zaffo oxnard
Active Member
My 2001 4x2 in Toreador Red is gone.
Put 92,245 miles on that truck and loved every one of them. That vehicle was the perfect blend of price, truck and seating capacity.
I bought it when the 1998 Ranger 4x4 that I bought new went in to the Dealer and as part of a routine service had a PCM reprogram that reduced the horsepower and mileage significantly. I am still angry at Ford over that situation. The Vulcan 3.0L v-6 was a good strong engine that I liked more than the 4.0L v-s my buddy had in his Ranger at the time, and felt it was stronger than the Tracs v-6. It pulled a jet ski trailer over a 5,000 pass (from sea level) with no issues. Then the PCM reprogram and it turned into a dog. Wheezing to get over the pass at 35 mph in second gear where it used to fly over at 70+. MPG fell off about 3 4 MPG. I eventually had it bought back by Ford, and I decided to get the Trac because I spent a couple of miserable trips to the lake in the rear jump seat while the wife drove and her friend rode shotgun. The Trac was exactly what we could afford at $24,000 vs a regular Explorer at $30,000 +. Ironically, when I took the Trac in for a pinging complaint, when lightly loaded at medium throttle pressure when the engine was cold, Ford once again did a PCM reprogram setting the ignition to retard, and the power it had when new was gone again, just like the Ranger. No amount of time at the Service Managers desk resulted in anything other than the statement that in California, I have to reprogram when it comes in anyway (whether you ask for it or not) and there is no going backward. There is no re-setting the spark curve to where it was when you bought it. Grinds me to this day. I almost feel it is false advertising. Yeah, the engine pulls hard when you test drive it, but if you take it to the dealer, you get back a totally different vehicle. Oh well In smog check CA I didnt think a chip was a good option.
It was never at the dealer except for warranty and recall work, and once I had them change the oil. It still had original rotors and drums, just changed the front pads 3 times and had the rotors cut last year. It never needed to be towed or broke down on me. Not one flat tire. I used the original Firestones till they were worn out, then took them in to be recall replaced by Goodyears. Finished up with the Michelins they had on them yesterday. It was all original except for the coolant, plugs, plug wires, one IAC, one DPE (?) sensor, an oil dipstick, shocks, the battery, and the speakers.
Favorite upgrade Monroe Reflex! They made a huge difference in ride and handling. Also liked the Boston Acoustics 5x7 speakers that went in all 4 doors.
Favorite features, the Ford remote entry FOB is better than the crap Honda system that I deal with now. Number pad entry! No more loosing the keys at the beach. The power rear window.
Issues transmission. I started to feel the transmission slip on the 1-2 and 2-3 shift years ago. I decided to just live with it and run with the o/d turned off when driving for the first 10 minutes of driving on cool mornings (So cal here, we dont know cold) and that prevented slipping for years. I towed a 15 jet ski trailer and never had it slip when warm.
Saturday, even with the o/d off, it started to slip. I backed off and let it shift, then took it to the car wash, vacuumed it out, posted pictures on craigslist and put a $6,000 price on it. Yesterday afternoon it let it go for $5,000. The two guys who showed up were pretty slick. They knew of the transmission issues, and I could tell they were ready to beat me up about that. I opened by saying that anything that nice was going to be $8,000 and up in this area, and that I had already discounted the price in case the transmission went. When the wad of $100s came out and he said 5 right now, I said sure, but if that transmission dies at the end of the block, you get out and keep pushing it to your house, not back here.
Getting 20% back after 10 years is better than I have done on other cars in the past, but the miles were low on this one.
This has been a great community and it really made owning fun.
Good luck yall.
