Project 1998 Ford Ranger

This truck came to us pretty much stock. It was to recieve a front clip Z and a rear step notch. It was also getting bags, a trans mount, gas tank mount, 4 link and whatever else it needed to lay the frame on the pavement.

We cut everything out of the rear of the frame and made our own crossmembers and installed an aluminum fuel cell in the rear section of the frame. We used a SD.com step notch 8 piece kit. I like to make my own step notches suited specifically for each truck I do but the customer supplied all the parts and pieces so we used it gladly. The SD parts are so nice to work with. the laser cuts make for easy welding and grinding.

The front clip was cut completely out and flipped over so we could cut 2&1/2" out of the bottom of it. we welded the bottom back on and installed it back in the truck 3" higher than it was stock and also raised the engine mounts up 2&1/2" to make the oilpan clear the ground when the truck was layed out. This truck had a V-6 and it barely cleared the hood. We had to cut the inner structure of the hood out to clear the engine. A Ranger Edge hood would probably have cleared better. This truck looks sweet layed out so low with a stock hood.

We used the stock control arm bushings to make some tubular upper and lower control arms. These did the job well and after testing the truck with these I built the jigs for completely new Ranger upper and lower arms. I also decided to make the uppers adjustable. As you can see the front lays pretty hard. In fact the front crossmember was much higher than it needed to be to lay out flat.

This truck still had the stock wheels and tires on it when we did all the work. The stock rollers were about the same height as the 20s this guy was installing on the truck later. We built some tubular pieces for the bed above the step notch. The bed cut was pretty simple and mounting everything was also simple.

For more info on this or any of the other projects on our projects pages, please feel free to email me at

Mike@Dallashotrodparts.com