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79' GMC C15 - Spruce Caboose

79 GMC 1500
Considering im tackling things NOT even on the windshield yet, im sure itll last its time haha.


Making a proper gas pedal bracket is on the list of things to make, plus i get to weld n cut stuff so im happy to take it on. Strange thing i noticed is some electrical ferry dust on the back of the gas pedal assembly.. like an arc mark or something.. will have to investigate! The pedal postition is great so thats a big part done. I will mimmick the older one at 7 inches above bottom firewall mounting hole to top of pedal assembly, and 2.5 inches proud off the upright bracket.

will re use the plastc mount and fabricate from there onward instead of the mashing of two seperate parts as a " good for now fix "PXL_20221205_011149011.MP.jpg



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Well i have a problem to fix with the transmission. Im suprised it hadnt happened earlier but its good to make sure end play i checked when noted in the manual lol. I have zero end play and i cant rotate the input shaft after installing the pump. I will pull the pump out and check to see if the thrust washer moved or what happened there. Easier to troubleshoot now than later! That roadblock means more work than i had time so i put some time into the throttle pedal bracket. Decided to join the two mounting surfaces together with some solid rod, plan is to duplicate on both sides, and have the leverage of the pedal go into the round stock so there is no deflection. Sorta like bracing a gate door for sag, when you build it. I was thinking of making a design out of overlapping plate but realized i may be creating more work than i want right now.








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I also made up a little gauge cluster for the subaru, ive had this stainless sheet metal from a a new build i did about 4.5 years ago, for a commercial space downtown when i was doing carpentry work.

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I also snagged a set of heads for the subaru. Being a boxer engine, i figured its easier to build a new set of heads and just pop em on. Reason for this is the bucket shims in the motor currently are starting to make some valvetrain noise, which is normal around 170K km on these engines. i also have ZERO information about this vehicle besides some dodgy facts from a teenager who sold it to me so trying to discover if any of the typical failures are starting to occur. Also ordered up a btSsm connector to pull some data from the ECU and see if it was ever tuned or the timing is still set for 100+ octane fuel in japan.

Only experience i have with shim over bucket style heads was the engine in my yamaha 4 cyl motorcycle. I ended up adjusting all the shims in that so i have SOME idea of what that part will take atleast. No play in the cams so the bearings seem fine but ill probably give these heads a solid rebuild. 4 cylinders is way cheaper than 8 :whistle:


I absolutely love squarebodies and ive been driving one daily for many many years now... and i dont know if its that or the fact ive never owned a car before, but man this things pretty neat. For a 99' its an all aluminum engine ( heads, block, pistons ), remote adjustable factory HID lights, 50/50 AWD, 13 psi of boost and around 275hp, power captains seat and power folding mirrors.. Maybe im blown away by simplicity here or just stuck in the 80s haha... but im diggin it as a fun daily.

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I absolutely love squarebodies and ive been driving one daily for many many years now... and i dont know if its that or the fact ive never owned a car before, but man this things pretty neat. For a 99' its an all aluminum engine ( heads, block, pistons ), remote adjustable factory HID lights, 50/50 AWD, 13 psi of boost and around 275hp, power captains seat and power folding mirrors.. Maybe im blown away by simplicity here or just stuck in the 80s haha... but im diggin it as a fun daily.

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I feel you. After driving a square body for nearly 20 years and other newer Chevy trucks for many years, I bought a '12 Audi A4 a few months ago and working on it is like working on the space shuttle in comparison.
 
I feel you. After driving a square body for nearly 20 years and other newer Chevy trucks for many years, I bought a '12 Audi A4 a few months ago and working on it is like working on the space shuttle in comparison.


Haha oh man, i bet its even worse with 2012. Luckily this thing is pre y2k for elechicken gismo's, but does has more vacuum lines controlling everything than a smog sbc...:doah: You get so used to one form of engineering principals, then its like " chit, what the heck is all this stuff...?".

My wifes toyota vehicles have kept me frustrated for the past 5 years
 
Finished up this gas pedal bracket so i could get the truck out of the shop for a day while i change all the struts on the subaru. Definitely a big upgrade from the old one and one less thing on the windshield, which is good because im running out of space ..




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I also ended up finally getting the subaru baby safe and reliable. Now i can really rip into the truck i hope.

My neighbour said he had some scrap laying around. Ended up going over there n grabbing some galvanized ? fence pipe, mild steel pipe, he also said i could take this motor. Story is he had it laying around in shop storage for most of the time and then it just ended up out here. i gave it a tug and it seems to rotate fine and have some compression. Im not sure if 6.5 hp would be big enough for anything fun but im sure ill find a use for it, and good to have a little project to get running.

