An Abandoned '78 gets another shot...

[Jigme]

Hello all, new here... from Edmonton alberta canada. HD mech by trade at a Mack Truck dealership, but doing car and truck stuff as a hobby since I can remember. I was mostly into NBS trucks, however I started a project that never got off the ground and ended up in the junkyard. I found myself not only missing having a truck, but being in situations where I really needed one... the quest began.

I'll be honest, the last thing I ever pictured myself owning was a square. I always had a hard on for the 67-72's (I do now own a 72... that's another tale for another time). Around here, those are few and far between, and you can expect to pay a small fortune for a write off.

A friend of mine knew I was looking for a good work truck. He told me about a 78 gmc he had sitting on his parents farm. The price was right, $400.

This was early june of 2015. I didn't even go look at it before buying it. I seen a couple pictures, couldn't be that bad right?



Seeing it in person, it was very evident this truck had been sitting for many, many years. My friend didn't know much of the history, however he did know it had been sitting for at least 7 years. Last tag on the plate was 2001, and it had a 2001 eskimos grey cup champs sticker on the back window. Safe to say it had been a while since it seen the driveway... let alone drove down a highway... None the less, I aired up the 15 year old tires, topped up the engine with used motor oil, filled up the tank which ended up leaking, and got her running.

It ran really good, surprisingly anyway. The hood wouldn't stay latched, had to use a few bungee's to hold it down. Realized I leaked all my gas out and sputtered to a stop... Got some more fuel and put it in the other tank which didn't leak.... Did make it home without much trouble after that.



So I got it home, now the problems. Hood won't latch, gas tank leaks, exhaust is a write off, no passenger side window, tires are about to explode, interior is a mess... NO lights, NOT ONE, worked. To be honest... I almost for a minute had regretted the purchase.

But like all things mechanical, you start to bond a bit with some work.




After tracing wires, fixing rotten patches, and a good scrub, this was starting to feel like a nice truck. It looked like hell, but it ran good and drove straight... what more good a guy ask for.

This being a work truck... cheap is the name of the game. I didn't want to dedicate the funds at the time to a nice paint job. What's the next best thing? bed liner!!!





Time to address the exhaust.... had some spare tubing and flowmasters sitting around... why not....





Found some cheap 31's and nice gmc center caps to put on it.



No shortage of work for her!



The truck stayed in this condition since July, fast forward to Feb of 2016 I had put over 10,000 KM's on it without a problem. Looking deeper into, I found out it's actually a heavy half, and came factory with AC and the 454. The 454 and ac were long gone, replaced with a 305. However... the TH400 remained.

I had a 2002 silverado that was modded heavily... I parted it out mostly, but still had a ton of LS parts laying around. I also sold the rear diff, which part of the deal involved a low ish mile 5.3L. Now the ideas starting coming to mind.....



It's all downhill from there... traded some stuff for go fast parts for the 5.3. Camshaft, flat tops, 799 heads, ls6 intake....



Free harness



My make shift garage... works for now..... shop one day.



I am posting this now, however this is a longer process. I started this project back in feb of 2016, the last picture of this post. I will update this as the events unfolded, up until now. I will spread it out over a few posts however.

[Mr.Chevy4x4]

Sweet! Love to see an old truck get another chance at life. It ought to be fun to drive with the 5.3.

Mike

[Jigme]

Any good project starts with taking the hood off... right?







You know it's funny... I really had no reason to remove this 305. It ran great. I daily drove it for nearly a full Canadian summer and winter, never made a peep. However... some things just need to go. I ended up selling this to a fellow for $60, who was going to throw it in his daily driver. May the 305 live on....



So, engine out of the way. At this point in the build, I had planned on re-using a lot of stuff. Well, everything actually. I got away with that to an extent, however some things perished.

Painted some stuff....




Pulled the trans and drive line. "rebuilt" the stock th400... well, no, just a paint job... but it looks rebuilt!!!

[Jigme]

With the drivetrain out of the way, I started on getting rid of the factory gas tanks for better plans.

That was about as pleasant as one can imagine....



Afterwards, decided to undercoat everything... why not I thought. Everyone looks underneath, right?





So about those plans I mentioned....



About this... I mentioned before I had an old 2002 silverado project then ended up in the junkyard. Well I had quite a surplus of fuel system goodies that were intended for that truck, however never quite made it there. At this point they were sitting in a box for 3 years, so it was time to make use of them.



15g cell, -6 feed and return, all AN.

Bought some tank straps and modified them a bit..







Welded bolts to the bottom of one strap to mount the filters and pump

pump is a walbro 255

[Warrens69GMC]

That didn't take long.....

