XionUAV
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Almost a full year. That's how long my Ranger was at the body shop for work that would have likely taken a competent shop no more than 2 months to complete. I thought the shop I took the thing to would be professional. I was wrong.
To recap, this Ranger had front driver damage. Needed a new front frame rail, radiator support, hood and fender. Also needed the battery tray and piece below that. I supplied all the parts. The aftermarket radiator support showed up with rust behind welded areas. It went back. The Ford sourced support was also a little rough but no rust at least.
The Ford sourced hood showed up damaged because it wasn't packed with adequate foam in the box. Even the delivery guy told me to open it up before he left so he could document expected damage. That's how often it happens apparently. This cost an extra $450 to correct. The hood was aluminum, but the Ford sourced fenders are steel and don't come with the attachment at the front that connects to the radiator support. The OEM aluminum fender has that part bonded to the fender. That part doesn't show up on the ford parts list anywhere. It took about 5 employees and the parts manager to finally figure out what the part was. I decided on an aftermarket aluminum fender that had the front mount already bonded.
I delivered the Ranger to the body shop with all the new parts and the damaged sections removed. They put it on their frame rack but didn't even start working on it for about 3 months. At 6 months they had done some work but were still slow. At around 8 months I get a text from the shop manager that it's ready to pick up. I go down there and find shoddy, incomplete work. The frame work was ok but the pieces that attach the front of the fender to the radiator support were completely missing. They were still in the package on the seat. They're supposed to be welded on. The front of both fenders were just hanging unsupported. Then I noticed there was no separator at the door jamb on the new fender. It was completely open to the fender well. I had supplied the old fender with the plastic separator that was supposed to be moved and bonded to the new fender. They had sent the old fender to the recycler with the separator still attached.
The Ranger was sitting outside their shop. The shop manager went and got the employee who apparently was responsible for the radiator support work. When told he forgot to install the fender supports on the radiator support, he actually suggested just drilling a hole through them and bolting them on. The shop manager told him they needed to be welded, so the employee then asked if he should drag the welder out there and weld them. Mind you the radiator support was painted at that point.
And with all this, the old hood was lying in the bed with the bump stops still in place. There were none in the newly painted hood that was resting directly on the fenders. I was just stunned how unprofessional these people were.
At that point I told the manager I was going to take the Ranger to another shop that would do the work professionally. He was embarrassed by the work of his employees and promised they would make it right.
I sent a letter to the shop owner and shared what was going on and how crappy the work was. He agreed that his employees had dropped the ball and said he would personally oversee the work to get the Ranger back to spec. They ordered a new fender separator from Ford but now it's just a piece of fat foam that doesn't even allow the fender to line up with the door properly. Sticks out at the bottom. So I'm going to have to find a parts Ranger, remove the plastic separator from the fender and fix that myself. It has to be cut from the fender with a long, flexible knife since its basically glued to the body and fender.
The owner was on a business trip the next time they had me come look at it. The clear-coat was rough. It appeared they had contamination in their air supply. Later I found out that's exactly what it was so they had to respray everything after changing their filters.
A month later the manager texts me that it's ready. I tell him to have the owner inspect it first. Next day I get a text that there are still things that they need to fix. A couple of weeks later I get another text saying the same thing. I say the same thing. The next day I'm told there are still things that need corrected. That happened a few times until almost a year later, I go down and decide that the work is going to have to be good enough.
There are still things that irritate me, like rust showing through the paint where the fender supports were welded on. I'll have to sand those spots, rust proof and paint them. The fender-to-hood gap at the front of the hood is wider than the middle and back to the hinges. Wasn't like that on the original hood. Might be because of the repairs due to shipping damage. I'll just have to deal with that.
The intake manifold had to be replaced because of a broken vacuum nipple on the bottom of the plastic manifold. That was fun. Some connections at the back can't even be seen without a mirror, or removed until the manifold is rotated away from the head so you can get your hand back there to unclip them. One of the zip tie clips holding a vacuum hose can only be reached through the driver fender well.
New radiator and AC condenser went in with only some minor adjustments needed to the rubber mounts. Used intercooler is mounted but I have no idea where the intercooler hoses went after a year. Finally gave up looking for them and ordered a used set off eBay.
Installed the Roush wheels with 285/70-17 Dura Trac tires just to see what it was going to look like. I like it. Won't install any of the front end pieces until the plastic separator is installed in the fender since the fender will have to come off again. They didn't seal the separator to the body on the passenger side so I'll have to do that as well. One of the last things I'll do is install minimalist Elite series fender flares.
Didn't notice until replacing the intake manifold that the plastic cover on the throttle body was damage with a piece of it missing. New FoMoCo throttle body just arrived today. Once the intercooler hoses show up I should be able to put enough of it back together to get it running. Still need to find a parts Ranger though for the lighting wiring at the corner that's shredded, in addition to the plastic fender separator.
Still have one major unknown hurdle. The case on the steering rack is cracked around its circumference with a gap of about 2mm. Got a used rack from another 2020. However, it occurred to me that the rack will have to be calibrated and possibly reprogrammed to work properly. Ford won't touch a used rack installed by DIY so not sure what's going to happen there. In Europe there's a company that sells reconditioned racks programmed for your vehicle VIN. Didn't see anything like that here in the States when originally looking.
