'50 chevy 3100

[joedoh]

heyooooo!

[8man]

Amen to the patience!

[Matt_50]

I have constantly changing ongoing list of what I need to do, change, modify, buy...

Helps me not to forget anything and today I marked off a few things.

I got some screws I needed and finished hooking up some ground wires.

Wired the radio and the speakers.

Wired my new usb charger outlet.

Replaced and wired up the neutral safety switch.

Made a battery hold down.

Cleaned, painted and installed turn signal covers.

Doubled checked all unused wires and capped them off as needed.

And I moved the alternator charge wire. Had it going to battery but was told it would be better to move it to my terminal block on firewall.

Wired my brake light switch too. Slight modification was needed but looks good.

Yesterday I cleaned up the engine, tightened p/s lines and filled reservoir. Shined up the air cleaner a bit too.

Tomorrow I plan to do the oil change and I think add a little oil to cylinders.

[8man]

Keep it up, you'll be cruising in no time.

[MiraclePieCo]

Originally Posted by Matt_50

I have constantly changing ongoing list of what I need to do, change, modify, buy...

Helps me not to forget anything and today I marked off a few things.

I got some screws I needed and finished hooking up some ground wires.

Wired the radio and the speakers.

Wired my new usb charger outlet.

Replaced and wired up the neutral safety switch.

Made a battery hold down.

Cleaned, painted and installed turn signal covers.

Doubled checked all unused wires and capped them off as needed.

And I moved the alternator charge wire. Had it going to battery but was told it would be better to move it to my terminal block on firewall.

Wired my brake light switch too. Slight modification was needed but looks good.

Yesterday I cleaned up the engine, tightened p/s lines and filled reservoir. Shined up the air cleaner a bit too.

Tomorrow I plan to do the oil change and I think add a little oil to cylinders.

Wow, you are working hard!

[gigamanx]

Originally Posted by Matt_50

I have constantly changing ongoing list of what I need to do, change, modify, buy...

Helps me not to forget anything and today I marked off a few things.

I got some screws I needed and finished hooking up some ground wires.

Wired the radio and the speakers.

Wired my new usb charger outlet.

Replaced and wired up the neutral safety switch.

Made a battery hold down.

Cleaned, painted and installed turn signal covers.

Doubled checked all unused wires and capped them off as needed.

And I moved the alternator charge wire. Had it going to battery but was told it would be better to move it to my terminal block on firewall.

Wired my brake light switch too. Slight modification was needed but looks good.

Yesterday I cleaned up the engine, tightened p/s lines and filled reservoir. Shined up the air cleaner a bit too.

Tomorrow I plan to do the oil change and I think add a little oil to cylinders.

Lots of little things. Making progress though! Funny that you have a USB charger outlet. That's what I'm putting in instead of a cigarette lighter adapter.

[Matt_50]

Yea, I didn't want to have an adapter for a cig lighter. A dual usb outlet works for me.


This morning,

Fuel filter done.

Oil change.

Spark plug wires.

A tiny little bit of mystery oil in each cylinder. Less than a tablespoon. Spark plugs loosely in until I get back next week. I'll crank engine with plugs out to blow out excess oil.

Started messing with dash pieces last night and a little more today. I need to repair bottom trim piece. I want to make a cup holder that fits in ashtray spot at some point too.

[28TudorAZ]

Looking really good.

[8man]

Waiting to see the cupholder.

[gigamanx]

Originally Posted by Matt_50

Yea, I didn't want to have an adapter for a cig lighter. A dual usb outlet works for me.


This morning,

Fuel filter done.

Oil change.

Spark plug wires.

A tiny little bit of mystery oil in each cylinder. Less than a tablespoon. Spark plugs loosely in until I get back next week. I'll crank engine with plugs out to blow out excess oil.

Started messing with dash pieces last night and a little more today. I need to repair bottom trim piece. I want to make a cup holder that fits in ashtray spot at some point too.