[Jigme]

So, onward with this. Some specs on this engine;

It's a 2004 5.3 with 110,000km. It came into my hands already stripped down to a short block. The original plan was just to throw a set of stock heads on and run it. However I traded some forged 6.0 pistons I was never going to use, for the following;
Sealed power 4.8 flat top pistons
Comp cams 223/231 .610 .617 112
New lifters, comp pushrods
ARP head studs
Rebuilt 799 heads, with patriot gold double springs and trunion upgrade
LS6 Intake manifold and throttle body

That's the jyst of it. Should be a pretty stout engine! I'll be trying to mock up a set of 2002 truck headers as well.

Funny thing is, the camshaft is the old camshaft from my old silverado. It has about 100k on it by now, and it lives on!

I didn't change any bearings or rings in this build. I seen no need to. The cylinders were still showing the crosshatch. I'm sure I'll catch some flak, but I can bet I will sling a rod or destroy a piston before I have to worry about worn bearings.....

Anyways, enough bull****ting.....















And.. here she goes...



Looks nice in there

[Sik66]

Should be hauling bit quicker with that donk in!

[daddyjeep]

Welcome to the forum. Great project you have there. I'm not sure I would have gone with the pink on the engine myself, but pink and brown are a pretty popular combination these days. For a diesel mechanic you stay current with the fashion trends.

[Jigme]

Originally Posted by daddyjeep

Welcome to the forum. Great project you have there. I'm not sure I would have gone with the pink on the engine myself, but pink and brown are a pretty popular combination these days. For a diesel mechanic you stay current with the fashion trends.

It was meant to be purple, however yes it seems like it took a turn towards a mix of pink and purple lol

Continuing with catch up!

Stock th400 bolted up with new 3500 stall converter. Used a ebay spacer and drilled new holes for flexplate



Modifying the alt bracket for ls6 manifold



idler relocate



Got a hold of my old pacesetter longtubes from my 02 silverado. They were $200, so I decided to give them a whirl. Turns out the pass side fits great, driver side, not so much... Had to notch the frame a little and do a bit of hammer work. Also modified the collecters a bit and welded in a 3rd o2 bung for wideband









Decided to wrap them also





After all that, started on the fuel system mockup. Ebay rails with stock truck inj on ls6 intake !





That's catch up for today... about now is roughly may of this year... we're getting there lol.

[Jigme]

Being with the Volvo/Mack truck brand, I get access to some neat things... These are transmission cooler lines from a Volvo VNL. They are -8 size, and extremely strong. Rigged them up with these russel fittings. They are going to run to a b&m 30k cooler which will end up being mounted inside the engine bay within the inner fender. Hard to explain... you'll see.

[Jigme]

So around this time in the build, middle of may 2016, my daily driver was stolen. It was a 99 Buick regal GS with a long list of mods, including internal engine work. I did locate it the next day, however lots of damage. It would be written off later by insurance almost 2 months later. I robbed parts from it for the truck and then sold the body.



At the time, I was pretty gummed up about it, but I kept working on the truck to keep myself distracted.....

Wrapped the headers



Time for the wiring... This is a 2001 6.0 truck harness. If I ever decide on a 80e, it's ready to go. For now.. just a th400.

I used LT1swap.com for all my guides. It's pretty straight forward and I was able to get this done without too much trouble. This took place over the course of 1 weekend.

Supplies....

[Jigme]

boy, tough crowd around here!

[Warrens69GMC]

Originally Posted by Jigme

boy, tough crowd around here!

You just have us on the edge of the seat waiting for more pictures

[Oldriginal86]

I have an '86 presently with a 305. Aquired a 5.3 from a Suburban that will transplanted in it when the time is right. I'm following this closely. Keep up the good work.

[Mr.Chevy4x4]

I'm following along. Great progress so far. Would like to see some pics of how the drivers side header fits.

Mike

[Jigme]

Originally Posted by Mr.Chevy4x4

I'm following along. Great progress so far. Would like to see some pics of how the drivers side header fits.

Mike

The driver side was a different story. I did end of having to notch the frame about 3/8" as well as hammering the header a bit. Not to mention the stock shift rod does hit it.



In anycase... lets continue.

So the wiring harness is now complete at this point. Roughly the end of may. The engine is in a mostly ready to run state minus a fuel return line. At the time I was in school, so funds were short to say the least...



I had already however purchased all the replacement sheet metal I needed...

What better time to rip apart the interior lol





Some free 93 Burb seats I got. I was able to modify two sets of bench seat rails to make these work.



Metal work...

[daddyjeep]

Into the fun stuff....rust repair. It is coming along good though.

[Jigme]

So now we're just in the beginning of june. A couple things happened that ultimately changed the direction of this build.

