Thread: 2000 Ford Excursion Cummins Conversion

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Thanks guys. Yeah, I've always thought that cleaning the paint gun and mixing the paint was too much work for smal pieces. But, after a while the spray bomb paint will become ugly and the gun shot stuff lasts quite a bit longer.

I also forgot that the alternator I cleaned up and put on this was bad so I installed a new one. Ka ching.

I replaced the alternator and now the charging system works. I'm waiting on the correct tone wheel for the tach to operate correctly. I found I only had 1/2" between the front bump stops and the leaf springs so I am replacing the leaf springs in the front and adding a add a leaf in the rear. This means a drop pitman arm as well. I decided to swap out the front axle gears now instead of waiting. That led to needing new ball joints and axle u joints. I got new non auto lock outs and will be ditching the factory auto locking hubs. I got a new grill and emblem, fog lights, and balanced one of my wheels and tires. Now I'm waiting for parts. I have been trying to get some stuff done outside before winter sets in. I'm really up against the wall as I crushed the caddy today hoping to use the cash for Excursion parts. Momma kept the money for Xmas presents. I guess she's kosher with no wheels then.

Yep, you guys know the story. She still isn't done yet. I've been doing some other odd jobs making extra coin, cleaning and scrapping, and of course working on the Ex. I decided to replace the front leaf springs with X code ones which will raise the front 2". I had to do this to get clearance in between the bump stop and leaf spring. Excursions had dearched leaf springs to get them to fit into standard garages. This project turned into new ball joints, new axle U-joints, seals for the axles, and inner axle seals as well as a ring and pinion swap. The cost of the seals on these front axles is rediculous! $125 for 4 seals my cost, and the inners are $44ea my cost. Plus you have to make or buy seal drivers to put them all in. I decided to purchase the vac seals and I got by without an installer for the inner axle seals. The ring and pinion swap was another PITA! Dana uses a long crush sleeve on 4.30 gear sets in a D50, but on 4.10 and down they do not use one. Guess what, like 0 people knew this. Yee haw.



I painted the RH battery tray. Got tired of the crusty look.



The inner axle seals are a PITA to get out. You just can't drive them out from the axle tube because these SOB's have a plastic seal saver that presses in from the axle tube side and you'll damage them. My LH axle seal saver was broken so I just knocked it all out. The RH side was a fiasco. Here's how I got the RH side out.




So now I have the vac seals installed, ball joints installed, axle u-joints installed, inner seals installed, and finally the 3.54 ring and pinion installed and set up. Now I can put the front axle back together and try to get this thing wrapped up. I wanted to drive it before Christmas, but I am thinking if that happens, it won't be totally finished. At this point I'm good with that.

Sounds like a case of "While your there get this too" Man how many times I start a project and it ends up a rebuild. Progress is good but Christmas ain't far off.

Been there, done that Ryan!!!! There's always more to it then how it appears at the start!!!!! But also, it's sure worth taking care of all those "other things" when the project is finished and you can enjoy the miles of trouble free driving!!!!!!

At least now I won't have to wonder about those parts.

The ring and pinion are in finally and set up! What a battle that was. This morning I put the RH side back together and tomorrow I'll do the left side. I'm going to try to get as much done to it as I can to see if I can drive it by Tuesday..................





I eliminated the vacuum assist lock auto lock outs and installed manual ones. The auto ones would have been nicer for the wife, but I couldn't find a reasonably priced multi function vacuum switch to accomadate the system and just opted to ditch the sticky original lock outs.

The front axle is put back together! Wahoo That brought forward another PITA problem though. I decided to install a drop pitman arm on this because Excursions have bad bump steer anyway and the leaf springs I installed raise it 2". Well, when you install a drop pitman arm with a stock front axle pan hard bar, it no work. The pitman arm hits the pan hard bar when you try to turn left. So, I relocated the bracket back and down a touch and that was a good way to eat up a good half a day. Next debacle was the rear springs.



