Robbie (Forum Supporter) said:Pretty sure indy guy nailed the lost exhaust stud removal a bit ago.
Might want to check his work
I found this thread , but is there a thread with the results of his work or more details? I'm a bit afraid to try welding on at least two of the studs as they are pretty far recessed into the head.
I'm hoping this takes you to it. Looks like his may have been sticking out a bit though.
I recently did a very similar weld-a-booger operation on my friend's son's replacement 5.9 for his Ram 2500 and got the stud out without any major drama. I think the key was relatively low heat with fast wire speed. If you'd like a hand with the extraction, I could probably swing by some night next week.
I think I will try it on the passenger side first, and if it works, I'll give it a shot on the driver's side, where the bolts are more recessed. Am I correct in assuming I should hit the top of the leftover bolt with a grinding stone in a dremel or something to get some clean metal to weld to?
Finished pulling the engine harness yesterday. Here it is ready to be opened up and stripped of unnecessary wires:
I've downloaded some files with diagrams and lists of each wire's function, just need to print them out and start marking off what needs to go away. For simplicity's sake, I think I am going to try to use the Sierra's underhood fusebox for the engine harness, and the S10's underdash fusebox for the chassis/interior wiring, similar to how a lot of more modern cars are anyway.
Part of yesterday and some of this morning was spent setting up the Sierra to be towed to the scrapper. when wae arrived here, we did some measuring, and abusing of a vice in trying to get the hitch height correct, then gave up and ran out for a new hitch. Once back, we got everything attached.
A short test drive through the neighborhood showed that the bumper mounting brackets I had chosen were not nearly strong enough. We swung back to the house, and tried to figure something out, possibly including a quick welding job to reinforce everything. Instead, wae figured out the right parts to delete from my tow bar to let us use the tow hook holes in the frame. If that's not strong enough, nothing will be. A quick test drive was a success, so we took a safe, leisurely drive to the scrapper, and managed to get $0.07 a pound for it. We got to dump it next to a square body S10 Blazer that, based on the rough painting, was in a Gambler rally before arriving there to be flattened.
At this point, the garage is a mess, and I'm a little bit too tired to do much about it, so very little more is likely to happen today. It is nice to have the driveway space back, though. I'm planning on looking over the engine/trans soon, and putting together a parts order. I know it at least needs a water pump, dipstick tube, output shaft seal, and likely a few gaskets.
I also kind of screwed myself out of getting a deal on another LQ4/4L80E combo. My neighbors have an early 2000's Sierra with a rusty service bed they are going to sell soon. They mentioned they were likely to ask $2K for it, and I told them they could probably put it up for $3K and still have it sold pretty quickly.
Major parts order yesterday.
-Water pump (with thermostat and neck - turns out there was a revision in the WP design, and I didn't want to order the pump to find out if I had a new or old style, then have to order a thermostat and neck later).
-Serpentine belt and idler/tensioner pulleys - They were all pretty much shot.
-Oil pump pickup, dipstick tube, dipstick, oil pan gasket, o-ring - I got a H3 Alpha oil pan from another GRM and it included the gasket and pickup tube, which I think were all used just for mockup purposes, but I didn't want to reuse the gasket, though supposedly they are reusable. I also saw a few flakes of metal in the pickup tube, so even if it's new-ish, I figured it was easier to just get a new one, than try to flush the old one and hope.
-output shaft seal for the 4L80E - turns out there's at least two versions of this, too. Hoping I picked the right one. If not, should be easy to get at a local store.
-Front O2 sensors. The ones in the truck may be fine, but I spent a lot of time hammering near them and have seen that cause a problem in other sensors, so I figure it's insurance. If I can remove the old ones from the exhaust, I'll keep them as spares.
I need to figure out what to do about the starter, too. I broke the stud for the signal wire when I was removing the wiring harness, and I have not found solenoids available individually. I may remove the solenoid, and see if I can put a new stud in. If not, may be time for a junkyard starter.
A plan is starting to form for how things will go with the S10 once it is in the garage. I think prior to removing the engine, the bed will be removed and stored on blocks in my backyard. It'll give me a lot more maneuvering room when working on the truck, plus I can do rust repair and painting on the bed outside if weather is agreeable.
