70 Jimmy--Rusty Rebuild

[toomany]

Wasn't out of town all week for work like I normally am so I was able to get the transmission tunnel knocked out.

Could have patched mine, and I probably should have. The new one doesn't fit as well as the factory one does. It's slightly narrower and curved differently.




Coated the bottom with the last little bit of LizardSkin I had on hand. Top got some Raptor liner. Only had one bottle left and it already started to set up by the time I got around to the second coat. Wasn't spraying very well, even if I cranked the pressure up some.

Used a shifter boot and transfer case bezel from a square body. Tried moving the t-case shifter as far back as I could. Still on the look out for something different for that.




Painted the fenders this afternoon. Depending on how they look I might hang them tomorrow and sand/polish right on the truck.

Eventually I'd like to find a better set. Mine aren't horrible but I didn't spend anytime working the insides, mainly the "fang" area. I cleaned up the rust and treated it, but there was enough there that I didn't want to get into cutting it out and putting new in. The outside is straight and rust free which is all I was concerned with at this time.

 

[toomany]

The more I thought about hanging the fenders before finishing them the more it sounded like a bad idea. Wanted the emblems/trim off while l was buffing. The rear emblem has to be installed with the fender off the truck. The front eyebrow trim can be installed on, but it is way easier with the fender off as well.

New emblems and light. Front trim cleaned up decent with some 0000 steel wool.




The second picture really shows how much dust is on the tub compared to the fresh paint on the door/fender.






Took a gamble on some inner fenders from Amazon. Only because they had free shipping. Almost every vendor lists the inners for $99 each but charges for "oversize" shipping which makes them closer to $299 each. These were $349 for the pair and they showed up 3 days after ordering. I assumed like most parts, they were made at the same place as all the others. They do have "Made in Taiwan" stickers on them which all the other sheet metal does as well.

From the little bit of research I did, they don't fit the greatest with the passenger side usually going on the easiest. I've only got the driver's side and it's in rough shape.

Every hole but one lined up perfectly on the passenger side. Didn't even have to open any of them up. The one that doesn't line up is about 3/4" off, won't be a big deal to drill a new one once I get the tire out of the way.




Ran out of time to get the other side started. From holding it up there it looks like I'll have to trim around the steering box before it'll even get close to the core support. This may have more to do with the 1" body lift than the aftermarket parts though.

 

[toomany]

Early 4th of July weekend update.

Fought with the driver's side inner for a couple of hours to get it to fit. Had to drill some new holes along the edge. Wasn't until I was digging through the parts trailer that it occurred to me I could have used the factory one that I did have.




It needs a wash and fine tune the fender gaps. It looks like the rear end is sagging a little bit too.








Grill didn't clean up as well as I had hoped. Some of the chrome is peeling and rust in a few spots. Haven't really looked at the reproduction ones to know what kind of quality they are.

Headlight trims I picked up years ago, was nice to finally install those.





About 8 years to get to this point. It's no where near finished, but this is the most complete the truck has even been since I've owned it.

For reference, this is what I started with.






Going to try getting the cowl panel and hood finished and on before the weekend is up.

 

[USSkoval]

Oh yeah. I forgot that's where I got those wheels from lol.

 

[toomany]

Oh yeah. I forgot that's where I got those wheels from lol.

You ever find a set tires for them? I wanted to keep them, but being a 16.5 and choices being limited for rubber I didn't feel the need.

 

[USSkoval]

You ever find a set tires for them? I wanted to keep them, but being a 16.5 and choices being limited for rubber I didn't feel the need.

Nope. My goal is to buy a brand new set of 33" Boggers for them and switch them out from time to time on my K5 (just for fun), but it's still not back on the road so that hasn't happened yet.

 

[toomany]

Hood and cowl painted. Hood may need another scuff and re-shoot. Noticed I had some tiger stripes going on as I was spraying the clear.

