1949 Chevy 3600 into a daily driver

[Coach529]

Originally Posted by lower50's

Sweet touch

Thanks!!

[youngrodder]

Yes, cool idea. Thanks for the pics

Marc

[Coach529]

Still plugging away. I get a lot of questions from friends, co-workers asking when Henry will be on the road. Last week I told a guy "A couple good long days and he will be on the road". Either I am a crappy estimator or a crappy mechanic.

Probably about 10 hour into the truck the last two days.

Brake lines done and ready for fluid!!



Rear shock mounts built and painted.





Punch list is getting smaller. Local car show in two weeks. Trying to decide if I make the commitment to get it done!!

[youngrodder]

You can do it........keep at it.

Marc

[lower50's]

You can do it!! Don't half ass it, just enough to drive it there.

[99 to Life]

deadlines suck, don't let them get to you if you miss it. make the date, if you miss, make another. This stuff takes way longer than most people think. I think I'v stated that about a million times in my life.

[Coach529]

One step forward.....two steps backs. Ha, seems to be a reoccurring theme.

Some steps forward last night. Pulled the tail off the TH350 and replaced the seals in it. Button that all back up and bolted on my driveshaft. I also pulled my pan on the TH350 ad replaced the filter.

After that there was a step backwards. I filled the tranny and started the motor to check the tranny fluid level. All seems fine. For kicks I checked the engine oil. Oil was really milky. DAMN.

When I did my initial start up I had a couple bolt on the passenger side rear of the intake that were weeping. I am guessing I forgot to do the second pass of the 25ft/lb torque for them. I tightened them up, the weeping stopped and I continued on with the start up. I am wondering if that leak also weeped inside......or do I have another problem?

I dumped the startup oil. I did not have a fresh filter, but I topped it off with fresh oil and let it run for 15 minutes and dumped it again. Still milky, but not near as bad.

Picked up a couple new filters this morning on the way to work.

Not sure if this is all residual water from the initial leak or if I should start digging into finding another leak.

Any advice??

[99 to Life]

Did you seal the threads on your head bolts? They can be retorqued, or atleast try that as well. Could be a slight leak in the head gasket, or..... maybe a cracked head. 062's were good for that I think (don't quote me and I think I recall that is what you have).
Its just a SBC, cheap and easy fixes for the most part, but yeah def don't want an engine issue now. been there done that, I have problems at the worst times imaginable.

[Coach529]

Originally Posted by 99 to Life

Did you seal the threads on your head bolts? They can be retorqued, or atleast try that as well. Could be a slight leak in the head gasket, or..... maybe a cracked head. 062's were good for that I think (don't quote me and I think I recall that is what you have).
Its just a SBC, cheap and easy fixes for the most part, but yeah def don't want an engine issue now. been there done that, I have problems at the worst times imaginable.

Head bolts were sealed and I followed the torque routine to the T........

I really doubt the heads are cracked. They came from a reputable source. If they are cracked he will take care of me no questions asked.

Bottom line......absolutely nothing to stress over. Should be an easy fix.........just another thing on the list!!

[joedoh]

ugh I hate dehydrating a motor. I had a 4.3 with bad intake gaskets and the oil change procedure was nuts, 4 full changes and filters before leaving it alone.

[Advanced Design]

That is a bummer and noticed the discussion on FB. Looks like you are on way to a good fix.

[Coach529]

I took some time this afternoon doing a pressure test on the cooling system. I cobbled together some pipe fittings and a pressure gauge.

Held pressure for well over and hour both with the motor hot and cold.

I changed the oil and filter 2 times and now it appears to be dried out......

[Coach529]

Solid couple of days. My trailer fenders arrived to make rear wheel tubs. I cut them down with a skinny wheel with a guide. Would out great!





Installed



Patina'd





MC bench bled and bled the rest of the brakes.



List is getting shorter!!

[mongocanfly]

Short list=excitement..

[oldman3]

Man, things rust fast in your part of the country , looks good...Jim

[youngrodder]

Good progress...Your getting closer.....
I to had issues fully bleeding my brakes. My remedy was to unbolt the rear calipers and rotate them up and hold them against the rotor while I bleed them. The issue was where the bleeder screw was located and the positon of my bracket on my rearend allowed a pocket of air to get trapped at the top of the caliper. By rotating it I was able to move out the pocket of air. It took a couple days many tries at bleeding it and a fresh set of eyes from a friend to come up with the solution.

You will get it.

Marc

[Coach529]

Originally Posted by youngrodder

Good progress...Your getting closer.....
I to had issues fully bleeding my brakes. My remedy was to unbolt the rear calipers and rotate them up and hold them against the rotor while I bleed them. The issue was where the bleeder screw was located and the positon of my bracket on my rearend allowed a pocket of air to get trapped at the top of the caliper. By rotating it I was able to move out the pocket of air. It took a couple days many tries at bleeding it and a fresh set of eyes from a friend to come up with the solution.

