1971 K10 Stepside - Getting a Roller Roadworthy

[D.B]

Got to hand it to you PJ, that dash repair turned out really nice. I wish I had that skill. I tried welding one time, and someone told me I booger weld. So, I leave it to the professionals.

[loudchevy]

Originally Posted by pjmoreland

Installed a new dash pad this evening. All of the rust repairs on the dash are completely concealed, thankfully. It was a bit of a battle to get the front four screws to line up with the clips on the dash.

Dash looks great! Is the dash a reproduction? If so, where did you get it?

[pjmoreland]

Originally Posted by jaros44sr

Dash repair come out great, I can’t see where it was welded

Thank you. You can see the patch panel welds in person of you look closely, but they're not obvious.

[pjmoreland]

Thanks for the compliments, guys. I got the patch panel from Burnsy01. He cut it out of a donor truck.

['68OrangeSunshine]

Originally Posted by pjmoreland

Installed a new dash pad this evening. All of the rust repairs on the dash are completely concealed, thankfully. It was a bit of a battle to get the front four screws to line up with the clips on the dash.

That's tough even on a truck w/o a Frankensteined front dash.
I once had to send back a new dash pad from Brothers because the extreme left stud was slagged. [Either defective or hit with a high heat source melting off the threads and leaving an ugly blob head.] They grudgingly sent me a new one, but it wasted my time. This was on the '71 Jimmy.

Years earlier -- before all the repop vendors [1980s] -- I pulled off the OEM dash pad, and chipped away all the brittle old Fawn vinyl. I had just reupholsrered the '69 T-Bird seat in the Orange Stepside with some red/brown ''Saddle'' vinyl and there was leftover material. I shot the bare foam on the pad with 3M 77 aerosol glue, and shot the off side of the vinyl with the same stuff. A mist of water sprayed over the pad allowed some correction as I affixed the new skin over the old pad. On the ends I made ''Darts'' and used leather rivets to secure the folds.
Still holding up some 40 years later.

Now that my Sun Visors need recovering, I don't think there's enough scrap materal left for that.

[pjmoreland]

Originally Posted by '68OrangeSunshine

That's tough even on a truck w/o a Frankensteined front dash.
I once had to send back a new dash pad from Brothers because the extreme left stud was slagged. [Either defective or hit with a high heat source melting off the threads and leaving an ugly blob head.] They grudgingly sent me a new one, but it wasted my time. This was on the '71 Jimmy.

Years earlier -- before all the repop vendors [1980s] -- I pulled off the OEM dash pad, and chipped away all the brittle old Fawn vinyl. I had just reupholsrered the '69 T-Bird seat in the Orange Stepside with some red/brown ''Saddle'' vinyl and there was leftover material. I shot the bare foam on the pad with 3M 77 aerosol glue, and shot the off side of the vinyl with the same stuff. A mist of water sprayed over the pad allowed some correction as I affixed the new skin over the old pad. On the ends I made ''Darts'' and used leather rivets to secure the folds.
Still holding up some 40 years later.

Now that my Sun Visors need recovering, I don't think there's enough scrap materal left for that.

I like the idea of saving the original dash pad. The one that was in this truck had been re-covered like you did at some point in the past. A couple of decades of sitting without a windshield did it in though. It just crumbled when I removed it.

[pjmoreland]

Just one quick little project this evening. The middle heater control lever was broken, so I installed a set of steel levers. The fan switch was seized, so I sprayed some contact cleaner in it, and it loosened right up. Hopefully the switch is functional.

['68OrangeSunshine]

When I rebuilt my control assembly, circa 2004, I found the ''professional installer'' of a local Car Hi-Fi outfit had stolen the power feed for a then-new Sanyo AM/FM Stereo Casssette Recorder [in the late '70s] from the Control lite.
I reconnected the bulb, as I run no Audio now, just a Delete Plate.

