68 C10/international L110 Mut

[jmlcolorado]

Well ladies and gentleman. The search for a 4bt donor has ended.
I had my mind set on driving to OKC next month to pick up a bread truck, bring it home, pull the motor then scrap the rest. It would have a pricy venture but I would have gotten the engine.

Scouring ebay the other day and stumbled across one, just one singular add for a 4bt conversion in a 1999 Dodge Ram 1500.
Seemed to look pretty good so I placed a bid. And for 3 days the price didn't change.
Guy said he had posted the build on 3 different forums so I tracked them down and read them all... A few times. And the more I read, the more I wanted.
I buy on ebay all the time but it's always a Buy It Now auction. It's been a very long time since ice actually done a real auction on eBay, and I don't think I ever won before.

Truck is 1200 miles away, so contemplated shipping. Placed an add on uship and am getting prices back between $1k and $1300.
Figured I could drive out myself and pick the thing up for less then that, and have more fun doing it.
So called up my buddy to see if he was in (more like, to see if his wife would let him go) on such short notice.
This morning, 2 hours before the auction ended, he got the thumbs up. That queued me to raising my highest bid. I figure if I'm not going to ship it, I'll roll that into what I would be willing to pay, minus cost to drive out.

Last 20 mi Utes of the auction was the most nerve racking 20 minutes I've had in a long time..... And a few souls tried taking this away from me by attempting to bid......but it was already long set in my head that this truck was mine.

So here's what we're looking at.
1999 crew cab short bed 2 wheel drive 1500.
4bt
47re trans which he says previous owner just rebuilt, and based off the pictures from when he did the swap. The trans was all shiney pretty, so I'll assume it's rebuilt.
He's done mods to the Injection pump already which you diesel guys will know, wakes these trucks up a little.
He has an Hx30 turbo on it with a modified 6bt exhaust manifold flipped up side down. This places the turbo in the primary spot for compound setup
See where I'm going here?
He also has 5x16 I jectors i. The truck, which is basically 200 horse injectors. These are quite large and more commonly seen in 1000hp 6bt's.
He also has a second turbo he was working on setting up as the compound
4" exhaust. All factory amenities in the truck work, ie AC, Heat, power options, and so on. Only thing not working is the tach.
He has about 2,000 miles on the truck since the swap and he says its broad worthy. Only issue is it has an AG pump with industrial governer on it, so it's not quite as forgiving as a road governer. His mods to the pump help this, but it's still not the best governer for a street truck. This particular governer is more commonly seen in 6bt sled pulling truck because they fuel heavy. This will be charged to a road governer once I have the truck.

So here's the plan, I can't miss a ton of work, so need to utilize the weekend here.
This Friday were leaving denver at 3am in my truck. Were going to take the 18 hour drive to San jose California (technically 45 min east).
Hopefully roll in late Friday night and crash.......and crash hard. Gonna be a long drive.
Saturday meet and buy the truck. Spend the rest of saturday driving the truck and getting a feel for it, in the hopes that we can catch anything it might need before the trip home.
My buddy has friends and family in San jose so we're going to visit them for the day and crash there for the night.
Sunday, 3am roll out. I will rent a 2 wheel vehicle dolly for my truck. My buddy will drive my truck back, and I'll drive the "new" one.
I'll drive it till something breaks, and If I can't fix it on the side of the road, up on the dolly it goes for the rest of the drive.

Weather looked awesome for the drive, up until the moment I bought the truck, now denver is going to get snow from about 8 hours ago all the way through Sunday. Fantastic
February total at the house is 17" and that was really all in the last week. 3' piles in front of the house tonight. I70 closed due to multiple wrecks.

I really don't see how anything could go wrong with this plan
BUT, if something does, I've got the GoPro and it'll be documented for all to point and laugh at me at a later date

Anyone here watch Roadkill TV!?
Yeah, that's how this whole thing is lining up.

[jmlcolorado]

And for giggles, here's a couple videos of the truck.
First start since conversion
http://youtu.be/TjJ39LLwur8



http://youtu.be/FxBAa6DidKQ


P.s. The reason he's selling is because he can't get smog passed in California due to the conversion. And he has 6 other cummins' on his property that are drivers. He was building this one for his wife as a commuter truck, but ran out of steam when he found out the hoops he had to jump through to pass smog.

[jmlcolorado]

Adventure.....yes.
We'll see about fun.
I know mother natures idea of fun is finally dumping a whole pile of winter on us the minute I decided to buy the truck. Video below.

