DoubleOh7

Haven't bought it yet, but it's gonna be a smallish (5x8) utility trailer I can can haul stuff from the home center or to the dump. Gonna go look at one tomorrow and then I can post a picture of something.

Just added a Curt hitch and wiring harness to my TC. The hitch was easy-peasy, the wiring not so much. Once I decided what to do it wasn't that bad, but being a passenger van, the instructions you see on YouTube only really (easily) applies to cargo vans. You can't easily take the rear floor panel up since it is tucked up under the side body panels about two inches on each side. So I didn't do that step. Instead I looked on the passenger side and saw a rubber grommet (plug) there below the rear Fuse panel. There was nothing like this on the drivers side, so I punched a hole the same size (I have lots of those large rubber hole plugs) and in the same location as the other side. This let me run the power wire and connectors to the hitch and the passenger side turn signal connectors out this hole and over. Had to drop the spare tire to run the wires up and out of the way. I plan to redo this harness a little once it warms up outside. It was also getting dark and my impatience overruled my OCD. Anyway, the rear fuse box had unused 12V constant terminals and allowed me to add the fuse harness from Curt using a spade connector. All in all, way easier than what Curt showed on the YouTube video.

It's a much smaller car herd now, but who knows what will happen if I ever get this garage built! I have a herd of guitars, so I can relate. I whittled that herd down by half as well, but there are a few I can't part with. I inherited both a bass and guitar from my father, but I sold the bass and the amp he bought with it (in 1970) because I'm not a bass player and I didn't have space - and it wasn't the instrument of his we all felt expressed "him" as we grew up. He was a guitar player who played bass. He took up bass much later in life. I like the blue on the van as well. Just don't like the name they gave it... High Impact Blue. ? I'm currently installing a trailer hitch on the van and got the hitch on in just a few minutes, but have to wait for the rain to stop now to do the wiring part. Also struggling with front seat stowage for small things like cell phones.

Thanks for the tip - since I still need to get a second key (only got one), that might be something to consider. Just returned from a trip down the I-5 corridor to southern Oregon and averaged about 25.5 MPG, which considering the traffic through Portland both ways and the southern Oregon passes - not too bad. The K&N filter was here when I returned, so didn't get a chance to see if that might boost it .01 MPG or not. The filter in it is the original, best I can tell (kinda dirty), so I can hope it improves some now that it is installed. Also replaced the mid-way worn out factory Continental's for a set of Michelin A/S tires, which improved the handling about 2-fold. I was very impressed by how flat it held the curves on the passes. Didn't quite expect that. Thanks on the Falcon and F100. I found the F100 on Craigslist about 3 years ago. It was in a barn from 1998 after being traded in by the original owner at a local dealership. A wholesaler bought it and kept it for himself until he pushed it into a field 15 years later and listed it for sale. The original owner had at some time earlier swapped the motor/trans/rear into it from a 69 Mustang (best I can tell from various tags). So it's now got a 390/C6/3.0 TracLoc. I had to redo all the brakes, interior, new tires and back to stock wheels, new fluids, did some minor bed-floor rust repair (followed by a LineX coating) - and repainted the white on it. The rest is patina. It is going up for sale after the holidays. I've had a few Falcons (stock 65 Tudor wagon, 63 Hardtop with a pretty radical 6-cyl, and a 62 Futura w/289). They're fun little cars, so got involved with the club. Once the truck is gone and I have a garage - the Ranchero is getting a heart transplant. Can't wait. Picture is of my previous herd playing musical cars to get any one of them up into the garage (previous house).

Indeed. I've had my jackstands for a long time, and though they are not marked as to where they are from - not a one is cast steel. I'll probably restore my old O'brien jack, but lacking that I'll research who makes/sells/rebrands a jack and has 5 out 5 stars.

Wow - have we gone off-topic or what! FWIW I just remarried, which is why I moved and why I'm having to redo so much. Long story short I was supposed to have my garage first, remodel her lower space for us (BnL and SnL live upstairs - she's a twin and has lived here with her sis and BnL for years) (and are great people). The house is all paid for. We planned to store all our extra stuff in second story of new garage, start my new business, live long and prosper. Because garage didn't get done first, second, third, or forth, we had to sell nearly everything we could let go of - or pay a small fortune for gosh knows how long to store it all. I kept all of my tools, but anything I could live without for a while I would sell and replace it later. I'd have repaired the jack (it just leaked from the pump push-rod... it held pressure; though you had to keep it topped up), but decided I needed the space more than a leaky jack. Once my other house closes with the new buyers, and I get a garage, I'll buy all the things I let go. Things like my sand blast cabinet, horizontal bandsaw, jack, bench vise - things like that - I plan to get again and they're not too expensive. My wife is VERY FRUGAL. Nothing wrong with that... it balances us out. HA. She garage sales every weekend with her friend and looks for only quality, not quantity. A couple weeks ago she bought some 1930's Christmas light for $10 and sold them 2 days later for $1200. Our "garage sale" netted us almost $20K after we paid the company that ran it for us. It was bigger than us. It was that kind of stuff. Had we had time to sell it the way we planned, would have been $80K, but had to empty my house to sell it while the market still exists. She will not pay full price on anything if she knows it can find it "on Saturday." But she is practical as well and if I've need something, she's usually supportive of it. She knows we won't go broke over it. She went with me when I went to look at this TC and felt it was a great deal for what I needed for our future. Anyway, said that to say - they're out there. I was blessed to find her - and that she didn't run when my "career ended abruptly" says all that needed to be said. I did loose my Ranchero to her. She liked it too much. I said, fine, it needs a new 450HP crate motor, so I guess that's yours to buy. Good info on the WIX catalog. Thanks for that! That's what I would have used way back then to make sure the oil filter crossed. And since we are talking lift points and jacks - the one thing I will NEVER use is any of these China jacks with the levers to hold the car up on cast-iron teeth. China has ZERO QC standards on their own. If a US company specs out something, they can spec-out material and other standards, but few do. Cheap is cheap. I have a nice collection of pinned jack stands made out of steel. I never feel nervous under a car with these. My '63 Ranchero, if curious.

