The Terrors of Tear Down and the Perils of Project Pause

[1leglance]

So today while working with my sons on getting my 70 Suburban ready for the paint shop it struck me just how scary it is tearing down a vehicle and the worries about what you will find.
Also it seems when you ready through build threads on older rigs it is the big "project pause for paint" that is pretty much the last you hear. Or maybe a few pics after the rig is back home but that shot of the happy family driving again rarely happens.



I am a horrible procrastinator. I need a deadline to be motivated at all.
So I have set Sept 7th for a trip to Prescott for the Overland Journal Trail Run & BBQ as my "back on the road" deadline. I might not be 100% done with the interior, there might still be bits and such to bolt back on but if I don't have a reason to work hard...well I will hardly work

Lucky for me the tear down terrors have been pretty small....a bit of rust that has been easy to fix, some old bondo but nothing really horrible, all my glass came out in 1 piece, and I still love the old rig.

Anyone else got stories of tear down terrors or projects that paused and never restarted?

Oh and Jan/Feb I want to do axles/trans/tcase....and then maybe next fall will be the diesel conversion. This will keep the girl rolling vs driveway art.

[LockDoc]

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When I start on something I am usually pretty focused. The '70 SWB is a different story. I don't know why. I stripped it down, blasted, shortened, and painted the frame, set the cab back on the frame, painted the firewall and the inside of the cab Light Yellow, installed the TPI engine and 700r4 and that is where it has sat since 2006. It's not that I'm not doing anything, I built the '72 GMC 4x4, the '71 Chevy 4x4, the '69 Chevy Suburban, and I'm working on a '70 Chevy 4x4 now, but the poor '70 sits... Everything came to a halt when I started trying to figure out the wiring...

LockDoc

[Average Joe]

I hear ya about having a deadline. last summer I gave myself a month to swap my BBC out of my 69 c10 and put in my 67 burb along with the front suspension and disk brakes. finished the night before we were scheduled to leave on a camping trip towing my 6000lb travel trailer. Luckily didn't have any major bugs with the 'burb just issues with the trailer lol. however it took me two years to finish a back half job on my Nova when I did not have any deadline.

[chevy_mike]

Hey Lance, didn't know you were over here too. It's Mike in San Diego (ExpoMike on ExPo). I completely know how it goes with project pause, for whatever reason. My '68 C10 has been on hold for over 4 years now. My '65 C10 Panel has been for 1.5 years. I was planning on getting on that earlier this year but the engine went out on our "new" '64 Chevy II wagon so I spent this summer rebuilding it and a bunch of other things on it. Still have project creep with that car, which I just can't seem to help...

Good luck with your burb and can't wait to see how it turns out.

[1leglance]

Howdy Mike!
I remeber going to your place and seeing some nice projects....and that is what I am trying to avoid
In my youth I didn't mind having 2-3 vehicles in variou stages...now I want to use my stuff not build it.

I really really hope to get my burb out to paint next week and Maaco is saying 5 days on their end. That should give me another week or two to put it back together before rolling up to Precott to hang out at Overland Journal.

I still cross my fingers everytime I work on it that I won't find something else to fix or worse have those thoughts of "might as well upgrade that"

[68 TT]

Originally Posted by LockDoc

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When I start on something I am usually pretty focused. The '70 SWB is a different story. I don't know why. I stripped it down, blasted, shortened, and painted the frame, set the cab back on the frame, painted the firewall and the inside of the cab Light Yellow, installed the TPI engine and 700r4 and that is where it has sat since 2006. It's not that I'm not doing anything, I built the '72 GMC 4x4, the '71 Chevy 4x4, the '69 Chevy Suburban, and I'm working on a '70 Chevy 4x4 now, but the poor '70 sits... Everything came to a halt when I started trying to figure out the wiring...

LockDoc

OP, sorry for the hijack but I can help LockDoc out a bit with his problem.

I have built a couple TPI auto trans harnesses from scratch. These are the much more common donors you can use vs. finding a TPI F-body harness:

Some of the 90-92 fwd cars with the 3.1 V-6 shared the 1227730 ECM that the speed density F-body TPI cars used and a whole lot of the wiring and sensors are the same. If you want to build your own harness that is a good place to start.

90-92 Astro vans & S-10 Blazers shared the same 4L60 trans too so that part of the harness can come from them.

You will need a real F-body TPI cal pac to put into the fwd car ECM if you use it or limp home mode will not work and you will be dead in the water if something fails that triggers limp home mode. They used to be fairly inexpensive new from the dealer but have more than doubled in price in the past few years. For the last one I did a few years ago I was able to find a good used 5.7 TPI Camaro ECM with the cal pac & AUJP prom chip still in it through a wrecking yard I found using car-part.com for less than what the dealer wanted for just the cal pac so that is also an option.

The TPI ECM wire harness pin outs are easy to find on the internet and will help you out tremendously when blending things together like this.

[ThreeQtr]

It's the 7th of September, did you make it ? Would like to see pictures of the ol' girl with fresh paint.

[LockDoc]

Originally Posted by 68 TT

OP, sorry for the hijack but I can help LockDoc out a bit with his problem.

I have built a couple TPI auto trans harnesses from scratch. These are the much more common donors you can use vs. finding a TPI F-body harness:

Some of the 90-92 fwd cars with the 3.1 V-6 shared the 1227730 ECM that the speed density F-body TPI cars used and a whole lot of the wiring and sensors are the same. If you want to build your own harness that is a good place to start.

90-92 Astro vans & S-10 Blazers shared the same 4L60 trans too so that part of the harness can come from them.

You will need a real F-body TPI cal pac to put into the fwd car ECM if you use it or limp home mode will not work and you will be dead in the water if something fails that triggers limp home mode. They used to be fairly inexpensive new from the dealer but have more than doubled in price in the past few years. For the last one I did a few years ago I was able to find a good used 5.7 TPI Camaro ECM with the cal pac & AUJP prom chip still in it through a wrecking yard I found using car-part.com for less than what the dealer wanted for just the cal pac so that is also an option.

The TPI ECM wire harness pin outs are easy to find on the internet and will help you out tremendously when blending things together like this.

Thanks for the info. I will print it out and do some checking. I need to get back on it...

LockDoc

[1leglance]

Got the Burb back from Paint and the wife loves it which makes every penny worth spending



And we are almost done putting it back together. Lost a metal glass channel for the non-door behind the driver, but a cool forum member as one in route to us now.
As a family this has been a great project and it will be even better once my granddad's 72 truck (my younger son's first ride) is done and they are parked side by side



Funny thing is I planned to wait till spring to convert axles/trans/tcase then next fall for the diesel swap. That way I would have plenty of play time between downtime. But the wife actually says to just get it all done as she likes the rig alot more and wants to see it completely finished.
Happy wife, happy life

[chevy_mike]

Looks great Lance. Much nicer than when you visited me.

[ThreeQtr]

Looks sharp! Did you have the inside painted also?

[1leglance]

Thanks Mike...

Yep the inside being done as almost as important as the outside as that is what the wife looks at while we are motoring down the highway to go camping

As much as I like a cool patina look I also really like it all shinny and fresh. Lets me imagine that it is 1970 and we are having fun in the backcountry like when I was a kid.

[vectorit]

Looks great!
The rest is all fun stuff now, detailing, putting things back better than they were.
I remember the point my burb was where you are at, and it was such a relief like I actually am going to finish this project!
Here I am 10 years later and still have things to do, but it's all fun stuff and slowed only by cash flow. But I still get to drive it, and take it to truck shows.

Enjoy!