[jmlcolorado]

So made the trip…..and what a long trip it was! 3000 miles in 3 days!
Left 3 am Friday morning. Started out the trip lookin like this.








19* and plenty of snow to keep everyone at home in the early morning hours to give us wide open road.

Got to Laramie, WY

Laramie is a wonderful place. I don’t know why more people don’t settle in there.
Got wrapped up in thick fog, blowing snow slowing speeds to 10-15 MPH. Miserable.
Once we got out of that we were in good shape. Rolled into Salt Lake City, UT with awesome weather.



Next leg landed us in Fernley, NV. I was napping while my buddy drove. I woke up and noticed the volt gauge was low. Tried to roll down the window and found it didn’t have any power.
Pulled over to the one and only auto parts store in town and replaced the alternator. Lost about 45 minutes on that break but it was good to stretch the legs.
Got the alternator installed just before sunset. We pressed on.

We made it to a town called Live Oak, CA about 10:30 Friday night and crashed in a hotel. It was a long grueling drive, and little did I know, was to be best night sleep I would have for the rest of the weekend.

The truck was having steering issues towards the end of the first day. It wasn’t returning to center all the way, which was making for a twitchy drive at 85 MPH. Next morning we got up around 8am to look into the steering.
I had just installed brand new ball joints and all new steering linkage about 5k ago.
I suspected ball joints since their break in period was 5k miles and required to be greased at that time. So I pulled the linkage off and checked both sides…… ball joints good and loose (but tight…..you know what I mean).
I greased all steering linkage and ball joints which cleared up the steering.

Off to the bank to get cash and off to buy a truck.

Rolled through some beautiful country. Guys house was in the middle of thousands of acres of cherry trees.
I haven't been to cali in years and was far too young to care about landscape, so this was nice to see now.

[jmlcolorado]

So to back up a little, my plan was to rent a car dolly as the contingency plan for when/if the "new" truck broke down. After the alternator swap in Nevada, I started looking at u-haul to reserve one. Turns out they wouldn’t rent for the truck I was towing since it was 200LBS over capacity. Figured id just shoot for car haler trailer. Same thing. PLUS they wanted $650 to rent from Live Oak, CA to Home!!!! CRAZY.
So I classic redneck style, we ran to wal-mart and grabbed a tow bar setup.
Having never towed with a tow bar before, did a little research prior.

Once we got to the sellers house, I drove the truck around for about 20 minutes and decided its sold. I asked him if I could work on getting the tow bar brackets setup on the truck before we left his property, which he was good with.
We removed the front bumper to get to the frame to see what was needed. Turns out there are holes in the cross member between rails that lined up pretty well for the brackets. We just needed different bolts (and grade 8 for comfort).





So handed him the green and headed off to ACE to get the required hardware.
Once we arrived, found we had a pretty solid fuel leak which soaked then entire engine in oily diesel. I considered it water repellant.
Finished up the bracket mounting at subway around noon.



Here's a fun video:


My buddy has family and friends in san jose he wanted to see so we headed that way. We planned on staying at his buddy's house in san Jose Saturday night then heading out early Sunday morning, like we did Friday night.
What we failed to realize was that by staying in san Jose, we added another 2 hours and 45 minutes to our drive back.





Heres a cool video on the way to san jose.


So we went to his family's house and hung out or a bit, grabbed dinner, then off to his buddy's house. We visited till 9:30 Saturday night then decided to start driving back.
We drove till 3 am when we arrived in Reno, NV. We crashed in the trucks till 5am when we started back on the road again.

Lots of road time, in and out of some rain, clear skys, more rain. Made it ALMOST to Bonneville when my buddy radioed me to say we lost the tach.
No big deal, keep pressing forward.
Few minutes later he said we also lost cruise. This was a problem since the truck has an agricultural injection pump on it. This makes the throttle peddle VERY hard to operate. The first 1/3 of throttle was soft, but was only operating 1/4 throttle. The last 2/3 of the throttle position was hard as a rock and was the remaining 3/4 throttle, but the overall throw in the peddle was only about an inch. You actually had to use leg muscle to operate, and it was more like an on/off switch vs variable throttle.
I told him to keep pressing forward till he couldn’t go anymore and we'd switch.
Another few minutes go by and he says the alternator is dead, then the truck dies.

Well, in comes the contingency plan.






Disconnect the battery and driveshaft, hook up the trucks and start back on the road.

