Project: 76, Orange Special Decor

[gnsteam]

Today I worked on a lot of little things. I checked each of the brake bleeders. Finding a few more air bubbles at each one. I needed to recenter the proportioning valve sensor piston. So that the dash, brake, fault light would go out. I built an additional heat shield for the brake line going down to the front differential. Then I installed the factory, driver's side air vent box. Sorry, I forgot to take some pictures.

I also spent sometime working on the center console design. For over the transmission tunnel. I think I 'm ready to order some materials to start the build. I will post pictures as I make progress.

Then this evening, I positioned the drivers side, Rock Slide Engineering. Power step rock slider. RSE, makes a kit for the 1st gen Bronco. And as expected, it's not going to be a simple unbox and bolt it on project.

More to come on this project.

Over the weekend. Harbor Freight was having a parking lot sale. So, I went against my purchasing practice of only buying things needed to get the Bronco on the road. And splurged on a winch. It was $130 off and I had a $50 gift card, thats been in my wallet for a few months.

Several months back. I prefitted the James Duff / Lick Creek. Hidden winch mount kit. So this install should go pretty smoothly. I will need to put some work into the relocation of the winch control module. So more to come on this project as well.

 

[gnsteam]

Yesterday I finished up mounting the driver side slider step. It actually went better than I predicted. I just had to move two of the support brackets a few inches. By drilling 4 new holes in the sliders base plate.

I had to move the brackets. Because I positioned the slider in a more centered location. Which is approximately 2 inches closer to the rear wheel. Putting the slider in the kits designed position. The slider interfers with the front fender flair.

Today with thunderstorms in my area. I worked in the shop and wired up a switch box for the ARB switches. This box will be mounted overhead. Between the two center roll cage bars. Along with another box or two with accessory switches.

This evening after the storms had cleared. I took my wife for her first ride in the build. Where now up to 16 miles, cruising the neighborhood .

 

[gnsteam]

After mounting the driver side slider. I was confident that the passengers side would be quick and easy. Boy, was I wrong. A little more than eight hours of work, over two days.

Now on too the wiring for the power step.

 

[gnsteam]

Over the last few days. I got the Rock Slide power steps wired up and working. The steps work great and much needed when you have 4" of lift and 35's. Sorry , I guess I should have taken a picture with the steps deployed.

Today I began to work on the hidden winch mounting. As stated before. I had prefitted the mounting brackets. So I was hoping for a somewhat simple install. However I am not installing the Warn winch that the mounts where designed around. I'm going to give the HF Badlands Apex 12000, a try. Looking at the overall dimensions of the HF winch. It is very similar to the Warn and should fit. And the HF winch is built to allow the relocation of the winch controller. At my first attempt to bolt the winch to the winch plate. The winch was a fraction of an inch to long. The winches end housings, are tampered. Getting small as it projects from the spool. So I was able to raise the winch by adding a 1/4" shims between the winch and mounting plate.

Next step was to mount it in the Bronco. We'll that first attempt failed as well. Back in time when I first fitted the winch mounts. The mounts fit fine. But at that time the radiator was not installed. The radiator, shroud bracket was interfering with the back side of the winch mounting plate by about an 1/8". So I made some 3/16" shims to go between the frame rails and the winch mounting plate. Once bolted up it gave me a little over 1/8" of clearance at the shroud mount.

That is as far as I got today. I had to pull it all back out. So I could take my wife for another ride tonight.

 

[.94 OR]

View attachment 966318

Does the fill plug sit rather high on that cover?
I can't imagine you fill till it pours back out, that would put all seals submerged in oil.

 

[gnsteam]

Does the fill plug sit rather high on that cover?
I can't imagine you fill till it pours back out, that would put all seals submerged in oil.

The cover comes from Ruff Stuff. I would exspect it to be OK. I will find my stock cover and make a comparison.

