12 yards long and two lanes wide, 65 tons of American pride, CANYONERO

In reply to irish44j (Forum Supporter) :

I was looking at Pilots, highlanders, the Lexus rx 3whatever series, even dodge journeys, when I fell into this deal. 

It's more and bigger than I need. I can't even afford a trailer to take full advantage of it really, but it will swallow whole sheets of drywall, a pallet of tile according to wae, and the family. 

Once the whole "I'm going to steer against you the first couple miles of the day" thing is resolved it should be a pretty alright tank, but I certainly understand how "tank" isn't the right tool for everyone. 

running boards are on, both sides. I don't entirely trust the drivers side, I had to make new holes on both sides because of previous rust repair, but they're on. 

Picked up a new breaker bar today so going to attempt the rear bumper soon.

Hello ABS light. Oh, and your friend 7.5 amp fuse where there should be a 20.

Right front wheel speed sensor. Ok.

Hmm what other codes will forscan find?

 battery voltage to low.. This interests me. 

Parking sensors, which I know about

2wd and 4wd solenoid codes, I assume this has to do with the manual hub conversion.

Code about trip computer and the wheel speed sensor. 

Simple enough I guess. 

IT'S NOT ACTIVELY TRYING TO KILL ME ANYMORE!!!

New tires too. I forgot to take a picture, but I left the white letters out because I miss them. 

Tomorrow morning I'm taking it for a refuel and to see if the new axle u joint fixed the steering problem. 

We're now considering taking it on the honeymoon instead of the civic. 

I've still done nothing I have the parts for though. Bumper still in the way, speakers sitting inside instead of installed, body matching gas filler is somewhere, rear wiper still unusable, fuses still not replaced. Part was laziness, part was not knowing if the u joint would fix it.

But the ABS light is out now. Either the bulb burned out or wiggling the wire fixed it.

But here are other pictures, from the shop.

 almost looks small in comparison.

 he's a bit of a Toyota fan. Not pictured, his Tacoma, Prius, and wife's SUV that's bigger than a Rav4.

Cause I know someone will ask, mostly original interior, recently installed EFI, not for sale. 

I almost never comment but the Excursion calls me. Back when these were first out I worked for a forestry contractor that bought several of these as crew vehicles. They were 4wd could hold lots of people and haul a trailer when needed.

They didn't turn out so great. It turns out full of crew they are fairly top-heavy but unlike a van they don't feel ponderous and they are powerful. Within a couple years every one got rolled, driven by University students without a lot of gravel driving experience in a powerful vehicle at high speed. The good news is they are very safe if you have seatbelts on in a single vehicle rollover. I don't think there were any really serious injuries. 

I doubt the actual owner experienced at driving and familiar with the vehicle will have the same problem.

I always assumed this was part of why they stopped making them (and sales didn't stay high).

They are pretty cool vehicles for the right use.

cheapest fill up I'm likely to ever see.

Yay, electronics gremlins.

Sometimes when I turn Canyonero on, the stereo refuses to turn on and the power widows refuse to work

 Gauges, HVAC, overhead display, lights, horn are all good. 

Shut off, turn back on, everything works again. 

Ummm what?

LOL. I've had a front window do that on my 2013 F150.  Apply the IT reboot and everything's fine. Who knows...

So you replaced both front axle u joints?

Didn't all Excursions / Super duty of that era have manual hubs stock?

Did you ever fix the broken leaf spring parts?  That will cause all sorts of wonky street manners.

How rusty is it underneath?

In reply to RevRico :

Wow... where/how is gas $1.27/gal?  Solid $2 more here in SE PA.  I've knocked as much as 60 cents/gal off using rewards points from my supermarket, but $2 would be a lot of points.

In reply to Ian F (Forum Supporter) :

SHOP N SAVE points for maybe 3 months, had $2.04 or close enough off.  $150ish a week in groceries, then Lowes and Amazon gift cards(10 cents per $50) help a lot. Figure we're gonna buy stuff from them anyway might as well get points for it. I actually filled up on the way to get groceries and had another $0.40 off after the shopping.

onemanarmy said:

So you replaced both front axle u joints?

Didn't all Excursions / Super duty of that era have manual hubs stock?

Did you ever fix the broken leaf spring parts?  That will cause all sorts of wonky street manners.

How rusty is it underneath?

Just one front U joint. I suspect I'll be doing the other one, but it tested fine.

