Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

That's it (so far) I still need to check the amperage draw on all 3 speeds for peace of mind.
It would be an easy modification to your Burban, judging from the photos in your thread. It's much easier to get under the dash with the front seat removed. :lol:

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Yes, it would be very easy, as the entire front clip is still off. I have already installed a new non-A/C blower motor, but it would be well worth getting the higher airflow from upgrading. THANKS!

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Just a thought, but adding a faster blower might be detrimental in some circumstances -- air has only so much capacity to transfer heat in a given time, and so moving the air faster might result in only minimal additional heat transfer. If that's the case, then blowing air harder might be nice in the summer but could result in a colder feeling air coming out of the ducts in the winter!

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

It doesn't seem to be an issue. It's been in the low 40's this week and it takes about 3.5 minutes to get warm air from the vents. That doesn't seem to be noticeably longer than before. Thats with driving about 3/4 mile at 20 mph before hitting the freeway at 55.

Two noticeable plusses are that at the end of my 14 minute commute now I notice it is getting hot in the cab and that never happened before. Like Doc said "Let there be heat!!!" :lol:

And the other plus I noticed was yesterday morning. The dew point was high enough that the front windows fogged up immediately after I got in the truck. A minute later 50% of the windshield was clear and most the rest was gone by the 3 minute mark. Markedly improved over the old worn out blower motor.
Now if I could just get the drivers side to clear up first. :lol:

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

little off topic but how has that little larrys box been holding up? thinking about going that route when putting my air ride back together

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

As all the topics here revolve around trucks (With occasional drifting off into Pontiacs :lol:) you are most certainly on topic!
The Little Larry's valve set operation (outside of the o-ring failure early on) has been flawless. That o-ring may have been defective from the factory.
Whatever the reason for the failure Larry sent me new set of o-rings immediately after we talked about the problem and I had them in a couple of days.
Problem solved.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

I had some M&R that I needed to get knocked out this week and fortunately there was one dry day and incredibly I had it off!
First up was fixing the tail lights. Two nights before I was 2 blocks from the house when the dash lights went out. A couple of quick checks revealed I had no taillights or emergency flashers. The fuse looked good so I knew it wasn't going to be a simple fix so I parked the WMB for a couple days.

When I started troubleshooting the problem I assumed the issue was going to be with the light switch. Lately when I turned on the high beams the headlights would go out. If I pushed and pulled the head light switch the high beams would come on. So I pulled the switch out and tested it with an ohmmeter and found poor conductivity through the dash light circuit of the switch. I thought I was on the the problem. However...

I disassembled the switch and cleaned all the contacts and reassembled the switch. Now I had good conductivity through the switch but, when I plugged it in and tested it, the lights still refused to light. After another 30 minutes of troubleshooting I decided to pull the fuse and check it and bingo! The fuse was bad. Visibly it looked good but, no conductivity. Grrrrrrr! I installed a new fuse and everything was good again. There is no indication of why the fuse failed.

This time there was an upside to making a bad assumption. And it was, now the high beams work every time and the dash lights seem a bit brighter.

Next up was fixing the leak in the power steering pump. Ever since I installed the CS130 alternator I have had very little adjustment range in the alternator drive belt. This comes from the alternator hitting the aftermarket valve covers. So a couple weeks ago I decided to do some slight modifications to the alternator mounts to gain some more adjustment range. By now I imagine you're asking what does the alternator belt have to do with a leaking power steering pump?

During the imagineering part I managed to drop the alternator and it hit the pump and deformed the edge of the fluid tank. At the time I was only bummed since my new pump now looked quite used but, the reality was that the tank now leaked. It was a pretty bad leak that left a 6 or 7 inch oil spot every time I parked the truck. The fix required that I pull the pump out and remove the pump housing from the tank. Once that was accomplished I carefully tapped the dent out of the tank and reassembled the pump with some sealant on the O-rings to be sure of getting a good seal. That seems to cured the leak. (Knock on wood)

Last on the work list was to replace the driver's door hinge pins. Since getting the WMB on the road I've had to re-adjust the upper hinge 3 times. Over time I would start feeling the door dragging on the latch, so I would move the upper hinge to get things back in line.

