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Old 04-17-2024, 08:56 AM   #126
JohnIL
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Re: 1965 C10 LWB Project Build Thread

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Originally Posted by SCOTI View Post
Time w/the young-gun & his project is a worthy reason. They're only this young once & we're never guaranteed a tomorrow.

Help them all you can while you can is my core belief.
Yep. He goes off to college in August. Time with him pretty much dictates my summer plans. He's hoping to drive the '77 C10 to school and I want to encourage his enthusiasm. But, he's run into a transmission problem he can't afford to fix. The 700r4 is completely skipping 2nd gear. I talked to a local transmission shop and they theorize the 2nd gear band is toast. A full transmission rebuild would cost almost as much as he paid for the truck itself. I'm going to open a thread elsewhere on the forum to see if anyone has any helpful advice. This is the kind of problem that takes the fun out of a project.

John
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SBC 350 and Saginaw 4 Speed

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Old 04-17-2024, 08:58 AM   #127
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Re: 1965 C10 LWB Project Build Thread

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Yep. He goes off to college in August. Time with him pretty much dictates my summer plans. He's hoping to drive the '77 C10 to school and I want to encourage his enthusiasm. But, he's run into a transmission problem he can't afford to fix. The 700r4 is completely skipping 2nd gear. I talked to a local transmission shop and they theorize the 2nd gear band is toast. A full transmission rebuild would cost almost as much as he paid for the truck itself. I'm going to open a thread elsewhere on the forum to see if anyone has any helpful advice. This is the kind of problem that takes the fun out of a project.

John
Truth.
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Building a small, high rpm engine with the perfect bore, stroke and rod ratio is very impressive.
It's like a highly skilled Morrocan sword fighter with a Damascus Steel Scimitar.....

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Old 04-17-2024, 09:51 AM   #128
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Re: 1965 C10 LWB Project Build Thread

Nice progress on your truck. The problem with your son's gearbox is annoying,
I'm also keeping my fingers crossed that you find a good solution.
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My 62 build thread
http://67-72chevytrucks.com/vboard/s...d.php?t=829782
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Old 04-17-2024, 11:58 AM   #129
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Re: 1965 C10 LWB Project Build Thread

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Originally Posted by Braunschweiger View Post
Nice progress on your truck. The problem with your son's gearbox is annoying,
I'm also keeping my fingers crossed that you find a good solution.
Thanks Harald. We need all the good luck we can get.

John
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SBC 350 and Saginaw 4 Speed

Build Thread:
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Old Today, 03:39 PM   #130
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Making up for Lost Time

Sorry fellas, no pictures this time. Just a good story about a kid and his old pickup.

When last we met, my son and I were doing battle with the 700r4 in his '77 square body. That was in April and he had dreams of driving his project truck off to college in the fall. I won't keep you in suspense. He and the square body made it to college (four hours from home) safe and sound. And now, as Paul Harvey would say, the rest of the story.

Transmission Shift Points
Back in April, we thought the transmission was skipping 2nd gear and shifting WAY too hard for a stock 700r4. It turns out that the transmission was actually fine, it was just extremely misadjusted. Whoever did the drivetrain swap missed a step. The TV cable was installed and it was even adjusted more-or-less properly. But, they forgot to add the geometry correction tab to the carburetor throttle arm. So, even with the cable properly adjusted, the 700r4 was hanging in 1st gear until 35mph. We thought is was skipping 2nd gear because it never hit overdrive until you were going 75-80mph (allegedly). With the throttle arm geometry corrected, the 700r4 shifts now shifts smoothly at the proper points.

With the transmission problem solved, we moved on to the rest of the pre-college punch list.

New Tilt Steering Column
The original '77 steering column was non-tilt. And, more importantly, someone wrecked the column attempting to steal the truck. The ignition lock cylinder was loose and only worked if you knew the secret handshake. The column housing was too mangled to repair. Plus, the turn signal switch was destroyed and the colar that actuates the PRNDL indicator was broken. The column had lots of problems. On top of all that, the truck had an ugly aftermarket steering wheel that looked completely out of place in a '70's pickup. So, we sourced a good used tilt column and a factory steering wheel from Doug's 4-Wheelers in Iowa. Doug's is only a few hours away from us, so we made a day of it. We walked their yard (hundreds of old trucks) and picked up several salvaged parts that were missing from the '77. Once we were home, we ripped out the old busted steering column and installed the replacement column and wheel. The whole job only took about four hours and it all looks 100% original. My son greatly appreciates working turn signals, tilt steering, and a proper square body steering wheel.

New Floor Pans
When we bought the '77 the cab floors were shot. In fact, the previous owner had already bought replacement pans from AMD and included them with the sale. We chopped the rot out of the footwells and welded in the replacement panels. In the end, we replaced about 70% of the driver footwell and about 80% of the passenger footwell. Luckily, the raised seat pedestal was solid. We treated the remaining surface rust with rust converter, seam sealed all the welds, and coated everything with rust encapsulator paint.

