell with the brush grown round it)

Seeing as today was a hell of alot cooler than last weekend I managed to get some real work done. I got the body off the 73 and the frame pulled out.

Does anybody know if the factory used Lok Tite on the body bolts? If they didnt somebody has been here before me. Would also shed some light on this car. Would seem she has been beat on pretty badly. There are at least 3 different mounts for exhaust systems on the frame, the drivers side door is off a compleatly different car, and the body is rotted to hell. Just as well I came along and used the frame, this one was going to the crusher if I didnt buy it.

Well should have the engine out on the 75 Tomarrow. At least I hope, my best friend will be there with me. The amount of work done is proportional to the amount of alcohol drank.
Will post more tomarrow.

Hey, Nice work. It's inspirational knowing you didn't let the accident hold you back. Sometimes I gotta drink two cups of coffee just to get out and wrench. Impressive that you lifted that body off out there in the back 40. Just to let you know you're not alone screwing with Ford's that are ultimately not worth much, I spent the day taking the front end off my 73 to deliver to my neighbor for body work and paint. My father-in-law helped me out which was way cool. Good luck and keep us posted.

Hmmm... I see you took the fenders off with the extensions in place. Deffinatly need to remember that for the future. Let me tell you, taking the fenders and grill off as one is a PIA. I dam near broke the grill in half at least twice.

I hear ya about the back 40. Unfortunatly my parents house, which is where I live at the moment has a Home Owners Nazi Party. Needless to say they would be S--ting square bricks over this. Oh well. I cant wait to let the neighborhood know the monster is back

Which exhauuste system do you think works better?

Ok started off Saturday with takeing the body off the 75. This was going down hill from the start. The body was being stuborn and some force was used geting it off the frame. No idea why it was being difficult, it just was. So as you can see from the pics I tried using the adjustable saw horses. DO NOT EVER TRY TO DO THIS JOB WITH THESE P.O.S.!! After I got the front up I was working the back and the two at the front collapsed. They came down slowly so there was no damage to the body thank god. Still I had quite a problem. After two different attempts to use the saw horses I said to hell with it and scrouged up two more 55 gallon drums and got the body up with out any further problems. Let me tell you guys 55 gallon drums are the way to go.

Seeing as I have a time constraint I am going to swap the from suspension over and then drop the engine and trans on the 73's frame and then run it back under the 75. I really wish I could get all the little things sorted out on this car but I need to have it running as soon as possible.

I also thought of a cool idea to try out. Filling in all the body holes for the Squire trim and then painting the whole car. Then taking the plastic pieces and removing the metal clips from them and some way attaching magnets to the inside so they would stick to the car. Then at my descretion I could switch from regular Ranchero to the Squire. Preatty cool huh? or is it the worst idea ever?

Originally Posted by 75Squire

Also thought of a cool idea to try out. Filling in all the body holes for the Squire trim and then painting the whole car. Then taking the plastic pieces and removing the metal clips from them and some way attaching magnets to the inside so they would stick to the car. Then at my descretion I could switch from regular Ranchero to the Squire. Preatty cool huh? or is it the worst idea ever?

Sound good, but I think you'll find it problematic to actually do.

Also, why are the two exhaust pipes so close together at the "X"? It looks painful when the body off, are they trying to fit around something when the body's on the frame?

Also, why are the two exhaust pipes so close together at the "X"? It looks painful when the body off, are they trying to fit around something when the body's on the frame?

The inlets and out lets are straigh to the front and the back, there is no angle to the entries. No idea why its just what the exhauste shop put on. I trust them on this, they do some very high end work for the off road truck racing teams and they have also custom fabricasted headers for several applications.

RICHARDS PERFORMANCE MUFFLER


The plastic trim idea is just that at the moment, a idea.

Well I got the engine and the front suspension off this past week end. Seems that things are moving right along and I will be dropping the body sometome on the 4th of July Weekend, I hope. Depending on what else is going on I might get around to putting in the Urathane bushings.









My growing pile of parts to put back on next week end.






Finally saw the true extent of the damage. The buckling extends to the back side of the control arm mounting point.