The Bronconator (1)

The Bronconator GT started off as a 1989 Ford Bronco. Dave bought this car for $200 in August 2005. Andy welded the rear differential to create a "diff lock" and one of the first things that happened to it was a short night trip along the river bottoms at West Terre Haute...

River Bottoms - West Terre Haute

Jammed between a couple of trees,
now minus the drivers door window, left rear side window and back window

This trip didn't end too well as it got bogged down and we spent a couple of hours in the woods with the coyotes howling at us whilst we waited for some friends to come and winch us out. The Bronconator suffered some minor damage. Apart from the windows that were smashed, the diff lock became unwelded, the starter motor no longer worked properly and most of the lights stopped working. We later found out this was because the rectifier had burned itself out and the light bulbs were getting far more than their usual 12volts and burned out.

We had several more trips in the Bronconator, including one to Redbird SRA near Dugger, Indiana in September 2005, but by now it was badly in need of some restoration - or at least a few modifications.

Damaged rear end
Notice the plastic used to replace the smashed windows
10th September 2005

That back hatch's gotta go
10th September 2005

From the front it still looks pretty decent
10th September 2005

Dave had already sawn off most of the roof and one night in late September 2005, four of us got a couple of cases of beer and started getting the Bronconator ready for its next trip to Redbird.

Scott, modifying the passenger door

Hey Presto - no doors at all!
Not quite content with Scott's modification, Andy simply cut the doors off!

Notice the deer horns screwed and "liquid nailed" to the hood (American for bonnet). The white pipe is a piece of old air vent from a laundry drier. It was duct taped to the air filter, a hole was cut through the hood and it was duct taped to the drivers side window pillar. One one of the previous trips on of the headlights got smashed. Dave "liquid nailed" a CD cover as a substitute. It really didn't look too bad.

Some serious work was also done. The starter motor was replaced with a new one. We had hoped to repair the fuel tank but after finally getting the thing out from underneath the car it was too badly corroded to weld. A newish one was gotten from a scrapped Ford Torus and welded just behind the back seats.

There was a reason for taking the doors and most of the body off. On previous trips the Bronconator proved to be a bit underpowered for anything like the hills we wanted to climb. By removing much of the body and other unnecessary items like the air conditioning, it was much lighter.

We even fitted a fire extinguisher. Well, when I say fitted, one was thrown onto the back seat along with the rest of the rubbish.

This page created 5th October 2005, last modified 3rd March 2006