Gunchsta said:In reply to 759NRNG :
Thanks - I say turd endearingly. It's a great truck, but it's far from perfect.
Which is good, because if it were perfect I wouldn't have it. Ha Ha.
fist bump...
Gunchsta said:In reply to 759NRNG :
Thanks - I say turd endearingly. It's a great truck, but it's far from perfect.
Which is good, because if it were perfect I wouldn't have it. Ha Ha.
fist bump...
Played around some more last night, actually did something I've been meaning to do for a while and I think I read about on here initially.
I took my rear sway bar off, greased the bushings on the bar itself, and put about a 1/8" washer in between the axle bracket & the mounting hardware. I think it was binding pretty bad before and between the grease and the slight less compression on the rubber bushing it feels like it's binding less. Truck rides better and doesn't feel quite so stiff in the back.
I also played around with the carb some and made another 'from stoplight acceleration' video seen below. I'm quite happy with how the new carb works, but you'll hear in the video it's a little doggy from a dead stop (I basically just punched it from idle). I think the cam and intake are a little too big for an otherwise stock combo. It feels like it wants to rev past where the trans will shift at WOT now. It's not bad but it seems like it shifts maybe 500 rpm earlier than it could. Overall though it's really nice, the new carb definitely gave me some more mid-range throttle response and is way crisper all around. Having fun!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLfVM4XDWc0
Not sure why I'm having such a hard time imbedding this...
In reply to Gunchsta :
I tried doing my normal routine of imbedding a youtoob vid but it didn't work either.
Keep the updates coming. Love the truck!
In reply to RossD :
Maybe there is something up on the forum itself.
Thanks for the compliment! I'll see if I can stir up some more content. The truck works pretty well so I try not to mess with it too much! There is however some rust behind the rear wheel openings that has been bothering me for some time now... :)
Will your rust repair test your skills at small panel replacement.....or going the LMC route similar to Tuna55????
In reply to 759NRNG :
I'm calling it small panel replacement. Picked up a couple of behind the wheel/quarter panel patches from an LMC type guy locally at a swap meet over the weekend. Was nice to be able to just grab them and bring them home versus ordering them. I think they're keystone/LMC/whatever brand everyone has. Pretty solid stuff though and if I can support the smaller local guy I'm game.
Photos to come!
BEFORE:
The rust is pretty low, but there is some ugliness under that red, and a trim hole that I patched previously. I decided to basically use as much of the replacement panel as I could, so I cut out quite a bit more than I needed.
Here's what the panels I bought looked like originally. The local guy (who's company name escapes me) was actually out of one side of the long bed panels, but as he pointed out these short bed ones were actually taller, which I needed. So I purposefully bought the 'wrong' panels because they came with more steel that was useful to me.
And, like any good patch panel, the first thing I did was cut it up to suit my longbed.
Then I removed the wheel opening trim and held it up against the bed side to see what I was going to remove from the truck.
Some nice blue tape guide lines, and a few minutes with the grinder later
Well ok another couple of minutes busting an unseen spot weld loose, and bam! no more rusty quarter.
Some careful trimming (yeah right) and cautious measuring (again, yeah right) and we have this nice new piece of likely chinese steel welded into place.
And, because I'm sure everybody loves to see ugliness... Flux core! I ran out of gas a couple weekends ago and just haven't found the time to get to the welding supply store and refill the tank, so we're going dirty. I'm glad I'm almost done welding this patch on, flux core works but it's gross.
That's where I left off last night, Hopefully tonight finish welding, smooth everything down and get a coat of primer on it.
My hopes came true! Last night I was able to grind the welds down and get a couple coats of primer applied.
However, I'm not 100% satisfied with the work. I ended up with a high spot where I welded the new panel to the old, which I realize is to be expected, but I still have it after grinding the welds down. Luckily for me, at the end of the day this is a truck, so I feel like it almost looks better if it isn't perfect. With some Bondo the problem area will probably clean up a bit, but I don't think that high spot is going away. I need to get shielding gas before I do the next side.
All ground smooth
You can kinda make out the high spot in this picture. It's not COMPLETELY horrible, but it's there. It's like the weld pulled the metal up where it connected vs. pushing it down. Perhaps I had too much of a gap, or went too fast tacking everything into place, or just got bamboozled by the flux core.
Then there was this little bugger above the wheel well. Started as a little rust-through, turned into this dumb patch. This was definitely one of those that I should have fully commited and cut a lot out OR just left it be. I was trying to tack my patch panel to some still pretty poisoned steel, and even with the welder turned way down I was still blowing through every where. Getting it together this much was quite a process. Then, knowing everything was thin, I was chicken E36 M3 with the grinder so here we go. Again though - this is a truck, and even if it's rough A.) I like it, and B.) I'm still learning. As much as it may sound/look like this was mostly a failure, I'm feeling good about it overall. I know that in the future I can do better, but for now I was able to hang a quarter on it in a couple nights after work.
garbage in primer
New quarter in primer. You can see the high point more with the primer on it.
We shall see how things turn out with a little bit of Bondo!
Bondo time!
Man Bondo is gross. I also have a tendency to put way too much on. Lots to sand off!
All sanded, another batch of primer & some clear and we'll call it good for now.
Trim back on - that's all folks!
Bondo sucks. What a messy substance.
Also - panel/rust repair is a really good exercise in spending a ton of time in the garage and not a ton of money. The panel I bought was $42 and probably another $50 or so in consumables, and even doing it kinda "quickly" as I did I still probably had 10-15 hours in the garage dinking around. Compared to the $500 in odds and ends to put the Holley carb on it, and maybe a 4 hour morning swapping it out, and a little road tuning. I would imagine if someone truly took their time and wanted to produce really clean results you could spend 20 hours on a 'simple' patch like this one. Not to steer anyone away from attempting it either- I'm looking it as a positive outlet for considerable time & energy without just pouring money at something.
Micro update - Took the truck up north over the long weekend. Rode 3 deep with my wife & brother in law about 2 hours on the road. Super comfortable even with a packed bench seat. Everyone had space, everyone had a seatbelt. All our gear was in the bed. Got 19.6mpg on the way up, put the truck-tent up in the bed and stayed dry in the pretty dramatic rains we had Saturday night. Took the long way home Sunday around lake Mille Lacs. Pretty views, again truck worked flawlessly.
I'm torn. I want to change something for the sake of learning/entertainment, but the thing is so dang good as it is.
Maybe tonight I'll start patching the passenger side quarter. That'll take some time. It could also use new door hinges... Plenty to do!
Want something different? Get a Chevy/GMC van with the 6.0 LS and swap the drivetrain in your truck so I can live vicariously. 
Sometimes a project is actually DONE.
The question is if you enjoy the build or the use more.
Im a build guy.
In reply to RossD :
That is definitely something I've considered.
In reply to Dusterbd13 :
Well said sir. I like a bit of both - I like the reward of wrenching on something, then driving, then changing and wrenching some more.
With the truck I'm kinda at that point where it works perfect (to me) and in order to change much it is going to be expensive and not necessarily make it work any better. The LS could potentially make it both work better and be faster, so that is a positive. It wouldn't necessarily be cheap, but it also wouldn't necessarily be a huge expense. Learning about fuel injection could be fun.
Well, decisions were made. This lovely beast has been sold. To the same guy that bought the shart! :)
I don't miss it in particular, but I definitely still have a soft spot for it. It really treated my wife and I good on our honeymoon and beyond, but in order to start another project it had to go.
Exciting new things to come !
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