Please be aware that things that fit may not be correct to use - especially when it comes to oil filters. Some have baffles and restrictions inside to do things like restrict oil drain if they are mounted face-down or face-up, etc. Not saying these, as mentioned, are not cross-compatible, but having a history as a parts guy (back when you had to use books to look things up) and in a rural area where farmers had older equipment you could not find in a book - I had to do a lot of creative parts finding. Anyway, just saying - external dimensions are not all you need to consider when changing a part out to another part.

I know it wasn't my question, and I'm not sure what the lift points look like yet, but this jack (as most bottle jacks) has a pretty high minimum height. This one said a minimum of 8.5". My low/high SUV jack failed last year, so I sold it off at a garage sale I had when I moved (which is why I'm building a new garage) - but it had a minimum of 3" and a maximum of 22" and still struggled going under some parts of a few cars I've done work on. I assume this van has a jack and can be jacked up with it to remove tires - so my best guess is to use it to lift it high enough to get another jack, and jack stands under it. My plan for the new garage is to get a lift, so at that point I may not even replace the floor jack. I have an old vintage "O'Brian" jack I plan to restore and may fast-track that. It's a cool old jack.

I've read about the issues some have had putting in the K&N on this year TC, but I'm not going to dig into this until we have at least a couple hours, or more, of dry weather here. I don't need it so bad to get soaked doing it. As for oil changes - I find these to be the least satisfying to do myself. I do my own oil changes on my collector cars, for obvious reasons, but to move those out of the garage (when I had one to move them out of) to do contortionist moves on these new cars to reach where they put filters, and such, has not been happening of late. But I doubt I'd have an issue doing it if I wanted to. I'm not yet familiar with what's under the hood, or under the van, since the same soaking issue would apply. Spring will be here soon enough and I hope to be fully equipped with what I learn here, and elsewhere, with the things I'll do to it. Hopefully by then I'll have some forward movement on my garage... fingers crossed. Thanks Fifty150 for your tips.

Don't see myself GymKhana'ing anytime soon, but the mods I look for are the ones others have found to make it gooder in some way. As for the K&N I do those as a lifetime filter. Clean and reuse and keep the dealer out of there when I get the oil changed. I also replace my own cabin filters to avoid them walking out with a cruddy one telling me for $40 they'll replace it for me I do all my own service except oil changes while the thing is under some warranty - then go from there as I feel. I'm currently lacking a garage (except for the 2 sheds and a ghetto garage sitting in the background next to my barn-find '66 F100). It, and the ghetto garage; containing my '63 Falcon Ranchero 289/T5 3.45 TracLoc which I hand-built a few years ago, are out in the weather as I painstakingly await my garage to be built. 14 months and counting to get that done. Permit mess. I'm planning to use the van as half work and half passenger. The Kia was just to small - though I loved my Soul a lot. But I sold my Soul to buy another Ford (again). ? I'm gonna be starting a Handyman service after being asked to clear my desk after 37 years, along with many others, when the company I was with circled the drain and folded last year. I was plant engineer, so, at my age, decided to just wing it on my own - and wanted a better work vehicle. I hope the TC serves me well for what I'm hoping for it. Certainly has far more potential. I'm daily finding the little features it has - like auto wipers, lights that come on in curves and others. Finally found all the manuals it was missing on Ford's site. One thing I sure miss keeping my key fob in my pocket. Keyless entry and push-button door and start was nice to have; if even for a while. That's the one "step back" part of this I feel. Keep asking myself, "What's up with this "key" thing." ?️

Just traded in my 2014 Kia Soul (with all the bells and whistles and 70K miles) for a 2014 Transit Connect Titanium (with all the bells and whistles and 27K miles). Still getting to know the van and came here to do that a little faster. I find user forums to be a wealth of knowledge, so at this point I'm looking to see what mods are being done and how well they help. I'm gonna do a K&N filter (always do that) and who knows what else. This van has so many features I hadn't seen on any I ever saw (and I looked at a lot of them), so there is not much I need to do to it. But I never leave well enough alone. Cheers- Roger