Gotta tell ya, flat towing is strange! You’ve got 5k lbs behind you with no brakes. When the tow vehicle breaks moderately, the nose drops, the tail raises, and the vehicle behind towed pushes back, forcing the tow vehicle tail end to sway around. Not cool.
Took about 40 miles to get used to it and get to a solid speed. 65-70 MPH.
Still 700 miles to home. This is going to be a long drive :/

I lost track of how many times we swapped, but we were both quite sleep deprived.
I ended up finding a semi cruising at a good speed and tailing him. Using him to lock vision on and follow vs scanning the dark road the whole time. This got me pretty far.
I got us into Laramie, which again was the most pleasant place on the face of the planet, with dense fog. I couldn’t see more than two dashed lines in front of me, but trucks were going 3 times my speed.
Finally got us out of Laramie and into Cheyenne wy, which is when we made the last swap.
I slept the rest of the way home and woke up to pulling into the driveway at 12:30 this morning.



So After all that, I have a 3.9L cummins 4BT for the rat. Also have a 47RE overdrive trans. I was getting 18 MPG out of it on the highway but it needs some serious tuning…….and an "on-road" injection pump. Hope to get into the mid 20's for fuel economy.

[jmlcolorado]

Well I've been driving the "new" donor truck off and on for a bit now. Gotta tell ya, at this altitude, with such large injectors, it smokes like a freight train from a stop!
While that might be cool for a minute, it won't do. This thing NEEDS compound turbos, that's for sure!
Still trying to figure out what setup to use. I'm thinking an HX30/HX40 setup as these have been done and seem to work well.
It has a pretty nasty power steering leak, which isn't a leak at all. The pump reservoir is right below the injection pump and you can only get two fingers in there to get the cap on/off. I took the cap off cause the steering got real stiff so wanted to check the fluid.
Couldn't get the cap back on
Waited till daylight and looked at it again. Apparently the lip the cap is to grab was crushed to fit on the engine, so the cap never really grabs.
Not a huge problem down the road once the motor is pulled and I can reconfigure the neck setup. But for now, it's a problem.

Reached out to Scheid Deisel to have them price a full RQV (on road) governor conversion for the a-pump. Not cheap, but I'll send the whole pump off and let them do a full disassembly and adjustment/rebuild on this pump while they convert, so it'll be worth in and provide peace of mind once it's back.
That should allow for easier tuning as well as make the truck more street friendly.

Kicking around the idea of going full manual valve body on the 47re to eliminate the need for more electronics. Nothing on the truck will be computer controled, so I'm not sure it makes sense to make the trans computer controled. However, the idea of being able to set my own shift points and different "programs" sounds awfully tempting. Not sure which way to go on that one. Both are pricy options.

Neighbor friend (who flips cars) bought himself a VW Beetle yesterday. Apparently he already owned it a few years back and regreated selling it back then, so he got it back.......4 owners later.
It has an Espar Gasoline fired heater, which is the first I've seen. Pretty sweet little heater. He said he's ripping it out and could have it if I wanted it. Thought it would make for an awesome heater in the Binder. I'd likely use the factory heater box for defrost, since I'll need defrost, and the factory heater is just too cool NOT to have in the truck!
Use the gas heater as foot/dash vent heat. I've got an old gas can I'd mount in the bed just for the heater. Mount the heater under the bed floor and duct into the cab. From what I hear, these things crank the heat pretty well. People just have fear of them blowing up. Just means I'll keep a fire extinguisher on the truck

Like I said, I can't continue with the build till I get this motorcycle build complete. But I'm not sure that means I can't get the donor truck running well with the new injection pump and compounds setup to test out before the swap

[jmlcolorado]

Well suppose it's time for an update. You guys have learned by now this project has slowed to a crawl

The previous 4BT out of the donor ram 1500 got pulled. I spent the money for a soda blaster from Eastwood since I wanted to clean this engine up and paint it.
I then bought a small greenhouse to contain the dust the soda would make. Rigged up air movement, and needed to filter the hazed air leaving the containment so built some duct work with those fancy outdoor water minsters installed in it.
Worked like a charm.

I stripped the engine down, pulled the head to inspect the Pistons and cylinder walls. All looked pretty stinkin good.
Masked everything off, plugged all the holes and got to blasting.

The black spray paint previous owner painted with came off easy, but the original tan from cummins was proving to be a chore.
It also had a solo layer of oil in some spots but the blaster made quick work of that.
I get down to the side of the block and come across some sort of sealant smeared all the way across the very bottom of the block above the pan rail.
As soon as I hit it, I knew what I was dealing with.
Soda wasn't touching it so broke the chisel and hoped for the best.
Started scraping and uncovered gold metal............weld filler.
Crap!

