Working Man's Burbon

[HO455]

Originally Posted by notchbackgta

The bottom length of the seal is too short, so when you put it on the window it pulls the bottom of the seal down into the channel. I sent pictures to GMC Pauls and I think Precision recognized that the seal is not correct, but I haven't heard back about it.

That may have been the problem with the old mould I don't know. But that wasn't the issue with the set I received. Dan's Classic had my set and one other in the store so I took my old one and the glass down and we examined the differences, I made some notes, (see post 42) and then I had PM's and phone conversations with Derrek at Precision. Precision knows they have a problem and told me they were going stop shipping and remake the mould.

[HO455]

The fixed window seal saga continues. I spoke to Precision again this morning and they sent a preproduction set out for beta testing and found the sizing was not right. This means a restart on the process and no new seals will be available for 4-5 months. So I'm on the hunt locally for a usable seal. With 4 leads at present and one seal I can reuse I should get this behind me soon. (Crossed fingers)

[richard2717]

I was able to save the one that you helped me figure out removal on. If the 4th door gasket will work for you you can have it. I have not torn down the 3rd door yet so don't know if I will be able to save that one yet. The one I did get removed is soft and flexible.

[HO455]

Richard2717 that would be great! The one I have is soft on three sides but the bottom is pretty crusty. I have a line on another one that I will go check out tomorrow, and with that one and yours I should be good. PM me when it is convenient.
Thank you sir. Once again "This place ROCKS".

[HO455]

Having gotten the front marker lights working, it's on to the headlights. I have an old set of Hella non-dot euro H-4 lights I wanted to use. These lights would not fit in the buckets with the rubber seals installed. Not wanting to lose the dust protection the seals provide, I removed the buckets, placed the seal in the center of the bucket as a template to mark the needed clearance, and cut about 3/32" out of the center of the buckets. Several minutes with a file cleaned up the larger holes. Then a couple coats of rattle can protection and reinstalled them in the grille. A simple upgrade that actually stayed simple.

[Ol Blue K20]

I have a pair of those H4s too.

[HO455]

I used them on a Alfa Romeo I drove for about ten years. They work good. Not quite as good as the lights on the old lady's Lexus, but they weren't $40K either.

[Ol Blue K20]

I used to work on Alfas and that's where I got mine..

[HO455]

A new issue has shown up. At some point in the past the left side of the top edge of the tailgate was pushed in. I never noticed in during the paint prep part of the project. The result is that the weather strip around the lift gate doesn't touch on the one side. The gap is several inches long and about 3/16" at the large end. At the least this will allow exhaust fumes to come in from the back if I run the pipes out the rear and it will make things noisier. I didn't have a water problem in the back so I am hoping that will stay the same. I am going to have to find some kind of additional weather striping to seal it up. In a perfect world I would of noticed this and found a way to jack the area back into shape before painting. I will have to think about it and maybe have a plan for repair when I paint the interior. Just sharing this so some else doesn't make the same mistake. Or maybe someone has a way to jack the top back in place. I can see how the gate could easily get deformed if it gets hit when down or if someone were to toss a big beam in the back with the gate up. Hope the pictures help explain the issue. First photo is the good side, the 2nd is the bad side, the last one is the gap from the inside (which is how I noticed it).

[HO455]

Originally Posted by richard2717

I was able to save the one that you helped me figure out removal on. If the 4th door gasket will work for you you can have it. I have not torn down the 3rd door yet so don't know if I will be able to save that one yet. The one I did get removed is soft and flexible.

Package was here when I got back from work!
Thank you very much Richard2721!!!
It's good folks like you that make this place so great!

[richard2717]

Glad ya got it. Hope it work out for ya so you can get her buttoned up. Looking great so far.

Richard

[richard2717]

I wonder if there is enough play in the hinge bolts to loosen and split the difference. If the gate on the burbs are anything like my blazer was I would not run the exhaust straight out back. Didn't matter what I did, fumes got in and there was a bad drone noise as well. Ended up kicking them both out behind the wheels and took care of both problems.

Richard

[HO455]

I will look in to moving the gate. Maybe I can get lucky. Good advice on the exhaust. Currently it has a pair of two chamber Flowmasters that dump down at the crossmember for the rear suspension. Not real pleasant to ride in for any distance. So I was planning on changing it, but i haven't really made any plans yet. It will be a couple of days before I get the windows in. I've got the seals soaking in soapy water for now, and maybe Friday I will have some time to put them in.

[HO455]

No improvement gained with moving the gate around. It just wants to be where it is.
I did get the carpet out and removed the aftermarket foam pad that had been put in on top of the factory sound deadener. No heat here! (If you look at the photo you can see the places that the foam melted over the mufflers. ) "Honey what's that smell? Oh it's nothing dear". I then pulled all the old sound deadener up and prepared some rusted spots for spot painting with POR15. All in all the floor board is in really good shape, with the exception that it has 35 extra holes drilled in it that are 1/4" to 3/8" and at least a dozen more smaller ones. Think I will try to find some rubber plugs for the bigger ones. The WMB looks to have had bucket seats once and I think that six of the holes went to some stereo equipment under the second row seat. There are lot of holes in the vertical piece that goes between the floor under the back seat and the wood deck in the back. Maybe some kind of bang board? Who knows? Going to put down B- Quite mat with some window seal tape to quite things down. Moving the mufflers will help with the heat.