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Finally managed to get the truck in the shop I pushed the generator to the back and got it in a good spot to work on it too, which is a nice suprise. Nothing like a 24 hour power outage and 1.5 ' of snow overnight.. to bump that up the priority list.:whistle: The little lunchbox one doesnt cut it for any bigger stuff ( infloor heat ect.. ) Glad i got the chevy in the shop before it looked like this..

This amount of snow is not new to me but it sure hits ya when the place you live in has the worst drivers, and no plow to be had haha.

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Generator to do:

Wire circuit board & voltage regulator into box.
Find and install transfer switch panel, beside house panel.
Build supporting enclosure for cooling system, grill and protection
Hoist into behind the shop and connect to existing wires burried in the ground. ( old power lines going OUT to the office canister from the house, where they used to send power to the container the generator used to supply in its day)

I lucked out and had a gentleman on another forum ( smokstak ) which is a generator forum, send me an original curcuit system with the voltage regulator as he had switched up to a much newer one. So i should have everything i need to make it work and output 240 1ph power.

Craziest thing about this generator is that the Fire & Safety cannister that was left here on the property, came from a part of my home town, and ended up on a property i would buy 40 years later. Oh and my original neighbhor Jeff was from ottawa as awell

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Also im back at my old job and my boss picked up this crew cab dually to build out as my supervisors work truck, and is getting a service bed for it ect.. pretty sweet rig. 454, th400, too many aftermarket gauges. Picked it up at an auction somewhere while i was working up on the barge.

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I am happy to try and adress a "few" issues now that the trucks in the shop. I was having some interesting MAP readings above 3500 rpm. Sometimes it would max out at atmospheric pressure way too low in the power range. Vacuum leak maybe around intake gaskets.. throttle body.. not too sure but also still had quite a bit of oil coming into the intake. After learning that subarus really need an upgraded pcv system due to the pistons being flat and overtime, burn quite a bit of oil over time... Led me to thinking about having a baffled oil catch can set up, and not return any crankcase ventilation into the intake at all.

Also wondering if its caused by blow by.. I do plan on puling heads and taking a good look at the bottom end of this thing as i didnt last time, due to wanting to just get it moving forward as a whole project. Id like to measure and inspect cam bearings too. My idea is to spend money on making the block decently powerful NA overtime with the current finances.. then someday down the line add boost somehow on a good foundation.

The front passenger steam port was obvious leaking also. Thinking of just putting a 4 corner steam kit on it and going back to the Gen III*? design. This is also led me to want to get a radiator with the intake and outlet on the same side and eliminate my hobbled top coolant hose set up. I would also like to put a warmer thermostat in this. I think a 190-195 got put in there and for tuning purposes id like it to reach 210-220 like factory design was intended. After i get that as the baseline into the fuel enrichment tables then i can change it if need be but from driving it, it seems a bit cold even in the summer.


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Man I wish we got snow like that. Awesome supervisor truck. Hopefully that job goes well for you. My 6.2L in my wife's yukon burns a lot of oil and I've got several ls and lt trucks at work that do also. There's videos on YouTube talking about the crappy baffle setup in the valve cover that causes it to suck oil and I also heard from Chevrolet the rings are not great and contribute to oil usage from brand new. Even the newer duramax trucks have a pretty high acceptable oil usage rate especially when towing.
 
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I watched a couple of videos about the valve cover baffle fixes and drilled some extra holes in mine. Had to pay attention to where the oil from the rockers hits the tin of the baffle and avoid drilling in the path of that. It seems to have helped, but not completely cured. I haven't installed a catch can yet though.
Something that didn't require draining weekly would be nice, but I don't know how to do that without lots of parts and modifications.
Cummins put a filter into the blow-by tube on the 12L and 15L engines that has a drain tube back into the engine. The smaller engines have filter media while the X15 has a baffled plastic housing. Then they both throw a "stop engine immediately " message if it senses too much back pressure. :angry1:
(Useless information there...)

I plan on looking at catch can capacity when I get to that.
 
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I did an experiment with a catch can on my 14 Silverado. It was a few ounces at best between changes and that truck would go through a couple of quarts. They definitely aren’t as critical as the internet would have you believe.
 
I did an experiment with a catch can on my 14 Silverado. It was a few ounces at best between changes and that truck would go through a couple of quarts. They definitely aren’t as critical as the internet would have you believe.
Good to know. I have pulled the intake manifolds off of 2 engines with 200K or more on them and each had over half of a cup of oil drain out. That didn't give me any idea of how bad the problem is.
 
I don’t know if I still have them but I had pictures of the valves on my engine at around 120k with no catch can and there was hardly any buildup. One thing I just remembered is I was running 5-30 and not 0-20 like it said to. Still within recommended but not so thin so it would burn less.
 

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