Mike's 60 Suburban build

[MikeS.]

That is just sick! I'm glad to see another old Suburban being well taken care of.

[mikesacs]

Spent a whole day stripping and painting the inner fenders and radiator support. I used POR-15. I hate brush painting stuff, but from what I've read it doesn't spray well. I also wouldn't put it through a spray gun I wanted to keep. Anyway it looked okay with only a few sags. I don't like how shiney it is so I topcoated it with a spray can of satin black on the top of the fenders. I did this after about 6 hours and I tried it on a test piece to make sure there wasn't a bad reaction. The last two pics show the satin top coat.

[mikesacs]

Mounted the battery box under the passenger's floor board. My first choice was to mount the batteries in the inner fenders, but there just wasn't enough space. The box is made with about 16 gauge steel with a swing down stainless hinge and rubber door latches for tool less access to the batteries. I will mount a set of jump posts in the engine compartment later. The pics are slightly deciving since it is painted with POR-15 and is super glossy. It is bolted to the frame with six 5/16 bolts and has a angle iron ledge welded on the back of the box that sits on top of the frame. The bottom of the box is just above the bottom of the frame. I painted the frame behind the box so I wouldn't need to take it off later when I paint the frame.

[mikesacs]

Started my engine bay wiring. I'm not doing anything special here. Just combining the two old wiring harnesses to get an operating engine. I plan to replace the entire truck wire harness and fuse block after the future paint job.

[mikesacs]

The engine is turning over now. The fuel has made it to some of the injectors and oil has made it to the turbo. I'll have the wife turn it over for me while I tighten injectors. I removed the glow plugs to let the engine turn over easier and prevent it from starting.

I'm going to pick up some interior charcoal paint for the steering wheel, emergency brake handle, and steering column. My burb has a column for a floor shift in it now. A while back I bought a 60-61 automatic column to install and I picked up an emergency brake handle from a 63. If the brake handle fits, I'll paint all of those at once. Then I can get the shifter linkage installed/made.

[mikesacs]

Worked on the new automatic steering column (red photo). Stripped the column and repaired the steering wheel cracks. Used a dremel tool to cut the cracks open wider and filled them with JB weld. Then ground them and sanded. Most of the cracks on the outer wheel were originating from the original holes on the backside. I filled the holes at the same time. Primed and then painted the parts. They should have been factory charcoal gray, but it turned out more like a medium gray. I didn't bother doing the clear coat. I'm headed to the paint store to see if it was mixed correctly or if I have the wrong paint code.

[mikesacs]

I started it this weekend! Nice to hear it run after 4 months. I still need to finish wiring, gauges, steering column, transmission linkage, bleed brakes, and a bunch of smaller stuff.

[mikesacs]

Went back to the paint store to see what could be done about the wrong charcoal paint. This store just had a fire and lost all of the old paint books that they used to come up with this number. He mixed another test sample to make sure that it was not just mixed wrong, and it was the same. Now I posted a WTB for a piece of steel that has that original charcoal color to take in for a paint match. My dash has been repainted with a metallic charcoal, but I don't think metallic was original. So I can't use that for a match. I'll probably install the steering column as is and deal with it when I paint the entire interior back to the original charcoal and silver.

[piratexpress1369a]

cool build ,that sucks when you can't get the right color match

[mikesacs]

Worked on the dash gauges. This is a homemade aluminum panel painted flat black with New Vintage USA gauges. I had to grind out the silver dash bezel slightly to fit the speedometer.

Also got the transmission linkage connected along with a new indicator on the column. The plastic now reads P-R-N-OD-D-L2-L1. The picture turned out poor with the glare on it. All of this is mounted on my mismatch painted column and steering wheel.

[Dinos63]

nice work ! and a ton of it to!!

[mikesacs]

I'm now in for some more work. I locked the engine up. Took it out for a short drive to get some fuel and an oil cooler line cracked. Lost all my oil in about 5 miles and by the time I noticed the engine sounding odd, it died. Sadly the oil pressude gauge was not connected in the engine bay yet. I'm now serching for a remanufacured 6.2 engine. When I started this, I was debating on replaceing the engine since it had 175,000 miles on it. The decision has been made for me!