Thanks to all the folks who posted the how to replace the pins this task was pretty straightforward. Fortunately the pins in my hinges were not fused in place. So the actual time to replace the pins was about 10 minutes per hinge.

The time consuming part of the job was removing the hinges from the truck. It took a combination of 4 different wrenches to remove them. (Photo #1) The bolts on the cowl side ended being a real pain as they had a fair bit of rust on the ends. Lots of pentrating oil and patience were required. Only an 1/8th of turn at a time on some of them. I supported the door with a cool door support, my buddy Bob turned me on to, while I removed the hinges one at a time. (Photo #2) That really made realigning the door fairly simple once the pins had been replaced.

The hinge pads for the swing control (? I'm not sure that is the right name) weren't worn very much so I just turned them 180 degrees and reassembled the hinge.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Where did you get the padded support cradle for the door? That technique seems immensely easier than using wood 2x4s

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

found this one on Amazon

Steck Manufacturing 21870 E-Z Rest Door Hanger https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000GBLZCU...PJDX75SW8Z5KY0

looks a lot easier than using 2x4s for sure

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Thank you sir!

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Good thing kev2809 knew as I got it from my buddy Bob. Your are correct, it is so much nicer than using 2 bys, especially with 2nd gen F-body doors.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

I replaced the front shocks on the WMB yesterday. Quite possibly it was the first time I made flat rate since I started the repairs to it. :lol:
New Bilstein shocks replaced the worn out Ranchos. The front end had developed a tendency to bounce after hitting bumps on the highway. Upon removal of the old ones i found the passenger side shock had amost zero resistance to movement.
As expected the Bilsteins made a huge difference in how the truck drives. It would be interesting to compare them against a new pair of Ranchos.

I had installed raised upper shock mounts in the truck back when it was bagged in the front. With the static spring set up the stock replacement shock is the closest shock Bilstein sells. They however come with the upper stud mount installed in the upper eye. I took a chance and ordered them hoping I could remove the stud and through bolt the top to the raised mount. As it turns out it was easy to remove the stud mount. The studs have a washer secured by punching and deforming the end tip on the stud. 30 seconds of grinding on the bench grinder removed the deformed tip and a couple taps with a hammer and the washer pops off. (Photo #3) I did half to come up with some 5/8" to 1/2" sleeves to put inside the rubber bushing of the upper eye. Fortunately I had a pair from some other shocks I installed in the past.
I noticed the rubber bushings on the uppers have a small lip on one side but it didn't cause any difficulty when installing the sleeves. (Photo #4)

Thanks to the folks who recommended Viking shocks but the price and the current lead time to get them made the decision for me. So I compromised and went with the Bilsteins.

Now that I have several hundred miles on the new shocks I will state. They work GREAT!
Better overspeed bumps, better on rough highway and much better over bad potholes. Now I want some for the rear axle.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Four hours of M&R today. The turn signal switch stopped resetting after a right turn. Easy fix I thought. One of the little springs must have broken. A common failure on older switches and with any of the new over the counter replacement springs. I've had such bad luck with the replacement springs, I scrounge every OE one I find at the u-pull-it. I believe the wire stock used to make the replacements is one grade above rebar. :lol:

In reality the plastic section that the lever operates was cracked. It was almost completely broken across. (See arrows on photo 1) I pulled it out and used my handy dandy Harbor Freight plastic welder to make it better. I should have gotten some more pictures but, hopefully there are enough to show what I did.

I cut a 3/8" by 3/8" piece of the stainless mesh and folded it 90 degrees corner to corner making 2 triangles. I then laid it over the crack on the top and the inside of the section and melted it into the plastic. (Photo 2)

The outside part of the cracked area wasn't large enough for a piece of mesh so I melted a groove and added some plastic filler and reformed it as close as I could back to normal. No photo here, sorry.

When I reassembled the switch I noticed that I did in fact have a broken spring. In all the previous instances I've had the "no return" problem the spring was broken in two pieces and was easy to spot. This time the spring was more splintered instead of broken. I had to carefully examine it to tell it was defective. My junk yard scrounging paid off today.

Once it was all back together it worked nice and smooth. I also found the base piece of the switch is also cracked near the detent springs. The plastic there is so thin and delicate I didn't want to attempt a weld on it for fear of destroying it.