Had a heavy work week, so didn't really get a chance to do much in the last few days. Yesterday, a 99 GMC Jimmy RWD with a manual showed up in one of the local junkyards I'd been planning on running to today for some other parts anyway. Loaded up my tools this morning, and after about 2.5-3 hrs of fighting stuck bolts, I now have this:
GM 8.5" axle with disc brakes, 3.42 gears, and the G80 gov-lock (so not exactly a performance limited slip, but probably better than nothing). It's also the same width as my stock S10 rear axle. It is still not guaranteed to be what I use, but being as it is kind of a holy grail piece in the V8 S10 world, I should be able to sell it for a healthy profit if I go for the other plan...which is pay another GRMer to narrow a Ford 8.8 axle for me. The original plan for junkyarding was to go look for short side Ford Explorer V8 axles. I will likely go to another, cheaper yard looking for them tomorrow.
The junkyard took a lot out of me, so I think I'll take it easy for the rest of the day, maybe do some cleanup and organization in the garage, and start figuring out what I can haul over to the storage locker this weekend.
I'd use the 8.5" personally. Directly bolts in and the g80 is not as bad as people pretend they are online
I mean, most people complaining about them are in one of two groups (a:) Building a 1400hp dragster weighing 4400lbs or (b:) Neutral dropping a 200hp stock engine at 5400rpm while rolling backwards at 10mph on Drag Radials because they make you FASSSST.
Is that the truck G80 that this has, or the more normal posi they have in the F-bodies and other performance cars? I've heard they can break if the difference in wheel speed is too great when it locks up.
Day 2 of junkyarding I hit a yard that had 3 V8 Explorers, but that did not go so well. The yard is hilly, the jacks are removed from the cars (someone died using one several years back), but most of the cars are lifted off their wheels with the usual two wheels welded together method. However, all three Explorers had rear wheels on the ground, as did a 70's Ford F-series with a 9" rear. The F-series was the only truck that was in a position to be lifted by a loader. Between this, and the ZR2s from a few months back, I am now convinced the yard people there are "saving" high demand parts for themselves to pull and sell. I did manage to at least grab a center section from a S15 grill.
The short route home was messed up due to an accident, and the alternate route ran back near the yard I hit Saturday. I was too wiped out to mess with the Explorers there after pulling the 8.5, but was doing better today. One of the trucks was on the ground, but the other was lifted up. Took me about half an hour to pull the passenger side axle, but now that I've done it once, I should be able to do it again much faster.
On the 8.8 (or 9") vs 8.5" front, I think I am happy to run the 8.5 with a mildly modded LQ4, but eventually, I will want to make enough power that it becomes a bit dicey. Not to mention, with an 8.8", I can just rebuild the trac-lok in it, whereas with the 8.5, I'd likely want to spend the money to replace the gov-lock with something more appropriate. It'll do for this year(and probably the next couple), just fine, though, if I can't source an 8.8 fast enough.
Back to another topic, though. I've always thought the grill on the GMC S15 was significantly better looking than the one on the S10, but for some weird reason, I don't really want the GMC logo on a Chevy. So, I'm experimenting a bit. I think this looks decent, but want to see if it's just my opinion, or what others think:
Obviously, the grill needs a bit of work and some repainting. I'd lean towards keeping the black and chrome mix, but am also curious how it would look if I chrome painted the whole thing. Might be interesting to see if the gold part of the Chevy logo is painted red, to match the style of the stock GMC logo.
This evening, it was time to try to extract the broken bolts from the head. Despite them being recessed, I tried the welding method first.
I ended up trying it twice, but both times, it just broke off, even though I had cleaned up the end of the bolt with a pointed grinder bit in my dremel. I think I just couldn't get enough heat into the bolt. I let that part of the head cool off, and went back to old faithful:
I managed a total of two extractions, plus part of a hole for the next extraction before my cobalt drill bit gave up the ghost, even though I had been trying to keep it cool with cutting oil. My titanium nitride bits didn't seem too happy trying to drill them, so it looks like I need to order 1 or more 5/32" cobalt bits to finish the job. That was the most used bit in my extractor set, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised it is finally done for. Not sure I need left hand bits for this part of the job, since it'll be the extractor actually turning the broken bolt, but I probably should get at least one for future use on bolts that are not as frozen.
Picked up a another drill bit.
Hallelujah
Had an exciting morning out picking up lumber today. On the way home, I started to pull away from a stop sign, and their was no resistance in the steering wheel, not just GM power steering level of no resistance. Turns out the pinch bolt on the steering shaft loosened up enough to let the steering shaft fall down. I got extremely lucky with the location, though. Was at a three way stop, where the road turns left, and going straight-ish allowed me to pull into the side road, that has no traffic, since it was an access road for a school that has been torn down.
Wife ran out with my tool kit, and by the time she got there, I had the steering shaft back in place, just needed to tighten the pinch bolt. When the engine is out of the truck, I think I am going to look into adding another layer of safety to prevent a repeat performance.
