[exavid]

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As for the brakes, I'd check out the master cylinder if the brakes are still dragging and the caliper is free on it's pins. If the master is okay it's time to replace the rubber lines. I never push the pistons back into a caliper unless I've already disassembled it and cleaned the pistons. When you just push one in, all the corrosion and dirt goes with it and can often damage the seal. It makes sense to me to replace the seals when replacing the pads.

Matt is telling you right, if the stator is good leave it alone. After all it lasted this long already! Brakes are the thing to take care of first, not nice if you can't stop. If they are dragging they can heat up and lock up. Not to mention that could be where most of your gas mileage is going. Fix the wires and connectors. Cheap work that, and it pays off. Do the exhaust last, pinholed ones work as good as new ones.

BTW my old 90 Dodge Cummins gets 22mpg, what are you getting on your Ford? I'd think it was a lot better than gas even with the high price of diesel these days.

 

[exavid]

imported post

Fix the brakes, check the wiring and repair as necessary. Those two jobs are easy and cheap. Connect an AC voltmeter (Harbor Freight has digital volt/amp/ohm meters for less than $10) across the three yellow wires, two at a time to see if the stator is okay, should have around 50VAC or more across all three coils. Hard wire the three yellow wires from the stator, check the wiring from there up to the regulator to make sue there's no other problems with overheating stator wires.

These two chores should help a lot. Might even solve the starter problem and don't cost much.