Things are working nicely for now but, I will order a new switch because I'm sure the bottom piece is going to cause problems at some point.

A quick search shows people are mostly happy with the American Autowire replacement switch so I am leaning to that one at present.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Weird they call it a plastic welder. When I was in the copier/printer business we had these sort of cracking issues with different types of plastics. I kept a few old broken pieces in my tool kit and used a normal soldering iron, just like whats pictured but it had a pointy tip. Melt out a deep a grove as possible, melt a chunk of my broken piece (same material) into the grove, and smooth it out with the tip. If need be use a razor blade to smooth it down even more.

All this time I was a welder haha!

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

I've had an old wood burning set when I was a kid that ended up being mostly used for plastic melting over the years. When it died I used soldering irons but, getting good solder joints after melting plastic usually meant filing the tip back to bare metal and retinning, so when I saw the Harbor Freight sets for $10.00 I picked one up.
The stainless mess it came with has been very handy for door panel repairs on late model cars. As is typical with Harbor Freight tools the metal in the tip is low quality so so the tip bends quite easily.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Its been way too long since I did any tweaking on the carburetor. The WMB has been running fine but, it can be improved.
Getting together with my buddy Karl we pulled the carb and looked back at what had been done earlier. Currently the truck will not idle down below 900 rpm in gear. The idle mixture screws will not respond to bring the idle down any farther. The joys of late 70's emissions carburetors.

Previously we had drilled, tapped and installed some plugs in the base plate to remove these massive air bypass passages. (Photo 1) Then Karl plugged two idle air bleeds in the main body (Sorry to say I didn't get pictures of this.) and to replace those air bleeds he drilled two holes in the top plate for air bleeds like a pre-emissions carburetor would have had. (Photo 2) These modifications allowed us to get the idle mixture screws to start responding, whereas before they had no affect on the idle. After a looooong test period we know that the air bleeds needed to be further modified to get the idle mixture screws to operate properly.

This leads us to the work we did this week. Basically an idle circuit is like a straw with a hole in the side of it. You adjust the size of the hole in the straw to make idle air to fuel ratio correct. You also have to have the correct size straw to get the engine the correct amount of fuel for the engine to idle at the desired RPM. To accomplish this the factory drills holes in the carburetor body to allow a certain amount of fuel and air to mix and then be introduced under the primary throttle plates. How much of this mixture is allowed into the engine is controlled by the mixture screws. This mixture of air and fuel is then combined with the rest of the air passing the throttle plates to make the idle mixture complete.

Our previous modifications had allowed us to get some response from the mixture screws but there was still to much fuel passing into the engine. In other words the hole in our straw was too small. In order to get the correct amount of fuel we needed to make further changes to the previous modifications.

To start we removed the plugs we had put in the base plate and installed ones with holes drilled in them. Then Karl reduced the size of the air bleed in the top plate by pressing in small brass tubes in the previously drilled holes. (Look closely at Photo 2 and you can see the tubes) once this was done we reassembled the carburetor and bolted it back on the engine. Now the engine would idle all the way down to 550 RPM in gear and 650 out of gear. Finally I got to use the idle speed set screw! :lol:

Not only did the idle speed set screw work but, the idle mixture screws now worked as they should. After a test run to get the truck to operating temperature I was able to set the idle speed in gear at 650 and out of gear it was about 775. The A/F ratio was dialed in to 14.7. Most excellent! :metal:

Now on to the next step, dialing in the A/F ratio.

When I am referring to the Air/Fuel ratios they are not an exact number but .3 or .4 above and below the number I state. For example above I said it was 14.7 the reality is the readings were between 14.4 and 15.2.

So back to testing the truck. I found the A/F to be fine in the upper speeds but around 40 mph it had gone to 12.5 and at 25 mph it was at 10.5. Way too rich, especially when driving with the choke on. It was turning my quarter panels black. UGGG! The 90 plus degree weather wasn't helping things either.

Since the higher speeds were okay I decided that larger primary metering rods were needed. Smaller jets would have leaned the A/F mixture too but that would have leaned it out every where instead of just at the lower speeds. Karl recommended that we remove the ATP screw cover to allow more adjustment of the metering rod position.