 

[toomany]

Hood and cowl back on. Pretty much all of the gaps need some work. Driver's fender needs to go out some at the front and the passenger needs to come up.

Gave it a quick wash then took top off and went into town to find a place to park and watch the fireworks. Got close to 80 miles on it tonight.




Cut the oil filter apart while I had it up in the air (pulled front tires so I could drop right on the ground to set the hood on). There were two metal flakes and looked like a few red paint chips, other than that it was nice and clean.

Adjusted the headlights the other day and got to try them out tonight. They work awesome. So good that you don't even really need the high beams.

 

[toomany]

Have roughly 300 miles on the new motor/transmission and they have been flawless. Been driving it almost every weekend when I'm home running errands on Sunday.

We are going back to the sand dunes the first weekend of September. There are a few minor things I need to address but for the most part it's ready to go. I'm close to home for work now so I can tinker with it at night some. Before I'd leave Monday morning and come home Saturday night and really didn't feel like doing much of anything with it once I got caught up on everything around the house.

Went and checked my field this afternoon. Been caught in the rain twice now with no wipers. Going to try converting over to wet arms when I install those.

 

[toomany]

Was supposed to go to the dunes this weekend but that got pushed back to next weekend. Gave me time to get a few small things done.


The PSC reservoir that I have for the steering is just their regular one. They sell an "offroad" one, but from what I can tell it just has a different cap with a hose on it. I don't loose any out the vent bit there is always an oil film around the top and rest of that area. Drilled and tapped the vent for a push-loc swivel fitting and ran the tube down below the spring.

Also put the outer wrap on the air filter while I was there.




The interior door handles/cranks have been waiting to go on. Only had the one door panel though so I was waiting for another. Got a pair from a friend of mine and installed those.

The panels are originals from a truck he had. Rest of the parts are OER. While they seem like nices pieces, good weight to them and castings, they don't fit nearly as well as an oem part. Both arm rests are slightly tilted and the window cranks are a little loose. I'll probably pull the arm rests back off and drill the holes larger to get some adjustment out of them.






Washed my paddles off and got them aired up. Been looking for a decent set of used tires so I can mount up the other set of rims and have all four match. I might swap my two best ones from the chrome wheels to the grey ones. Would force me to get a set of new tires for those which it needs.




Changed the oil last weekend, cut the filter apart again and didn't find anything unusual. Put 20/50 VR1 in it instead of the 10/30 I had before. Running it with more load/heat I wanted the heavier weight. It bumped the hot pressure up from 25psi at idle to 40. At rpm it's at 70.

Checked the rest of the fluids while it was in the air. T-case was a little low but everything else was right where it should be. Greased u-joints/ball joints too.

Driving home the other day it stopped charging. Pulled the alternator off yesterday and had it tested, checked out good. Which is good but not exactly what I was hoping for. Looked over all the wiring and fuses and none of that looked bad. Thought there might have been a fuse for the power tap connector from the Terminator (what I'm using to control the alternator) but couldn't find one. Re-installed it and it's charging again. Don't know what I did but I'm hoping that problem is solved.

 

[Truckman4life]

What's up with that Monte Carlo you got hiding over there?

 

[beags86]

What's up with that Monte Carlo you got hiding over there?

No shit. MCSS alert!

 

[Truckman4life]

No shit. MCSS alert!

Even brought you out of the woodwork! HAHAHA!

 

[toomany]

What's up with that Monte Carlo you got hiding over there?

No shit. MCSS alert!

That's a coworkers. He did an Ls swap and brought it over to me for a few things. It's relatively clean for a Michigan car. Needs some floor work, has bubbles in the wheel arches. Looks likes it's had one repaint before.

I'm not really a G body guy, but I'm trying to talk him into selling it to me.

 

[Truckman4life]

Really want a silver t-top one. They are harder to find out here any more and expensive. Love g-body cars.

 

[USSkoval]

Really want a silver t-top one. They are harder to find out here any more and expensive. Love g-body cars.

