68 C50 Looongbed pickup build

[63 gmc]

luv the long bed cant wait to do mine

[rkn463]

Originally Posted by 63 gmc

luv the long bed cant wait to do mine

Looking forward to a build thread from you!

-Richard

[rkn463]

OK, it's been a while since I updated; some progress has been made just not nearly as much as I would like. As I stated in a previous post my progress to frustration ratio has been very out of whack! I guess the first problem is that I was working with wiring and that always takes way longer than I expect. I had a few things to accomplish with the under hood wiring:
- Get rid of the resister wire that went to the coil and replace it with a wire capable of running HEI
- Add a tach wire into the harness
- Extend the alternator wires since the 366 has the alternator on the passenger side instead of the driver’s side
- Get rid of the extra wires that were for the externally regulated alternator and make it like it came with the internal
- Unwrap everything and look for any problems that need to be addressed
The under hood wiring is in two blocks - first up was the “motor” side of things: ignition, starter, temp gauge and backup light switch.
I grabbed the under hood harness that was on the 89, from it I stripped the plug and wires that went to the distributor.




Next I used colored zip ties to mark various things on the original harness: red is where the harness branches, green is where there were tie downs, white marked where the harness was connected to the “gutter” that runs across the firewall. (Note the blue masking tape where I marked the connections when I disconnected the harness from the old truck)



Then I unwrapped the old wires and separated out the ignition wires. I pulled the resistor wire from the connection that screws to the fuse block, cut the old wire loose and then soldered the big HEI supply wire and then rewrapped the harness. The other wires were all in good condition. I also had to extend the tach wire. Then I plugged it back in to the connector





To be continued...

-Richard

[rkn463]

First of all WOO HOO I finally found out how to post pictures in-line with the text!

Back to wiring, I didn't have any more room for pictures in the last post so here is the new big wire plugged back in to the connector and the harness rewrapped



Any splices I make are wrapped around each other, soldered and covered in heat shrink tubing.



Once the wires were ready I rewrapped the harness and plugged it back in to the truck. I had a bit of difficulty getting the newly wrapped harness down in to the gutter but I prevailed. Didn't get a picture of that one.

That wraps up what I got done the weekend of October 29th.

More updates soon.

-Richard

[rkn463]

Next up was the weekend of November 3rd which happened to be the start of a week of vacation. The plan was to do some deer hunting in the mornings, work on building a new fence between myself and my neighbor; a refreshing little 2400 foot project across solid rock and down a steep hill (should be a hoot). Any time left over was to work on the truck.

So that plan did not work out very well. First of all it rained from the time I got there clear through the following Thursday morning. Seven inches total. OK, too muddy to work on the fence which should leave more time for hunting and working on the truck. Apparently the truck does not want to be finished, it fought me at every step. Saturday when I was cooped up in the house I went about doing the other half of the under hood wiring, this side is the lights, horn and alternator part. Again it needed to be assessed for damage and rewrapped but it also needed the alternator conversion to internal plus make the wires for the alternator reach to the passenger side of the engine. For what ever reason I did not take any pictures of that process. I did the conversion and extended the alternator wires longer than they will need to be and will not do the finish work until I reinstall the front clip to see where things land. The rest of that part of the harness is done but not installed. This took most of my free time Saturday and Sunday. After hunting Monday morning I headed in to Waco to pick up the auxiliary pump for the hydroboost, the re-builder was done with it. My Camaro was in need of state inspection, license renewal and replacing the transmission mount so after Waco I headed on in to Fort Worth and traded the truck for the Z28 and headed back South. I stopped off in Meridian and got the car inspected and licensed and headed back to get in an afternoon hunt.

Monday night I decided to finish up connecting the "motor" half of the wiring harness. All that was left was the starter connection. The previous week I didn't get it connected because I didn't have an 11/32 socket to get the old solenoid wire disconnected. I borrowed a 1/4" drive set from my brother and went to remove the wire. It did not want to come loose. I ended up dropping the exhaust pipe for better access and could see that the battery cable was fried, disconnected that but couldn't get the nut on the solenoid wire loose. In frustration I cut the wire and removed the solenoid from the starter. Now with good access I drenched it in PB Blaster and started twisting and broke the post off the solenoid. I decided to use the solenoid and battery cable from the 68 as they were both still relatively new (3 or 4 years). No big deal getting them loose other than I did it by flashlight. When I went to remove the old positive cable from the truck there was a heat shield covering where it was connected to the frame. I removed that and finally got the cable replaced, then put the solenoid back on and connected the wires. Great, what I expected to take 10 minutes just took three hours! I did not realize it at that time but this would set the tone for the rest of the whole week.

-Richard