Home » Public Forums » GMCnet » [GMCnet] Last Couple of Weeks' Projects
| [GMCnet] Last Couple of Weeks' Projects [message #259832] |
Sat, 23 August 2014 12:44  |
Ken Henderson
Messages: 8726
Registered: March 2004
Location: Americus, GA
Karma:
|
Senior Member |
|
|
I guess I let Y'All down -- I didn't record the projects I've been involved
in for the past couple of weeks. Nothing very visually exciting anyways,
though:
John Beaver, who some may remember as my engine builder friend for whom we
rescued the '76 Eleganza last year in Montgomery, AL finally got to a
"good" stage week before last. He's been gutting and rearranging the
interior and finally got to the stage of having foam insulation sprayed
into it. The shop for that is 40 miles from here, the first "trip" since
we took about 16 hours to bring it 160 miles. So, I loaded up a spare
tire, my on-the-road tool kit, and some other stuff to follow him to
Albany, GA. The trip was flawless, so when they called on Friday for him
to pick up the GMC, he didn't bother me. Until he called to ask for a P/N
for a replacement fan belt. That was easy. And it was almost as easy when
he called later for the P/N for the lower radiator hose, damaged when
another fan belt broke.
Not quite as easy was the call at 6:00 PM from 15 miles away, where he was
beside the road with another fan belt broken and the first one damaged.
Since his other friend, who'd taken him to the parts store, was no longer
along, I had to make a service call. Fortunately, I had a replacement for
the broken belt, and he had another for the damaged one. He also needed a
15 mm end wrench because one, only one, of the bolts on the alternator was
that size. It took us over an hour to get the two belts on to stay:
Because the second replacement belt he had appeared to be much too narrow,
we tried to use the slightly damaged new belt -- only to have it
immediately turn belly up as soon as the engine was cranked After two
tries we gave up and put the narrow one on -- it lasted 15 miles anyway.
We finally got home at 8:00 PM.
Him being a professional mechanic and me an experienced amateur, we were
both pretty shame-faced when we agreed that none of those replaced
components, and a lot of their still-installed cousins, had any business
being on the road in the first place. We should have replaced ALL of them
last year before we ever moved it from Montgomery. Never too old to
re-learn the lessons we've forgotten in our old age, I guess.
Oh yeah! They did a great job spraying his coach, and the deal included
THEM doing the trimming (they said they had equipment to make it easy). I
meant to ask his cost, but forgot.
With that ordeal behind us, I tackled a job I've been dreading. Before I
had the GMC painted in 2002, or so, I installed different roof-top clearance
lights, the small torpedo-shaped ones. With them well caulked in place, I
had Topeka Graphics paint their bases the roof color, figuring that would
help the caulk persevere. I sealed the lenses, I thought well. Over the
years, the bulbs have one-by-one failed. Since I don't drive much at night
and think those lights are a useless hold-over from the days when a guide
watched tall vehicles to be sure they'd go under the bridge, I didn't worry
about them being out. And I never got stopped for them. But when SHE
found out that we had only 3 in front and 2 in the rear, SHE began to
complain. Even I didn't much like the electrical tape covering the holes
the sun had eaten in some of them. Still, I didn't want to go back to the
OEM lights, which seem most available with LED's, because of the different
footprint in the paint.
Finally, after a LOT of internet searching, I found sources for replacement
lenses for cheeep. Since I could not find the complete lights with LED's,
I decided to install my own. I had 9 little 1"x1-1/4" PC boards with 9
bright LED's each that I'd bought a year ago for cheeep too. By using a
Dremel tool to cut away the old rusty sockets, I was able to preserve the
lens screw sockets and make room for the PC boards. Angled slightly and
hot-glued in place, those LED's look about as good as any I've seen, and my
cost was nearly nothing. While I was tempted to cast the lenses full of
clear epoxy, that would have complicated the job just too much, so I merely
bedded them well in caulk. If they last another 10+ years, I doubt that
I'll care what their state of being is. I'm awaiting another shipment of
the LED's to MAYBE replace the remaining, still working, lamp.
That done, I got interested in my instrument panel again. When I first
started fooling with EFI, I installed a cheeep Chinee fuel pressure gauge.
The sender didn't last long, but the VDO replacement worked well with the
gauge for a few months. Then it decided it might as well just read 30 psi
at any time 12 VDC was available. Since I only want about 18 psi, I got
tired of that indication. Finding a spare vacuum gauge in my Instruments
Box, I decided to use it to monitor my brake vacuum tank, which is kept
evacuated by the new Super Pump (I added a dash activity light for that
when I installed the pump). That has already proven to be more useful than
I expected -- with the pump and the engine producing about the same vacuum,
a slight vacuum loss will cause the pump to come on unexpectedly, even with
the engine running. I'll have to find that vacuum leak.
With the instrument panel's back side exposed, I decided I might as well
add another indicator I've needed: Since I control the dash A/C with a
thermostat for the compressor clutch, I need to know when the compressor's
running. Many years ago I added a green LED to the face of the HVAC
control panel, but that now resides in the console where the LED is nearly
invisible. So, I paralleled that LED with a new one on the dash. HVAC
control will be a lot more pleasant now that I don't have to convince HER
to stand on her head on the engine hatch to tell me if the compressor is
OFF or ON. :-)
Yandina sent me a replacement C160 combiner for the one that failed during
last summer's "out West" trip. While I very much like combiners, I've had
too many failures: 2 each C100's, and now the C160 to which I upgraded
after the 2nd C100 failure. Ann-Marie's never told me the results of the
tear-downs on them; she just sends me new ones.
.
'Nuff of my tinkering...
Ken H.
_______________________________________________
GMCnet mailing list
Unsubscribe or Change List Options:
http://temp.gmcnet.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/gmclist
Ken Henderson
Americus, GA
www.gmcwipersetc.com
Large Wiring Diagrams
76 X-Birchaven
76 X-Palm Beach
|
|
|
|
Current Time: Thu Oct 03 11:25:41 CDT 2024
Total time taken to generate the page: 0.00655 seconds
|
GMCforum
Search
Help
Register
Login
Home