Turns out the block had a crack from front to back above the pan rail. Of course I was not told this.
I reached out to the seller, which I suspected wouldn't return calls, but he did.
He said he knew nothing of the crack as he bought the engine as is and tossed it in the truck and called it good.
I verified this by his build thread on other forums which depicted the truck getting the swap and the engine was already painted black and oil covered.

He said he talked to the farmer ache bought it from and he said on of his laborers had run into the engine with a fork lift and cracked it. He took it somewhere that "fixed" it. He used it for a couple years before deciding to sell it.

Well, anyone who knows welding knows engine blocks are tough to properly repair, and grinding a chamfer and welding up a bead just doesn't cut it.
This was made apparent by the signs of the cracks propagating outside of the filler metal now.
Honestly, I'm surprised the block lasted this long. It obviously had leaks indicated from the silicone smeared all over it.
My plans were to juice the engine up a but with injection pump tuning, injectors and compound turbos. With that plan ahead, I didn't feel comfortable using this engine.
Yep, another roadblock.
So now I have a fancy iron paperweight in the shop I don't know what to do with. I COULD buy a new block, but the engine serial number for the engine shows this engine came from Case equipment, and cummins sells the rights to all their engines that goes into case equipment.
Talking to Case, they can't identify what exact engine this is off the provided ESN. Stuck again.
There are hundreds of variants of these engines all built for different applications and rather then rolling the dice on the parts hoping they would work, I decided to out this one aside for now.

I've been searching ebay and Craigslist for quite sometime for a 4BT with little luck.
There is a seller on eBay that sells these religiously, but my research online about him was disheartening and I choose not to work with him.
So the search was still on.

Finally I stumbled across a single line add, with no pictures. Didn't seem promising, but made the call anyways.
Talked to the guy and he sounded legit so decided to take the hour trip up north to look at it.
He had pulled this one out of a Grumman bread truck to use for a 4x4 project. This is great because these particular engines come with the coveted p-pump injection pump. They a re rated for higher factory horsepower (120) and are much more tunable for higher power levels. My reads indicate this factory pimp with the proper mods can fuel enough to support 500hp on the top end.
Great news!
So I decide to pull the trigger on ANOTHER FREAKIN ENGINE.
I ask him how we can load it, and he says he has a skid steer on the farm.
He leaves and roll up about 20 minutes later with a skid with 1 broken bead wheel and hay tines on the front

Needless to say, it took us almost 2 hours to remove said engine from the pickup bed he had it stored in, and into my truck (with a brand new $3k topper).
It was quite sketchy to say the least. I wish I had video of it cause it HAD to be entertaining to anyone watching.

So now this thing is in the truck and home. Now to figure out how to unload it.
This thing is 800lbs dry, and kinda sorta strapped to a half failing wood pallet, and not at all stable in the back of the truck.
So I enlisted the neighbor to come help unload.
http://youtu.be/S6bjppEYmjk

After all that fun, I mounted the engine on the engine stand, rigged up the battery and fuel and am now working on getting it to fire.
These trucks are a nightmare to bleed the fuel system out if you get air in it. I've gotten it to pop a few times, but not totally light.

So anyways, there you have it. I'm nearly done on the mortorcycle project for my buddy so I can get cracking on this again.
I've actually told him his bike needs GONE ASAP! I'm itching BAD to get back to work.

[jmlcolorado]

I tried for a while to get diesel #2 to start on the engine stand but couldn't get it. It would pop a few times with ether, but just wouldn't light off.
I spent a lot of time trying to bleed the air from the injector lines, but just couldn't get it.
I decided to try changing the lift pump. Cracked block diesel had a known good lift pump, so I snagged it, hooked it up to this one, and with only about 10 revolutions, it fired!!!!!
http://youtu.be/KuS_lngxSlA

[jmlcolorado]

Well, buddy's bike is going slow. He was supposed to drop off parts last week after work for the exhaust work. Didn't happen. So I decided to drag the rat back into the garage so I can get crackin on it again.
After the house chores last night I decided to take my last break for the night before hitting the sack.
While looking over the rat, I figured I could pull the olds 350 and 709r4 in prep to stab the new engine/trans combo.
Then decided I might as well see if the engine fit the engine compartment.
So the 47re and 4bt made it into the hole.
It fits! Perfectly in fact. Like I built the truck for the combo.
Can't ask for much better then that!

And the best part is, I can start the engine as it sits now...... And say the rat rod now runs! [cl
Kinda cheating, but whatever.




Disregard the ABS intake charge tubing. I just put that in place to get the engine fired to assure it works.

