K1's build thread

[k1rodeoboater]

Since I've got a 4 day here are my tentative plans

Friday
- swap out passenger outer tie rod end
- get grease gun fitting free from driver inner tie rod end
- get all fittings greased up and torqued to spec

Saturday
- get brake lines installed
- get MC installed
- get brakes working!!!

Sunday
- Finish anything not completed from the previous two days
- pull taillight harness and rebuild it off of the truck that evening
- reinstall tailgate
- reinstall drivers side step

Monday
- re-install taillight harness
- install new tail lights

I also have a few side projects that need to get done, but I'm saving those in case of rain.

- rust repair, primer, and paint on the drivers rear fender I just got
- clean up rusty sill plates (going to try the CLR and scotchbrite trick)
- clean up and paint the take off tailgate chains I've got


If I can get all of that done I'll be pretty dang happy. If I can get it driveable I may take it down the street and have them build me an exhaust setup from the mainfold back. I'm holding off on the alignment because I need to rebuild the upper and lower A-arms yet, though I may just pay a shop to do it all at once.

I still haven't heard back from my contact I've been using for rust repair panels....starting to get a little erked about it. I'd like to get those panels ASAP so I can start doing rust repair next weekend.

[k1rodeoboater]

Steering linkage is greased up and good to go.

Brake lines are hooked up...but the brake hoses aren't hooked up, nor is the M/C bench bled yet

tailgate and drivers step installed

Gonna bolt up the replacement fender to see how badly I did on the rust repairs too...

[k1rodeoboater]

lines are run, hoses are hooked up, MC is bench bled, front brakes are bled, but the rears are giving me trouble. I know the fronts are getting fluid because I had it pouring out of one of the hoses that wasn't tightened down enough (lol woops). With the rears I opened up the bleeder valves and I got some old fluid to come out but that was about it. I don't know why we're having issues with the rears. I've replaced all but the rear half of the frame line, rear brake hose, and axle piece of hard line

On a side note...you can run 73-87 hoses on a 63-66 with the hard lines in the stock 63-66 location. You'll need a 1/4x1" bolt, plus 2 washers, 1 lock washer, and 1 nut (per side) and drill a hole in the edge of your crossmember with a right angle drill. It was a PITA and awkward to do, but it can be done and provide enough clearance for the wheels.

My buddy and I may push the truck into his garage tomorrow to try to bleed the rears, but I think that it's wishful thinking. I'd rather wait it out till the rain passes this week to take a break from the truck. The last 3 days have been both productive and rather frustrating.

[S-31]

Those rear (rubber) hoses will break down on the inside and clog up and you won't be able to get any fluid through them at all. I've had it happen on several different trucks.

[k1rodeoboater]

I don't think it's the rear rubber hose. I was able to bleed the drivers rear drum today. The passenger rear drum still is dry. Perhaps the cylinder went bad on that side? I took the screw completely out and nothing came out.

I also finished welding up the patch on the front of the fender I got recently. It also lined up ok despite my really crappy cut out of the patch. There was a lot of using a copper spoon to fill in a obscenely large gap due to my crappy cutting. It's not pretty but it worked, and it looks like it came out alright. I'll know better once it's in primer. I spread JB weld on both sides of the weld to "seal" it. Tomorrow I'll probably tackle the rear of the fender, a 8" long by 2" wide patch is needed on the underside of the fender. It's not visible but I know that the rust will just keep going if I don't try to get rid of it.

I'm also going to be going up to Raleigh this weekend to get all my rust repair panels...except for the one I forgot to order of course. I'm going to tackle the rust repair once I get the brakes working again.

[k1rodeoboater]

I got the last wheel cylinder bled today. I ended up having to use a vac bleeding tool to do it, but it worked like a charm. Almost ended up running the rear chamber of the master cylinder by accident, but I got fluid in it in just the nick of time. NO air bubbles anywhere in the system now that I can tell. I have gravity bled all 4 corners. I may have a leak or two show up as I pressurize the system once I get the pedal hooked up, but that's easy enough to fix.

Speaking of hooking the pedal up...I'm stuck right now at this point. My original idea to make a linkage to hook up to the booster rod has failed. It worked for three pushes but ended up flexing and hinging at that point (on a positive note it was pretty stiff and only traveled a short distance before I met total resistance...guess the brakes work now). Looks like I'll need to extend the rod...but I'm scratching my head as to how to do it. I'd like it to be adjustable so I can fine tune it, so chopping and welding in the length of rod is out. I don't know how well the rod will take a thread, and I have no idea where to find a coupler to fit on there to extend it out. Any ideas?