You will get it.

Marc

At this point I am not sure if it is actually a problem, or my lack of experience with power brakes on a hot rod.

I do appreciate sharing your experience. I can see that being an issue.

I am 99% sure I am going to need some sort of vacuum assist. I am only in the 10-12 psi range. That could be part, if not all the problem.

[Coach529]

Had a damn good productive weekend. Buttoned up a ton of little things that needed to be addressed.

Got the rear fenders hung. I had built some metal brackets on the frame for the box mounts. I have the box bolted down in a couple spots just top hold it in place. Looks like I got it mounted about an inch to far forward. That will need to be moved in order to get the fenders to match the old rust lines.

I still have an air leak out of the tank that needs to be addressed. From the bags to the manual switches is good though. It will hold for days without loosing PSI.

Snagged a PS pump last night out of a donor. Hopefully that gets mounted tonight. I was investigating my rack last night and found a kinked factory line on the rack and pinion. Not sure how the hell that happened. Bent to far to repair. I tried reshaping and re flaring it......but it is now to short.



Brakes are still a question. They work. Not really sure how to explain them. They seem spongy and week, but I know I do not have enough vacuum for the booster. I have a canister on the way. Hope that helps. Otherwise I will have to look in to an assist pump or go back to manual brakes.

Best part of the weekend.......back the bad boy out of the garage under his own power.

[lower50's]

Congrats on the first movement under power. The trailer fenders you used look just like the ones I used. It took me 4 different times to get the all the air out, then found my rear drums where way out of adjustment.

[99 to Life]

congrats on all the work. The vacuum shouldn't haven much to do with the spongy feeling pedal, all that does is make it easy to press down. I'd bleeeeed the brakes over and over. Also the prop valve needs to be for correct setup and sometimes the bore in those MC make a big difference. I'd also think once you get a harder pedal, your engine should pull more than 10-12 vacuum. I'd play with timing and idle and honestly if you have an edelbrock, put the vac advance on the drivers side FULL ported vacuum. The Pass side is partial port and was more of a smog era deal, so you prolly aren't getting enough timing to pull good vacuum. Sounds strange but the more it revs at low RPM the vacuum will move up until a certain point, say 20hg and then it drops back to zero. Just try the vac advance and I bet you will notice a difference.

[Coach529]

Originally Posted by 99 to Life

congrats on all the work. The vacuum shouldn't haven much to do with the spongy feeling pedal, all that does is make it easy to press down. I'd bleeeeed the brakes over and over. Also the prop valve needs to be for correct setup and sometimes the bore in those MC make a big difference. I'd also think once you get a harder pedal, your engine should pull more than 10-12 vacuum. I'd play with timing and idle and honestly if you have an edelbrock, put the vac advance on the drivers side FULL ported vacuum. The Pass side is partial port and was more of a smog era deal, so you prolly aren't getting enough timing to pull good vacuum. Sounds strange but the more it revs at low RPM the vacuum will move up until a certain point, say 20hg and then it drops back to zero. Just try the vac advance and I bet you will notice a difference.

I have great pedal feel with the truck not running. Once the truck is started the pedal seems to go soft, spongy. I order a vacuum canister and a reverse bleeding tool. They will be here tomorrow and I will try and address the issue.

Vac advance is set up on the FULL ported vacuum on the carb.

[Coach529]

I can laugh about it now....but last night was a comedy of issues.

I set out to get the interior wiring finished. Get the gauges back in, column hung. I had some misc gauge wiring to do.

The truck fought me every step of the way. A lot of it was my errors. I put the gauges in first and then tried to hang the column. I could not get my hands up underneath to spin the nuts on the column bolts.



Finally I decided enough is enough and start the truck up to pull it back in the shop. I walk away and let it warm up for a minute and come back to oil all over the floor. Pulled the gauges back out. The oil pressure line looks good and is tight but leaks like crazy once the truck is started........another thing to add to the list!!

One positive is my 12 year old boy sealed up the bed wood with some boiled linseed oil. Turned out great!!

[99 to Life]

this build is so sounding like my last one, just every corner I turned something else to deal with. that is why I dubbed it hardtimes. You are close though and this was a runner bf so its not that bad IMO. You'll iron em out and be on the road soon.

[ptc]

Coach the milky oil can also be exaserbated <s> by not bringing the oil up to temp each time it is started and then letting it sit for a while.. it causes condensation in the valve covers and the water leaks into the oil... if you just run it until it warms up to proper temp the moisture will be heated up out of the oil just fine. This happens with boat motors ALOT! ---- ask me how I know...

[Advanced Design]

Coming together nice. Wheel tubs and floor look just right. And that sounds like one of my days in the shop...every step fights back.