The ATP adjustment is one advantage of the later emission style Q-jet carburetors. The ATP screw is in the front center of the base plate. It allows you to change the height of the power piston and thus which part of the taper on the metering rod is used at steady state cruise. There is about 1/8" of height adjustment provided by the ATP. The screw in the front moves the small lever on the base plate. (In Photo #3 the red arrow indicates the lever and the green arrow is where the screw is.)

This was a factory adjustment back in the day that was made to adjust individual carburetors to pass emissions, then it was blocked off never to be adjusted again.

There is a staked in plug that must be removed to access the adjustment screw. (Photo #4 shows the plug with a hole drilled in it and the 3 staked areas to be removed.) You have to drill a hole in the plug and then grind the 3 stakes off with a Dremel and then twist a small screw into the hole so you can pull the plug out. And there's the ATP screw. (Photo#5)

Now with the ATP turned all the way out, which drops the power piston to it's lowest point, we installed the larger metering rods. (I will have to post the new rod sizes later. I forgot my notes. :dohh:) Then the carburetor was reinstalled and I was off on a test run.

Things were much leaner now. So lean in fact there was a stumble upon acceleration. Just at the point you would expect the accelerator pump shot to have been used up. At that point I could see the A/R ratio jump to 20.0 (which may be the upper limit on the guage). At 20 mph A/F ratio was 15.5, and at 40 mph it was 17.0 and under deceleration there was amount slight back firing from the exhaust.

Back to the shop where we turned the APT screw all the way in which raised the power piston. The higher power piston meant that the part of the metering rod inside the metering jet's orifice was smaller thus allowing more fuel to flow through. And back for another test run.

Much better this time. The 20 mph A/F was 12.8 the 40 mph A/F is 13.5 and at 55 mph it is 14.2. The stumble was gone, as was as the back firing. Most excellent!! :metal::metal:

We decided to leave things as they are for a while and get a longer term feeling on the carb's performance. I have noticed the engine starts easier when it is hot and heat soaking would be a concern. I have also backed the choke off as it seems starts better with less choke. Of course we've been having lots of 90 plus degree days lately, so I may end up setting it back when the weather gets cold.

Such a long post! Man I'm tired. Not to mention I had to repost some of it as I somehow lost the photos and some of the text at the 3/4 point.
Any questions? Don't hesitate to ask. I'm good at confusing myself as well as others. :lol:

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

So much work on your carb to get it working the way you want. I have no idea on fine tuning a carb like that. I would have to find someone to trust to do it for me. Becoming a lost art these days.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Having the correct carburetor for your vehicle does help avoid a lot of this. My friend Karl has been doing this for a living most of his life and I've been hanging around him since the 1980's. We both used to race GTO's and we've learned a lot the hard way. Maybe by sharing some of this someone will be inspired to pick up the mantle and become a carburetor craftsman.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Also on this weeks work list was installing a 2nd speed sender in my speedometer cable. I have been waiting for what seems like forever for 1/2 of a two piece adapter to allow me to have 2 senders in the cable. See arrows in photo below.

I got the wiring run from the sender but, my better half decided we needed another raised bed planter in the front yard so I didn't get the rest of the modification installed. Member PJmoreland has been waiting most patiently for me to get this one done for a while now.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Haha. No pressure whatsoever. It might be possible to mount the second speed sensor to the speedometer up under the dash. I looked at doing it that way, but it was going to require me to shorten the square drive rod, so I chickened out.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Man, Big Brother is watching me! I swear I just barely posted that.

I looked at putting it under the dash thinking it would be slick and easy but, there just wasn't room without moving the whole cable towards the transmission. I decided that was going to be more work than running the wire to the transmission.

Then the whole adapter saga started with only half of it showing up and the other half back ordered.

It's so hard to feel like one is making progress these days.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Yep, that makes sense.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Thank you.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Which speed sensor are you using and what is the purpose of the second speed sensor?
Thank you, TNANG

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

-
You have been doing some pretty technical stuff here. I had trouble following what you were doing on both of them, let alone trying it myself.... :(

LockDoc
.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Could your Burb be any more dialed in? Great work and write up on the carb.

So
What is the purpose of the speed sensor and even a second one? Are you adding cruise control?

