73-87chevytrucks.com
73-87 Chevy _ GMC Trucks => Members Rides => Topic started by: bake315 on January 11, 2020, 11:57:50 AM
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Well, another one followed me home, Ma. Can I keep him? Please? ::)
Brought home a 1979 Scottsdale K10 a few days ago. It almost made it home under its own power before I had to call for a tow!
The good:
- 350 4-bolt main (rebuilt) runs like a scalded dog
- Smooth shifting 465 and clutch
- Straight, solid frame, showing no signs of collision
- Solid doors, bed, fenders and floor pan
- Nearly new tires
- Undamaged windshield
- Recently re-done original bench seat
- Recent exhaust system with H-pipe
The bad:
- One cab corner is completely rusted through
- Both rockers are rusted through
- Hood folds up like an accordion
- Front differential is a question mark (disconnected)
- Auxiliary fuel tank bypassed
- Leaking rear brake cylinders
The ugly:
- Unnecessarily high suspension lift
- Gauge cluster completely absent, with all wiring cut away
- Aftermarket gauges apparently wired up by a 3-year old
- No fuel gauge present at all
- E-brake cable cut because of the too high suspension lift
- Engine harness butchered (including missing fusible links)
Going to try and bring this guy back into the realm of reasonable, and then I will decide if I’m going to keep it in the fold, or sell it on.
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The things people do to these trucks hurts. All can be brought back though. Cool truck 8)
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Nice find, congrats! What did you have to part with to take her home, if I may ask?
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Nice
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Nice find, congrats! What did you have to part with to take her home, if I may ask?
Two and a half large. Feel like I got a pretty good deal, really. I’m really looking forward to digging into it!
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Cool like the Fonz! 8)
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Cool like the Fonz! 8)
Aaaaaaayyyy! 8)
Younger members out there are like, "Who?" lol
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First thing I did with "Oscar" (my R30 is named "Felix") was to address the wiring nightmare. One of the PO's had totally removed the instrument cluster, then hollowed out the old gauge faces and inserted aftermarket (Bosch) gauges in their place. Actually didn't look all that gawdawful, aside from the fact that there was no longer any fuel gauge - a Bosch tach was in its place, and no speedo - he'd mounted an old Garmin satnav to use instead, which would have been okay I guess, had it actually been working.
And then - descent into horror.
I should have guessed something was a bit off when I initially noticed what looked like an extension cord (it was), coiled up on the hump behind the floor shifter. Apparently they'd used it as speaker wire for speakers which were no longer present. These were twisted together with the wires in the still present head unit (basic no-name DIN-style) by hand, and wrapped together using the best part of a roll of electrical tape (apparently there was a sale on electrical tape, as you'll see later). The head unit itself was inoperable. There was a 12-volt accessory socket that was mounted down low, which presumably was used to power the Garmin. However, it too was dead, and the wires - also twisted together with... that clear power wire you get at the hardware store for those lamps you hang over the dinner table at your house, or those "swag" lamps from the 70's. Both wires were completely bare at the ends - apparently they'd run out of black tape!
I then began to dig into the gauge situation. Great care was taken to be creative in mounting them. They took the time to use crimp ring connectors on each gauge, but then... more lamp cord, more hand-twisted ends, and of course copious amounts of electrical tape. Beyond those gauges I literally never saw another crimp connector, and never saw a single solder joint. It's like they spent all the time making it look sorta cool (it sorta did, for what it was), but then hastily wired it up with the barest minimum of effort. Did they work? Actually they did, but who knows for how long? Truth be told, I probably would not have dug in as soon as I did had it not been for the fact that the oil pressure gauge came loose and started dripping oil right on my left foot (and the clutch pedal!) while driving it home. So, out it all came. I dug until nothing remained but factory wiring. Fortunately, whoever did all of this at least had the good sense to not remove the connector for the instrument cluster - they had liberally wrapped it in electrical tape and tucked it up and out of harm's way. After getting it "back to basics" I removed every fuse from the block, and replaced them with the correctly rated versions of the type that glow when they blow, then reapplied power. No shorts there, at least. But we aren't done yet!
