Working Man's Burbon

[HO455]

I'm pretty stoked to find out it is a local (fifty miles) truck and the dealership is still exists. Although it has moved.

[HO455]

Its been months since any noticeable progress has happened on the WMB. I had to get the final inspection on my house signed off and that involved building the banisters on the stairs of the house. Which for me was a large project that took a lot of time. But it is done with exception for some more coats of clear finish. When I could get away I was on the hunt for a used engine but after a bunch of calls and trips to look at used engines I gave up and ended up getting a low dollar rebuild from a local shop. It is a stock rebuild long block with the 67 300 HP 327 cam. Today I got most of the dead engine's connections removed or loosened up. After pulling the radiator I decided that it must be replaced. It looks as if it had been repaired at least once in the past and was not at all pretty on the inside.
Also up for replacement is the intake manifold. I had originally thought it was a single plane dominator but it is one of those terrible partially open plenum manifolds with divided runners that wants to be a dual plane and a single plane but ends up being neither.
The lower radiator rubber saddles were bad, one hard as a rock and the other one had been exposed to oil and was soft and spongy (probably from a tranny cooler line leak in the past as there is no sign of a leak now). So since I need new saddles and a radiator it is a good time to up my cooling game and go to the bigger four core size. I got new saddles at Dan's Classic, which is up for sale and downsizing and may end up closing, much to my dismay. The up side of this that everything is twenty percent off new parts and they are making deals on used parts. So I got a factory non EGR manifold and a good looking Qjet for $50. The manifold's threads all looked good but the surface where thermostat housing was little rough. I clamped it down on my little mill and cleaned the surface up. It interesting part is the factory machining was no longer flat. The area around the bolts was about .012-.014 higher than the front and back surfaces. (High spots circled in photo). Which makes me wonder how many I times I have cussed the thermostat housing for leaking and maybe the problem was the actually the manifold surface. The last photo is of a washer that is stuck under the intake manifold. I tried to pry it out but it is clamped down hard by the intake. Wasn't going to pull the intake off the engine when I returned the core, but now I just have to see if there was an vacuum leak around that washer.

[HO455]

Got the old engine out and the new unit in place. A couple photos for the record. The arrival of the engine. Draining of the oil. Notice the metallic flecks on the surface. After removing the pulleys from the balancer found the rubber was out of position possibly from all the heavy hammer blows it was given during its installation. REALLY A HAMMER!!! (I heated the new up to 180 degrees and it stucked it into place with the bolt.) I decided to leave it on the core and get a new one and a new timing cover. In addition I found the valve covers had the lip that holds the gasket in place had been ground off so now there is no rigidity to the gasket surface. I threw them on to keep the dirt out for now. Looks like I will have all new sheet metal on this engine. I had already installed a new Milodon oil pan. In other news one of the motor mount bolts was cross threaded and so the passenger side mount wasn't tight against the stand. Still waiting on a new radiator to arrive and some more time away from the salt mine to finish the odds and ends.

[HO455]

I just noticed that over 25,000 views have been counted at my little project. Wow!! Thank you all for looking and all of your comments.

[LockDoc]

Originally Posted by HO455

I just noticed that over 25,000 views have been counted at my little project. Wow!! Thank you all for looking and all of your comments.

Good to see you making progress on it. Just keep plugging away at it and it will come together for you.....

Keep thinking about how much fun it will be to drive it to the cruise nights.....

LockDoc

[HO455]

Thanks Doc. I would be happy to get back to driving to it work again

[HO455]

Got some quality time laying on my back under the WMB today. Hooked up the exhaust, torque converter and starter. The starter part turned into a bit of an annoying adventure. The old engine had the 153 tooth flexplate and the starter with the even bolt pattern. I had installed the flexplate on the new engine, but when I shoved the starter in place there was only one bolt hole. Of course I had to wait till the engine was installed and bolted down before I noticed this little issue. GRRrrrrrr! My options were to pull the engine and change the flexplate to the larger one and get a starter with the angle bolt pattern. Or pull the tranny and do the same, or drill and tap the block so I could use the flexplate and starter I have. The path of least resistance was to drill and the tap the block. (In the first picture the missing hole is circled) The biggest challenge would be making sure the hole ended up being in the right place and perpendicular to the starter base. My plan was to use the starter as a jig by bolting in place with the one bolt and drilling down through the other hole. I had to use a 6" long bit to reach through the hole on the starter. I used a piece of 3/8" tubing as a bushing to keep the 5/16" drill bit centered in the bolt hole. I flared one end of the tubing so it would be locked in place between the block and starter base. (Second photo shows the tubing on the end of the bit. After lining the starter up I locked it down with the one bolt and drilled the hole. Afterwards i removed the starter and tapped the hole. As there was very little room I had to use a ratcheting tap handle to turn the tap. After blowing the new hole out with air I snugged the starter down and checked the clearance between the gears and installed shims. It took about an hour to complete. Now all I need is the new radiator to arrive to finish the reassembly.