The buick was written off, and now I was struggling to receive a decent payout. That's another story, in the end I got the car back for parts and also a fair chunk of money to dump into the truck....

I had decided to make this truck my new daily driver as this point. This build was in the originally a low buck spare parts street cruiser build. Now we needed to change direction and go towards a bit comfier.... quieter.... etc. Well, let's try that I thought....

Got lucky at the local pick n pull and found all my missing interior trim.



Exhaust time!

Plans for this are a cross over a some point, electric cut outs out the side, and tail pipes in the rear. Mufflers are flowmaster outlaws and Dynomax VT's welded open.









Okay... So here's the other thing that happened.

I had my makeshift garage set up in my parents driveway. My current living place had no area for such a thing, so it got set up there in the beginning.

It stood for a long time with no real issues... however someone in the area wasn't happy anymore, and I got this in the mail.



So, with the truck in pieces, it became a scramble to get this thing road worthy and move everything. I took a couple days to find a place where I could call home again, and the rush began. I was in school until the 19th, which didn't leave much time. I ended up calling and getting an extension to July 22.

One could call it a blessing in disguise... At least that's what I call it now. While picking away at this thing, I got laid off on july 4th. I didn't like it there anyway... right.. well.. a little.. oh well, more time to get this on the road before the deadline and find a better job, what fun!!

Let's continue....

Power steering all setup



robbed all the gauges from the buick



Race drive shafts!! just kidding... more paint. New u joints at least!



New rad, hoses, etc...



Getting somewhere...

[Jigme]

Okay, so at this point, we're dam near july 22. A day or two. I finally get this thing back to a running state. My tuner guy comes over, he gets rid of the vats, mild base tune. It runs!! woohoo! I hook up my oil pressure gauge, only 20 psi.... odd... pull the line off, and just air coming out. Oh great....

It is 1 day before this truck needs to get out of here, and I have no oil pressure. On top of that, I had a massive coolant leak at the water pump. Weep hole...

I had a lot going on at this time. I was unemployed, my car tent that I had for 2 years that I loved to death was being torn down, and my project truck turned daily driver that I needed to find a new job, now had no oil pressure.

For a few minutes I remember just feeling super hopeless, it actually really sucked.

But, like all struggles, there is usually a solution. I found a good water pump from a friend for cheap enough. I decided to go on a wim and pull the pan off the truck quickly. Pan off, pick up off. The o-ring didn't look horrible, however it was worn a bit. Guess I should have changed that one.

New o ring...


Thankfully, it fixed my problem. 50 lbs at idle! I had a couple friends come over and we unloaded the entire tent in one trip. I brought everything to it's new home. The truck made it's first voyage over 40km without one hiccup even fully loaded!



After all that chaos, I took a few days to relax... gather thoughts... make some plans... etc.. I pretty much worked 12 hour days for weeks to get that truck running.

I decided I wanted to enjoy it for the rest of the summer. No paint job, etc. Just a nice square with an LS.

Started putting all the body together

I'm not sure if I mentioned it somewhere, but I got newer doors and fenders for this along the way. Used, but rust free ish.



From the End of july to the middle of sept, I simply drove the truck and enjoyed it. Other then a minor oil leak, it didn't give me 1 issue. It was really fun to take it to little meets around town and have all the old guys asking if it's an LS7.

Of course, here is a running video!

https://youtu.be/j-Y6z0Bu_Jk

So, middle of Sept.... started getting cold. I figure I got my time to enjoy it, now it's time to finish it....

The tent at it's new home, truck parked... for now. Updates shortly.

[daddyjeep]

Well cool, I am glad you got it working and was able to get it out and enjoy it. I'm looking forward to more progress. Just don't paint the outside pink like the motor.

[ProudSoul]

looks and sounds pretty sweet! Sucks that someone had to complain about your tent/garage. Can't wait to see more updates

[bustin dailey]

Great work so far! Keep it up, and keep the pics coming!

[dec010974]

Keep it going. I'm right behind you. i need some funds. i wish $6000.00 would fall out of the air.

[Jigme]

Back to this.....

With things settled down a bit in life, it was time to get back to working on this, and ultimately getting it back on the road in complete condition.

Started with, body parts removal, glass removal, cab lights, etc.


Getting rid of everything I don't want.





Removed the dash...



What a mess... this will be dealt with soon...



Ripped out all the wiring, finished most of the metal work on the rockers and floor pan. Gave it a coat of rockerguard for now.

[Jigme]

I decided to start getting the truck prepped for paint. Box removal....





Stuffed that into the tent for now.

This cab was rough, lots of dents and problems.




Shaved cargo and cab lights






Primered