New heater core, fan, and speed control resistor
The previous owner of the truck bypassed the heater core because it was leaking (and contributing to the rotten footwells). This was another problem he obviously knew about because he included a replacement heater core with the truck. Since we had the interior apart anyway, it was a perfect time to replace the heater core. The core replacement is a pain in the butt, but it is doable. Once it was all back together, it became obvious we had a problem with the heater fan. Actually, we had two problems. First, the fan ran at a very low speed all the time. It would speed up with the fan speed control, but it would not shut off. Second, the fan rattled and squealed. The bearings where kaput. A replacement fan fixed problem number 2, but the fan was still running at a slow speed, even when the HVAC was completely shut off. A replacement speed control resistor solved that problem. My son is all set (or so we hope) for colder temperatures this fall and winter.

New Seats and Carpeting
With the floors patched and the heater box all back together, it was time to gussy up the interior. We laid down a fresh layer of jute padding, followed by a some generic automotive carpeting we ordered from Amazon. By luck, it is a dead match for the original dark green factory carpet. Lastly, we installed a pair of Procar lowback bucket seats. They're the same ones I have installed in my '65. They are a little bit old-school for a '77, but they're comfortable and my son likes the musclecar style.

Transmission Leaks (and lots of them!)
The very day we parked the truck to start digging into the rotten floor pans, the transmission decided to hemorrhage fluid all over the garage floor. It appeared that fluid was leaking from everywhere. Frankly, I was afraid we might have somehow cracked the transmission housing itself. I've resealed transmission pans before, but this was way beyond me. And, we were running out of time. This was just two weeks before my son was scheduled to report for his 1st day of college. I reached out to a local transmission shop and the shop owner assured me he would get the leaking under control for us. So, we topped off the transmission (it was over 4 quarts low) and we headed for the shop. A couple of days later, the shop owner called to let me know the transmission was fine. It was indeed leaking from multiple locations, but it just needed some new seals. Best of all, he was able to do all the work with the transmission still in the truck. Believe it or not, the job cost us less than $100. Thank goodness there are still honest mechanics out there. The hard part is finding them.

Tonneau Cover and Tailgate Locks
If the truck was going to sit on a college campus for days/weeks/months on end, we wanted the bed to somewhat secured. We ordered a folding tonneau cover that can only be opened from inside the bed. Of course, the vinyl cover will only keep the honest people honest, but at least it keeps the bed contents out of plain sight. The real challenge with an older truck is locking the tailgate. As far as I can tell, nobody makes a tailgate lock for a square body. We could have done something truely hideous like a pair of hasps and padlocks, but we wanted something a little bit less obtrusive. So, we installed a pair of cam locks (the same kind used for RV storage compartments), one on either side, near the top of the tailgate. We cut small slots in the rearmost stake pockets for the lock cams to engage into. The locks are unobtrusive enough that the untrained eye wouldn't even notice them. Again, these things don't provide Fort Knox level security, but they will keep the honest people honest.

Off On a New Adventure
Once we had the truck back in the garage, my son packed his bags (and his bicycle, refrigerator, and microwave) for the four hour drive to college. I led the way in my daily driver pickup and he (with his mother riding shotgun) followed behind in the '77. Is that a cool Mom, or what? We were all prepared to spend some family time on the roadside if the old truck experienced mechanical problems. By the grace of God, we arrived at school with no mechanical mishaps. So, our son and his squarebody are off on a grand new adventure. The truck gets to rest in a storage lot while my son is getting some edumacation. He's been on campus for about a week now and he says his '77 is the oldest vehicle he's seen so far. That's a pretty cool badge of honor.
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Build Thread:
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Old Today, 03:46 PM   #131
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Power Steering and a Tilt Column for the '65

Over the winter, my son and I found a good excuse to travel to the Speedway Motors headquarters in Lincoln, Nebraska. The retail side of the operation is just a walk up counter in the corner of the warehouse. No fancy storefront. But, the Speedway staff is impressively friendly, knowledgeable, and helpful. Beyond the giant warehouse full of go-fast parts, the big draw is the Speedway Motors Museum of American Speed. The museum is an absolute must-see. The shear scale, variety, and quality of the museum is overwhelming. If you're ever in the Lincoln area, it's definitely worth spending a few hours emersed in automotive history. While we were there, I took the opportunity to load up on parts for the '65 C10. My long term plan for the truck included power steering and an automatic transmission. So, I bought one of Speedway's power steering conversion kits and one of their tilt steering columns with provisions for an automatic transmission. Fast forward to August. After dropping our son and his square body pickup off at college, I suddenly have time to work on my own project truck. By coincidence, the bearings in my factory steering column began failing this spring. Throughout the summer, the steering has been getting rougher and rougher and the effort needed to turn the wheel has gotten heavier and heavier. The time was right to install the new Speedway parts.

