Trucks are sketchy

[njdriver19]

Looks like billsteins are available also, designed to work with 0 - 2.5 inch lift.

Took a turn yesterday with a lot of pace, noticed that our trucks tends to understeer as expected , from a safety perspective that’s good , with a lighter rear end. Oversteer & a light rear = bad news . I think it is the main reason why no rear sway bar from the factory. Predictability is another positive, my friend had a 2014 tundra that would understeer or oversteer, you never really knew what it would do. Pushing your truck helps to know what it will do when you are in an emergency maneuver.

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[njdriver19]

honestly officer...I wasnt stunting...i was practicing moves for safety.

I once got out of a ticket in Manhattan while I was driving on the sidewalk. I think I got out of it because the guy was a detective and he didn’t have a ticket pad on him. Driving in The five Boros you can be more “creative” with your driving.

 

[BCRanger]

Driving in The five Boros you can be more “creative” with your driving.

You have to be! Last time we were in Brooklyn visiting rels in LI an ambulance going the wrong way out of an underpass forced my wife to jump a curb to give it space to get by. Thrashed the 20" rim and put a big gash in the tire on our Flex. Wish we'd had the truck that day. The kids are living for the day we drive the truck back east and we get to take to the city.

 

[BCRanger]

Pushing your truck helps to know what it will do when you are in an emergency maneuver.

Yep, people don't get that. You need to practice what to do when things are under your control in order to have the reflexes and knowledge to be able to do the right thing when things aren't under your control.

 

[navsnipe]

Forgot to mention that body dive under heavy braking is greatly reduced by the fox ford performance kit, I have a lot more confidence in heavy braking situations. Another advantage of the kit. Have I sold you yet?

I've noticed the FX4 suspension has very little small bump/ripple compliance which is especially noticeable on concrete roads at slow speeds (sub 30 mph). It seems to transmit the rough surface. Does the Fox or Eibach shocks help with this? I don't want a lift or level.

 

[navsnipe]

I think I just found the answer to my question over in the suspension/chassis section of the forum. Looks like Eibachs on the back end are a popular upgrade and improve the bouncy-ness.

 

[grizzly]

Yup.....

My old Mountaineer with AWD was the bomb.

Icy, wet, gravel it didn't matter. Punch to gas and go.

One of the many vehicles I wish I still had.

 

[njdriver19]

I've noticed the FX4 suspension has very little small bump/ripple compliance which is especially noticeable on concrete roads at slow speeds (sub 30 mph). It seems to transmit the rough surface. Does the Fox or Eibach shocks help with this? I don't want a lift or level.

I have had the fox suspension for a while now so it is hard for me to give a honest answer because I can’t recall, but I will try my best. Seems like with fox suspension hits bumps and works to settle the truck down, the fx4 suspension would feel like it is trying to work but it doesn’t know what it wants. The under dampening causes the springs to be still loaded when the next bump comes along. The stiffer fox suspension does not discombobulate with multiple bumps. I wish our resident retired ford engineer would chime in.

 

[njdriver19]

Yup.....

My old Mountaineer with AWD was the bomb.

Icy, wet, gravel it didn't matter. Punch to gas and go.

One of the many vehicles I wish I still had.

How was the gas mileage? I’m guessing under normal conditions it has at least a 70% to 30% of power going to rear vs front

 

[THLONE]

You guys would really like the old Packards with the electric suspension. ?

 

[Sanford & Son Salvage]

I've gone through a number of different suspension setups on my 2019 FX4 Lariat, and am finally really, really happy. Ultimately I settled on a front coilover and replacement rear shocks from Eibach. Prior to this I tried the Fox 2.0 shocks on the rear (which helped some, but not enough) and a 2.5" Rough Country lift up front (which gave me the stance and ground clearance I was looking for, but made the ride even worse than factory).

The Eibach Pro Truck front coilvers are fantastic, and the rear shocks to match completely convert this thing into a much more predictable and comfortable ride, both on and off road. I drive a lot of gravel/groomed roads similar to what you describe, and love what the Eibachs have done to it.

Just wondering.. Did you remove the Rough Country lift after puting the the coil overs or did you keep the level in?

 

[quangdog]

Just wondering.. Did you remove the Rough Country lift after puting the the coil overs or did you keep the level in?

