1977 Silverado Crew Cab.

[y5mgisi]

Interesting! Maybe 76 was the first year? I'm not really too sure. And I seem to remember hearing something once upon a time about factory 3/4ton crew cabs but figured it was all wrong. But I'm convinced that they did offer them now!

[justcuz]

Yes I am sure they were built.
I believe the front Dana 44 had the big external hubs from the factory too, like all K20 front Dana 44's I have seen. GM went to the internal hub design when they incorporated the 10 bolt front axle as I recall.
I stand corrected on the first year of the K30, it was indeed 1977.
How much work would it be to make an LS engine to put out 400 ft lbs of torque below 3000 rpm? If doable that would be my engine choice for sure.
The new 6 and 8 speed automatic transmissions are getting lower gears at the bottom and 2 overdrive gears at the top. That is why newer truck offerings are going away from lower axle ratios.
The Max Tow Package in my 2015 Suburban comes with 3.42 gears and the 6L80E transmission (if that's what they still call it).

[y5mgisi]

[y5mgisi]

Just after I posted about the bolt, my battery tray showed up! Good quality! Bolted all up just fine!



Battery in, yes I know I need to cables and bolts.



Can't find my hold down, but a distributor hold down works perfect in the mean time!



Got rid of a bunch of the po wiring garbage...



And slowly getting a little cleaner in the engine compartment!

[y5mgisi]

Just emailed a guy that has a cheap 6.0 on Craigslist. If he says good things, I'll be picking it up this weekend!

[y5mgisi]

The 6.0 is sold

[Anchorism]

Originally Posted by y5mgisi

Interesting! Maybe 76 was the first year? I'm not really too sure. And I seem to remember hearing something once upon a time about factory 3/4ton crew cabs but figured it was all wrong. But I'm convinced that they did offer them now!

Hell mine is a 75.... had a 350 in it originally. That being said it gets it with a 454....

[justcuz]

In general truck forums, all 4x4 tech and off roading, there is a thread by sbrooks called "what size tires?"
That thread has a red K20 crew cab with either 9.00x16 tires or 11.00x16 tires on it with a cab over camper. I blew the picture up and it has the big hub Dana 44 front axle with Warn hubs on it. It also has a front axle truss on it if you look closely.

[y5mgisi]

So the driver rear door needs replaced but the passenger rear is perfect. I got that pair of rear doors off a 91 burb so I just wanted to take the factory tinted glass from the burb door and put it in the passenger side. So I did that today after work and luckily, it worked perfectly! The rear doors are exactly the same and since the old glass is thicker than the new glass (clear for clear) but these are tinted, they are the same thickness so no mix and matching of window seals and felts will be required! Very happy with how it turned out/worked out.

[y5mgisi]

I was bored today so I gave the crew a test fit in the garage. I think I'll just barely be able to get away with painting it in there.

[y5mgisi]

That door where the post is is going to be replaced and painted separate from the truck but at the same time as the truck.

Anyway, I have begun the disassembly process. Got basically all the trim pulled and everything stripped to the point where the truck is still usable. Then I started removing paint in what I knew would be trouble areas. At this point it's looking like about half the driver side bed side is covered in about a 1/4" of bondo. And the c pillar and into the door jamb...

[y5mgisi]

Started stripping paint for real today!

[77K10Silverado]

Damn son!!

[y5mgisi]

Got the passenger bed side pretty well stripped and ordered some more stripping discs.

[slimneverdies]

How many disc did it take to do that? What kind too?

[y5mgisi]

The whole bed side would take one disc. I'm using the 3m 18424 discs. They are fairly cheap and work pretty quick! I want to say that whole bedside probably took around 30-45 min to strip. I am getting them off eBay for I think $8 a piece plus $5 Shipping but if you order over a certain dollar amount they offer free shipping. I think the store I'm getting them from is like zoro tools or something.

[COS399]

nice work.

[y5mgisi]

Thanks! My stripping discs should be in today. So I'll get more work done on that. Still looking for a new driver side bedside. Ordering my primers from SPI tomorrow! HOPEFULLY going to spray a first round of epoxy next weekend, but we'll see how it all goes. My plan as of now is to get it all painted by the end of September.

[y5mgisi]

Went out and put on another hour and a half or so today.

Here is my dust pile so far.











Also found more bondo in this door so I'm deciding if I should use it or my other perfect one.

[foamypirate]

Nice work! I am planning to do the same to my 88' crew after I get the 6.0L/4L80E swapped in there next spring. I guess your PO didn't understand the term "skim coat" of bondo!

[OutlawDrifter]

if you've got good sheet metal without bondo, i would swap over. it's easy to do the jambs when painting.

[y5mgisi]

Yea I'm thinking new door.

Going to be spending a small chunk of change today and again next pay day.

Today I'll be ordering;

Gallon of epoxy with a gallon of activator,
Solvent based wax and grease remover,
Waterborne wax and grease remover,
Gallon of Rage gold filler,
Gallon of duraglass filler,

Still trying to track down a bedside. Also need to buy some lights so I have proper lighting in the garage as well as some misc stuff like plastic, masking tape, respirator, tack rags, etc.

I'm now figuring I'll have between $1200-$1500 into this paint job with all the misc stuff included like stripping discs and so on. But I am using better materials than I probably really need to.

[y5mgisi]

More crew paint progress. Got the roof and half the hood stripped.

[slimneverdies]

Wow man. You are really putting in work. I bought some stripping disc and paint remover and am going to see if I can get this much done. It's just so damn hot in Vegas...

[y5mgisi]

It's getting there! My goal is to get a coat of primer on next weekend. Not sure it will happen but that's what I'm shooting for. If not, weekend after next for sure.