Funny, that's exactly the hole I'm putting mine. Did you have to enlarge it at all?

[Matt_50]

I'll need to a bit, it's just hanging right now.

[joedoh]

I put lighter sockets on both sides, key and lighter. the donors come with multiples haha

keep it up!

[Matt_50]

It runs!!

First thing was to hook up battery. Horn started blaring. I unplugged the horns but how do I fix that?

I cranked engine to build up pressure, bring up fuel, and to clear cylinders of the mystery oil I squirted in.

Hooked up plugs and with a little help I got it running. Unfortunately there was a fuel leak. I added a fuel filter just before the carb and the little squeeze clamps that came with it weren't holding tight enough. In fact I should have noticed the filter moved about.

Just got a foot of hose, new worm clamps, and got that installed again just now. Tomorrow I will get the engine fully warmed up and look for any other issues. I hope not to find lol.

[Matt_50]

The steering column is from a 1970 c10. No steering wheel on it. Is this why the horn goes off?


Next, unless I bend the arm on the gas pedal; the throttle cable is a little to long. I'm not getting the full motion at the pedal. Can I shorten the cable?

[joedoh]

woooooooooooooo! congrats!

unless you have slack before the cable starts to move, shortening the cable isnt the answer, you have to change the pedal or arm for more travel.

funny story, I put CBR600 F4i throttles on a mazda truck a million years ago and the handlebar grip was set up for 1/4 turn full throttle. when I hooked it up to the gas pedal, it was like a binary switch, ON or OFF haha. I extended the arm where it attached to the throttle shaft so that I had normal amounts of travel on the gas pedal. the full throttle burnouts on the test run were fun though hahahaha

[Matt_50]

I misspoke. The cable is too long and the pedal is swung too far forward. If that makes sense. I think if the cable was shorter then the pedal would start in the right spot and then I could push it down with my foot with full movement.

[Matt_50]

Any advice on the horn? It's a new turn signal switch assembly.

Am I correct that the horn wire is hot and it is grounded when button is pushed down? But this button isnt pushed down....

[joedoh]

Originally Posted by Matt_50

I misspoke. The cable is too long and the pedal is swung too far forward. If that makes sense. I think if the cable was shorter then the pedal would start in the right spot and then I could push it down with my foot with full movement.

might be, give it a shot, the "too long" you are talking about is the distance from the stationary point that holds the cable housing to the cable end itself where it attaches to the pedal. so if you held the pedal up where it should be there would be "slack" in it, dead space where there is no pulling going on till a certain point.

on the horn, that contact is just to pass the horn signal from the steering wheel button to the horn relay. its not necessary to push down on it, its just a pass through, it rides on a contact ring on the back of the steering wheel, and that contact ring is wired to the horn button. usually the other side of the button is wired to a contact that touches the center of the splined shaft (or if your wheel has a die cast center, is screwed to the die cast). the reason its honking is there is ground on that wire that shouldnt be there. might be at the bottom, where the wire is just laying loose and is grounding out on something. could be grounded at the horn relay.

[Matt_50]

Can I pull out the horn relay, set voltmeter to ohms, can set leads on black wire of relay on column side and one to a clean bare metal spot? To test for a ground inside the column?

[joedoh]

yep thats the way I would do it, except set the VOM to continuity (beep)

[Matt_50]

Thanks! I'll try and test tomorrow.

I also added a switch to manually turn on the fan. I tapped into the single wire going from the relay to the probe. I ran that wire back to switch and also ran a wire to ground off the switch.

It works, I can manually turn on the fan.

But... if I tapped into a grounding wire, and also grounded the second wire.... how is the light on the switch able to come on? It lit up and I didnt think it would, only used two prongs. These switches have three prongs so you could have it light up if you wanted. Is the wire going to the probe hot?

