Glad to hear you'really staying warm out in the shop this winter! It will make it alot nicer to work on your rigs being able to stay warm and dry! That will be nice having a week off to get things done!

 

Thanks Ed... I have been stocking up on supplies to get several things done. The family will be at work or school so I plan to spend the whole time in the shop. Got several things I want to work on and am hoping it is a productive week. I am ready for some time off.

 

Merry Christmas, hope everyone is having a great one. Just lit the fire, getting some coffee in me and getting ready to spend some time out in the shop working on the 85.

I got the horn working. The one I had mounted was bad, stuck another one on and did my little test and got it working.

Testing horn
Another thing I got fixed on my 91 was the horn. I know this happens alot and hopefully this will help some in the future. Pull the steering wheel with a Steering Wheel Puller that you can usually rent from a parts store for free. Then check it by touching the brass spring in the 11 oclock postion. I just used my wrench. If it honks it is most likely the brass ring on the back side of the wheel. Not the best picture but you should get the idea.



Got the passenger side done. I need to get the pig tails for the marker lights. I use carriage bolts to hold my end caps on. They look like the factory bolts in the rest of the bumper and I dont loose any more of them. I have one out on the interstate somewhere and it was a new one. This fixes that problem.


Starting on drivers side and need to find a end cap, and pigtail for it. Bumper and brackets are bent and will work on that and try and get it looking better. Will eventually replace bumper and brackets with new ones. I also installed an 85 grill, I have an 87 and like the 87 grills better but wanted to stay to the year on this one. I actually like the 85 grill on this truck.


A friend of mine and me tried to pull a pulley and stripped the center of the pulley out. This is my first weld in 25 years that I have done. As long as it works it will be fine for me. I do plan on spending some time on my week off learning to weld. I did do a test on the welded nut and it held so am happy with it. Definetly not pretty but functional.

 

Some things went well today and some things went completely wrong. I was hoping to get the truck at least to move under its own power. After working on it all day and getting ready to back it out. It was pouring antifreeze inside the cab. I know it is coming from the heater core and I am going to pull the dash on my vacation to paint it so it will wait until then. In the mean time I just bypassed the heater core.

I went to start it and could not get into reverse gear. I have a couple of forward gears, if I recall right this one has 1st and 3rd out.I know I have a bad G52 transmission and am keeping it for parts and for learning to work on. I am thinking I may have put it in the truck instead of the good one, Doh!!!

Here is what I am thinking is my good transmission setting on the shelf. Grrrrr.....


Got the bed bolted down, wiring routed to the way is should be. I dont have tail lights for some reason and probably a fuse or bulb. I will check into that later.


I got this idea from 4Crawler. For a little more illumination, paint your light seperator silver instead of leaving it factory black.


I replaced my fuel sending unit. I still dont have enough fuel in the tank to see if the gauge works. A lot of these trucks, when you get to 1/4th tank or less, the gauge is not accurate. Here is why, the wires are just worn thru.


When installing a new fuel sending unit, the flat part of the triangle should be pointing the drivers rear bumper.

 

Got the bad tranny out and marked it. Got smart and turned the shaft on the other one and all gears were working, even reverse. It is easier to swap transfer cases with the transmission standing on its end. I didnt get a picture of it but I have tried with the transmission laying down and it is a royal pain. Manuals even suggest standing on end.

 

Glad to see u making more progress Terry. If that tranny doesn't work out I still have a w56-b laying around and a transfer case to go with it if u need that too.

 

Thanks sr5excab... It is slow progress but is moving along. I was up in KC a while back and had somethings come up. I am selling a truck after the first of the year and will be intrested in that tranny. I am hoping to make it to KC in a couple of months and will not be to far from you and could make it up there. 7700 post, doesnt seem possible.

 

I got the tranny back in the same day and litterally had it stabbed in less then a minute. Just lucked out and had everything lined up just right. Then got distracted on another project at the house and just got back to getting it bolted up. I also did a bang up job on getting a temporary muffler on it as it was just running off of the "Y" pipe and was noisey. I will get an exhaust on when I get a windshield installed on it. Still got some things to work out.

It moved out and in the shop on its OWN power!!!!, at 12 oclock. Shifter is being difficult but I can shift it just fine without the stick in it. Probably just needs a new shifter bushing.

 

No worries Terry. Just let me know. I could meet u part way to make it easier.

 

Nice work Terry! I can see how getting the tranny's mixed up could happen pretty easy, that's a good idea marking the bad tranny with an X! Sounds like you got them swapped out pretty fast.Congrats on getting it moving under its own power, that's got to be a good feeling!

Wow 7700 already! I'm falling way behind, lol.

 

Hello 85sr5excab... It is looking like February before I would get up that way. Always like meeting another Yotatecher.

Thanks Ed...It is great getting one to move under its own power. Even if it is just around the yard. It frees up the shop when I have other things to do as well. I have been a little slow on my postings as well. I have been busy which is nice. Getting things done always feels great.