Other than that I helped my buddy install a front sway bar on his 81 C10. Just as a FYI an 81 C10 lowered with drop spindles you don't need to use the swaybar brackets. You can bolt the bushings right to the frame, there's enough room for them and it tucks it up and out of the way nicely.

We also took some time this evening to clean up his garage a bit. That'll be our continuing project till I can figure out an idea to hook up my brake pedal.

[k1rodeoboater]

I'm hoping to take Tuesday off from work to do a little work on my truck. I have the brake pedal linkage all sorted out...well in my head at least. I'm going to go back to Lowes and buy a 3" 7/16x20 bolt, thread it onto the stock clevis, mark where I need to cut the booster rod and bolt, disconnect the MC from the booster (gonna use straps/blocks/whatever I can to hold it in place w/o disconnecting the lines, pull the booster, do what I need to do, and get it back in the truck all in one day. Hopefully my buddy can give me some help with it, but he's had a pretty rough weekend family wise so that's got his mind really pre-occupied.

Aside from that no progress this weekend due to the aforementioned family emergency he was having...that and my girlfriend moved down here on Friday so that sorta took up all my free time. My girlfriend is going to be competing with my mistress, as she calls the truck, for time with me.

I'm really debating about doing the rust repair immediately following the finalization of the brake swap. The truck needs to get inspected in Nov, and I'm not sure how much time I'll have to work on it between now and then. I may just get it inspected before Nov just to remove the stress of the deadline.

[k1rodeoboater]

The brake conversion is DONE!!! I had to buy a 2.5" long 7/16x20 bolt, cut just behind the eye of the booster off, and welded it in place. Pedal is nice and firm, but I can't tell if the booster is doing much of anything.

There were a few minor setbacks....

1.) The studs on the booster need to be chased again, they may be shot where they stripped out. In order to hold the MC on I put two washers behind the nuts to allow the nuts to hold the MC in place. Ghetto but it works.

2.) I took the truck for a quick ride not thinking to double check the alignment again, it was all sorts of jacked up, but the ride was just 200 meters so I'll probably wear my passenger tire out sooner (oh well these are cheap temporary tires anyways). As soon as I tried to drive the truck I knew something was wrong, 50M later it dawned on me what it was.

3.) I had to tighten up a few fittings, but they were the MC and the PV connections so that was convenient.

I also got a skim coat of bondo on the drivers rear fender that I patched some rust on. I'll go back tomorrow to sand it down and spray primer over it. Hopefully by Wed it'll be mounted on the truck.

All I need to do now is to get the tail lights and license plate light hooked up and I should be street legal. I'm gonna try to rebuild the rear harness tomorrow after work and maybe get the tails hooked up. Since I deleted the backup lights I'm thinking about using that wire to draw power for the plate light. I'm pretty sure that the backup lights were hooked up into a toggle switch on the dash. Don't know if that was OEM or the previous owner's doing.

[k1rodeoboater]

Got my truck moved to a 10x30 storage unit since my buddy is moving this weekend. Drove her there and got quite a few looks on the way. Then again I'm missing my fenders, doors and cab are still flat black, and my drivers stepside fender was in the bed (painted, just needs to be mounted).

I still need to get some things from my buddy's place before he moves this weekend, so I doubt much, if anything, will be done on the truck. I'm going to make a harbor freight run tomorrow to get a floor jack and maybe some wheel dollys. I will be hopefully getting the rest of my rust repair pieces in this week.

[McMurphy]

This is a great thread K1.... I like how you had a plan to start off with. Of course having a suspense helps too.
Mine is just a project to keep me from spending the 9month long Alaskan winter playing World of Warcraft, so I will be a tad more casual in my approach I think...

I will start a thread soon, probably this weekend after I have actually gotten my hands on the old boy.
I'd like to sit and tell some old war stories with you from when I was your age and working on my car in the barracks parking lot (which for me was a 63 Crysler 300, and the reason why I will NEVER own a Mopar again ) but that is for beer and another day.

Keep up the motivation soldier!
Motivation doesnt last, but neither does a shower, so that is why they need to be redone daily!

[k1rodeoboater]

Thanks McMurphy. Lately my plan has sorta gone out the window. I hope to be mechanically sound by the end of NOV so it'll officially be 1 year from when I registered the truck. If it'll happen I don't know....but it's a goal.

here's some pics before my wordy update...





Can't see this one all to well but it's my "work area"




As you can see I'm no longer at my buddy's house...he moved so I had to get a new home. I figured since I was not driving, and all that's left to do is rust repair, I might as well get a storage unit where I can do all the work inside of and leave the truck partially disassembled. I'm glad I got the 10x30, it's just enough room in there for me to work and have a work area as you can see. It's a bit cramped but I can roll with it. Ventilation isn't bad too with both doors up, though I probably will grab my box fan and have it blow air through the unit just to help keep temps down some.

