Post your "Home-Brewed How To's" here ...

[Eddie H.]

To keep from dropping sockets off your extensions while working, just wrap a little electrical tape to hold them together.

[lukecp]

When installing cork valve cover gaskets, remove and clean the valve covers. Then place a decent sized bead of Permatex Red Hi-Temp gasket maker around the lip of the valvecover.

Carefully place the gasket on the valve cover, than lay a flat board on the valve cover and let it dry for a few hours.

When you install the valve cover, the gasket won't try to squirm out, it will be perfectly alligned, and the bolt holes will be in the right place. Also allows easy removal of the valve covers later w/o replacing the gaskets.

[bad 71 chevy]

not really a tip but i will let you see if you have any vacume leaks
let moter warm up then take of air cleaner and just put a pice of cardbord over the carb if the moter almost dies then no leaks if still runs strong then some leaks

[lukecp]

That reminds me.....

I have another tip for finding vaccum leaks.

Turn the idle screws on the carb to as far to the lean side as you possibly can and still have the engine run.....should be about 300rpm.
Then use carb cleaner to go over all the vaccum lines and fitting. The motor will be pretty starved for fuel, so when it gets a burst of carb cleaner, it will jump to 500 or so rpm and make it VERY easy to find the vaccum leaks.

[racedvl]

Here's a good one if you drain your aintifreeze often. This is the same size petcock that fit's in your rad.

[racedvl]

Don't wanna spend big $$$ on spark plug wire looms? Spend $12 on a big ole' tube of zip ties, beacuse ya know you can use'm anyways. Now take the wires, and position them the way you want then LOOSELY wrap one zip tie around them. Next LOOSELY wrap zips around the first one , between the wires. Make sure the wires are where you want them, and begin to tighten then all a little at a time, till they are just the way you want them. And walla! Cheap wire looms that work GREAT!

[krue]

Not a trick, just something learned from experience, NEVER tighten a bolt on something until ALL the bolts are started!

[racedvl]

Here's another shot. . .

[ddsmith]

I have a couple of tips that may help someone out.

1. I was getting my butt whipped trying to install nuts on screws which I had little access to without removing the radiator. I finally decided that taping the nut and lockwasher on to a 3ft piece of filler material for my TIG welder would allow me to position the nut and lockwasher on the screw and get it started. Once started, a pull on the filler material releases the tape from the nut and lockwasher. The bolt/screw was then tightened.

2. This is not specific to our trucks but the principle should still work. I had a 75 Olds Cutlass with those stupid stainless steel caps over the real lug nuts. Problem with these was you would lose the stainless steel cap and the lug wrench was no longer correctly sized to remove the lug nut. I used some sandpaper to take up the extra space. The sand paper grabbed the lug nut and the lug wrench and the lug nut came off.

3. I used my gear puller on several occasions to remove tie rod ends. This is particularly good if you don't want to destroy the boot. I set the puller up so the screw is pressing against the tie rod end shaft end and put the two/three jaws on the area that you would normally drive the pickle fork into. Tighten up on the gear puller until it is tight. If it doesn't come apart, take a hammer and smack the side of the joint. It should break free. You may have to do this more than once but it provides excellent results.

4. Here's one from the fight I had removing a pilot bearing on my Vette. I didn't own the slide hammer deal so I tried the pack it with grease deal. I managed to smack the flywheel twice trying this method and got no movement on the pilot bearing. It was very worn making it impossible to get a good seal using the hydraulic approach. Since the material in the pilot bearing is soft I ground down the threaded end of a bolt which was a little larger than the hole and long enough to go all the way to the crankshaft. The end was ground so it could be inserted into the pilot bearing slightly. I then just started driving the bolt in. The bolt cut threads into the pilot bearing and when it got to the crankshaft. The pilot bearing came out on the bolt.

[Paul72]

Here's a few I use:

1 - Use fishing line to tie oil pan or tranny pan gaskets down. Install the pan and bolts, torque to spec.

2 - Alternator test - If you want to know if your alternator is going out, disconnect a battery cable with the engine running. If the engine quits (like turning the key) your alternator is shot.

3 - To find top dead center, remove the spark plug in #1 cylinder, put your thumb over the hole, turn the motor over until you feel air coming out (compression stroke), stick a long screwdriver into the cylinder and continue turning the motor until the screwdriver starts going down again.

[Southpa]

Tearing off that rotten, warped wooden bed being held on by tons of 1/4" fused and rusted carriage bolts? You plan to replace the hardware anyway and most times the bolts will just start spinning when you try to loosen them. Then you have to get the hacksaw, prybar, boltcutters, flame etc. or whatever. Well, if they might spin anyway you stand a better chance by turning them the other way first thing. Just tighten until they snap. There is a good chance that the job will go a whole lot easier.

Get the most out of your sandpaper. Sometimes the material being sanded will clog your paper up fast and that makes things slow...right...down. Buy some cheap paintbrushes (or use old ones) and cut the bristles in half. Whats left is stiff enough to brush off the sandpaper every few minutes.