I put the Ex back on all 4's to see how far off the ride height was from front to back. It is higher in the front than rear. I didn't want to take a chance and have the rear way too high. So today I installed the add a leaves I got for it. My brother has some time off work so he is going to seal in between the trans and tcase for me since I forgot to when I installed the tcase for mock up. I'm going to keep at it so I can try to drive it before New Years. we shall see.....

Oh yeah, watch out for the China C-clamps. I guess this one seen too much use in it's life.

I buy C clamps whenever I see them at garage sales, usually $1 or $2. Forged clamps are the only way to go. Cast iron or cast whatever will usually do what yours did when really put to the test. I have a pretty good collection, from tiny to mucho grande!

I'm sure mine get used more than they are supposed to. I need to start buying better ones instead of those harbor freight specials. That one had pressure on it and just popped. Luckily I already had the center pin in the leaf spring so nothing really happened. I did have 3 others on the spring too. Those add a leaves are pretty stout.

Most of my C clamps have the rod bent around from putting a pipe on them Yeah I tighten them a bit

Time for an update..... It runs and drives! Then Monday morning it gelled up. Dang cold weather. More on that later....

After the rear suspension was modified, it was back to the front. Buttoned everything up, tying wires back and checking things to try not to over look things. I modified the header panel to install the 05 up head lights. I also had to modify the header to run an 05 grill too. We put the bumper on but need to remove the lower cross bar because the 05's don't have them. We also installed the first set of HID's.





Now we were working on wiring up grid heaters, which I skipped the delay relay for now to get this thing driving. Intercooler piping back on, had to make a long intake bolt since the soonest I could get one was 5-7 days.




Nick, my brother, ran wiring and installed the new back up light. Ya have to be able to see to back up this unit.



There was an issue of too much timing and this thing would fog you out of the shop. Luckily we have a timing light for diesels and could check it without tearing it apart. Also, for all the people that say there is only roughly 10-12* of movement on a VE is wrong. It'd more like 20*. Luckily we were able to retard the injection pump and that problem was fixed. Here's a pic of the tail pipe right after start up. 26* not plugged in 5 seconds on the grid heater. It started within one revolution too.



Also, the engine wouldn't rev up over 1500rpms. That was tricky. Put a pressure gauge on it and it read 0 with the lift pump on. The pump was flowing fuel but no pressure. Hmm I had been leery of my return set up so I made some calls with no real help. Nick went down to the fuel injection shop we use and Tom saved the day. Turns out that the return system on a VE is regulated with a banjo bolt that has 2 .012 holes in it. Yeah, mine was a -6 JIC fitting and -6 hose. No restriction. Nick installed a return line and the banjo bolt and it fixed it. Chaulk that up on the board as a lesson learned.

Next was some instrumentation. The wife did not want a pillar pod so I removed the old SOF 4x4 switch and added a boost gauge. I put the trans temp gauge next to the power point recepticle. I also installed a toggle switch for the back up lamp under the boost gauge, and added an LED that indicates the grid heater is on.



We buttoned it up and took it out for a test drive. It was freaking cold! -12 at 8:00pm and driving down the road the outside temp gauge said -40. It was dang cold. I put ten gallons of fuel in it with half a bottle of penray anti gel, and it had 10gal of fuel in it already with power service 911. Guess what? Monday morning it was gelled up. Not cool! Plus I thought the lift pump I put on there was bad. Here are pics of it sitting in the drive way. I've got some bugs to work out but at least it is out of the shop and mobile!

Congrats! It looks great after all the hard work too!! We'll have to request an update in a few months after you work the bugs out.

Just getting it out under it's own power must feel good. Mark the fuel problem up to the bad weather luck on startup and keep in there chugging on it. You will make it. Looks nice too.

Thanks guys! It sure is nice to have it drivable. I'm hoping to put some decent miles on it this weekend and take the kids so the wife can see how nice it will be to have all the extra room.