[jmlcolorado]

Suppose I should keep the theme of the thread and show you every freakin step I've done.

The engine is heavy. Really heavy. So I had to redo the engine mounts. Apparently small block Oldsmobile mounts and 3.9 cummins diesel mounts don't match up, and needed something that would support those giant hydraulic mounts.
The block has 4 holes on each side for mounts. And apparently they are in a great place on the 6 cylinder diesels as there is plenty of room to clear everything.
The 4 cylinder, not so much.
The two missing cylinders place this plate directly behind the starter. So I had to devise a way to clear it.
Nice guy neighbor brought me a bunch of 3/8 plate steel to work with for helping him do something. So that's getting used.

Template:




Cut main plate:


The side gussets cut, and starting to form around the main plate.
P.s. THIS SUCKED!
I didn't really think through how I was going to bend the 3/8" plate to into the inner diameter.





So far so good.
Then I broke China.


<a href="http://s526.photobucket.com/user/jmlcolorado/media/Mobile%20Uploads/IMG_3230.jpg.html" target="_blank"><img src="http://i526.photobucket.com/albums/cc349/jmlcolorado/Mobile%20Uploads/IMG_3230.jpg" border="0" alt=" photo IMG_3230.jpg"/></a>

I broke out 'merica to finish up the bends. 'Merica didn't break.




Onto the next piece:

[jmlcolorado]

Skipping ahead to the next few pieces.




Test fitting:




The passenger side:


That side was much easier.
Posts more later as I make progress. Probably another or year or two from now

[jmlcolorado]

Oh......and mr nice guy neighbor.....while attempting a good deed, provided me with galvanized 3/8" plate.
The main plate was normal steel with mill scale on it. No problem.
But all the side pieces are galvanized. Despite my best efforts to grind the galvanization off (yes, I know, that's a no no), apparently galvanization makes itself part of the parent metal. Looks all pretty clean when ground down, but once you throw weld wire at it........SURPRISE!!!
Quite frustrating. Nasty, dirty, disgusting welds with more then a truck load of weld spatter left behind.
Live and learn. No galvanized..........ever

[jmlcolorado]

Drivers side each done. Disregard the crap slag on the plate. I haven't yet mastered upside down welding. I'll likely grind out and hit this seam again with the frame flipped over later.




Finished up the passengers side this evening.









They are staggered in order to clear different things in each side. They are equally staggered front to back in each side.
Goal was to balance as much of the engine weight as possible to relieve stress on the bell housing.

I tossed a scale under the trans and found the crossmember is only supporting 112lbs. Not bad for a guess on placement.
The engine weight about 750lbs, and the trans about 250lbs, so the motor mounts should be carrying somewhere around 990 lbs, split between 2 is close to 500lbs each.
I think they'll hold up, but we'll see I guess. That's a good chunk of weight and vibration.

[jmlcolorado]

Snagged a few things for the rat.
Figured my fancy, fully custom butt welded, not so square tie rod adjusting sleeves needed changes before I forget.
With the disk brake upgrade on the front comes larger tie Rod ends then the frame side of the truck has, so an adapter was needed.
These are 5/16" on one side and 7/16" on the other side if I remember right.




I also pulled the gauges from the initial donor truck before I get completely tired of seeing it and haul it off to scrap.
The important ones. Trans temp, Exhaust gas temp, Boost (not as important, but fun still) and fuel pressure.


I almost forgot the exhaust was still in the old truck too so I snagged that.
Turbo outlet, 3"


And a bunch of 4" pipe.

I need to mount the cab to see where it lands, but the goal is to mount it on the outside of the frame and run under the cab. I think I'm going to shoot for it to dump through the rear fender, just behind the cab. Not sure yet really though. It's going to be straight piped, and I've driven a truck with straight pipes stack and it was ridiculous. Completely unusable. Couldnt hear yourself think with all the drone.
We'll try it and if it doesn't work there, I'll just dump behind the axle.
Problem is I have the trailing arm crossmember and trans cross members inside the frame, and no were close to enough room to squeeze in a 4" pipe through those.
Plus, the frame is c-notched for the axle when aired out, so here is even less room to go over the top of the axle there.

Just out of curiosity, and I think I know the answer, but is the sound and exhaust gas flow compromised drastically if I were to pancake the tube to, say, 2" tall?
Technically the inside space is still there, the pipe would just be wider then 4", just shorter.


Also picked up a power steering gear. This truck will have hydroboost brakes, so a power box was a no brainer.




Oh! And my ultra super duper custom intake! You can't find these things just anywhere!