 

[Yeller]

The cover fill plug is high, it is high by design. They do not know what your set up is, high pinion, low pinion, front or rear, pinion angle turned up high, etc. So, to protect themselves they put the fill plug high on the cover. It being filled to that level isn't hurting anything as long as it doesn't push fluid out of the vent with the hubs locked or in 4x4. The factory cover will have the level for a stock bronco. One thing for sure, with the level that high, you will never have an issue with pinion bearings dying from a lack of lubrication.

 

[gnsteam]

The cover fill plug is high, it is high by design. They do not know what your set up is, high pinion, low pinion, front or rear, pinion angle turned up high, etc. So, to protect themselves they put the fill plug high on the cover. It being filled to that level isn't hurting anything as long as it doesn't push fluid out of the vent with the hubs locked or in 4x4. The factory cover will have the level for a stock bronco. One thing for sure, with the level that high, you will never have an issue with pinion bearings dying from a lack of lubrication.

Yeller, thanks for the explanation.

 

[gnsteam]

Work on the winch install continued yesterday. With the help of Bruners4. The Duff/Lick Creek mounting system. Requires, mounting the winch upside-down. Under the mounting plate. Once hung under the frame.

A protective skid plate goes under the winch. Attaching to the bottom frame rails and winch plate. And to the back side of the bumper, using the fair lead bolts to support the bumper and skid plate.

The next obstacle was the large, winch clutch engagement handle. It is too tall to fit inside the skid plate and it would be difficult to access as well. So my solution, was to cut of the excess handle material. Place it in the lathe and turn down the remaining material. I turned the diameter down to .707". Which is the corner to corner dimension to make a 1/2" male lug. I also found that length of the 1/2" lug needed to be .350 in height. This is measured from the top of the existing tapper feature of the handle.

At this lenght the lug is approximately 1/16" recessed into the 1 1/2" clearance hole, that I drilled into the skid plate.

I ordered a 1/2" square x 1/2" drive socket and 1/2" drive T-handle wrench to fit the lug. Then everything fit just .

 

[tasker]

VERY VERY NICE WORK!!!

 

[gnsteam]

Next up Dave and I looked around to finding a suitable place to relocated the winch controller. And where to route the power cables. Over last weekend, I found a company. shawntexasproducts.com Makes a 3D printed relocation box for this Badlands winch. It sells for $50 including shipping.

The box is approximately, 5"×5.5"×3.75" in size. It accommodates all of the Badlands controls, winch plug and wireless on/off switch. Overall, I am pleased with the product. We settled on the box location at the driver side inner fender. Here is a picture of its appoxment location. I'm going to make a mounting plate to mount the box and Badlands supplied cutoff switch. So that I can use the three holes already drilled into the fender that are currently filled with button head screws, too make them look useful.

Last night, I order some more 2 awg cable and lugs. To make longer cables to go from the winch controller box to The winch. The Badlands supplied relocation cables where 1' to short to reach between the box and winch. More to come on this project next week.
This Saturday is Speedway Motors, next monthly Car and Coffee. So I'm going to take the Bronco to it's first show. With that plan in place, Dave and I installed the rear tire carrier before calling it quits for the day.

It sure is great having Dave (Bruners4) as friend and helpful hand on this project. Without his help, I surely wouldn't be at this point with my build. Thank you Dave.

 

[Yeller]

Love the mods to make the winch work. FWIW I find I power mine out most of the time unless it needs to go out more than 50 feet or so, often the fight isn't worth the reward. The ability to be able to free spool is well worth the effort but often not practical in practice.

The world will tell you powering out with synthetic is a big no no, the drum heats up damaging the rope. Bunch of hooky, if it gets hot enough to be a problem it's the least of your worries. The same camp that says you can't power out will use their winch lower themselves down a decent, so there's that bit of hypocriteness LOL.

 

[Bruners4]

It has been a pleasure to assist and also inject a few ideas to make it a better build. Looking forward to it's completion so we can go put on some miles and hit a few easy trails.