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

EXCELLENT!!! Can't wait to start getting my Q-Jet dialed in. It starts pretty easily after sitting all night, and just the short little trips I've taken it seems OK. We'll see soon.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

The second speed sensor is a Dakota Digital and it is for a transmission lockup controller that PJmoreland developed and graciously has loaned to me to test. The link is to his thread.

https://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/...d.php?t=822382

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Thanks Doc. But as someone who understands the magical inter-workings of locks you shouldn't sell yourself short.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Thanks Joe. Are they ever completely dialed in?

No cruise control control I just need to get my transmission lockup working correctly.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Thank you. Best of luck dialing yours in. It sounds like you're off to a good start already.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

After getting mine back on the road, I pulled the 71 jets out of my Q-Jet, and replaced them with 70 jets. My lil 307 is much happier for the change.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

I MADE FLAT RATE TODAY!

Yesterday I noticed something shiny hanging off the front of the WMB. Closer inspection revealed I had lost a bolt from the sway bar mounting strap. I started to reshape the strap when it dawned on me I might have a spare strap. After a bit of scrounging around the shop I located a similar replacement strap.(Photo #2)

The replacement strap doesn't have any provision for greasing the bushing. So I cut the little nub off the bushing (Circled in photo #3) and drilled a hole in the strap on the front side so I can use a U-joint grease gun adapter. (Arrow in photo #3)

The original mounts had zerks in the lowest part and I kept tearing them off on parking curbs. This should work better.

I believe the reason the bolt fell out was the cheesy washers the mounts came with. Going back together I used heavy duty washers and nylock nuts. That should cure any future problems. I will do the same to the other side after a trip to the hardware store to get some more 1" bolts.

Anyway it was under an hour to get the repair done.:two:

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Started the "Out with old and in with with the NEW process! After only two years of waiting for the upholstery shop.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Sorry for the cliffhanger posting. I thought I would be adding some installed photos later that day but, things did quite work out as I expected. After I got the new seat installed and sat on it I realized the foam cushion was way too tall.

Compared to the old seat I was now sat about 3 or 4 inches higher. When I sat straight and looked directly ahead I was looking at where the window seal meets the sheet metal. Obviously that wasn't going to work so I called the upholstery shop and they said to bring the seat back to them and he would take 2 inches of foam out of the cushion.

So out with the new and in with the old! Ugh! Now more waiting for the upholstery shop!

But before I put the old seat back in I needed to repair the frame. Months ago my buddy was riding in the truck and decided he needed something out of his pocket so he pushed against the back with his legs and BANG! The seat broke. In the months since with one side broke the drivers side eventually cracked and now the back now moves back and forth a couple of inches.

After 4 hours of messing around with hammers, clamps, grinders and the welder I had the old seat repaired and installed. No photos of that part of the dog and pony show as I was racing to finish the repairs before dark. The next day I dropped the new seat off for the foam height adjustment.

Fast forward to yesterday and here is the adjusted seat installed. It is still a bit too tall as I'm looking through the tinted strip across the top of the window. I'm hoping the foam will soften up some with use. If not I may have to modify the mounts to lower the seat an inch.

Outside of that that the seat is nice and comfortable. The old lady even commented on how much better it feels than the old one. Big win there! :lol:

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Seat looks great! The color is about like the one I used in my suburban. I like the insert you went with for it. Its always nice to have a comfy seat.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Thank you! The inserts are the 72 factory Highlander Grey plaid. I went for the "What if there were 67 Highlanders" vibe.

I was surprised how un-grey the Grey fabric is but the color seems to change between goldfish and Grey depending on lighting.


I now need to finish prepping the back seat mounting brackets and get them installed with the matching seats. :four:

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Outstanding look!!! The colors go really nice together...and you got that fold-down armrest with cupholders that you so desired!

Woody

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Looks real good.

Re: Working Man's Burbon
 

Fold flat rear seat ... Early on in this thread someone mentioned when they installed the fold flat seat they had to move the front seat all the way forward for the rear to fold flat. Now you mentioned you were over 6ft, has this been the way it works for you having to move the drivers seat all the way forward to get the rear to fold flat? Or is your way of mounting the rear seat different than the other fella did his? Having the drivers moved all the way forward would be a no go for me and you're taller than I am.