Slumberjack
Newbie
Well this isn't going to be the most informative or helpful build thread considering I am pretty unskilled mechanically, but I would like to track the progress of things I'm doing to my bitchin' K5. About 5 months ago I purchased a 1990 V1500 Jimmy SLE. The motor has 178,000 original miles and the tranny was rebuilt around 30,000 miles ago. It runs strong and has plenty of power, which was surprising because I'd looked at/test drove quite a few before this one and none of them felt this good. The truck is pretty much stock. Here it is, in all it's glory:
The guy who sold it to me had it for 8 years and bought it from the original owner. Other than regular maintenance the only thing he said he did was add another leaf spring to level it out. He also had it repainted and reupholstered about 4 years ago. It ran well when I bought it and about 2 weeks later I moved from my little town in California to Carson City, NV. My truck pulled a Uhaul trailer full of my stuff up 9,000 feet over the Sierra Nevadas without issue. A little over 3 months later I got a phone call offering my dream job if I came back to CA and it was something I couldn't turn down so I moved back. It pulled me and my trailer up over the mountains and back down into the central valley once again.
About a week after I moved back to CA I started having some issues. The truck fought me whenever I tried to start it up. Once it got going it would surge/lope pretty badly. Rev waaay up, then sputter and die. If I let it idle for a few minutes everything would finally even out and I'd be able to drive. Once I was driving it never died on me but there was a substantial loss of power. I spent all my time reading and researching online but never got a definite answer as to what could be wrong. I did the exact opposite of what I should do and started throwing money/parts at it.
I started small and replaced the fuel filter first. Then I bought a new IAC valve. Then my starter died and I replaced that too. Next came the ignition control module. Shortly after that I discovered that my EGR was bad so I replaced that as well. I tested my TPS and o2 sensor and they were working fine so I left them alone. Next my battery died so I replaced that too. But I still hadn't made any progress. My only guess after that was a bad fuel pump because it just felt like I was never getting enough fuel. I finally gave up and took it to a mechanic for a proper diagnosis. My hunch was correct. Replacing that was beyond me current ability (but I'm learning!) so I had him do it. He put a new pump and fuel sending unit in for me (my gas gauge works again - hooray!) and now my truck runs like a scalded dog!
I didn't think to take any pics while I was doing that stuff, but it was all fairly simple anyway. I just bought new stereo stuff today (the one currently in there was a butcher job and it doesn't even power on) so hopefully one day this coming week I'll have time to hack up my doors and dash, get that installed, and show it off to all of you. After that I've got plenty of ideas of things to do, although none of them will be huge undertakings.
Like I said, it's not gonna be much of a build thread, but I do plan on updating with pics of the little (and possibly big) things I do to it from now on. Looking forward to sharing with you all!
The guy who sold it to me had it for 8 years and bought it from the original owner. Other than regular maintenance the only thing he said he did was add another leaf spring to level it out. He also had it repainted and reupholstered about 4 years ago. It ran well when I bought it and about 2 weeks later I moved from my little town in California to Carson City, NV. My truck pulled a Uhaul trailer full of my stuff up 9,000 feet over the Sierra Nevadas without issue. A little over 3 months later I got a phone call offering my dream job if I came back to CA and it was something I couldn't turn down so I moved back. It pulled me and my trailer up over the mountains and back down into the central valley once again.
About a week after I moved back to CA I started having some issues. The truck fought me whenever I tried to start it up. Once it got going it would surge/lope pretty badly. Rev waaay up, then sputter and die. If I let it idle for a few minutes everything would finally even out and I'd be able to drive. Once I was driving it never died on me but there was a substantial loss of power. I spent all my time reading and researching online but never got a definite answer as to what could be wrong. I did the exact opposite of what I should do and started throwing money/parts at it.
I started small and replaced the fuel filter first. Then I bought a new IAC valve. Then my starter died and I replaced that too. Next came the ignition control module. Shortly after that I discovered that my EGR was bad so I replaced that as well. I tested my TPS and o2 sensor and they were working fine so I left them alone. Next my battery died so I replaced that too. But I still hadn't made any progress. My only guess after that was a bad fuel pump because it just felt like I was never getting enough fuel. I finally gave up and took it to a mechanic for a proper diagnosis. My hunch was correct. Replacing that was beyond me current ability (but I'm learning!) so I had him do it. He put a new pump and fuel sending unit in for me (my gas gauge works again - hooray!) and now my truck runs like a scalded dog!
I didn't think to take any pics while I was doing that stuff, but it was all fairly simple anyway. I just bought new stereo stuff today (the one currently in there was a butcher job and it doesn't even power on) so hopefully one day this coming week I'll have time to hack up my doors and dash, get that installed, and show it off to all of you. After that I've got plenty of ideas of things to do, although none of them will be huge undertakings.
Like I said, it's not gonna be much of a build thread, but I do plan on updating with pics of the little (and possibly big) things I do to it from now on. Looking forward to sharing with you all!
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