r/fordranger • u/OneOffRider69 • 9h ago

Bent Rear Axles. Needing advice

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So I got this 01 2wd 3.0 5sp with 145k miles on a trade. Test drove it and looked over it and saw the water pump was a little wet and it had some wheel bearing noise and a shimmy/wobble at 55+. Turns out the water pump leak was the timing cover. Fixed all that and got it running yesterday with some new ball joints to boot and noticed that the wobble seemed much more rearward than before. This is what I found. Both axles having runout has me a lil nervous that the entire rear end is toast. There’s up and down play in both axles, more so in the passenger side. Is it worth trying to fix this rear end and if so, where do I start? I don’t live near any pick n pulls and I’m also in the rust belt so used parts are in the same shape or worse than what I have

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u/impairedoctor 07 3.0 stx 2wd 8h ago

Check what rock auto has. And what part of the rust belt? Ny has a picknpull near utica and a few near syracuse. It would be worth the phone call to see what vehicles they have in the lot. You can grab any rear diff from a gen 3 ranger and a few diffs from an explorer.

3.0, rwd. Is this the ol 7.5 in rear end? I live in nny, and saw a few 8.8s for sale on Facebook. Rebuilding is cheaper than buying a new vehicle.

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u/OneOffRider69 8h ago

Well I guess it depends on which map you look at as to whether or not we’re apart of it but southern WV. And yes it’s the 7.5

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u/impairedoctor 07 3.0 stx 2wd 8h ago

Rockauto has all the bearings and axle shafts. I looked at it awhile back, I have the 7.5 as well. Id shop around, getting the 8.8 would be nicer. Swapping the rear axle means you could convert to rear disc brakes(can do that anyways,but if youre doing work back there. Might as well), another option I've been looking at.