[HO455]

I got my new radiator today. It's Cold Case GMT558A and it looks good so far. The box took some abuse getting here, but the radiator looks undamaged! Yea! Of course the swap meet starts tomorrow, so it will have to wait until Tuesday for the fit test. Why couldn't it have arrived yesterday morning? I hope the warning about hood clearance is not justified or it will be making a return trip. The tranny cooler looks to be a tube in a tube and definitely not just a piece of 3/8" tubing going from one port to another.

[Dieselwrencher]

Yeah, that old engine was on borrowed time it looks like. The starter deal is one I ran into before and it sure is a pita. Nice fix. Where did you find the 6" drill bit? I need to get a couple for a project. That radiator looks very nice too!

[HO455]

I got the bits at a local tool supplier as it was close but normally I would have gone to Grainger as they are close to home. I hope the radiator fits as good as it looks!

https://www.grainger.com/category/ex...26sst%3Dsubset

[HO455]

After carefully looking at how the radiator fits I am returning it. The rubber cushions do not fit the radiator tanks correctly. With brand new GM 4 row cushions in the saddles there is 7/16" of slop in the lower saddles and about 3/8" in the uppers. My old 3 row saddles and cushions were no where near large enough to fit either.
I called Cold-Case and talked with Eric about the way it fits. Over the course of two phone calls (and my emailing photos to him) he first said that there were no known issues with the model I have and it is one of their more popular versions, but "some people may have to shim the mounts". Then on the second call he first said I needed new cushions, and when I told him I had a brand new set. He then claimed that some of the after market cushions were not correct to which I responded that mine were brand new from GM. Eric went on by saying that there really would be no problem as " once the hoses were hooked up it would never move." I told him that if they are claiming "Direct Fit" then I shouldn't have to shim the mounts and if I had wanted to fabricate mounts I would have purchased a universal race car radiator for $160 instead. It looks to me that they are trying to use some passenger car tanks as truck tanks and hope no one notices. He did say that if Jegs wouldn't allow me to return it he would allow me to return it to ColdCase directly.
I wanted a drop in no fuss aluminum 2 row radiator with at least 1" tubes. That would work with the factory shroud and fan. But it looks as if that is going to be at least a $7-800 deal.
If it isn't DIRECT FIT then say so! If they had been honest about how it fits then I would have found a way to make it work.

I called Jegs and they have no problem with the return. The gentleman I talked to said he almost spit his soda all over his computer after I told him about the" once the hoses were hooked up it would never move." line ColdCase gave me.

[HO455]

One last photo showing how the top mount fit. (Bolt on the far side is snugged down but not tight)

[Spf79]

Originally Posted by HO455

After carefully looking at how the radiator fits I am returning it. The rubber cushions do not fit the radiator tanks correctly. With brand new GM 4 row cushions in the saddles there is 7/16" of slop in the lower saddles and about 3/8" in the uppers. My old 3 row saddles and cushions were no where near large enough to fit either.
I called Cold-Case and talked with Eric about the way it fits. Over the course of two phone calls (and my emailing photos to him) he first said that there were no known issues with the model I have and it is one of their more popular versions, but "some people may have to shim the mounts". Then on the second call he first said I needed new cushions, and when I told him I had a brand new set. He then claimed that some of the after market cushions were not correct to which I responded that mine were brand new from GM. Eric went on by saying that there really would be no problem as " once the hoses were hooked up it would never move." I told him that if they are claiming "Direct Fit" then I shouldn't have to shim the mounts and if I had wanted to fabricate mounts I would have purchased a universal race car radiator for $160 instead. It looks to me that they are trying to use some passenger car tanks as truck tanks and hope no one notices. He did say that if Jegs wouldn't allow me to return it he would allow me to return it to ColdCase directly.
I wanted a drop in no fuss aluminum 2 row radiator with at least 1" tubes. That would work with the factory shroud and fan. But it looks as if that is going to be at least a $7-800 deal.
If it isn't DIRECT FIT then say so! If they had been honest about how it fits then I would have found a way to make it work.