One of the issues Oscar had when I bought him was a very noisy starter, which seemed to slip and grind quite a lot. Hoped that I could get away with just shimming it a little (pinion gear was chewed to heck and gone, unfortunately), so a new starter was in order. Shame, really, as this one looked almost new otherwise. As I went to disconnect and remove it, I saw more wiring horror. Somewhere along the way, the engine harness leading to the starter solenoid had been completely cut. This truck has a really high lift, but that would not justify cutting this entire batch of wiring. Maybe they thought it needed to be longer for some reason? Well, they made it longer, all right. Much, much longer, using something like what you'd wire your house with, different sizes and colors, with ends more or less pushed together, then wrapped with about 2000 feet of black (and some blue!) tape. Battery lead was 4-gauge, way too long, with several sections that were partially melted, where it apparently had gotten too close to the exhaust manifold. Also, all of the fusible links had been removed. With Rich's (bd's) assistance (thanks again, Rich!) I was able to determine the appropriate wire types and sizes so that I might reconstruct this portion of the harness. Having successfully done so, I replaced the B+ from the battery to the starter with a proper 2-gauge cable of the proper length, and, noticing the rather decrepit state of the B- lead, replaced it with a 1-gauge cable. I mounted the starter - needed two shims - hooked up the wiring, and cranked. And cranked... and cranked... While the starter itself cranked smooth and quiet now, I was not getting any spark from the distributor. A quick poke around the distributor, and I discovered that in my moving wires around back there, I'd managed to pull the hot switched lead to the distributor. Connected it, and good to go, right? Wrong. Same no-spark condition as before. Just for grins, I swapped the power that otherwise went to the tach, and it started instantly - just like someone flipped on a light switch. So now it boiled down to - why? What was the difference between these two switched circuits? Knowing I could make it start and run, and also knowing that some semblance of law and order had been restored to the block inside the cab, that left only one real possibility - something wasn't right about the wire itself. Put a tester on it, and it was only registering around 11.5 volts. So, resistance somewhere. Tracing this wire back, I noticed it had been doubled back on itself rather tightly on itself with - you guessed it - plenty of electrical tape. Upon removing all of this, and un-doubling it, I noticed a small section that was individually wrapped with - if you can believe it - a combination of electrical, silver duct tape and... clear packaging tape! :o Underneath was literally the pièce de résistance - a section that had multiple broken conductors. I fortunately had a length of 12-gauge SXL left over from the starter section, so I cut away as close to the block as was appropriate, and added in a new length, using a heat shrink butt connector, followed by two additional layers of heat shrink on top of that. I then made up a new female quick connect - also wrapped in heat shrink - and attached to the distributor. Hit the switch, and Oscar roared to life!
I'm amazed at how smooth and quiet the engine runs on this truck, but also equally amazed at the absolute craziness I see in other places... like the E-brake cable simply cut because it no longer would reach due to the height of the lift - but that's a tale for another time!
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Picked up a set of near pristine Blazer buckets the other day. 8) These will go into Oscar, and Felix will get Oscar's bench seat that will replace one that's fairly knackered.
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Bake you're having too much fun 8)
Black tape is the bane our my industry (automation) so I banned it from use like 20 years ago. I can only picture the goo you had to endure.
You're a pretty good wordsmith, glad you got him going! So where does Knackered come from?
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You're a pretty good wordsmith, glad you got him going! So where does Knackered come from?
Oh, I watch a whole slew of different car shows each week, including one called "Wheeler Dealers", that originated in the UK, but now they're in L.A. I expect that's where I got it from.
Thanks for the compliment on my word skills. I figure if I'm going to tell a story, I might as well make it as interesting as possible! ;D I just wished I'd taken pictures of the carnage. I will probably do so going forward. I also need to get back on my CS20 3+3 project at some point - it's been languishing in a million pieces for far too long.
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Keep the novels coming they are great reads. I am just waiting for the weather to warm up a bit for my adventures to start...
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Major score. I needed gauges for this truck, and happened to catch - of all things - a set of new in the box, with unopened packages, Dakota Digital gauges, last night on Craigslist. 400 bucks! Guy had been doing an LS build, lost interest in the project, and had sold the truck. This was one of the few things left. Too good to turn down, I thought! ;D
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Very nice!
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Great score!
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Well now you have a chance to install new fuse boxs and lots of new wire the correct way
Also install relays for everything to take the load off of the old wires
Especially the headlights
We used a VW fuse panel for big stuff
And got the marine fuse boxes with the screw down lugs
It’s a lot easier(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20200204/2ac26127b9908c58d05a2d51c7f1bc28.jpg)(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20200204/dfe21a91e9e5bdc6b97ff62c2143f6bf.jpg)