The power steering installation went well. My only complaint is that Speedway's instructions where very lacking. Thankfully, I found a couple of YouTube videos of CPP kit installations, which are VERY similar.

Here's the parts list I bought from Speedway Motors, including part numbers. I'll explain my decisions as I go through the installation.
  • Power Steering Conversion Kit - Speedway Motors 91015019
  • 30" Chrome Tilt Steering Column w/Shifter - Speedway Motors 91032978
  • Collapsible Steering Column Shaft - Ididit 4468301
  • Steering U Joint 1"DD to 3/4" DD - Sweet Mfg 91032401
  • Steering U Joint 13/16" 36 Spline to 1" DD - Sweet Mfg 91032396

Power Steering Pump
The Speedway kit includes a '68-'72 style power steering pump, which looks right at home in a '65 engine bay. It comes with a very simple mounting bracket that seems to hold the pump well enough, but it doesn't do a great job of aligning the pulley with the crank shaft. The bracket is intended to align the PS pulley with the second (middle) groove on the crankshaft of a small block with a short water pump. The problem is that the bracket doesn't hold the pump perfectly square with the front of the engine block. It may be an optical illusion, but the pump appears to be twisted away from the center of the engine. Now that it's all installed, the belt seems to track OK, but the alignment isn't perfect. I will have to keep an eye out for signs of early belt wear.

Steering Box
The kit comes with a '73-'87 style power steering box. The kit includes a mounting bracket for the outside of the frame and a reinforcing plate for the inside of the frame. The brackets utilize a couple of the factory steering box mounting holes, but you have to drill two new mounting holes through the frame. Then, you have to drill out one of the threaded holes (lower front corner) on the steering box to remove the threads. This hole was the hardest part. Being cast, the steering box doesn't drill well. I ended up expanding the hole using a reamer. With all the holes drilled, you have to manhandle the box into place. It takes lots of hefting, fiddling, and adjusting to match up the holes. Once the box is mounted, the rest is pretty straight forward. Connect the pressure line between the pump and the steering box, flush the system with clean fluid, connect the return line from the steering box back to the pump, and burp all the air out of the system.

Tilt Steering column
Once the pump and steering box were mounted and plumbed, I turned my attention to the new steering column. I have the same complaint about installation instructions. The Speedway column is a good product, but there are literally no instructions. I learned how to install the new column by removing the factory column. Trial by fire. The key to success was researching the products (through the Speedway online catalog) ahead of time and making sure I bought the correct collapsible steering shaft and U-joints to connect the new box to the new shaft and the new shaft to the new steering column. The steering box has a 13'16" 36 spline input. The steering column is 1" DD output. In between, I used a collapsible shaft with 3/4" DD on the top end and 1" DD on the bottom end. The trick to making it all work is getting the correct conversion u-joint on each end. See the parts list above for part numbers.

I purposely went with a 30" column (I think the factory column is 32"-33"). The shorter column puts the steering wheel a couple inches closer to the dash. This is more like the modern daily drivers we're used to. Adding the extra two inches and tilt makes a HUGE difference in cab space. It's much more comfortable now. With that said, the new column presented a couple of challenges.

1. The steering column is almost too short.
More accurately, the Ididit collapsible shaft was almost too short. If either the steering column or the collapsible shaft were 1" longer, the installation would have been a bit more comfortable. As it was, there was no room for error. I had to remove the aluminum rivets from the collapsible shaft and extend it a fraction of any inch to mate up to the u-joints on either end.

2. The wiring for the column doesn't match up with mid-1960's dash wiring.
The column is intended to be "universal". It comes with a GM 3 7/8" electrical connector. It will not match up with factory '65 8-pin dash connector. American Autowire makes an adapter harness that should make this a plug-n-play connection and it adds a hazard flasher circuit (Part Number: 35780). Unfortunately, I didn't know about this harness until after I started the column installation. So, instead, I did it the hard way, which really wasn't all that hard. I clipped the connectors off both the column wiring harness and the dash wiring harness, then matched the wire colors together. The only caveat is to know that the light green wire on the dash harness goes to the gray wire on the column harness. All the other colors match. I did not build a hazard flasher circuit, but that would be easy enough to add later. For the record, the hazard flasher circuit connects to the brown wire on the column harness.

As I mentioned above, the column is equipped with a shifter for a future automatic transmission. I simply left the shift lever off the column and set it aside for the future automatic transmission swap.

This wasn't intended as an installation write-up, but I hope some of this information will be helpful to others doing similar installations. I'm happy with the end result. The truck is MUCH easier to drive now, especially when tootling around town. The tilt column and additional couple inches of arm extension make the driving position more comfortable. The steering wheel isn't right in your face anymore. Apologies for the lousy pictures. Power steering isn't a very photogenic installation.
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