#minijimmygmc Wifey's 1990 K5 Jimmy rebuild

[chevy3100truck]

Front seats in...
They're out of a 2003ish Silverado extended cab. I have a set of 99 seats to go in it, but the budget & time to get them required isn't there right now lol. These ones are a bit beat, but they are power seats so cheap seat covers to make them look a bit cleaner & they'll work.

I had made reinforcing plates for under the body when I first put these seats in last year.


Rear seat - 2006ish Yukon Denali XL 3rd row. Fits like it's made to be there lol. Again, plates under the seat area to reinforce the floor. The 1990-91 trucks had 3 point harnesses in the back, but the 3rd point was on the roof, so you couldn't use the seatbelts with the roof off. This solves the problem (it was either that or use 89 & earlier 2 point rear belts).

[chevy3100truck]

Next up was the tailgate - kind of a pain to put on solo lol. I did however get the power switch on the back working and also wired in remote control operation so you can lower or raise the window from the key fob (ie. while walking up to it and wanting to load stuff in the back)



Biggest issue was the trim - I had put in new window channels to replace the rusted away originals, then the exterior rubber seal worked ok, but when adding the interior seal it was WAY too tight. Window would barely move. For now - no interior seal, I might try to use a second exterior seal on the inside or I'll try to find an old worn out one lol.


Added the trim & new bumper (without the factory style trim on the bumper - just the clean chrome style)




The filler panel between the bumper and the back of the truck isn't in, I haven't painted it yet as it was pretty beat up. I'll probably either just replace it or use bedliner on it.

[chevy3100truck]

next up - the rest of the front clip.....
My father in law dropped by to help with the hood, then put on the grill & cowl panel. Ended up with a bit more of a gap on the drivers side than I wanted, but I'll have to move the fender to fix it and with everything now installed it'll have to wait a bit.

[chevy3100truck]

next up - fun stuff lol. Pushed the truck outside (after disassembling part of the garage door opener for clearance...…) and bolted on the tires. First drive around the block without the windshield was actually a success! Truck drove decently, alignment wasn't bad, and only a couple of little gremlins to fix.





The windshield got installed last Friday, so after picking it up at 5pm, went home, washed it, and went for a 20 or so mile drive with the family to a car show that a friend puts on every year. Basically the shake down cruise for it.

[chevy3100truck]

Fixed a couple of the bugs (a turn signal issue and the brake warning light being stuck on due to a bad connection at the old style ABS/brake computer). Still having an issue with the knock sensor or the timing controller, but it runs just fine, just drops a code sometimes.

Wifey drove it around Saturday, then she had to go a bit of a distance Sunday so me and my son took it to the dragstrip for the day while he was racing in jr. dragster.

[chevy3100truck]

Still have some stuff to do - interior needs to be completed (headliner recovered, panels for beside the seats in the back, trim installed). Need to get the new seals on the canopy & get the windows in.

It's definitely not perfect, but this is the before / after.

October 22nd 2017



July 22nd 2018





It's definitely no where near perfect, first shot for me at doing paint & body work. It'll have to do for now, and the next one (my 70 GMC) will be better.....

[Palf70Step]

Fantastic Job! What a transformation.

[Greenlee]

Awesome!!!

[chevy3100truck]

so we've put a few kilometers on the Jimmy now, and buttoned up a few things. Unfortunately the axle I had swapped into the rear of the Jimmy ended up having a bent shaft on the drivers side, not too bad, but you could see it when it was rolling down the road. Luckily, the guy I sold the front & rear axles to had never used them, so he sold the rear back to me & I swapped over the shaft. Ended up selling the housing & carrier for the same as I paid to get the axle back, so I guess other than time and a few liters of 80-90 it didn't really cost me anything (and the diff cover had a drip anyhow - so it was going to come off and get refilled eventually)

The Vintage Air AC system is now charged - it moves a ton of air which is nice.
Being as it now has AC - we could put the top on

[chevy3100truck]

Buttoned up a few things for the interior as well, recovered the headliner in gray vinyl & installed most of the trim. Still need to make the panels for the rear beside the seats, but hopefully I'll get to that soon. The visors are just the original ones with the fabric pulled off, at least the plastic underneath is black lol.





One of the new power door locks is a bit sticky (sometimes won't unlock all the way), so I'll have to do something about that I guess, but otherwise everything has been working surprisingly well. Even drives not too bad (for a solid axle truck on 35 x 13 1/2's), it's not going to win any races, but it seems to be working OK for now.

[Ski-me]

Maybe I missed it but I assume you painted the fiberglass top? Is it glossy or were you able to keep the factory texture somehow and flat?

[chevy3100truck]

So now that the Jimmy is more or less complete, just a few details to work out, I can get to my other projects...…

The 6.0L is coming out of the golden turd



to go into my truck - 1970 GMC 3/4 Ton (along with a ton of other work it needs)




so that my 12 year old can have the 350/350 combo out of the 70GMC for his S10 that he bought this summer (to race in Jr. Street at the local dragstrip)

[chevy3100truck]

Originally Posted by Ski-me

Maybe I missed it but I assume you painted the fiberglass top? Is it glossy or were you able to keep the factory texture somehow and flat?

I did paint the top. I sanded all of the texture off (I wasn't really fond of it - plus it has some spots were it was worn down or scratched off). I filled the seams with fiberglass & then skimmed in filler to make it smooth overall.

It is painted in a base/clear both inside & out with a flattening agent in the clear. It's not a totally flat paint, more of a satin/low gloss (which is what my wife had wanted). Inside bright white (instead of the factory off white - or stained mess that this one was lol).

[orngsikL]

Nice build! I like it!

[chevy3100truck]

3 summers on the road now, no significant issues (other than an annoying misfire occasionally at idle that popped up last month & a bad distributor cap causing a bit of grief).

Just about time for it's winter nap, so cleaned it up again before it goes into hibernation

[LT7A]

That truck really turned out nice. I'm glad you guys are enjoying it. I like that little blue S10 too. Will you guys be making it street legal to drive on the road soon? Your son's got to be just about old enough to do that. Also, is there a build thread on your 1970?

[Palf70Step]

[chevy3100truck]

Originally Posted by LT7A

That truck really turned out nice. I'm glad you guys are enjoying it. I like that little blue S10 too. Will you guys be making it street legal to drive on the road soon? Your son's got to be just about old enough to do that. Also, is there a build thread on your 1970?

Thanks! The S10 is done (well, for now) and it's street legal. My son is 14 now and races it in the Jr. Street class at the local dragstrip (1/8th mile, limited to 9.0 second ET's). We had to throttle stop it a bunch to slow it down to 9.0 in the 1/8th, based on the numbers without the throttle stop it would run low 13 / high 12 second ET's in the 1/4 mile. Lots of fun - though it's kind of weird riding shotgun with my kid driving lol