The RC lift is essentially a "top hat" style thing that sandwiches between the top of the coilover and the mount bracket for the coilover in the truck. When I swapped suspensions, I left the RC lift attached to the factory coilovers, since the new Eibach coilovers already had roughly the same amount of lift built-in.

You would not want to install the RC lift on top of coilovers that are already providing a bit of lift.

 

[Fawnbuster]

Excuse the clickbait title, but just got our Ranger and not having driven a truck in a long time, it's been "interesting" to get used to driving a 4WD pickup. For reference we traded in our Flex on the Ranger and our other car is a FWD EV. The Flex has the Haldex AWD system (same as Volvo XC70 and many others) and it is completely unflappable in dirt and gravel. I could pitch it around without any worries about stability. It would even oversteer enough or at least not plow so I could really hussle it. My old Subaru Outback XT AWD was even better, phenomenal in fact, it felt totally confidence inspiring and at same time I could juice the throttle and get it to kick the tail out in a totally controllable way.

The Ranger otoh is a lot more ...errr... demanding. At any speed on loose uneven surface above say 60km/h -- I'm talking decently maintained graded road with washboarding dips and potholes etc..not forest service roads -- I find I really need to stay on top of it. It wants to yaw unpredictably, sometimes to the extent it feels like the rear end wants to switch places with the front, which you know wouldn't be good, lol.

To be totally clear, this is not a complaint/criticism. I knew exactly what I was getting into going from AWD to 4WD with no center differential. And I also know that trucks, carrying so little weight in back along with stiffer (FX4 in my case) suspension will cause the rear end to not be planted. I've gotten behind enough slow pickups in rough conditions and watched them jounce around.

It does provide more of a driving challenge! For now I'm reigning myself in until I get more confident with the handling limits, don't want to end up in a ditch or worse in my new truck.

For folks that have been driving their Rangers in these conditions, curious about your experience/technique. Do you tend to just let it run a bit loose, confident you can recover from transient behavior? Or do you god forbid just slow down? Is it actually better in 2WD for this? Have you seen any improvements with aftermarket shocks? Do you run weight in the bed even in non-winter conditions?

Swapping out all 4 FX4 shocks for Bilstein 5100s helped the yaw and ride immensely. I also drive with psi between 35 and 40 psi, above that it's harsh (truck had 52psi when I got it) and below 35 (with these oem Hankooks) it was mushy due to softer sidewalls at low psi. My Durango at the Sheriff's office was always at 40psi. 5 extra psi made a huge difference in that suv, I had a few hundred pounds of normal gear plus scuba gear in the back of it.

Rotate tires every 5k and always have even wear.

 

[BCRanger]

I'll look at lowering the pressure. I'm pretty sold on need for suspension fix here.

It's getting to full mud season here, and the road up to the ski hill makes a great proving ground for suspensions. It's a mess of crazy washboards, ruts, bumps. What's hilarious is that our EV (Nissan Leaf) and really any smaller economy FWD cars seem to do as well if not better than trucks. At least less nerve racking lol, though I'm sure their suspensions aren't happy.

I found the mud/ruts selection on TM and that seems to help a bit but mostly I've just gotten more used to it. There is a point where you push past and then I just get these massive yaw patterns. Generally easily correctable you just have to be on your toes the whole time. Kind of fun but not exactly a relaxing ride. Kids love it.

 

[EJH]

I'll look at lowering the pressure. I'm pretty sold on need for suspension fix here.

It's getting to full mud season here, and the road up to the ski hill makes a great proving ground for suspensions. It's a mess of crazy washboards, ruts, bumps. What's hilarious is that our EV (Nissan Leaf) and really any smaller economy FWD cars seem to do as well if not better than trucks. At least less nerve racking lol, though I'm sure their suspensions aren't happy.

I found the mud/ruts selection on TM and that seems to help a bit but mostly I've just gotten more used to it. There is a point where you push past and then I just get these massive yaw patterns. Generally easily correctable you just have to be on your toes the whole time. Kind of fun but not exactly a relaxing ride. Kids love it.

BCRanger, did you ever replace any suspension components? If not, you should do the rears. Huge improvement in stability and confidence, for a very small cost and DIY effort.

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