[dsraven]

on the horn, the wire is simply "ground to operate". usually, if it worked correctly before a steering wheel or column change, then the problem is in the column. if it blows with the steering wheel off then it could be a pinched wire under the signal switch or inside the column since you say the sig switch is new. if you simply unplug the column and turn the key on and find the horn doesn't blow anymore then the problem would seem to be in the column somewhere. since the wiring to the column is unplugged at that point you could do the continuity test on the horn wire right then to see if the wire has continuity to the column or not. if it does, pull the screws on the signal switch and pull the switch out a bit, retry the continuity test. sometimes the wire gets pinched under the switch. if the problem is in the column just keep bulldogging it until you find the short to ground. if the problem is NOT in the column,
you could:
check the relay, the contacts could be welded or stuck together inside the relay or you simply have a faulty relay. use a light in place of the horns so you know the horn draw isn't gonna weld the contacts together again if there is a horn problem, plus it is less annoying to have a light come on instead of the horn blowing. make sure to test the light to ensure it works so you have trusty testing. first do the wire tests on the relay to ensure you have the circuits correct, power,load, signal. the signal wire is the one that goes to the column. leave the column connector unplugged and see if that wire has continuity to ground when disconnected from the relay. if it does then it has a short to ground somewhere between the relay and the column. pinched or stripped of insulation on a sharp edge during install or rubbed through someplace.
on the oil pressure sender, you could plug the hole on the block behind the intake manifold and use the threaded hole just above the oil filter if you have room. gauges have ohm ratings so the sender has to match the gauge. if you unplug the sender the gauge should go either all the way up or all the way down. then, if the sender wire is grounded, the gauge should go all the way in the opposite direction. a good ground to the gauge and to the engine is a must, of course, as is the correct rating of sender. also, some senders are simple on/off switches so if you have a gauge that reads pressure you will need the sender that also allows a variable ground voltage based on oil pressure instead of the simple on/off style switch.

[Matt_50]

I thought I'd check for a grounding issue on the oil sending wire. I unplugged it from the sender and no ground. Engine is still running and I look at the gauge. It is still maxed out but I noticed it doesn't jump anymore. The needle moved back and forth maybe an 1/8 of an inch before.


So I pulled my little cluster out to see if maybe something touches when it's running. There are three posts on the gauge. B, T, GROUND. Just like in this picture.

From a good ground to the sender wire, T, I do not have continuity.

Ground to ground I do.

From B, to T nothing.

From B to ground. I also have continuity. Is that right? B to the gauge case and B to a good ground or to the ground post beeps at me.

[dsraven]

unless they started building gauges differently these days I am pretty sure you need some continuity between the B and the T.
there are 2 coils inside the gauge making a magnetic field. one coil is a constant and it's field will move the needle all the way over to zero. the other coil has a varied by the amount of ground given by the sending unit. that field varies so the needle will more easily pull toward the zero mark by the stronger constant magnetic field on the other side of the needle. should the oil pressure spike then the needle would, of course, be drawn over to the high end of the gauge. it would make sense, then, that there should be some continuity between B and T. the internal coil would ground through the ground connection on the back of the gauge. since you have the gauge out you could easily test it on the bench with a battery and some test leads with alligator clips on the ends of the leads. connect batt neg to the ground, batt pos to the B and then see what the gauge does. it should spike to the zero end of the gauge. now ground the T connection with another test lead and the gauge should go to max oil pressure.
we are talking about some pretty small coils here so a continuity test may result in some pretty high ohms. sometimes best to simply test it manually with the old battery trick. you can also connect the oil pressure sensor to the air line if you have a compressor and use a pressure regulator to control the air pressure (with a gauge so you know what pressure you are feeding the sensor). the oil pressure gauge should react like normal. if it has nothing then suddenly as you increase the air pressure the oil gauge goes to full pressure you possibly have a sensor for an idiot light that is actually an on/off switch instead of a variable resistance sensor.

[8man]

Matt, good work. Test the switch with your vom to see which prongs on the switch do what. Then test the wires you ran to the switch to see if they are power or ground. Then you will know for sure it’s hooked up right.