85 Chevy SWB

[softballnrd27]

Here is some of the pictures of the wiring nightmare I am dealing with:

I took out all the wires I don't need and then I started to route the wires with the intake and stuff on the floor and I got it to what I thought was good and then took it out to the truck and found out that I can probably route all the wires in a way that will allow me to put the computer inside the cab. Here it is in the middle of re-routing the wires:

I had to pull the mock-up engine out by I sold the block and heads. Once I get my engine bay cleaned and the motor painted then I will install the new motor and start the wiring again.

[softballnrd27]

I received some parts today and was super stoked!!! I got my hd 3 row radiator with dual 14" electric fans and som enew radiator mounts from classic parts.


My little helper watching me to make sure I put the fans on right:

[softballnrd27]

Painted my new engine yesterday and took some pics this morning. Don't mind the red valve covers, I have another set that I am going to paint, I just haven't decided if I want to go black or green on the valve covers.

[softballnrd27]

I had a decent weekend on the truck but didn't make it as far as I wanted to. I planned to get the engine bay/firewall done so I could drop the motor in for good but due to some get togethers and having duty friday night I was limited on time. I spent some of saturday cleaning the garage and then I dropped the gas tank sunday. I spent pretty much all day today in the garage and I got the 2 big hole on the firewall filled in and realized I am not a body man at all. I had to take a break in order to not lose my mind. Here is the pic of where I am at right now:



I am going to get some filler and add a little so it doesn't look as bad but I am not going to go crazy bc I will have a real body man take care of it when I put it in paint prison in a couple of years. I really just want to get this dang thing going. I have to finish cleaning the engine bay so i can paint it and drop the motor in for good.

[softballnrd27]

I just placed an order for my fuel system so I should be complete from fuel rail to tank. I hope to have the motor in it's permanent home this weekend. Only a little bit left.

[softballnrd27]

I got some more done on the truck this weekend. I am 1 step closer to dropping this engine in for good. All I have left to do before I drop it in is drill out a bolt where the trans mounts and pull out the pilot bearing on the crank.
I got my engine cover, intake, valve covers, and engine bay painted on saturday.
I spent a long time masking off the intake cover to get it painted the way I want it and I pulled the tape off a little to early so I have some spots that i need to fix. I also forgot to mask off the 3 little raised areas in front of the mounting bolt hole so I have to figure out how I am going to fix that. Here are some pics of wht it will look like though:








Today I got the fuel tank cleaned up and painted with some undercoating just to protect it and installed the sending unit and -6an fittings to prepare for the install.

[softballnrd27]

Oh yeah I forgot the picture of the engine bay. It isn't the prettiest but I am waiting for when I go through the whole truck for real.

[softballnrd27]

I got quite a bit done this weekend, it doesn't show in the pics but I did.
1st I got the v-bands welded on to the manifolds:

Welds aren't the greatest but they will hold. I hit them on the inside and outside:


I also started to tackle the wiring harness. I pulled all the pins out of the connectors so I could feed the wires through the firewall with out having to cut a 17" hole.


All I have left for the harness is to route the power, keyed ignition, and all individual wires and then shorten the wires that are too long.


Just a couple of beauty shots:

[softballnrd27]

So I have slacked on updating this thread but I am going to revive so that I can begin to document it's progress. Keep in mind that these updates are a couple of years old.
I got alot done but there isn't alot of pictures. I did get one of the battery mounted up though. I got the exhaust done and measured my trans cooler lines and fuel feed line so I can get those built this week. The exhaust was a long process and sucked. I also got my son to dig out the bushings on one of the leaf springs but I couldnt get him to do the other side. All in all a good weekend but still lots left to do.

[softballnrd27]

Took the front end apart to put on the spindles, spring and polyurethane kit.


Here is a picture of the new spindles and rotors waiting to be installed.


I also bought a 21 circuit wiring harness from EZ wiring. I took all the wires out that I won't be using at this time. I bought it so I can upgrade later and not have to worry about adding more standalone fuse blocks.

I almost finished rebuilding the front end today, what a pain in the @$$!!! I now have PST polyurethane bushings, inner/outer tie rods, solid adusting links, pitman arm and idler arm. I didn't get the brakes installed but that won't take long.

[softballnrd27]

I am have been plugging away a little at a time. I had to drop the fuel tank once more to wire up the fuel pump. I installed the new harness and started routing all the wires where they won't be seen. So far with the intake installed you will only see wires at the conections. Not much to take pictures of but here ya go:



I got all but the OBDII port wired up for the engine harness, I just need to hook up power and ground it.
When I started wiring:

How it is now:

OBDII port in the ashtray:

The body harness is almost done, I need to wire up the rear lights, headlight switch, and some other little underdash things in order to finish the wiring completely.
I got the steam lines and PCV system hooked up, some plug wires and a tune and I should smell exhaust fumes this week some time.
I still need to paint my grill and hood and then put the bed bed back on and also install my interior pieces as the upholsterer finsihes them up. I am hoping to drive before the end of the week so wish me luck.

[softballnrd27]

I am ready for a tune!!!!
I got all the wiring for the motor hooked up had to do some troubleshooting but I figured out the issue. I was getting power to my relays and fuse block constant and keyed but my fuel pump wouldn't come on. So I checked all the wiring and the computer connection and all that was good, changed the relay and still no dice. I dropped the gas tank again and cut the splice I had for the power and gauge hook up and ran a wire straight from the battery and still nothing. So I pulled the sending unit/fuel pump up and I didn't connect the plug to the fuel pump. DUMMIE:doh: Hooked that up and what do you know it worked. Put the tank back in place and primed the fuel system. It will turn over and almost run but just sputters out. Jamie should be coming over tomorrow to get a tune in it.