Okay, it's just the rubber 90* elbow with a cheap filter. But still, one more thing "done".
At least for now, until I change it later. Again.

[jmlcolorado]

Got the body mounts started. I had planned on using the weld on mounts on all four corners, but when laying on the filthy concrete last night and contemplating the plan, I realized I could use the factory rear mounts and just replace the worn rubber bushings with the new poly bushings.
Rear mount:




The bushings are a bit squashed on one side, but I'm not sure that will effect anything.
Front mount, I just placed the top bushing between the frame for now to get an idea of there the mint needs to be. I'm not sure if I should place the weld on brackets inside the frame, or on the outside of the frame.
The drivers side, outside the frame (like normal) is fine, but on the passengers side I need to pass the 4" exhaust past it and the under side of the door.



And pro's or cons' with mounting inside the frame rails?



Some of the parts required for lift off arrived today.
Truck will have an Accuair E-Lefel air management system on it.
I couldn't swallow the $2k plus the bags in one shot, so I bought everything BUT the ECU. I'll get that later once the truck is closer to drivable. I'll be able to operate with normal switches for now.

Just a fun picture when closing up shop last night.




The two compressors are quieter then I expected.
I will be mounting these under the cab, inside the frame rails. I will then pipe the intakes up somewhere else dry. They came with remote air filters. The compressors are "water resistant" but not water proof. Manufacturer says to just not submerge them. I don't plan of ford any rivers with this truck. Might be a struggle to overcome drainage ditches at street crossings with how low the truck will be anyways

Tank will mount on the drivers side frame rail. It will be slightly higher then the bottom of the frame.




The bottom ports will not be used. I will plug them with flush plugs and locktite.



The tank has one port on either end the compressors will consume. Then it has two others on one end. One will be used to plumb the air solenoid valve box, and the other will be the safety pop valve.

I'm not looking for fast operation of the bags, so I figure one 3/8" line to supply input of he valves will be sufficient.

[jmlcolorado]

Didn't want to spend a whole lot of time in the shop tonight, so decided to swap the steering gear box's. Manual for power.
Quite the size difference.


The frames almost always have 4 blot hole provisions for a power box. Manual box's only use 3 mounting points.
Later frames (68 and up) had a dent in them to accommodate the larger box's. The earlier frames don't.
Mine didn't have the dent. I had thought this frame was for a 68, but since the dent doesn't exist, I'd guess it's a 67 or 66. Either way, there are two options.
1) But an adapter plate that spaces the box away from the frame to allow room for the large box.
2) Place dent in frame.
I opted for #2 since I've heard some have problems aligning their trucks after the space plate is installed since it offsets the box.

Just a little heat, and a little tap tap tap.


Oooooo. Ahhhhhh. Pretty





All bolted up. Just like factory. Except the extra texture on the frame. That's called custom. Or something.



The bar going through the grill is intended to brace the front frame horns for this box. Need to minimize flex to allow for tighter steering.

[jmlcolorado]

Bags were delivered.
I went with RE7's for the rear and RE6's up front.
I'm going to see if the 7's will fit up front and if they do, I'll upsize the front to the larger bag too to aid in supporting the weight of the diesel.
These are bigger then I expected.

[jmlcolorado]

I bought half a billion fittings from a "large" air suspension online store.
The tanks and compressors from eBay
The bags from the same "large" air suspension online store last Thursday.
And the expensive air solenoid box directly from the manufacturer.
I figured it would all arrive near the end of this week so I could go to town this weekend.
However, all that's arrived are the bags, tank and compressor. Called the other two places to see what was going on. The fitting place........ran out of fittings. Land the air solenoid place........ran out of one of the main components to their system.
Really?! I specifically went to these places in order to assure they DID have the parts and would ship quickly.
So now I'm in a holding pattern till the suppliers get their poop in a group.


I'm news REALLY hoping to have some up-down-up-down fun this weekend.
Grrrrrr.

[jmlcolorado]

Figured I might as well squeeze in as much work as I can while I wait impatiently for my house to go under contract.
Rear springs installed tonight.

(Almost) fully compressed.
4.5" spring height.
I had moved the rear axle forward 1" in order to center the wheels in the rear fenders. I did this AFTER I did the frame c-notch.
Whoops.
So, frame c-notch is out of alignment with axle tubes, and the rear end nose is hitting the rear crossmember.
Double whoops.
I won't correct either of these just yet. I want to see how the bed fits with the new wheel/tire combo. I know I need to widen the bed another 1.5" due to the tires, and initial figment showed I needed to raise the rear fenders due to the new tire height. Not sure I want to do that. The lines are perfect as they are, and I don't want to loose that.