I called Jegs and they have no problem with the return. The gentleman I talked to said he almost spit his soda all over his computer after I told him about the" once the hoses were hooked up it would never move." line ColdCase gave me.

I'm glad to see that JEGS is taking care of you on it. !!!

[Hart_Rod]

Originally Posted by HO455

One last photo showing how the top mount fit. (Bolt on the far side is snugged down but not tight)

Sorry to hear you've had problems with the radiator. I've had good luck with Entropy. Not the cheapest, but great quality and fit. Just make sure you tell him that you have the heavy duty mounts.

[crakarjax]

I'm using American Eagle (Champion) AE369 -- 2 row, 1" tubes and fits the 3-row mounts (I did shave the sides on my mounts to make sure they don't contact the tank). It has a built in steam port to facilitate LS applications. $200 shipped at Jegs.

http://www.jegs.com/i/Champion-Cooli...AE369/10002/-1

[HO455]

Thanks for the recommendations guys.

[HO455]

At last years swap meet I bought a new battery tray as I knew the one in the WMB wasn't in very good condition. As the radiator is out I dug the new tray out of the mess-0-stuff in the garage and took advantage of the timing. When I went to remove the battery I saw that it wasn't bolted in which was odd as I am big on that. However once I lifted the battery clear it was obvious why it was loose. The tray was now broken in two. After removing the six bolts (that were barely snug) the tray came out in two pieces. Once again another PO modificaion was evident. They cut the side on the fender end and bent it down flat. Probably to allow a bigger battery to fit and to allow me the pleasure of cutting my finger on the jagged edge they left from the sawsall. I will have to do a little rejigging of the one mount for the overflow tank but nothing to major. Unfortunately I ran out of daylight and just after the photos got taken the dry weather ended, so the new one didn't get installed today. But I am happy that the new tray is the correct one. I bought it on memory and faith the guy selling it was correct as to what it fit.

[HO455]

Got a day to wrench on the WMB. The new battery tray when in along with my fresh from the swap meet Camper Special 7 bladed clutch fan. Out with the old 4 blade fixed. Then attractively arranged around it is my perfect $8 junk yard score shroud! SWEET! The radiator has been installed. Contrary to the previous post I ended up going with a copper four row core from Canada with a plate cooler in factory tanks. If I have to spend $700 bucks to get a drop in unit want one that has a quality core, a real warranty, is repairable and I supported a local business. Plus they had the core in stock and the radiator was ready the next afternoon. I took my old hoses to NAPA to get replacements. They lower one was not really a problem, but none of the ones they had were anything like the old upper I removed. So I guessed (wrong) and went to see what I could make work. The lower needed about 3/4" cut off of the radiator end and 1/2" off the pump end to fit. Amazingly the hose no longer rubs the frame. Hurrah! The upper one ended up looking like the correct hose if you had a center pointed water neck. (NAPA # 7315 if you have that style housing ). I ran back and got a #7459 which I believe is the listing for a 72 C10 with a 350. It's bends are more pronounced to clear the alternator. I'm sure if I had searched the board I would have saved having to return one. At this point I'd bet the old upper was off the 305's donor car.
It doesn't sound like a lot got done for 7 hours work, but the mounts for the overflow tank had to be reworked and then the battery tray drilled to bolt them on. And the heater return had to rerouted to the radiator instead of the pump. Which turned out to be fortuitous as the steel hose connector in the pump had lots of deep pits and looked like it was ready to start leaking anytime. And then there was some watching of paint drying. And then the whole search for three of the shroud bolts that I had last week, but this week were nowhere to be found. Still!!
But now it's thirty.

[HO455]

More hose photos showing the difference between the two uppers styles I had.
One of the delays in getting the WMB back on the road was getting the home stereo back on line this winter. New wall mount speakers took wwwaaaaayyyyyyy too much time to complete, but they Fracken Rock. Tonights posting was to the Beat Farmers!

https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=...Z97gDwQnd_bGsP

Enjoy.

[HO455]

Originally Posted by Hart_Rod

Sorry to hear you've had problems with the radiator. I've had good luck with Entropy. Not the cheapest, but great quality and fit. Just make sure you tell him that you have the heavy duty mounts.