I also did some cosmetic things up front.
Before:



After:



I spent all day on the truck today doing a little of everything today. I had to take a break from the wiring so I wouldn't go insane so I changed the oil/filter, and the trans filter and gasket and buttoned up a few more little details before going back to the wiring. 2 things for sure will come out of this whole evolution:
1. I will know every inch of wiring in the truck is good to go
2. I will be able to do Yoga after this with all the crazy uncomfortable positions I had to get in.

I had to trace some wires in my old harness and find them on the schematics I have so I can wire up accessories that weren't included in the EZ wiring kit. That took a couple of hours and was mind numbing. I got the column wired up and the wires taped up and out of sight. I also addressed the gaping hole left by the factory fuse block. I sandwiched a piece of 22 ga sheet metal between the new fuse block and the fire wall, drilled a hole in it and threw in a grommet and called it good. With the wiper motor mounted you can't even tell.
Before:



After:



I wasn't able to get the tune in it today. Hopefully this week, I am itching to drive this thing!!

[softballnrd27]

It finally runs!!!!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wb_HRuJe2zE&feature...

[softballnrd27]

I got this pig 2 steps closer to being road worthy, I bled the brakes, and hooked up the power steering so it doesn't take an act of congress to turn it. I picked up my seat and newly recovered dash pad and i am pretty happy with it. He is making my new seat cover and i should be able to put a new cover on it soon.





I loaded up the truck and took it to a Josh's house so Jamie could work his magic. Here she is all put together, on a trailer, and headed to my Parker's Performance.

[softballnrd27]

Well I hit a fairly big bump in the road with the truck. I had some issues with the flex fuel injectors that I had so I swapped them out for stockers. Not sure what happened but number 6 was filling up with gas and it caused some fairly gnarly damage:


This is what was still in the cylinder head above the valve:


The cylinder and piston are still good so I can salvage it.

Ended up getting a 5.3 to swap in
I got the motor installed and ready to start putting all the other little stuff together on it.

[softballnrd27]

Here is a ground clearance comparison shot between the truck and f-body oil pan:
Truck:

F-Body:


I got some more done today. I got my oil pressure, fuel level, and water temp gauges installed. I installed the inner fenders and grill. All I need to do is put the bumpers and hood on and get it tuned. Once I have it tuned and running I will clean up all the wiring.




The mess I have to clean up:

I had it cleaned up at 1 point but I had to tear it back down to chase some wires so I am leaving it as is until it is running.

[softballnrd27]

I bought some 243 heads to replace the 706s with the 3 broken bolts in them and also got a Lunati Voodoo 60510 cam and matching springs for $550. It is about the same as an ASA cam only on a 113 lsa instead of 110 so it should have a nice little rumble.

Here she is running, although not 100% it's a huge step in the right direction:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvtad...ature=youtu.be

[softballnrd27]

Got a cold air intake in today. I just got it mocked up, I still have to find a way to mount it to keep it from bouncing around.



I got all of the wiring cleaned up this weekend what a PIA that was. I found out that I have a bad injector that is causing the truck to run like crap. I got one on the way and I should have the truck running good by the end of the week. I also ordered a gauge port and fuel pressure gauge that I can mount to the rail adapter to keep an eye on fuel pressure.
Wiring when I started:

End:

[softballnrd27]

Heads and cam are installed. Now I am going to work on the new wiring harness. I am starting from scratch on the harness bc I didn't like the way the stock one fit.




I have been working on building a new harness because I don't like the way the stock one fits.
Here it is hanging:


Here it is installed:

[softballnrd27]

Started working on installing the newly built harness. I have quite a few hours ahead of me to get it 100% installed but it will be worth it in the end.



Well, I finally finished installing the wiring harness. I am so glad it is done. I got everything installed except the CAI, V/C, and coils. I checked the torque on the rocker arms and got the exhaust bolted up as well. I had to get 2 new rear tires bc they were dry rotted and I finally brought my seat to the interior guy so he could install my seat cover it looks amazing!!
New seat cover, I have to get it out in the sun to get the wrinkles out and also paint the blue plastic trim.


Hankook 275/60r15s


It's ALIVE!!!!
I got it back together and running, now I just have to clean up some wires and re-install the interior. Jamie is gonna tune it some time this weekend so I should be driving it next week.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cwa7clF9a5o

[softballnrd27]

Here is a crappy ride along video. I will get a better one when I have a passenger!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lf5txfDuxzE

[softballnrd27]

So as you can tell with that update dump I had alot of ups and downs , 3 different motors and even more wiring. Funny thing is I bought an AAW 22 Highway Series harness to update the not so good ez-wiring harness. I have a 9" in the garage waiting to get rebuilt and installed. I'm currently looking for a 4l80e to swap in bc the $150 th350 I bought 6 years ago is starting to slip, can't really complain about that though. I am still collecting parts to do the 73 front end swap. Also changing out the flowmasters for some dynomax bullets, x-pipe and full exhaust out the rear, no more dumps under the cab. Once those things are sorted out I'm going to start saving for a porterbuilt touring front and rear coil over w/trailing arms and get another frame to install those on.

[softballnrd27]

Track results from both trips.
1st trip 305/th350 stock 10 bolt w/2.73 gears 2.497 60ft 17.795 @ 73.86
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-APossaxBg

2nd trip 5.3/same trans and rear 2.4 60ft 14.85 @ 97.9 mph
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBTTkvgQHmE

I will take it back to the strip after the rear/trans swap

[tinydb84]

Damn that was an update lol. I love that green, and LS swaps.

Crazy amount of damage!

[softballnrd27]

Yeah it's crazy. I forgot I had a build thread here. These were from a local board when I was stationed in NC. That board is pretty dead so I wanted to document the new stuff I'm doing.