 

[ntsqd]

I thought that I was being unusual when I used a Barnes 4x4 winch plate to mount an ancient Warn M8 upside down on the front of the FSB. With the Warn winches the housing with the freewheel lever in it can be put on anyway that the screw holes line up. I rotated the housing 180° and hole-sawed a 4.5" hole in the plate for access. I'll link the pics rather than pollute your thread:
Pic 1 The capped socket is for the pendant winch remote. There's another one under the dash inside.
Pic 2 On it's first trip in Millers, NV. Mounted, but not yet wired so no cable on it.
Pic 3 Can sort of see the lever just beyond the HID transformer. If you ever needed a reason to not use Steel-it paint, there it is.

 

[gnsteam]

Love the mods to make the winch work. FWIW I find I power mine out most of the time unless it needs to go out more than 50 feet or so, often the fight isn't worth the reward. The ability to be able to free spool is well worth the effort but often not practical in practice.

The world will tell you powering out with synthetic is a big no no, the drum heats up damaging the rope. Bunch of hooky, if it gets hot enough to be a problem it's the least of your worries. The same camp that says you can't power out will use their winch lower themselves down a decent, so there's that bit of hypocriteness LOL.

Thanks Yeller. I can sure use the advice when it comes to winch use. When I bought this Bronco it was equipped with a Warn 8274. The only time I use it. Was one test, free spooling the steel cable almost all the way out. Attaching it to friends tractor and drawing the Bronco up to the tractor. Then I removed it and sold it. At that time my Bronco was only getting used as a daily drive. So I didn't have a need to drag around that extra weight. So thats the extent of my winching experience.

 

[gnsteam]

Thanks Yeller. I can sure use the advice when it comes to winch use. When I bought this Bronco it was equipped with a Warn 8274. The only time I use it. Was one test, free spooling the steel cable almost all the way out. Attaching it to friends tractor and drawing the Bronco up to the tractor. Then I removed it and sold it. At that time my Bronco was only getting used as a daily drive. So I didn't have a need to drag around that extra weight. So thats the extent of my winching experience.

I just read in Scoops thread. Adding a hidden winch on his 6G Stroppe. He mentioned that on some winches. The clutch end house can be rotated or clocked to a different position. I didn't know that was possible. Does anyone know if the Badlands winch can do this? Otherwise I will check it out next time I pull the winch out of the Bronco to work on the wiring.

 

[ntsqd]

Looking at the owner's manual it shows that the bolt pattern holding that housing on is not symmetrical, so I'll guess probably not.

 

[gnsteam]

Looking at the owner's manual it shows that the bolt pattern holding that housing on is not symmetrical, so I'll guess probably not.

Your right, the bolt pattern is not symmetrical. I crawled underneath and took a look. Thanks.

 

[gnsteam]

Bruners4 and I, attended my Broncos first gathering today. Speedway Motors, Cars and Coffee. Its a big show each time. Well over 200 hundred attendees. Now up to 101 miles with no issues.

 

[gnsteam]

I didn't do much work on the Bronco last week. Other than washing it and preparing for a 90 mile round trip to Elkhorn Nebraska. To attend an open house at Mike's Classic Cars. Mike And Amber have a nice facility doing mechanical and full restorations, of all types of vehicles.

I first met Amber at the Speedway Motors Cars and Coffee, early in 2025. She was there with this 76 that she had just finished.

This year she finished another one, a 66 that is beautiful and it is available. You can contact her through their website.

Also at the show was Fred and Denise with his 77 halfcab. Fred has been a long time member of our forum. And it was great spending the afternoon with them again.

Amber and Mike had special parking set aside for any Broncos that came to the show. So here are some pictures of them.

Mike's 79 Godzilla and I think 76 Free Wheelin pickup. Really nice with a factory 460ci.

Mike and Amber are great host, and such a fun event. They had well over hundred attendees coming and going through out the afternoon.