[Tinkermc]

sorry about your bad luck, the work looks very nice, good luck

[mikesacs]

Originally Posted by Tinkermc

sorry about your bad luck, the work looks very nice, good luck

Thanks, been looking at a jasper long blocks today to ease my sorrows, but not my wallet. $4100 for the long block.
Posted via Mobile Device
Posted via Mobile Device

[piratexpress1369a]

that blow big time ..4100 for a long block ouch

[MikeS.]

Man, I'm sorry to hear that. 4100 is a lot of greenbacks.

[mikesacs]

I might get my new engine at the end of next week. That's the soonest that it could arrive. I've been working on the gauge sender wiring and cleaning up the wiring in the engine bay. I have all the gauge wiring ready except for the tach. Since this is a diesel, it requires a mag sender facing the flexplate. I'll try to take the front clip off in one piece this weekend.

I also need to deal with the fuel fill tube. I trailered it to the gas station after the "incident" and the fuel went in very very slowly. Diesel tends to foam easy. I am going to remove the fill tube to start the diagnosis. It does have some flexible hose from the fill tube to the tank that might be the issue. It was adapted to use the 1980 fuel tank that came with the frame.

[mikesacs]

Removed the front clip. Took a picture since it showed the inner fenders, radiator, and fan modifications well.

Investigated the fuel fill problem. The current 1 3/8" stock fill tube connects to a flex hose and then to the 1 3/8" tank inlet. The flex has some sag that will cause diesel to pool. The air vent also sags causing pooling. I'll try to remove the sags and reinstall everything. I did look at the donor truck and its fuel fill tube is about 2". I'll try to live with this until after the burb is running and look at installing the donor tank and fill tube down the road. I almost bet that you need a larger (2") fill tube to make diesel flow without kicking off the nozel.

[mikesacs]

I added a couple of pictures of the shifter indicator. I found that our shift indicators were used on several cars like nova and chevelle. Thus ShiftWorks makes an indicator lens that will work for a 700r4. I am missing the red indicator that is behind the lens. Any photo or leads on who would make it is appreciated.

[mikesacs]

The engine is now out. It was a bear to work with a seized engine. Some things like the torque convertor and injection pump needed the engine turned and it won't! I'm still dealing with trying to find a remanufactured one or take this one into a local machine shop. Jasper kept delaying the original order. Now they say that they can take mine and rebuild it, but it will take 3 weeks.

It looks like rods 1 and 2 spun the bearing. Rods 3 and 4 also got hot.

[piratexpress1369a]

Originally Posted by mikesacs

The engine is now out. It was a bear to work with a seized engine. Some things like the torque convertor and injection pump needed the engine turned and it won't! I'm still dealing with trying to find a remanufactured one or take this one into a local machine shop. Jasper kept delaying the original order. Now they say that they can take mine and rebuild it, but it will take 3 weeks.

It looks like rods 1 and 2 spun the bearing. Rods 3 and 4 also got hot.

did you pay for the new motor yet ? how is the block on the seized motor ? can it be reworked?

[mikesacs]

Originally Posted by piratexpress1369a

did you pay for the new motor yet ? how is the block on the seized motor ? can it be reworked?

Odd you asked that, I brought the short block to a local engine builder this morning. It's a shop that has done some gas engines for me in the past. They are pricing out the job and going to get back to me. He thought it would need a crank and 2 to 4 rods. The main journels might need to be line honed. I hope to get the price back from them tomorrow.

[mikesacs]

I'm taking the engine in to a local machine shop today for a new crank, a few rods, and then the usual for a rebuild.

I worked on the fuel fill tube some more. The original one is too small for diesel. I took one from a 90 burb and cut it in a few places to get the fit correct. I'll probably still need to change out the tank later to have a larger neck also.

[mikesacs]

Finished the fuel fill tube. I now have a larger path from the top all the way to the tank where it reduces to 1 3/8". It all has the correct slope. I'll see if that helps my problem. I still intend to swap tanks in the future. The tanks I have with the larger inlet is a 37 gallon and is longer than the 31 gallon that is in there now.

[jonzcustomshop]

been watching this...
on your rad support, did you just move the vertical bars over? Did you change the top or lower mount at all?