[Hooter]

get a case of beer and get your best friend to do all the bit'ch work for you in exchange for the beer.

use camper jacks and two 4x4 posts to lift a body off a frame. Duct tape is qualified as being DOT approved for fixing rust holes in British Columbia (might not be the same in other provinces and states). Use a chainsaw tool (the screwdriver with the socket ends) to remove those bolts on shaft style radio's and tape players.

[Shane]

Someone referred to this in another post .... just wanted to bring back up.

[Ed ke6bnl]

Originally posted by racedvl
Don't wanna spend big $$$ on spark plug wire looms? Spend $12 on a big ole' tube of zip ties, beacuse ya know you can use'm anyways. Now take the wires, and position them the way you want then LOOSELY wrap one zip tie around them. Next LOOSELY wrap zips around the first one , between the wires. Make sure the wires are where you want them, and begin to tighten then all a little at a time, till they are just the way you want them. And walla! Cheap wire looms that work GREAT!

Darn we did the same thing about a month ago on my boys sparkplug wires we used big and little ties, I saw somthing similiar when a grip on a set had used string to tie a set of large dc cable together on a movie set. My boys wires were 10.5 mm and I didn't think we would find wire holder that size too easy. It works fine just did it to my street rod. and looks fine. Ed ke6bnl

[SWINGSAX68]

1. Pulling a motor with ram horn manifold on em still?????....one straight one turned?? Or any manifold with small gaps too tight for the conventional hoisting chain????? Take some bailing wire LOTS of it......double it over a few times, twist it up like a mother to make a doughnut a round the manifold...and hoist away.

2. Having trouble with ground to your tailights on your stepside????? Ground from the bolts that hold the tail light housing to the brackets....example...take two wires, one very long and one short and an open-eyelet connector. Strip both ends of each wire, take two ends and twist them together so that they fit doubled up in the open eyelet connector and ground the short one from one of the bolts on your brake lights to a bolt on your rev lamps.
then run the long one with an eyelet connector to a hole on your frame or bed and clean it up and bolt it down....instant ground!!!! Then for looks just take some wire cover and cover up all the wires in it and run all the way under the bed.
I'll try to find a pic

[doughby82]

if your broke down and need a 1/2 wrench but just have a 9/16 install the 9/16 and slide dimes, nickels or washers to make up the distance.i have done this while in the garage under my truck and didnt want to roll out from under the truck.it works

[cduster]

To find #1 compression, take a piece of paper towel and wad it up. Put it in the #1 plug hole and bump the starter. When the paper towel blows out, you are coming up on compression. Then you can turn it by hand to find TDC. Dan

[Dean]

You will be able to rotate both pushrods with your fingers and timing mark on 0 also to find #1. That is if you have the valve cover off.

[SWINGSAX68]

USE ARMOUR ALL TIRE FOAM TO CLEAN CHROMED PARTS!!! Tire Foam is also good for cleaning up rubber step pads on 88-98 rear bumpers and the like....and any rubber trim stuff....works real good!!!. Tire foam works on tonnue covers as well. Watch your pads though on the bumpers, they get a bit slick.

[PanelDeland]

Pulling distributor.
Bread tabs(the ones that close the bread bag up by holding the twisted end of the bag)Use a sharpie marker to number them and then use them to number the plug wires.Letter others for vacuumn lines.

[knucklebuster]

Heypaul72,That is good idea but I had to tear some heads off once to remove the tip of the srewdriver!!Never let an idiot turn the motor over!!Learned that the hardway back in high school

[whitesswj]

Originally posted by SEVEND2
OK First get a Large Tarp or Plasic sheet, line the inside of your bed of your truck (as shown below) then fill with water (as shown below) then jump in!!

I did this in an old 87 Jeep comanche in the summer of 02 for a Youth group in MO that i was interning w/ and the 150 youth that was there thought that was the most awesome idea they'd ever seen. And sure enough I saw at least 10 of these things in the projects over the next month. I mean what do you do when the youth pastor says we need a bigger pool quick. The kiddie pool just wasn't big enough!!

[cc_bob]

Here is a little trick my dad showed me and has been using for years. If you have a bolt that is broken off flush or below the surface you can build it up with weld enough to take the broken bolt out with vice grips.
To do this make sure you are able to weld to only the bolt, if you are not sure of your welding abilities you should probably stick to an easy out. Start by welding a small bead to the top of the broken bolt, tap it with a small hammer, and repeat until you have enough weld to get a hold of. The key here is the tapping of the hammer and the bolt heating and cooling usually get it to come loose. Once the bolt starts to move, move it back and forth a little at a time. Use some PB Blaster or WD40 to help things along.
I've seen my dad do this 100s of times and have done it a few times myself, it works well.

[raggedjim]

If yer cheep like me and wanna lower a 71-72 truck with spindles buy spindles for 73 up, use balljoints and outer tierod ends from a 73 up. You can get the spindles for less and the outer tierod end has the same thread as the 71-72 tierod end. Sorry, but the 67-70 tierod ends are different thread.

Rg