Ride height.
7" spring height.



Full extension of spring.
11" spring height.



These three points will be points of reference for the Accuair ECU.
Settings in the accuair are as follows
0-Fully aired out
1-10% of suspension travel (for slow cruising, to look ultra cool, and to quickly wear the insides of the front tires due to excessive negative camber in on the IFS, which is another way to look ultra cool)
2- 50% of suspension travel (Normal ride height). Which reminds me to verify pinion angle at this height.
3- 90% or suspension travel (for maneuvering speed bumps and curbs. Also completely rattle your fillings out of your head from the excessive pressures in the bag to raise to this height. Read-rock hard springs)

Accuair will automatically raise to setting #2 at ignition on unless I set it otherwise.

[jmlcolorado]

Got the final front springs permanently mounted. The ones in there were craigslist buys, and quite frankly, I didn't trust them as a major suspension component since I didn't know their history. On top of that, I could have swore I remember seeing a nick on one of them when I bought them, but now I can't find it. Never the less, new springs.
I plumbed the fronts together, and rears together for now, till I get time to mount the compressors and valves. This is the first time I've actually been able to fully set the truck at ride height with the proper springs.

0-frame laid out


1- 10% of suspension travel. This leaves me with about 2" clearance under the frame to the road. Truck won't spend too much time in this position.


2- 50% suspension travel. This is ride height. It's actually a little disappointing. I've spent so much time seeing the truck laid out, that it's my favorite look. Obviously, can't drive like that, so this is the compromise, I suppose. It will look better once the bed is in though and the rear fenders hide some tire.


3- Fully extended. This position is rather surprising to me. At this height. I have a full 8.25" clearance under the frame. Looks goofy as heck, but very practical should I decide to off-road


Also shot a quick video from laid out to ride height. The rear bags take next to nothing to air up to ride height since there is so little weight back there. They shoot up to ride height fast, and take forever to air out.
With fuel in the tank, and the bed on, that should, help. I think I will also mount the battery, both compressors and valves as far back as I can to assist in balancing weight of the truck.
Click for video

[jmlcolorado]

Since the rear springs are in, and final wheels and tires were on, time to fit the bed…….again.
I had it perfectly set where I wanted it with the original wheels and tires, and only needed minimal work on the wheel wells inside the bed to make it work. These tires are much taller, and believe it or not, slightly wider. It was a chore to put the bed on with these as they rubbed the fender lip. Getting the bed off was far worse as the fender lip caught the aggressive lugs on the side wall, preventing "lift off".
I knew I was going to at least have to widen the bed a bit, so tonight I cut it apart and added 1" to each side and set the bed back on. With the truck aired out, I found that I will also need to raise the fenders 2" as well. This is because the outside corner of the tires hit the inside of the fenders which prevents fully dropping.
Ugh.
I don't want to widen the bed anymore, as I don't want the square front bulkhead of the bed to pass the rounded rear cab corner.
I love the extra room in the bed it provides, but proportions are starting to get out of whack a little.
So, I will section the entire bed side 2" and raise the bed. The side of the bed has an awesome bead roll that encompasses the outline of the fenders and bed rails, and I want to keep those intact.
On with the pictures.

Fender os off on this side. You can see how far up the fender will need to go to clear the tires. I don't want the tires contacting the fenders at all as I plan to haul some weight with the truck (motorcycles) and I don't want the weight resting on fenders.


Here you can see how much room the bed will have. While only 15" deep, and 5'10" long, it's 5' wide. Makes the frame appear insufficient.


Here's the fenders fully aired out. While I would prefer this look at ride height, it's not possible. And I doubt I'd be able to get the tires off without removing the fenders or the bed. Out of the question.


Just another view. Fender is held with 2 clamps at the top, so the bottom at the front is kicked out. This will pull in.


This is the bead roll line I want to keep. Tire is about 1 1/2" up. Trying to keep 1/2" clearance for unlevel ground when parking.


View from the front.
I actually like the wide rear end. Makes it almost appear as though it's a dually (I have a soft spot for those).


This is the area the 4" exhaust will exit from under the cab. More than enough room to place where needed.


I'm thinking of dumping the exhaust out the rear fender where the circle is.
Since I have aluminum wheels, I think it's safe to use aluminum elsewhere on the truck, so I think I'll make a ring with aircraft rivets around it to clean up the hole, but this is the first idea. As we all can tell, ideas change progressively as I go along.


Since the truck is so small, I feel, for safety sake, I should add some adequate beep-beeps.


