Lookin good man. Very cool project. Clean too. Nice job

 

Where's da pics?

 

Have patience Grasshopper. My camera wasn't with me today, but it will tomorrow.

 

Here's the long awaited pics.






Shiny new coils and shocks.


Shiny new leafs and shocks.


The holy grail for the speedo. Found the housing and gear on fleabay. The gear will be close from the charts I seen but at least it gives me a starting point.


My current speedo.


Now I can pick at things until I get sick of picking and just drive it.

 

Took it on another ride today. After driving it the first time and the epic vibration coming from the middle was telling me things weren't happy.

Pulled the front shaft to eliminate that part of it. Still has vibes but nowhere near what it did before. Then I took it on a 10 mile drive to see how things would act. Still vibes and I found a few things that can use attention.

The electric fan I put on has nowhere near the pull it should. The temp gauge took a dive so it was a guessing game. I'm thinking the trans cooler needs to be moved because it's blocking much of the radiator.

The rear pinion seal decided to start leaking. Good thing I was at my shop by then.

As for the vibes, even though I have the SYE in it I thought about putting the t-case drop in and see if that helps. My problem with that is the distributor is close to the firewall as it is and don't see trying to cut/bend/bash to gain clearance. I can get a new dist with an external coil which is about half the size of the current HEI.

Pinion angles look good at the diff and t-case. I thought about pulling the rear shaft and bring both to the driveshaft shop to see if the balance is off.

I'm thinking out loud to see if anything makes sense.

 

hmm... do you have stock axles? and check to see the driveshaft shop made your shafts in phase also....

 

Stock diffs, 30/35 w/4:10 gearing which will be changed at some point. With no overdrive the engine is at 3K at 60 mph. The driveshafts were checked out and what little they were out was fixed. Taking vacation time in a couple weeks and I need to pull the t-case to fix a small leak so I'll do that and a list of things then at work where I can do it on the hoist. I detest creepers.

It's nit picking I'm doing now.

Now to put money away for plates and insurance so I can really drive this hog.

 

Pulled the t-case today to fix a leak at the adapter. Did that, put the new speedo gear and housing in then put the new (To me) wheels/tires together. Figured out why it was leaking ATF. The new dipstick was mis-marked and the trans was over full letting it pool up by the adapter and leak there. Put a new pinion seal in the rear diff, the other was shot and leaking.

Took it for a drive after everything was done, the vibe I had is now gone, the speedo is +5 mph according to the GPS which is fine, I know it's close. It's 3000 rpm at 60 mph which I can live with so nothing will happen with the gearing for now. I didn't put the front driveshaft in yet so if there was a vibe, I could isolate it. If I still have vibes in the front once I get the shaft in, I want to get a posi-lock for the front diff so I can engage/disengage it when 4x4 is on.

The new wheels bring the sexy. 16x8 Moabs with 265-75-16 tires.




The gauges. I'm not entirely happy with the location but I can see them easy. So far, the temp is staying in check after I found what t-stat I put in it.


It's even closer now. Does this mean I get to go backwards now?

 

Put the front driveshaft in it today and drove it a few miles to the gas station. No more vibes other than the tires. I even transferred the title. Only took 5 years. I wasn't in a hurry.

Now I can nit pick things.

 

any gas mileage reports yet?

 

More than 10 and less than 30. Not real concerned with that until I can drive it consistently. The speedo/odo works now so I can check it when the time comes. A Metro it isn't.

 

Still following this build. It keeps getting better and better.

 

Nice work clean too... keep on going...

 

Just scored a almost new set of Goodyear Authority AT tires from a friend that said they were too loud for him. Just the size I wanted too. I'll get them and glue 'em on in a couple weeks.

 

The tires have been in a holding pattern for the last 3 weeks until the day comes that the guy pulls his thumb out of his **** and gets them off his truck.

I did a couple things in the mean time. In my quest for a working horn I did everything aside from running new wiring for it. I happened to be looking at the owners manual for fuse locations for it when I ran across something in there that the key needs to be on for it to work. I tried and alas, it works! The key needs to be on for the horn to work?!?

I also worked and lubed the rear lock and latch trying to get the lock to work. I figured that out too. It was never used as the power locks work that too. It does work fine but I want to be able to lock/unlock the gate so the lock cylinder will come out and either be replaced or get fixed.

I have a few more things to pick at since there isn't money to get it legal yet.

One thing I forgot about was that I scored a nice set of vent windows so I can get rid of the useless pieces of glass taking up residence in the front doors.