I have the truck on mini moving dollys from harbor freight. I was skeptical if these would work, I ended up greasing up the wheel bearings just to be safe. So far they're holding the weight without issue, and they roll pretty easily so long as all the wheels are pointed the correct direction. I can move it by myself too so it's not as bad as what the HF reviews said. You do have to check them in the store though, a lot of the ones I looked at the wheels didn't want to spin back on their own.

My work bench is actually two harbor freight sawhorses and a solid top pallet. It's ghetto but it works for my needs at the moment. I have 2 more pallets in there to rip apart and use to make shelves/storage/whatever with. My truck bed is full of stuff still. I'll eventually need to clear it out so I can more efficiently use the space I have. My drivers side rear fender is in there, and once I get that mounted I'll be able to get all of the clutter off of the floor and into the bed.

So yeah my progress for today...I drilled two witness holes in the door hinges for re-aligning them, removed the passenger door (I was shocked, it's not as heavy as I figured it would be even with all the glass in it), wire wheeled some of the floor and found I'll have to replace more than I initially thought, ripped out all but the drivers side firewall padding, and attempted to sweep out the inside of my cab which is full of dirt.

Hopefully tomorrow I can get back over there and cutting out the rust

[k1rodeoboater]

Well the cab's a little less rusty now...and holy crap was there a lot of dirt in the cab supports and rocker. I wouldn't have bothered to sweep up prior to starting had I known that.

Progress for the day, all on the passenger side...

cut out the rocker
cut out the cab corner
cut out the B pillar
cut out the kickpanel
cut out the A pillar
cut out the outer part of the floor
fit the outer floorpan replacement panel (triplus...so-so fit but it's workable)
tacked in outer floorpan replacement panel


Tomorrow I hope to (more or less) finish welding in the outer floorpan panel. I ended up screwing up my gap a bit in a few places so I'll need to use a copper spoon to help bridge the gap a little easier. I'm not keen on doing it but I'm even less keen on cutting out a strip and fitting in another piece to weld in. Once that's done I want to fit up and weld in the B pillar, kick panel, and A pillar. I still have more surgery to do on the floorpan to remove rust near the transmission hump and right at the seam for the firewall.

[McMurphy]

You are quite a bit ahead of me man.
I have all that yet to do, luckily my passenger side isnt bad at all.

I took some pics of the emergency flasher switch for you. I will have to post more as I can chase my wiring in deeper, after I get my engine out.

I dont know why someone would cut out and take the ignition switch out of my truck but they did.

#1 is the switch from the outboard side looking in
#2 is a close up from that view
#3 from underneath
#4 is an attempt to get from the back looking forward. Sorry the E-brake is in the way.

I am boneyard scavenging today, if there are any other photos I can help you with (locations or specific up close) please let me know. I hope to get my radiator support out this week and start dismantling the IL6 292 that is in there.

[k1rodeoboater]

hmm so that's where that orange wire goes to.

Yesterday I picked up over $1K worth of parts for $725. I'll post up the full list o crap this afternoon when i'm over at my storage unit. The guy I got the stuff from was cleaning out his shop so he gave me a whole bunch of stuff for pennies on the dollar. Here's what I remember though, all of this is repo

full door skins x2
drivers rear cab support
drivers A and B pillars
driver door relay x2
wiper arms
all the knobs for the headlights, choke, wiper, and cig lighter
interior window crank x1
interior window crank and door handle gaskets
side mirror gasket
cab mounts
radiator mounts
low hump black carpet kit
chrome Chevy headlight bezels x2 (maybe 3)
60-66 GMC glove box (know someone who needs one)

[McMurphy]

Whew... glad those pics helped you some.
Unless you were just being nice LOL.

Cool score on the parts man! I was grave robbing at the boneyard yesterday as well. Gonna post pics of my new pieces and parts in a few minutes on my thread.

Keep up the good work Soldier, good to see you still at it!

[k1rodeoboater]

I got the outer floorpan piece completely welded in today. I also got the kick panel pretty much fit down to size, and the A pillar is almost there as well. Since I still have the A pillar and kick out I dropped in the replacement front floorpan to see how much I'll need and how much of it will need to be reworked. Just as a FYI to everyone, the cab bushing hole isn't in the right place on these repo "actual fit" pans. Luckily for me I won't be needing that part of the pan. My passenger side is rusted in the depression by the trans hump and up where the pan meets the toe board from the trans hump across. I'm going to have to make some patches for that out of scrap metal since the patch panel doesn't hit those areas.

I also probed the drivers side to see what I've got in store for me. Where the gas pedal was is completely rusted out. The previous owner had it held in by a block of wood under the cab and two wood screws.