[pjmoreland]

I've been working on things under the dash today. I started by removing the wiper motor. One of the screws snapped, so I had to get a replacement from the hardware store. I'll track down an original screw eventually. I removed the washer pump because I plan on using a reservoir with an electric pump in it from an S-10. I bench tested the motor, and it worked well. It was a little noisy, so I popped open the motor and put some oil on the shaft bushings. That quieted it up. I reinstalled the motor along with new seals.

[pjmoreland]

Next on the list was the heater box and controls. I used the box and heater core that I pulled out of my '68 when I installed Vintage Air. I didn't realize the inside heater box that attaches to the firewall was plastic in '71. The one out of my '68 is metal. I replaced the inside box seal because the original was torn.

[pjmoreland]

The next thing I planned on doing was to install the speaker and radio. I have an OE-style speaker I purchased from Classic Parts. I discovered that their magnet is installed 90 degrees off from how the originals were made, so it won't work with the original brackets. I am going to try and return it. I ordered another speaker from S&M Electro-tech. It's more expensive, but it will fit. That's what I've got in my other truck.

I went ahead and installed the antenna cable.

[pjmoreland]

Originally Posted by '68OrangeSunshine

When I rebuilt my control assembly, circa 2004, I found the ''professional installer'' of a local Car Hi-Fi outfit had stolen the power feed for a then-new Sanyo AM/FM Stereo Casssette Recorder [in the late '70s] from the Control lite.
I reconnected the bulb, as I run no Audio now, just a Delete Plate.

That's one way to do it

['68OrangeSunshine]

Originally Posted by pjmoreland

That's one way to do it

Long ago, and far away, in a time before L M C, before Pickups and Panels in Print, even, I broke the Air Fan lever. I didn't want to hunt a whole Control Assembly down in a junkyard, dig it out and pay a whole $10 to the junkie, so I tried a splint betwen the broken halves. A thin strip of metal same width as the lever was drilled in one place on each end and screwed together with domehead slot screws, star lockwashers and nuts. Worked OK at first, until continued operation and heat cycles loosened up the fasteners. Then it became a finesse game of jiggling the control arm just right -- tongue hung in the right way -- and the Fan would go on or off. Unless it decided to jam. Then you had to let it ride until it totally bugged you. Then pull out the needlenose pliers and go under the dash and set it the way you wanted. On or Off.
When repop venders evolved out of the primordial ooze of junkyard mud, I got a replacement lever. I was amazed at how easy it was to turn the fan on.

The same lever broke on the '71 Jimmy. I pulled the Control Assembly and reinstalled the replacement. But I forgot which rods controlled what, the tape ID tabs had long fallen off. So my '71 GMC has neither Heat nor Air. I also took off the heater ducting and box. So that stuff is in the carport somewhere.
In the Summer I roll both windows down.
In the Winter I keep a pair of wooly gloves in the center console, and an Eddie Bauer down puffy under the seat.

[pjmoreland]

The heater controls I pulled out of this truck had one of the levers spliced on it. Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do to keep old vehicles running. I didn't end up using those controls because the faceplate was in poor condition from being exposed to the weather for many years.

[pjmoreland]

Worked on the NP205 transfer case today. Swapped out the long 32-spline input shaft for a short 32-spline that will be compatible with the NV4500 transmission. The swap is a fairly straightforward process. Cleaning the gasket surfaces took a long time though.

[pjmoreland]

More photos of the input swap

[pjmoreland]

While I had it apart, I replaced the rear selector shaft with a stock one that wasn't modified for twin sticks. I'm going with a stock stick.

[pjmoreland]

Wrapping up the input shaft swap

[pjmoreland]

I noticed that the front output has what I would consider excessive in-out (axial) play. The yoke is clamping the bearing to the shaft adequately. The bearing is sliding in and out in the housing by almost 1/8". I pulled the bearing out, and I can still see machining marks on the housing bore, so it doesn't appear that the bore is worn. It seems that the seal housing is the only thing that constrains the bearing from moving, and it has a decent size gap between its inner surface and the bearing. Is this slop normal??