Started in on removing unnecessary wires from the harness. It's taking a little longer than I'd like because the guide I'm using pulls all the emissions equipment. The rear O2 sensor wiring is easy, but trying to figure out the evap is taking more time. Trying to find out if the fuel tank pressure sensor wiring is needed, and if it would even have an equivalent on the S10.
Edit: It appears the sensor is part of the evaporative emissions system, but my donor had federal emissions, and may have had a high enough GVWR to not have one. So, now I'm not sure I need it, but will need to do some more research.
Having been lucky and lost steering at a stop sign also I then thought back to how bad it would have been the day before going down I95.
Stampie said:Having been lucky and lost steering at a stop sign also I then thought back to how bad it would have been the day before going down I95.
I suspect it went out at a stop, since the Jeep steering shaft is collapsible, and the negative G's from the stop are where it was slipping off. But yeah, really lucky. The Chevy column has a hole for a through bolt, so I'll either drill a small hole so I can put a cotter pin in so it won't fall out if the pinch bolt comes loose again, or I'll try to drill out the proper size bolt hole and use a through bolt(and some loctite).
Finished de-pinning the unneeded wires from the PCM connector, and labeling the wires that may end up needing to be connected to external sources. This would be a lot faster if I was not trying to keep a few extras, like emissions equipment, the fuse box, and the cruise control wiring, but it is still way simpler than merging a TBI 305 harness into the truck. Had I realized this a few years ago, I would have been more aggressive about looking for an LS donor. Anyway, next I should be able to start unraveling the rest of the harness, and removing wires and connectors I don't need.
The fuel tank pressure sensor on the donor was on the fuel tank, so I did not even think to grab it. Based on some reading, it looks like some people add a T to the evap line between the gas tank and the charcoal canister, and run the sensor there, and it works fine.
Need to do a bit more reading. If I want to keep the rear wheel ABS on the truck, I may need to reinstall one of the wires I pulled yesterday. It might use the 128K speed signal from the PCM. Not sure what it would compare against though, as I'm not sure I've seen a tone wheel anywhere on the drivetrain. It may just make more sense to install an adjustable proportioning valve anyway.
On the positive side, it looks like I may be able to send the 4K speed signal straight to my current gauge cluster and it will work. The factory 92 configuration had a box (DRAC) that takes the signal from the VSS in the trans, then splits it three ways and conditions it for the ABS, speedometer, and cruise control. I should be able to just delete that piece of hardware.
I've been digging into old GM TBI wiring lately (I'd like to run it in my squarebody suburban) and I feel your pain on wire sorting and the mental gymnastics. I don't know if the newer fuel injection makes it harder or easier, but there's a lot to keep track of!
God, gm tbi harness is way simpler than an sfi obd2 harness like the 3400 or ls stuff.
I suspect if you are using the full harness from a donor vehicle, TBI isn't bad, but trying to merge the 305 TBI engine harness and computer with the 4.3 TBI body harness in the S10 was a mess. Things were just different enough to make it weird. Never was able to get the instrument cluster working in the truck. I would not be surprised if you try to set it up as a standalone (with a chip burned to disable VATS), it might be as simple as the LS, but it seems like the LS engine harness is just more self contained.
Started pulling wires out of the loom today, and I am beginning to debate with myself the merits of "properly" cleaning up the harness, or just cutting and taping off ends of wires. GM did a great job of using loads of electrical tape that has aged very much to the point where it doesn't like to be undone. Combine that with all the intersections I keep running into, and it is a lot off tedious effort. If I do pull it all apart, I'm tempted to pull some of the circuits I had been planning on keeping, and just making a more minimalist harness and fusebox setup like in the lt1swap.com instructions I am following.
I've also noticed there's a single connector (C100) that handles almost all the wires I need to run into the cab. Thankfully, I haven't cut it from the loom like the instructions say (when building a new fuse block), and I did cut the other end of the connector out of the truck so if I do use the Sierra's fuse block, I think I can run almost everything through the firewall on that connector.
I think I am going to just cut off remaining wires. There are only 8 loose wires to remove from the loom for EGR, AC accumulator, coolant level sensor, and I think one or two for the non existant 4WD. I can cut off the EGR, accumulator, and coolant level connectors, tape off the loose wires, and tuck them into the harness far more quickly than unbundling this mess.
I've already removed the AC compressor wiring, and will need to get some more electrical tape and tubing to put the remaining starter wires back into. The old stuff was oil soaked.
I did a quick continuity check for the coolant temp sensor and there seems to be a break between the PCM connector and the sensor connector. I need to make sure there is no run to the fusebox or elsewhere, but this might explain the P0118 code, although it's weird, since the code should indicate too high of a voltage.
You'll need to log in to post.