Definitely could have used a crystal ball last year to tell me to just walk away from this one. But here we are deep in it so just have to keep going.
To recap, this Ranger had front driver damage. Needed a new front frame rail, radiator support, hood and fender. Also needed the battery tray and piece below that. I supplied all the parts. The aftermarket radiator support showed up with rust behind welded areas. It went back. The Ford sourced support was also a little rough but no rust at least.
The Ford sourced hood showed up damaged because it wasn't packed with adequate foam in the box. Even the delivery guy told me to open it up before he left so he could document expected damage. That's how often it happens apparently. This cost an extra $450 to correct. The hood was aluminum, but the Ford sourced fenders are steel and don't come with the attachment at the front that connects to the radiator support. The OEM aluminum fender has that part bonded to the fender. That part doesn't show up on the ford parts list anywhere. It took about 5 employees and the parts manager to finally figure out what the part was. I decided on an aftermarket aluminum fender that had the front mount already bonded.
I delivered the Ranger to the body shop with all the new parts and the damaged sections removed. They put it on their frame rack but didn't even start working on it for about 3 months. At 6 months they had done some work but were still slow. At around 8 months I get a text from the shop manager that it's ready to pick up. I go down there and find shoddy, incomplete work. The frame work was ok but the pieces that attach the front of the fender to the radiator support were completely missing. They were still in the package on the seat. They're supposed to be welded on. The front of both fenders were just hanging unsupported. Then I noticed there was no separator at the door jamb on the new fender. It was completely open to the fender well. I had supplied the old fender with the plastic separator that was supposed to be moved and bonded to the new fender. They had sent the old fender to the recycler with the separator still attached.
The Ranger was sitting outside their shop. The shop manager went and got the employee who apparently was responsible for the radiator support work. When told he forgot to install the fender supports on the radiator support, he actually suggested just drilling a hole through them and bolting them on. The shop manager told him they needed to be welded, so the employee then asked if he should drag the welder out there and weld them. Mind you the radiator support was painted at that point.
And with all this, the old hood was lying in the bed with the bump stops still in place. There were none in the newly painted hood that was resting directly on the fenders. I was just stunned how unprofessional these people were.
At that point I told the manager I was going to take the Ranger to another shop that would do the work professionally. He was embarrassed by the work of his employees and promised they would make it right.
I sent a letter to the shop owner and shared what was going on and how crappy the work was. He agreed that his employees had dropped the ball and said he would personally oversee the work to get the Ranger back to spec. They ordered a new fender separator from Ford but now it's just a piece of fat foam that doesn't even allow the fender to line up with the door properly. Sticks out at the bottom. So I'm going to have to find a parts Ranger, remove the plastic separator from the fender and fix that myself. It has to be cut from the fender with a long, flexible knife since its basically glued to the body and fender.
The owner was on a business trip the next time they had me come look at it. The clear-coat was rough. It appeared they had contamination in their air supply. Later I found out that's exactly what it was so they had to respray everything after changing their filters.
A month later the manager texts me that it's ready. I tell him to have the owner inspect it first. Next day I get a text that there are still things that they need to fix. A couple of weeks later I get another text saying the same thing. I say the same thing. The next day I'm told there are still things that need corrected. That happened a few times until almost a year later, I go down and decide that the work is going to have to be good enough.
There are still things that irritate me, like rust showing through the paint where the fender supports were welded on. I'll have to sand those spots, rust proof and paint them. The fender-to-hood gap at the front of the hood is wider than the middle and back to the hinges. Wasn't like that on the original hood. Might be because of the repairs due to shipping damage. I'll just have to deal with that.
The intake manifold had to be replaced because of a broken vacuum nipple on the bottom of the plastic manifold. That was fun. Some connections at the back can't even be seen without a mirror, or removed until the manifold is rotated away from the head so you can get your hand back there to unclip them. One of the zip tie clips holding a vacuum hose can only be reached through the driver fender well.
New radiator and AC condenser went in with only some minor adjustments needed to the rubber mounts. Used intercooler is mounted but I have no idea where the intercooler hoses went after a year. Finally gave up looking for them and ordered a used set off eBay.
Installed the Roush wheels with 285/70-17 Dura Trac tires just to see what it was going to look like. I like it. Won't install any of the front end pieces until the plastic separator is installed in the fender since the fender will have to come off again. They didn't seal the separator to the body on the passenger side so I'll have to do that as well. One of the last things I'll do is install minimalist Elite series fender flares.
Didn't notice until replacing the intake manifold that the plastic cover on the throttle body was damage with a piece of it missing. New FoMoCo throttle body just arrived today. Once the intercooler hoses show up I should be able to put enough of it back together to get it running. Still need to find a parts Ranger though for the lighting wiring at the corner that's shredded, in addition to the plastic fender separator.
Still have one major unknown hurdle. The case on the steering rack is cracked around its circumference with a gap of about 2mm. Got a used rack from another 2020. However, it occurred to me that the rack will have to be calibrated and possibly reprogrammed to work properly. Ford won't touch a used rack installed by DIY so not sure what's going to happen there. In Europe there's a company that sells reconditioned racks programmed for your vehicle VIN. Didn't see anything like that here in the States when originally looking.
Definitely could have used a crystal ball last year to tell me to just walk away from this one. But here we are deep in it so just have to keep going.
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