This was the era of vacuum bullE36 M3 hubs from Ford. They'd been replaced by Ford by 2002 for the Ranger but stuck around on bigger models until the 04 face lift. 

The leaf springs on the excursion are different than the leaf springs on my light duty trucks were. What we thought was broken is apparently factory. The rubber bit at the tip looks like it should attach to something but there's nothing for it to attach to. 

UUnderneath isn't bad. Lots of surface rust on the frame and skid plates, but everything is solid. The replacement metal for the rocker panels and inner part of the door well is not the best patch work. I feel sketchy about the running boards being installed or used a lot, but is solid.

148657

I have AC, for now. My mech called me up yesterday morning and asked if he could borrow Canyonero before it became wedding shuttle vehicle. Couple hours later, it came home blowing cold air.

Something about the control head and losing vacuum at full throttle is switching it to defrost and will need looked at in the future. I don't think he dye tested it, so I don't expect to keep cold air for long, but it worked through the shuttle duties.

I haven't tested the rear stuff yet, I know line clogs are kinda prevalent though. It would be nicer for the kids if it worked, but it would be nicer for me if they were quiet once in a while, so eh, maybe it'll get fixed. 

In reply to RevRico :

The rear AC lines leak easily. Sometimes you won't even know it because it'll be cold then not. I bought some AC lines off Amazon pretty cheap. Had Vigo from this forum replace them and refill. These trucks don't have the best AC from the factory but it's good enough for this Texas heat. Now the heater works too well in these lol

I had the shift to defrost issue in my F150 and followed this video.  The seals were cheap and the fix was pretty straight forward if not a little fiddly.  Solved a bunch of vacuum issues that I didn't realize I had. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtfucNa6R_o

I just agreed to buy one of these... a surprisingly rust free one with low mileage in Ontario.

In reply to BMWGeoff :

Welcome to the tank club!

I finally got around to replacing the fuses in the panel.

Otherwise it's just been moving stuff from my winter garage to my year round garage. AC is still holding fine, so that's a plus. 

ABS light is back. I'm now fairly certain it's the wire on the connector. Good thing prices range from $15-150 for the ABS sensor and pigtail, should have a nice expensive window of trying different quality parts there. 

Alternator replaced today.

Fun new noises. Sounds like it's out of oil above 2500rpms, lots of vibration through the gas pedal. Oil level is good and clean. Only happens above 2000rpms. Not a huge problem, but scary/annoying enough that after I pay my mechanic back for the alternator (business discount was 50%!!!) I'm gonna have to have him dig into it. 

think I found the source of the noise I heard the other day

Thought maybe there might be an exhaust leak because it only comes on over 2 grand, and I know the exhaust manifold is suspect. Well the pipes coming out look ok, but sure looks to me like the pipe going into the muffler is just floating there. Would explain the noise, and maybe the vibration.

A new record

 that's uhh 55 cents a gallon. $2.91 in fuel perks thanks to the grocery store. 

for my next trick, I need to get the portaband under here too chop out some trash metal to get a patch put in. The V10 sounds angry and not great without the muffler. 

In reply to RevRico :

I'm loving the v10 in the motorhome, though the mileage is absolute E36 M3, but that's no surprise. 

I picked mine up today. One owner, 101k miles, Eddie Bauer, 6.8L V10, originally from Kentucky, but now in Ontario. Not perfect cosmetically, but drives nicely so far.

Header setup

Gonna be a while until I get the exhaust fixed, gotta come up with the $1300 for the header/Y pipe pack from Banks. Slightly more expensive than just replacing the manifolds and everything with stock, but should be good for a few MPGs and some extra torque, if the Ford truck forums are to be believed. 

Figure manifolds are cracked, cat is 20 years old, the T pipe collector is known hot garbage, and the muffler is rusting out and separated on both sides, might as well just bite the bullet and replace everything with new. Especially if it could get me to double digit MPG while empty. 

U Pull and Pay Pittsburgh just got a 2003 Excursion in, going to the yard soon. As seen on FB.

https://www.facebook.com/UPAP.Pittsburgh/

Pics look decent, has a lift kit.

We got 40+ cms (16+ inches) of snow on Monday. I put the Canyonero in 4x4 and it was like the road was just a bit wet. Kid across the road in a fwd Lancer couldn't make it past the end of his own driveway.