Project Texa Go

[Chevymann1968]

Haven't heard anything from you in a while how are things going?

[Billett]

Honestly this is probably the first time I've been on in several months so I'm glad I caught this. It's been interesting. I've graduated college, gotten married, gotten a new job, a dog, new house, and a Ford Falcon all within a few months.

So things are pretty busy.

The truck runs, but is mostly used by my wife to go ~2 miles to and from work instead of the 100 miles a day I make. I'm still having some problems with it, but I just haven't had the time to figure them out.

Brakes are still working pretty well but they squeal because of the crack in the shoe from when they were on wrong. I have 72 spindles, rotors, pads, etc, but haven't had the time to find 5 lug rims, ball joints and tie rods.

LQ4 is a trooper, but it still gets terrible gas mileage for what it should be, and still throws misfire codes at random times for some reason. I'm pretty sure the filter came off the pickup tube in the fuel tank because the inline walbro pump is starting to shriek too so I'll need an inline filter and more -an fittings asap.

The body is falling apart much quicker than it used to because of the harsh winter we had and I haven't had time to clean up the rust and get it patched or at least cleaner to slow the process.

Oh and the brake switch under the dash gets stuck on sometimes so my lights stay on and drain the battery.

So all in all not super great for the truck although it keeps soldiering on god bless it. All fixable things, (except for that damn misfire...), just have to set aside a weekend to take care of it all before something serious happens.

[Chevymann1968]

I hear ya on that one.. I sold one of my guns to start funding my truck build which i could have bought the cab floor, cab corners and a few tools i need. Well not 2 days later my car blew the rear and destroyed the diff housing... So 3000 bucks later i have moser 12 bolt in the car. No we are trying to save up for a down payment for a house when we sell our current home... So once again my truck project is on the back burner.

[Billett]

Well you won't believe what seems to have solved my problems.

A $10 gas cap.

I noticed one day when I was filling up that some fluid came out of the cap when I took it off. At first I thought it was just gas that got caught in the lip of the cap, but when some rolled down my hand I took a sniff and it definitely was not gas. I think the seal was loose letting water into my tank slowly over time which would explain the random misfires and general crappy performance and terrible mileage. It would also make sense for why it was so tough for the guy in DE to tune. We had snow so often that I'm sure it kept getting right into the tank.

I got the new stant cap two days ago and put it on and drove 100 miles or so yesterday with no problems at all so I have high hopes.

In addition, I used to just have the old sock-style filter in the tank, but i think that may have come off and some debris and crap has been getting through to the pump. I finally picked up a nice aeromotive 100 micron filter to put in line before the pump. Hopefully the combo of new cap/no water and a nice new filter should have the truck running and performing better.

[68shortwide]

Found your build looking through an old audio thread lol Lovin what I've seen. Any updates?

[Billett]

Man, has it been a while. Unfortunately not a lot has happened in the past year for the poor girl. She really got pushed back. Like Chevymann all of my projects were put on hold for a down payment on a house. We recently moved to Columbus because I got a job as a Quality Engineer at the Honda plant here in Marysville. For a while we were just recouping after the move, but we found a house we really liked and needed to save some money. We'll close on Tuesday so hopefully I can start putting some money away every month to go towards all the vehicles.

Upside is that the new place has a 30x75 pole barn! I'll have a two post set up in there in no time! The plan is to put my money towards making the barn a little easier to work in first since there's no insulation and it's got a dirt/gravel floor. Once It's warm and flat inside It'll be a lot nicer to do some wrenching. Until then I'll really only do minor work.

[Chevymann1968]

Man it's glad to hear from you. A lot has transpired since the last update. I actually closed on a house 2 weeks ago. It also has a shop not quite as large as yours but it's do able. It's 20 by 30. Once we get settled in I will try to start up my project. I've decided to do a turboed 5.3 for my engine. I plan on going to pull a part and do a junk yard build. But here is a picture I took of the shop. The wall to the right of the truck will be coming out so I can get the full 30' of the shop.
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[Billett]

Man, time really does get away from you. Last post being in 2016 makes me sad, but the good news is I still have my C10!

Been through I don't know how many other vehicles (gotta update my signature...), but the C10 has always been apart of the family and it's finally time to start buying some parts and giving it the attention it deserves.

Haven't done any updates to it at all since the LS swap way back when. Daily drove it for a while and then it got pushed aside for other stuff. I'd run it around for small errands and parades and stuff, but the last 3-ish years it's had trouble starting and a fuel leak on the rail that's had me to nervous to start it.

Plan going forward is to add quite a bit of power to the old LQ4 with a single/twin turbo setup, refresh the 4l80, add an LSD, and throw a No Limit suspension under it. Going to be a long road from here too, but I'm happy that I'm finally focusing on this.