I guess that now that I didn't go with the aluminum radiator I won't need get one of those big pumps on the top of the engine like yours has. That should save some $$$$.

[HO455]

Got everything except the kickdown switch hooked up. The old intake had the original kickdown bolted to it on the front side of the carb with a piece of plumbers strap holding down so it sort of made contact with the throttle. By switching to a factory manifold and having to have an adapter for the Edelbrock card means the old switch and bracket won't work as the angle is way different. So I am gnoring that for now. New spark plug wires went on and during that operation I discovered that #4 and #7 plug wires were swapped. It took a couple of minutes of confusion to work through this as the truck idled well and I didn't think there was a problem but the wires were just not following the firing order cast in the intake. After checking with Chilton to confirm the intake casting was correct and how the distributor should be oriented the problem was confirmed. Which would account for the general lack of power the old engine had and it's reluctance the start when hot. Filled the cooling system and primed the oil system and we were ready to go. The engine fired right up and we set the idle for 2200 to break in the cam. About every five minutes reset the idle up or down a couple hundred RPM. At about the 15 minute mark the engine developed a vibration just after resetting the idle. I decided it must be a misfire and a quick check of the plug wires confirmed #5 had popped off the plug. Of course it is the most inaccessible one on the engine. The decision was made to shut down the engine and cool the header with water as quick as possible to replace the wire and restart the engine. 90 seconds later and a bit of burnt flesh the wire was back on and we restarted the break in. All went without issue after that. Finished the cam break in and I headed to the interstate and hit every on ramp on the 205 for all the truck was worth to get the rings to seat. It is faster than before but not what I would consider quick. The tune on the carb is definitely still rich even though this engine is 40 plus cubes larger. But it LIVES! And the Edelbrock is going away anyway.
The other thing we noticed is the power steering pump pulley has a serious wobble to it. It looks as I will have to fight with the pump some more. I am also not really thrilled with the current pressure hose from the pump as the crimped on the hose area nearest the pump cannot be routed without it touching either the pump mount or the motor mount or both. There is less than 1/32" from the motor mount and that was the best I could get it. And like other things on the truck the metal tubing coming from the pump has been twisted and is partially collapsed.
But at the end of the day no leaks, or failures, and who knew the oil pressure guage could go that high! The oil pressure, hot idling now is higher than the old motor was just after start up on a stone cold frosty morning.
And thanks to Karl and Johnathan for there help.

This posting was done while listening to the Bodeans.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WGho9tOIcbQ

[HO455]

Some more info on the radiator installation The new core was slightly taller than the old one and as a result the upper brackets are slightly angle up which means the shroud mounting holes no longer lined up. I took the brackets clamped them in a vice with some 5/8" bar stock and massaged them so the holes were lower and lined up with the shroud. Basically I bent the tab with the speed nut out and the pushed the top down flat. I also had to shorten the two bolts so they didn't bottom out before they tightened down on the shroud. Before and after photos.

[HO455]

I have about 200 miles on the new engine and all is well with it (No leaks yet!). It has much better off idle torque than the old 305. One thing that has become apparent is there is a much more pronounced vibration at highway speeds than before. When we were dropping the new engine in I discovered that one of the motor mounts had been cross threaded when it was last installed. (I couldn't have checked it before hand, that would've been smart so I did it the hard way, with lots of cursing to make it easier.). So my thinking is the new motor mounts made the engine sit higher in front and may have put the drive shaft angles out of spec.
First thing was to put the rear end on jack stands and set the rear ride height. (I had cut down a 2x4 when I when to the alignment shop to check all four corners for height before they aligned it.). Using this board to set the height I squirmed under the truck with my trusty angle finder. The first angle to check is the transmission. I prefer to measure the angle off of the end of the u-joint cap. But the one at the transmission is the spring clip style which I would rather not have to remove. Fortunately the transmission yolk is machined pretty well and I am fairly happy with it being true to the output shaft centerline. (You can verify the surface by reading the angle finder on the bottom and then rotate the shaft and get the reading with it on the top. They should be the same if the surface is true.). Measure the angle of the first drive shaft, the second shaft and then the pinon angle of the rear end. The photos show the finder hanging by the magnet. I didn't use the magnet when taking the readings . I use the V-block side as it is a more positive way of locating the finder. I was able to mimic the readings with the magnet side to take the pictures. I was not happy with the yolk surfaces on the rear end so I used a socket to take a reading off of the u-joint cap.
The readings ended up being 3.5* down on the transmission
0* on the front drive shaft
2* down (down at the rear) on the rear drive shaft
2* up on the pinon.
It looks like I have some work to do. The front u-joint should be in the 1 to 1.5 degree range not 3.5 degrees. I will go out in the morning and raise the rear of the transmission. I think that if I can get the tranny to 2* then the forward drive shaft will move to about the same and then most likely I will have to shim the pinon to finish the alignment. More to come.

