When you have time, but no money

[LSUMurse]

My wife will be having surgery on Friday. I am taking 3-4 weeks off of work to help her recover. However, she's not one to have me in her face 24/7. So, I will have a lot of down time.

I'm looking for suggestions on things to do to the truck while she's sleeping, etc. The problem is with taking 3-4 weeks off of work, cash is going to be tight. I'll have a little, but not much.

So, give me some low cost suggestions to help keep me from going insane (I am not one who functions well with nothing to do).

[KyleSeal]

I've found that buying plane stripper then using that to remove all the gunk from parts until they shine is a great thing to do to pass time.

Or go back and fix small things you may have over-looked due to small amounts of working time before.

[Mr Handy]

clean, degrease, detail engine compartment.
clean detail cab. even if you can is not super nice, cleaning the floor and wiping everything down can make a big difference, assuming you don't do this often.
service your bakes. pads, shoes, seals, and wheel cylinder rebuilds are pretty cheep... having rotors and or drums machined is not to expensive and can make a difference if needed.

[lowrollin70gmc]

If the truck needs electrical work or it's harness sorted out that would be a great cheap time waster.

Obviously not cheap if you buy new harnesses, but going through and cleaning up the stock harness. Could also remove side/turn/tail light buckets, clean and paint the inside white or silver, install new bulbs (cheap) and polish up the existing lenses for better light output.

If you have chrome wheels, polish and wax them to protect them. Change rear axle lube and inspect axle (only cost is a gasket and a few qts of 80/90). Hopefully catch any problems before they are big expensive problems.

Also, I agree with clean and detail engine bay. Paint is cheap and there are a lot of things you can do with zip ties to route harnesses properly. I spent a weekend cleaning up the harness on my mom's 70 elky and it made a world of difference. Only cost was a roll of nice harness tape and some connectors.


Or if you can spring the initial investment, buy a rough truck and part it out. I've doubled/tripled my money doing this and still kept the parts that I wanted. 88-98 trucks have a lot of good parts (I kept the 700r4 and serpentine setup from a 91 and still profited 500 bucks off of parts and scrap).

[AirSpeed]

I would drink beer and go fishing.

[imjeff]

Originally Posted by AirSpeed

I would drink beer and go fishing.

After you're tired of drinking beer and fishing (lol), start tracking down and fixing any leaks you have. Seals are cheap and cleaning up and fixing them passes a ton of time!

[AirSpeed]

Originally Posted by imjeff

After you're tired of drinking beer and fishing (lol), start tracking down and fixing any leaks you have. Seals are cheap and cleaning up and fixing them passes a ton of time!

Well ya, that stuff too but mostly drink beer and go fishing.

[BADAZ chevy guy]

Originally Posted by AirSpeed

I would drink beer and go fishing.

[farmall]

Go down to the Quarter and get a 190 Octane in the BIG mug!

[19673ontree]

If you time and you have a computer you have money EBAY ! I work a fulltime job but I have a lot of time with nothing to do in the winter so I do ebay it's almost not fair how much money you can make on ebay if you have time to fool with it ! Good luck ! I would clean detail fix little things and just enjoy the time off if you absolutely dont have any money to buy parts ,,,

[WIDESIDE72]

Make a list of what the truck needs and go from there.

[DeadheadNM]

Cleaning the cowl and vents is a good, cheap idea. You can consider adding a cowl screen from LMC to keep the debris out so no more leaves blowing into the cab. Also look into replacing the radiator/cab mounts if they're worn. This has always improved my ride and makes the body lines jive nicely.

Best wishes for your wife. Pete

[yuccales]

Go on a "nut & bolt tighting rampage". Cost zero, truck just seems to run better............................at least I thought so.

PS, hope your wife does well.

[LSUMurse]

Thanks for all the suggestions, I'll probably run through most of them.

I'll make sure to do some drinking (Bourbon for me) and fishing, but I'll wait at least a week after she's out.

Thanks to everyone for their well wishes. I'm an ICU nurse and the thought of her going under the knife scares the hell out of me, I always see the worst results of surgeries.

[SS Tim]

If you haven't, download the factory manuals applicable to your truck like the service and overhaul manuals. Maybe even the parts manual and teach yourself parts speak. It would be a great time to sit down and paginate an assembly manual if you have one. Then you can sort through the index to it posted up here on the board.

* VIN/Model Decoders
* Power Team Charts (engine/transmission/gear ratio)
* Post Your Pickup SPID Blazer SPID Suburban/Panel SPID
* RTFM ... Read The Factory Manuals... download 'em here