 

A friend of mine came over and I was telling him the bell housing in the bad tranny has a big hole cut into it and he was telling me that is the only transmission with a hole in it means it is from a turbo truck. I thought it was from the 84 that I parted as it was to rusty to fix and sell and would of been dangerous to put back on the road but it wasn't. It was when I bought all of the things from a guy that parted a roll over turbo truck. I will keep it and see if it is worth getting rebuilt someday.

I got up at 3:30 in the morning on my day off and was out in the shop until 4 in the afternoon. Got a ton of small things done.

All lights now work. Had a broken wire in the harness keeping the tail lights from operating.
Got the fuel tank, filler hose, and a new gas cap installed and it DONE.
Mud flaps are all on. A rear one had three broken bolts so I had to cut the captured nuts off and use a nut and bolt to hold them on.
Washer pump and bottle is working.
Transmission is completely bolted up.
Bed completely bolted up.
Timing and Lifters done.
New Brake Master Cylinder installed. Still no brakes. Calipers are frozen and rear brakes are not operating.

Here is what is holding me up on getting this truck finished.

Need new windshield.
Need new exhaust.
Need heater core.
Need heater controls.
Need new battery.
New brakes front and back.
Need one rim to have a matching set for now.
Install the power steering.
Paint and install the interior.

Not much left really, just the funds issue and some time on it. I am going to send Mistys runner to Toyota as I can not get the Cherry Manifold issue fixed and have way to much time on it. So my truck will get set aside for a little bit.

A tail light issue I had due to the crimps that were corroded.


I use carriage bolts to mount my end caps. No more lost caps on the road.


Truck is evicted for a day or so to do some work on my 86 in the shop. Just that little drive is sooo nice.

 

Sounds like you got quite a bit accomplished on the truck, glad you got the wiring for the lights all figured out and working! That sure is a pretty looking truck, I still want an 2nd gen x-cab bad! My uncle had a couple of 2nd Gen custom cabs sitting, I thought about getting one of those, theyd have plenty of room for the kids, but they needed a lot of work, and I need a driver, not another project, lol.

 

Hello Ed.. I hear you on the projects. I like doing them but it does take some time and like from what I have done, chasing down parts really extends the build time on them. I still want a first gen pickup. It will be the short bed. I just like the short beds over the long beds so if I do another project it will be one of them and hopefully it will be more of a complete truck.

I will say that starting with what I have, it has given me the opportunity to make them the way I would of bought one, add several features, and fix some issues while it is in the project stage. I like working on projects, when it comes to daily drivers that is a different story. The same fix on a project can be enjoyable, on a daily driver it is stressing as you cant have it down long.

When I get my truck up and running, it wont be so bad as I will have an extra daily driver that it wont bother me to have one down. I need a truck anyways. never again will I be without a truck. Luckily I have a trailer to get things done with.

 

I had five heater control assemblies and it took all of them to make one. I still need another cable to have this one finished. Usually the blue cable that attaches to the heater valve on the fire wall gets bent up due to the valve sticking. Once the cable is bent, I have never gotten one to work right. Also some of the tabs that hold the cables snap. A poor design but it is what is on these trucks so have to live with it.

Some have a 3 and some have 4 speed switches. I am sticking a 4 speed switch in mine just to have an extra option. I need to get a heater core and some interior paint and that should be soon. Taking the dash out isn't as bad as it is let on to be, the pain in the rear part is getting the heater control cables to work right.

5 controls to make just this one. One of the biggest project left on this truck getting closer to being done. Some of the others like exhaust and windshield will be done by a shop so those are really counting on me to get done.

 

Something a little funny that I was unaware of until a full day later and it has gotten some things stirred up. Mom and dad sure were concerned I was not going to have kids. I was late but still got around to it and really fortunate that I was later then most, patience is definitely a virtue, hehe.

Their little grand heathens was at a cousins house and found prankdial.com and sent them the Cold Old Lady phone call. One of the fake numbers that the site gives you just so happened to be City Hall. My house we have a great sense of humor and I know the kids didn't mean to get anything going, but mom and dad don't have the same sense of humor, but are retired and have to the time to start looking into things and just make the joke even funnier and they were completely unaware.

Now we are having to hold a straight face and tell the kids they should of let us know what they were doing. One of those things were some of the things you do as a kid come back to bite you.

 

^ That's funny Terry! It's hard to get after the kids with a straight face sometimes, when we ourselves have been guilty of doing the same things ( or worse) lol. I have to be careful of some of the childhood stories I tell, don't want to give the kids any bad ideas!

 

wow a lot goin on she looks good terry glad to hear ya found the light problem

an thank you *eveil grin* for the link to the prank call place

 

Hey Terry! Hope you had a good holiday. I have been away from the forums and been busy with life and work. I see you are still plugging away on your projects. Stay warm my friend. Its been really cold here this last week and does not look to be letting up anytime soon.

 

nice work on the heater control..