1997 Silverado Stepside Project

[lsxponcho]

I finished up all the small little things to a point where I was brave enough to take her for its maiden voyage. For exhaust I ended up going 2.5" dual's, swept over to the pass side with flowmaster super 44's with sort of a side exited 90 / dump. I will take some pictures to show what I mean. Its pretty noisy, though (no interior but dash and drivers seat). I'm would like to put in a v-band clamp split over the trans cross member so everything can unbolt, and come out, and then I can weld in the h-pipe. Fan and fuel pumps are wired up properly now with relays, fan works good, kicks in at 185 and back off at 170.

Anyways on to the test drive...it was mostly a win. Timing was all over the place, as i was running ported vac from the wrong spot...it wasn't charging since I forgot about wiring the signal wire from the alt to a dummy light, and fuel press was getting weird with falling voltage. The M/T valve covers I spent so much time re-doing don't seal at all. The lip on the valve cover at the corners interfere's with the thicker gasket surface of the Edelbrock head, and it pretty much gave everything an oil bath. The headers melted any loom that was close...which isn't even that close lol, but didn't hurt any wiring. The 5 speed is still alive which i'm happy to report, considering I was getting a little grumpy on how it ran until I figured out the timing problem...so I beat on it a little hard. I can probably attribute that to not having posi yet. I'm surprised how the suspension behaves. Most of that is probably due to the how the rear shock arrangement has changed. It squats really hard.

[lsxponcho]

My neighbor came over to help me shoot some video of test and tuning. Seems to be running a little better...oil leaks are fixed, and timing is fairly close. I forgot to shut the hood on the first pull... Good thing I missed third gear lol.
https://youtu.be/AGJUV7cpdZ8

[lsxponcho]

As promised here are some pictures of how the exhaust came together...pretty simple set up.

[lsxponcho]

Just doing a little update with a video. I will try and do more with a little better sound quality.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?featur...&v=D7126Tve-cw

[lsxponcho]

I made a trip to pick n pull and grabbed a bunch of interior stuff. I now have all the correct grey parts, and the interior is complete. I even found a nbs with a 5 speed, so I grabbed the clutch and brake pedal rubber covers, shifter, and boot also, so that looks way better now. I also found a local guy selling a bunch of new roll pans, and picked up one for the truck. Its made by precision grills, and although its not perfect, it wont take much to make it fit nice...plus it was only 75 bucks which was nice.

Also just before the video was made i was having trouble with the right signals, and brakes lights blowing fuses. After going through the dash, and making sure I didn't pinch, or cut, or cross something, I ended up trouble shooting the front and rear harness's. Sort of backwards, but I thought since I had my hands in the dash, that it was the best place to start. The culprit is somewhere in the tail light harness between the firewall plug, and the rear tail light harness plug section. The truck is back up on jack stands, to yank it out, and have a look. While its up there I'm going to finish detailing the frame under the cab, and re-attach the e-brake cable.

[lsxponcho]

Who thought a person could have so much trouble with 4 wires....I pulled the harness from the fire wall to the tail of the truck out and checked for ground spots...and found them to be plentiful. So I re-wired it front to back, and in the process got rid of the old fuel pump harness and a couple of extra plugs at the firewall connection spot under the booster. All in all much cleaner now. I was ready for a win, but then after no right tail signals again, I found the tail light harness had issues too. No biggie...I swapped it for the spare one I had from one of the donors, and wouldn't you know...same problem. What are the odds of that. Both harness had issues right at the plug, one broken wire, and the other bad terminal corrosion. I have the fix for it now, but wow...what a pain.

On the plus side, this forced a couple of other items to get finished. I stripped and finished detailing the frame under the cab, so that looks nice now. The e-brake cables are re-attached, but one or both need to be replaced as the don't retract well. The 454ss mirrors are painted to match now, and I started sectioning the roll pan to fit it properly. I also ran wires to the reverse sensor on the trans, so hopefully after the harness fiasco, this gets put to bed.

Since I was burning the midnight oil, I took a cool gauge picture while having a sit and pondering.

[lsxponcho]

I wasn't happy with the beat up parking brake cables as mentioned before, so I picked up a new pair. That blossomed into doing shoes, drums and wheel cyl's. Now the rear brakes will be trouble free for a long time. I also finished up wiring jobs here, and there (and the tail lights are fixed for good now). The new to me interior parts are all installed now, and its finally done. Basically the truck is finished for now...which feels weird. Just have to get it alligned, and pic up the autometer gps unit so my speedo will work. Last but not least, one other little project is working on the roll pan. I have the first sectioning done now, but there is still some slice and dice yet before it should fit nice...then get to layin the fiberglass.

[lsxponcho]

I made a trip into Mopac and got the truck a gps interface module for the speedo. It was pretty simple to put in, but fishing the antenna cable through the interior was kind of a pain. The antenna itself is magnetized, and doesn't want to sit anywhere that isn't almost perfectly flat, so the only good place I found was at the back of the roof, in front of the high mount tail light. Its almost the perfect spot, and you don't notice it. I calibrated the module quick, and finally took the truck on a nice highway cruise. I made a stop in at the weigh scales in my travels. The piglet tips the scales at 3873 # with no driver, and a 1/4 tank of gas. Weight distribution is approximately 58% front, 42% rear. Not sure how acurate the scale was, but I think that's pretty decent...kinda wish I knew what it weighed originally for comparison. I'm guessing it was over 4000# somewhere. Then I went to town for ice cream and back home. It was pretty much a success except for the drivers side window kicking itself off the track when I rolled it down. It was only around 4 degrees Celsius...so the ice cream didn't melt on the way home at least, lol. I'll still chalk that up as a win.

[OutlawDrifter]

wow, great job. enjoyed reading through this!

i think that thing would look killer with some highway patrol caps.

[Palf70Step]

Very nice project. I like what you have done to the ole girl!

[lsxponcho]

Thanks for the comments. I initially wanted to go police caps when I ordered the wheels, but settled on the stock caps after test fitting them. Looks sort of o.e. I still think they would look cool though...even cooler with black rally's.