[LockDoc]

Originally Posted by HO455

I have about 200 miles on the new engine and all is well with it (No leaks yet!). It has much better off idle torque than the old 305. One thing that has become apparent is there is a much more pronounced vibration at highway speeds than before. When we were dropping the new engine in I discovered that one of the motor mounts had been cross threaded when it was last installed. (I couldn't have checked it before hand, that would've been smart so I did it the hard way, with lots of cursing to make it easier.). So my thinking is the new motor mounts made the engine sit higher in front and may have put the drive shaft angles out of spec.
First thing was to put the rear end on jack stands and set the rear ride height. (I had cut down a 2x4 when I when to the alignment shop to check all four corners for height before they aligned it.). Using this board to set the height I squirmed under the truck with my trusty angle finder. The first angle to check is the transmission. I prefer to measure the angle off of the end of the u-joint cap. But the one at the transmission is the spring clip style which I would rather not have to remove. Fortunately the transmission yolk is machined pretty well and I am fairly happy with it being true to the output shaft centerline. (You can verify the surface by reading the angle finder on the bottom and then rotate the shaft and get the reading with it on the top. They should be the same if the surface is true.). Measure the angle of the first drive shaft, the second shaft and then the pinon angle of the rear end. The photos show the finder hanging by the magnet. I didn't use the magnet when taking the readings . I use the V-block side as it is a more positive way of locating the finder. I was able to mimic the readings with the magnet side to take the pictures. I was not happy with the yolk surfaces on the rear end so I used a socket to take a reading off of the u-joint cap.
The readings ended up being 3.5* down on the transmission
0* on the front drive shaft
2* down (down at the rear) on the rear drive shaft
2* up on the pinon.
It looks like I have some work to do. The front u-joint should be in the 1 to 1.5 degree range not 3.5 degrees. I will go out in the morning and raise the rear of the transmission. I think that if I can get the tranny to 2* then the forward drive shaft will move to about the same and then most likely I will have to shim the pinon to finish the alignment. More to come.

It seems like there is always something to throw a monkey wrench in the works..... Hope you get it sorted out.

LockDoc

[HO455]

Progress was made today! But first let me correct my post from yesterday. I did not correctly post the angle directions. The correct information is:
Transmission 3.5 degrees down
Front shaft 0 degrees
Rear shaft 2 degrees UP
Pinon angle 2 degrees DOWN
I jacked the rear of the transmission up and slid a 1/2" piece of plate under the mount, lowered the transmission back down and after double checking my ride height, I took a new round of readings.
Now the transmission angle is 2 degrees and the front shaft is 1 degree. Victory at that end! The second shaft was now just shy of 2 degrees. Now with a one degree difference between the transmission and the front shaft angles, and with the pinon and the transmission at the same angle I should be good as long as the other two u-joint angles aren't too extreme This arrangement puts the u-joint operating angles at:
Front 1*
Center 3*
Rear. 4*
A one degree shim under the axle would make things perfect. But I don't think that it will be necessary. So I drilled a couple of holes in the plate and bolted it in place.
As LockDoc says there's always one more monkey wrench! I needed to replace the old tranny mount bolts with longer ones and knowing that at some point GM switched to metric fasteners on the mounts I cleaned the old bolts to make sure I got the correct fasteners. This lead to the discovery that the PO had apparently cranked metric bolts into the standard thread mount. After bolting the mount down the new 3/8 NC bolts and one came up tight and one didn't. I guess a new mount is in order. I hope it won't change the geometry, but we will see. I had to remove the metal loop strap that goes around the emergency brake cable to get a good reading on the yolk and that bolt was stripped too. My poor Burban must have been owned by a neanderthal at some point.
I got the WMB back down on the ground and went for a drive. The harsh vibration is now gone.
Today's post accompanied by Doug MacLeod.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=h2R8OTXJsxw