I want the bed to be 100% useable, so a requirement is to keep everything out of it. No gas tank, no exhaust stack, no frilly pointless typical rat rod crap, so these giant horns need hidden.
This is literally the only spot to put them. When I build the bed floor framing, I'll build a mount for them under there. They will barely squeeze past the trailing arms and drive shaft. This location will also keep them dry. I'm not worried about them pointing backwards, these have enough oomph to alert anyone around, no matter their location.

[jmlcolorado]

Thinking the only pointless rat rod frilly thing the bed will get is an antique doorbell button with vintage script saying "ring bell for service". Might make for some good laughs at the local shows.



Or maybe no sign, just the botton on top of he bed rail.

[jmlcolorado]

Okay guys. Almost up to current.
Few big life changes. We have a little boy on the way. And sold the old house in favor of a new one on 4 acres so I can build a proper shop. Planning stages of a 40x60 in process. I told the wife she gets the garage by winter of 2016, so cranking hard at the rat rod as I want it on the road summer of 2016.

Well, got it back in its now home at the new house. Just about have the garage setup so time to start crackin away at it.


Also, started making a list of to-do's so I can start checking things off. It's much longer written out then it was in my head



This garage has 12' ceilings, which provides a new view [cl



Found out this thing barely fits on a car trailer. Since I have the wheel spacers to fit the wheels, it widens the truck quite a bit. No way could I back it on as the rear fenders would hit the trailer fenders. But hey, it fits
Now........where to start.

[jmlcolorado]

Ran to the scrap yard today and almost started pulling the MC and Hydroboost off a 95 Astro when I found a 99 k3500, which is what I was wanting in the first place.
Pulled the parts, left behind the ABS junk and Prop valve since I'll use my own.
I was going for the brake pedal too, however, the bracket that holds the pedal Assembly is a massive bracket that is somehow secured to the firewall. I've pulled the dash nearly completely apart but can't see how it's attached. All I had was a basic socket set, vice grips, channel locks and wire cutters so I couldn't get it.
Any suggestions on best route to mount a brake pedal?
I might end up going back with a battery grinder and battery sawzawl to cut it off, then I can weld up the rest I left behind onto the bracket to moint to my firewall but I'm open to suggestions. See photo. I really like the giant pivot lin this pedal has.


I have also been trying to find a fuel filler neck setup that I liked. I was eyeing jeeps for awhile, but all of those are plastic. I don't like plastic. Just couldn't find a metal mount that works.
I haven't been to this yard in a while and they have reorganized since. They now have a fairly good size RV section. Seriously.........who would want a part of a 70's RV?
Well, me. That's who.
Found this epic rolling meth lab that had just the neck I wanted! I needed something that would recess the gas neck, but have a angle downward. I HATE flat fuel necks. Can't keep a nozzle in to save my life.
So a little chop n cut, I walked out with $50 worth of filler-up and stop-er crap

Stop-er crap donor truck



The light colored gargantuan sized bracket is the think I'm trying to get


I really only want the part the pedal pivot mounts to. I can make the rest.

One the same picture, what the heck is that switch with 6 wires coming off of it left of the pedal arm? There are two harnesses on it. One with two wires and one with 4. There is an arm off of that that holds the brake pedal so it rolls with the brake pedal movement. It feels like there are two switches in there, one is like a rheostat that varries signal based off where the pedal is located within its full movement. The second feels like a solid on/off switch that's engaged when brakes are completely released.
Here's a picture of that switch removed.



There was another switch separate, but next to this one that I believe was the brake light switch. That one you can see as two round tabs mounted on metal facing the camera.

Here's the filler-up donor. Fine specimen.






ill start playing around with my new parts tonight [cl

[jmlcolorado]

Of course doing this dropped the pedal an inch and a half too low, so I had to raise the entire assembly again. So I have a couple extra holes in the new patch piece. Oh well, I'll fill em.

So here she sits.






I will probably end up rotating the hydroboost section 180* just to keep the lines below the cowl. We'll see.

I need to add a bunch of backing inside to eliminate flex.
The steering wheel will be reusing its original brace under the dash so I'll stab that in tomorrow night, then start bracing everything off inside.
This huge bracket was permenatly secured to the cab of the donor truck, and I'm not sure it will even need to be removed in my case, so I'll likely do the same once I have everything in its final location.

I assume I can replace the brake fluid reservoir right? The plastic looks out of place. I'd like to change those out to something else.
Maybe I can turn down some basic steel cans with separate caps and use those in its place?
I'm open to suggestions.