In my area, the SS Montes were the first of the 80's cars to start skyrocketing in value. Well, except the GN's of course.

 

[toomany]

SilverLake recap.

Swapped tires around Friday morning. Picked the two best looking ones that held air and put them on the other pair of wheels.

Load up the truck and trailer. Took way less tools with me this time with the thinking that I haven't had much problems in the driving I've been doing with it and if I couldn't fix it with the basics then we should be heading home anyway.

Got into the parking lot a little after 8 before it started filling up.




Cruised around for a little while to get a feel for how the sand was. Hadn't rained in over a week so it was pretty beat up. Soft and rutted up everywhere.

Down at the beach, lake Michigan in the background.






Same spot, later in the day.




Spent a lot of time at the drag strip. Didn't get any pictures of our own, but I can probably track some down from others that were there. In the 50 or so races we ran, there was 1 sxs and 1 Ford truck that was faster than us. The Ford only ran with us one time. He'd line up and then not go with our group when the dropped the flag and wait for the next group to run. Of the street legal vehicles that were there I'm pretty confident that we were among the fastest. More on this down below.

Went to play on some of the hills for awhile after. Truck went up anything I pointed it at with zero problems. It's funny because you watch a lot of the other trucks/Jeeps/sxs's struggle and we just idle up to the face and blast right up to the top. Most times I let off 3/4 of the way up and coast the rest.






I didn't walk back to the edge, but give sort of an idea how high up it is.




Around 7pm it really started to fill up. This was the last weekend of the year that you can be out there till 10pm. Monday they change hours and are only open until 8pm. Because of this it's the last unofficial "night ride". We didn't drive around a whole lot at this time. Mainly parked and watched others.




They were jumping this hill






Sunday we got out there around 930 and there were barely any people in the parking lot.




Overall the truck performed great. No real issues that I didn't already know about. One of those issues is/was the rear springs. I knew they were getting saggy and combined with the taller tire and whoops everywhere the paddles were into the wheel arches fairly often. No real damage done other than some scuffs on the paint and a roll on the front edge of the passenger side, nothing I'm real concerned with.

On the drag strip, when I'd launch and even on the shifts the truck would twist and right rear would get into the quarter. Didn't matter if it was rough or they had just gotten done grooming it.

I'm at a crossroads with what to do about it. East option would be to replace the springs and maybe go up an inch or so. On the street I get wheel hop pretty bad, don't really notice it much if at all in the sand. I built the truck to drive on the street first and use in the sand second. But we are talking about trying to get more trips in next year, so usability out there is more of a consideration now.

Going 4 link or trailing arm with coilovers is in my mind. Going to think on it some and figure out what would work best for me.

 

[toomany]

6 month bump!

I have done exactly zero to this since our last trip to the sand dunes with it. Except for airing up the tire that likes to go flat and moving it in/out of the hoist bay when I needed to get something up in the air.

Weather is getting nicer and I want to start driving it again, finish out the interior at little bit and find a better tail gate.

Going 4 link or trailing arm with coilovers is in my mind. Going to think on it some and figure out what would work best for me.

To re-visit this: Decided to keep the leaves. Bought some stock replacement springs last week and am working on getting those installed.




Separated the packs and cleaned up the edges with a flap wheel. Looks like they were cut with a shear and had a little curl on the ends, rolled that back so they wouldn't dig into each other. Painted them with the same graphite paint I used last time.




Waiting for the last coat to dry now. Going to reassemble and hopefully get them installed tomorrow.

 

[toomany]

New springs in.

Decided to swap out the rubber bushings for the poly's from the old springs.

Before it measured 33 7/8 to the body line behind the tire. Now it's an even 36". I'm sure they'll settle some after a few miles. If I need a little more height I'll take one of the old leaves and shorten it and use that.

 

[toomany]

Bumpers reinstalled. Neither one is perfect, but their good enough for now. Did my best to straighten them. Rear one still has a little twist to it.