I'm not counting on getting back to work on the truck this week for any serious length of time. Maybe an hour here or there but not a solid enough chunk to really make serious headway. Hopefully this next weekend I can get the passenger side complete minus the rocker.

[VA72C10]

Nice progress!

[allaboutchevelles]

hey, thought I would just let you know the SUPER CHEVY show is going to be at rockingham dragway this weekend. Ill be heading down earlly saturday morning.

[k1rodeoboater]

Update for the day...

Got the A, B and kick panel fully welded in. I also started on fitting the other passenger floorpan, it's 75% of the way there. Just need to do a little trimming and it'll be time to weld it in. After that all I've got left is to repair the rust damage by the trans hump, cab corner, and outer rocker. I'm kinda surprised at how quickly this is all going. Granted I've not gotten to work on the truck as much as I'd like to, but it's still steadily getting done.

Also here's all the parts I got last week

Low hump black carpet kit
3x 64-66 Chrome Chevy grill bezels
2x 64-66 parking light bezels
Chrome interior rear view mirror
Chrome interior rear view mirror mount
Window crank
turn signal cam
turn signal stalk
horn button
stepside tailgate chains
gas pedal
door handle/window crank gaskets
all the dash knobs (lights, wipers, choke, cig lighter)
2x chrome or stainless door sill plates
battery tray
cab mounts
radiator mounts
x2 full door skins
drivers rear cab support
drivers A and B pillars
x2 driver door relay
x2 wiper arms
side mirror gasket

...all for $730


Looks like I need to get a membership on here to start offloading some of these extras.

[VA72C10]

Sounds like nice progress and a good score of parts!

[McMurphy]

Just checking in with ya...
Are you going to get some pics up after this long weekend?

[b2948kevin]

Great work, K1. Good to see your progress on your stepside.

Stepsides FTW!

[McMurphy]

Anything new here?
You didnt deploy did you.... ??

[k1rodeoboater]

Originally Posted by McMurphy

Anything new here?
You didnt deploy did you.... ??

Nope didn't deploy, just been dealing with work/career issues. Ended up getting a P2 for my back so I'm now looking to try to re-enlist and reclass since an 11B with disk degenerative disease and 2 blown discs in the lower lumbar is pretty much destined to be stuck in an S shop and passed over for promotions. Been fighting that battle with the CoC for a while now. Haven't gotten to work on the truck as much as I'd like because of the time spent packing up stuff and preparing to PCS. My car also started acting up on me, so I was busy fixing that, then my harley up and quit on me...still don't know what's wrong with it. Add in the holidays, going to visit my folks, spending time with the girlfriends family, and still dealing with pain from the injury. It's been not as productive as I'd like.

Right now I'm still working on the rust repair. Gonna get the rear cab support welded in today, and hopefully the front cab support as well. I want to get the truck to the point where if I need to PCS sooner than expected I can at least get it onto the trailer and drag it wherever I'm going next.

[k1rodeoboater]

Here is a quick update of the weekend process.

Cab supports on passenger side are welded in and done. I need to widen up the opening by the inner rocker on the front one so dirt and crap can come out. The rear is as good as I can get it. I can't weld the top inch or so of it, so I'm just gonna have to fill the gap with JB weld or something.

Gutted the passenger door and mounted it back on to see how bad I screwed things up. Everything looks fine gap wise, and the door swings and shuts just fine....so that's good. Also with the door gutted I am going to try to fix the skin that is on it rather than replace the whole thing. Worst case I waste some time and end up welding on a new skin. The only rust is in the bottom front corner in a small section. Te dents from the cowl and the old mirror that were on there will be harder to fix but I can figure something out.

Test fit the repo rocker...boy is that gonna need some surgery to fit right. Just a lot of pie cuts, hammering, and some small strips of metal. Also it doesn't meet up with the inner rocker. At this point I am just going to leave it be. I figure for now any dirt and crap i cAn hose out of there. Down the line I will seal it up by welding the gap shut, but for now I have other things that require my attention.

I looked at the stock exhaust on a 63 short stepside. I think the OE exhaust will fit, and that will probably be the route I go with. I don't have the time nor inclination to mess with building a custom exhaust at the moment. This of course will be down the line when I start driving the truck. I still need to get the A arms rebuilt, which I will likely farm out to whoever does the alignment.

The passenger side floor pan is almost completely done. I have a spot by the trans tunnel I need to fabricate a patch for, and a small portio by the toe board that needs a patch as well. This next weekend it will be DONE for good.

During the week I have a bunch of things I need to get done, so likely no progress till the weekend. I want to clean up and organize my work area. A lady a few units down from me gave me a storage shelf, so I will make full use of it to get my crap off the ground and organized....again.
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