'84 K10 The Animal- Now on Forty Two's

[skunked]

What amount of lift are those leaf springs?
I need similar.

not really sure to be honest, probably 5-6", here's the setup:

1" ORD body pucks

Front: 52" pro comp 13311 lift springs with a 1'" zero rate, 6" shackles
Rear: 93 F150 57" springs, DIY4X shackle flip (pushed toward the rear), 1" zero rate, 6" shackles

 

[skunked]

Nice pics! Way better place now?

Oh yeah, it's a much better place and something I've wanted for a long time. The house is a bit older but I'm on 3 acres now with attached and detached garages. Lot's of oaks on the property and consistent wildlife roaming through daily. My previous house was newer with modern amenities but it was a track home with 12-15' between the houses and lacked the freedom, space and quietness I wanted.

 

[mrk5]

That sounds like a great set up! Congrats on making the move!

 

[skunked]

Coming off the trail I noticed the truck was running kind of rough and it died as I pulled up to the tow rig. After setting up the ramps and stabilizers the truck wouldn't restart and I had to winch it onto the trailer. A few weeks later I was back in town from traveling and the truck fired up like nothing was wrong. Something still isn't right with the tune and it's always had an intermittent issue starting with the occasional backfire/fireball out the exhaust that needs to be addressed.

With all the nice weather I decided to pull the truck out of hibernation and start prepping for the wheeling season. Last fall I had an issue coming off the trail when it started to run like crap and died at the trailer. I noticed a check engine light was illuminated so I pulled the codes.

Popped the hood and found the wiring to the camshaft sensor had fell off and the plug wedged itself between the water pump and water pump pulley.

I pulled the loom back, checked the wires and re-wrapped it all. Runs great now.

 

[imiceman44]

With all the nice weather I decided to pull the truck out of hibernation and start prepping for the wheeling season. Last fall I had an issue coming off the trail when it started to run like crap and died at the trailer. I noticed a check engine light was illuminated so I pulled the codes.

Popped the hood and found the wiring to the camshaft sensor had fell off and the plug wedged itself between the water pump and water pump pulley.

I pulled the loom back, checked the wires and re-wrapped it all. Runs great now.

Did you secure it better now?

 

[skunked]

Did you secure it better now?

I added a zip tie to the cable so it stays away from the belt if it falls off again. The plug feels tight & secure so I'm not sure WTF happened.

 

[Truckman4life]

Gotta love the easy fixes!

 

[skunked]

Gotta love the easy fixes!

I'll take them whenever I can get them!

 

[skunked]

It's been a while, time for another update.

In mid July I went on a trip with Zak and his stretched TJ to fordyce to dust off the cobwebs before the Sierra Trek event that was scheduled a couple weeks later. As we approached the first obstacle on the trail I went into double low, locked the hubs and noticed I was pushing through the power of the brakes. Kinda weird but I wasn't too worried about it at the time.



Shortly thereafter at the top of driveline hill I realized my driver front wasn't spinning in the rocks. Axle shaft was spinning so the lockout wasn't engaging or I broke another stub. I backed down, took the bypass and pulled the lockout for inspection.


talking shit as usual and I deserved that after a break on the first obstacle 30 minutes on the trail

I quickly realized the water crossings over the past two summers has corroded the shit out of everything and the lockout wasn't sliding on the hub, in fact it was stuck. I broke it free so it's in the locked position and added some grease to the dial.

About an hour up the trail after the first crossing, before WH1 I was driving through deep ruts in 2wd, off cambered to the passenger side when the front passenger tire grabbed the outside rut and spun the steering wheel out of my hand. As the steering maxed out passenger I heard a loud hissing noise and steam or smoke from under the hood. I thought I popped a bead. Backed up, pulled out of the ruts and got out of the truck and found fluid gushing out of the front of the engine area. Quickly found the PS pump pissing everywhere so I killed the engine and radio'd ahead.

We were down in the trees with standing water in the ruts so we towed the truck about 200 yards to get out of the trees and away from the mosquitos.




Further investigation revealed an o-ring popped out, presumably from the pressure of the steering slamming into the knuckle stop?



The witness marks on the pump indicated something was in that hole, possibly a bolt. Then I remembered the old 454 had a bracket that attached to that point but I didn't recall using that with the serpentine setup on the 8.1L.

It was getting dark at this point so we decided to setup camp about 20' off the trail and cook some burgers.

 

[skunked]

I called a friend that usually wheels with us and confirmed there's normally a bolt in the open PS hole and it's a 3/8"-16 which I had in my spare hardware ammo can. I found one with a flange and cut the threads down to 3/4" with a cut off wheel. I put a liberal coating of rightstuff rtv on the bolt and hand tightened it with the idea I would tighten with a wrench in the morning and top off the fluid.

The next morning I put a wrench on it while my coffee was cooking and bled the system. She was whining a bit but otherwise it looked to be back in working order so we loaded up and hit the trail with the plan to run all the way to Meadow Lake and camp there.

we didn't take too many pics, but we got a few on WH1



made it to meadow lake around 2 or 3pm and ran across this unicorn. Mind you we haven't seen a single vehicle on the trail since it was the middle of the week so it was a surprise to see a linked K20 with ORD goodies head to toe

 

[skunked]

The next morning we drove out via the fire roads, stopping along the way to play with the crawlers. During this stretch of the road I quickly realized the front brakes were damn near non existent. I adjusted the wilwood proportioning valve however that made little difference, if at all. I also noticed a growling noise at speed, likely the bearings.

 

[skunked]

The front brakes on the truck were original, untouched from when I bought the axle so I decided I should probably upgrade them.


You can see the front brakes are clearly not working based on the rust on the rotors after a couple days of drving.



tore down and ran through the parts washer. Tons of shit built up so I had to do a second cleanup with the wire wheel.

back together with all new bearings, seals, studs and the lugnut 4x4 brake kit

 

[skunked]

Shortly thereafter I was doing my usual nut and bolt check and found this





This was the second stud I broke, the first was the rear stud two summers ago. Sierra Trek was less than one week away and I didn't want to pull the axle to drill it our properly so I decided to go with the u-bolt kit that WFO sells.

the outer u-bolt was also replaced.

 

[skunked]

Now that it was back on it's tires I was able to drive it, bleed the brakes and confirm I still didn't have front brakes. After some research on the interwebs I found some people had problems with the the Wilwood proportioning valve that I have so I ordered one from Summit that was scheduled to arrive the day before I left for sierra trek.

I also decided to pickup a lightly used camper for the tow rig




It's a 2022 Palomino Badlands edition. It's a pop up with AC, heater, gas stove top, 3 way fridge, full size queen bed, outdoor shower and it has a couple hundred watts of solar. I ended up putting bags on the Ram and buying TorkLift brackets and tie-down equipment for it.

 

[max 02]

Sweet set up!