[HO455]

The biggest issue I had with the fixed windows in the third door and the false door was the way the seal was distorted. See photos of seal before removal and the distortion after removal. If you look under the seal you can see the seal is only supported on the back half. I was even more concerned as i would be reusing old seals. So I used some light weight 1" square tubing to hold the front of the seals up in place. I just cut it to size, drilled the window frame and the tubing. Then pop riveted it into place. I was worried that this may be to flimsy to hold the seal, so I had a plan to put a small angle iron to on the divider to hold the tubing up. Turned out there was no need for this, as the rivets seem to hold it fine. Just need some paint and ready for assembly. I believe GM left the seal unsupported so it would be easier to assemble the windows. I did a test run to see if the tubing would prevent the window from being assembled. But it was not a problem, really no different than replacing the roll up window with the fixed window installed. Tomorrow I should be able to get the window sets installed. I have been soaking the seals in soapy water for the last week or ten days.

[HO455]

Got the second row window sets installed! The support modification worked well on installation so now we'll see what the long run brings. It is hard to see in the photos but the seals no longer sag into the unsupported area. I did use a tip forwarded by the master "LockDoc" saying put some petroleum jelly on the frame to allow the seal to slide into place easier. Worked like a champ. I made sure all the tracks and rollers were lubed up with garage door lube. The windows now roll down and they work like they are new when going up too!
Soaking the seals in the soapy water (Dawn) really helped with cleaning the old paint/over spray off of the seals.

Thanks again to Richard and Mel.

[richard2717]

Wow that looks a whole lot better. Glad to see it coming together.

[Dieselwrencher]

That's looking very nice!

[Advanced Design]

Looking very nice!

[HO455]

Thanks everybody for all the encouragement. It makes the skinned knuckles and empty wallet all worth while.

[notchbackgta]

Definitely going to do something like that when I get back around to it later

[HO455]

Its not a flashy modification, but I'm happy with the results.

[HO455]

Pulled the old dash harness out and put my brand new one in. Everything worked with the old one except the amp meter, but the fuse holders were rusty. And the highbeam switch plug was missing and the wires had been spliced. Of course I found a few surprises along the way. The ignition switch plug was melted and the amp meter feed was broken and the ends were sort of twisted together. And the heater harness had been repaired at some point with smaller guage wire and a fuse holder that has been overheating. The new harness plugged right in and worked. The only question I had was on the light switch the old one had a purple wire on its own pin and the new one had two browns on a different pin. The the gent I talked to at American Autowire said that the last revision from GM was that way. So no problem it all works as it is supposed to. The other surprise was the how much the previous owner hacked the gauge panel up to install the Vette column that was in the Burban when I got it.

[HO455]

More photos of the removal of the old harness. Most of these pictures were taken through the dash with the guages removed. I hope my crude labels work for everyone. The biggest issue I had with the job was hooking the oil pressure line back up to the guage. It must have taken me thirty minutes to get it hooked back up. I just could not get the threads to start. I took all the switches out and buffed the contacts up with a small wire brush then treated both ends of the connection with Corrosion Block before installing the new plug and wiring. The connector pins in the engine harness plug were the most difficult to clean up. There were some green ones that took special care. Hopefully I can get the engine harness to last for another year.

[HO455]

I did some Por15 touch up on the floorpan and laid down some B-quite Ultimate damping material. Went full coverage from the firewall to behind the second row seat. The PO had some heavy felt(3/8") under the carpeting. Well, actually they had some 1/8" white foam on top of the factory tar mat, and on top of that what I think was the original rubber floor mat and the felt on top of that, with carpeting over that. Going back with the felt over the damping and then the carpeting. The carpeting is a little rough in places mostly due to poor installation. Having 1 1/2 square holes for 5/16" bolts seems a little excessive to me. The second row seat bolts are all stripped out as are one of the front seat bolts. I can see the rear as it may have been removed numerous times the the from one? Once the carpeting was in I installed my new front seat belts. They are retractable shoulder harnesses from buckleup.net. A fairly straightforward installation. Bolt a L bracket to the original spot by the door and then bolt the retractor and the other end to the L bracket. My only grief is they don't include the bolt for the top of the shoulder harness. It is a 7/16"-20 bolt which I believe is a common seatbelt fastener. So for now I have some temporary bolts until I source the correct ones. I won't be driving it until I get the seats bolted down. I also noticed that the rod (?) that connects the seat adjustment lever on the driver side to the slider on the passenger side is gone. Anyone know what goes there???