Tim’s Alaska Ranger Raptor Build + Adventures

[Tim_AK]

Hey everyone! I’m new here, and just wanted to document my use of my 2025 Ranger Raptor and some things that have worked great for me as I use it to travel around the remote northern parts of North America.

I’ve utilized this forum a fair bit during my “build” process, learned a lot as I went, and figured it was time to say hi and share the awesome stuff this truck is capable of!

A little backstory: I live in Alaska, and remote travel is something I love. I not only needed a vehicle to get me out to the mountains for skiing, climbing, hiking, etc, but also to take on multi thousand mile trips around AK and northern Canada.

Prior to the RR, I had a built 3rd gen Tacoma. Took that thing everywhere from the Mojave desert to the Arctic Ocean in the Northwest Territories. Rock crawling, mud, thousands and thousands of miles of dirt roads. It was reliable, underpowered, had a confusing relationship between the engine and the transmission, and had typical underwhelming Toyota suspension, even with multiple different suspension systems tried. My wife and I found ourselves exhausted after our last trip in it up the Dempster highway to the Arctic Ocean. 1200 miles of dirt (2100 total) in one trip, it just lacked the comfort and composure I wanted on nonstop bad roads at 40-50mph. Not impressed with Toyota’s current build quality on their new Tacomas, I decided to shop around and the reviews of the RR were all great (raptor suspension and a front locker? Let’s go). One was coming into my local dealership so I put a deposit down on it and gave it a test drive when it arrived last October. Instantly fell in love, made the purchase, and off we went! Will hopefully update this with photos as time goes on and detail some build stuff.

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[Tim_AK]

I really wanted the ride feel to stay as close to stock as possible since I was so impressed with my initial testing. So that was the goal. I off road a lot, but I think people often think “lift” immediately, and then it is a big game of compromise. I wanted to do as little as possible to upset the great suspension on this vehicle.


Immediately looked to recovery options since I often travel solo. Wanting to forgo an entire heavy bumper, I typically aim for a hidden winch mount like I have on my last two vehicles. I saw what could have been a decent option on eBay and upon receiving it, despite being guaranteed that it would fit North American raptors, I realize that it was going to take a fair amount of cutting on the frame which I was not willing to do on a brand new truck. I’ve used different hand winches in the past for recovery (they’re a pain but they worked well if you’re mediocre at rigging), and settled on a Wyeth Scott power puller with synthetic line. This puller with an extension line made me feel comfortable for solo travel since I generally don’t push it too hard. And for a travel in a group it’s nice to have the option for a directional pull in addition to my friends with mounted winches. It is nice to be able to take it out of the vehicle as well when I’m not on a trip (even though the raptor isn’t my daily driver since I have a work vehicle).

Having done very long dirt road trips with an open bed and a tent on a bed rack, I knew I wanted an enclosed bed (the dust can be unimaginable over the course of a week). I went with the RSI smartcap and love it. Looks a little strange at first with the curved roof line of this vehicle, but with the load bars on it looks better, and with a tent on it looks even better than that. I love the ability to open the side windows and access gear. I also don’t want to constantly look like an “overlander” (even when spending long periods of time on the road), so I have bedside molle panels to hold all my gear out of sight (builtright industries). On stock rear springs the sag was negligible and the ride was still great.

Added an M&R automotive light bar (dual amber/white beam) and tapped it into the number 1 and 6 auxiliary switches. Alaska is really dark in the winter so extra lighting is great when driving to go skiing and climbing.

https://mandronline.com/products/2024-ford-ranger-raptor-40in-light-bar-pro

 

[Tim_AK]

My next concern was armor, because the vehicle is pretty wide and squat. Previously only did steel skids, going for ARB ones because they were a little bit lighter than super thick steel options for my Tacoma. I beat the crap out of them and they never cared. For the raptor though, because I figured I would probably be crawling in rocky terrain a little bit less, I opted for rival aluminum skids. Nice and light, and I don’t mind replacing them if I beat on them too hard (skids are a consumable asset in my mind). I generally try to have pretty good mechanical sympathy on my trucks, and find that when I start hitting skids into stuff, I generally back up and try again rather than skinny pedal it in rocky terrain.

After skids was sliders. I like how much the steps protect your vehicle from road rash in high speed situations, but this thing sits a little low already, and the side steps make it even worse. I went with RCI frame mounted, 10° (I think?) with top plate. Definitely exposes your vehicle a little bit more and accentuates the need for front mud flaps. But they give the vehicle a little bit more clearance and they look great (and give some peace of mind in case I accidentally hit them into something, which I probably do once or twice a season). They don’t act as a great step going in or out, but this truck isn’t super tall, and the rough side step doesn’t get the back of your leg anymore.

 

[Tim_AK]

Interior-wise, all I have done is add a ram track from tackform above the center display. I routinely rely on a Garmin overlander for navigation (trails, camps, where to find fresh water, etc) and also mount my Garmin inreach up there for communication when I’m out of cell signal for days at a time. Sits perfectly flush and looks stock with no vibration.

 

[Tim_AK]

As I entered summer and the white north thawed out, it was time to test my camping system to see how it would work on long road trips (on some really crappy roads). Having read everything about suspension modifications for these vehicles, and knowing that I have a highly variable payload in the bed, I decided to keep the rear spring stock since I generally just have the smartcap, and then I added some sumo springs coil helpers in the rear.

This actually made a big difference when carrying my camping gear and the tent on the back. Yes the rear end sags to level with the front, but the ride is still very comfortable. We just drove 3000 miles from Alaska through the Yukon, British Columbia, into Hyder AK and back. Some high speed rough dirt, a little bit of rough trail to access camps, and the truck drove great. I tried to keep my kit light (tough when you are planning on being off grid for a week except for some fuel and water stops), so at this point this is what I’m going to use for the summer.

I have two base pieces of plywood, covered in self adhesive carpet. On one side I attached my fridge slide, on the other side I attached a Milwaukee pack out base. Then I use two Milwaukee pack outs as the pantry while camping. Setting up and breaking camp every day can be a pain, so having everything be quickly accessible was important to me. I run my dometic fridge off a goal zero Yeti 500x battery. I have the battery plugged into the bed power port so it charges while we drive, then at night it runs the fridge and recharges some cameras and such.

 

[forestclouds]

Welcome to the forum! Great posts and a cool rig.

 

[superj]

That's super cool that you do all that kind of stuff up there. I like when people don't lift immediately too. Learn what it does first and adjust to where it fails is way better than just lifting with no reason

 

[NM Mike]

Welcome to the forum. I love your no nonsense approach to your rig.

 

[scuba mike]

awesome build.. thanks for sharing

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