Nomad's 2000 Ford Ranger Project

2.5L New Timing belt and tensioner What needs to be done on a 250,000 mile 2.5L Ford? Well... either nothing, or a lot...  OK who's kidding who... a lot. Time for a change Since I want this to keep going reliably for the next 3 to 5 years I'll be taking care of as much as I can. I have no maintenance history and I don't want to just wait till something breaks to fix it.  Unfortunately, I have a stumble after coming off the throttle and I'm afraid it's a recessed valve issue which would require a head refresh at a machine shop. I'm hoping to avoid that.  I'm going to stop throwing parts at it till I see how bad this engine feels once it's running. I'm hoping this list  takes care of most problem areas but then again new parts these days have poor quality and could fail me vs an older non-broken part. The list: Timing belt and tensioner pulley. Drive belt, tensioner, and idler pulley. Water pump, flush block and heater core. Thermostat and housing. New...

 The original rusted and patched together exhaust is "functional", but not really a long term permanent solution. The hangers have rusted through and the muffler was just hanging its weight off the exhaust manifold and the tail pipe was rusted off the muffler body. Not good. A heat shield on the floor above the catalytic converter rusted off and was rattling badly. I want to replace it as well.  I'd like to find out what muffler may be even quieter than stock. Instead of trying to get the 2.5L 4 cylinder to "sound cool" I'd rather make it whisper quiet if possible. The old engine will be loud enough without a droning exhaust. Added an aluminum heat shield above the cat and will clamp on a regular oval muffler.

Ranger with Explorer bucket seats, center console, new carpet   Hiding a nasty surprise 26 years of service, and dirt As I try to make this old '00 Ford Ranger as clean and comfortable as I can on a budget I have run into additional unexpected issues. This is "Scope Creep" as they call it. In this case, a rotted away driver side floor pan!  I decided to spring for brand new ACC "cut pile" carpet with the "mass backing". To the tune of around $200 this will be one of the larger single items I've purchased for this tired old truck. I'd considered pulling a complete carpet from the junkyard for $35, but it'd still be hard to clean out 20 years of dirt and wear. Since this is for my daughter's first vehicle this is a "splurge" that will make the interior clean, fresh and new feeling with the nice condition '98 Explorer Sport seats and '00 Explorer center console I'm installing.  Almost fine, but we can do better Out wi...