Viva La GMC!

Keep it clean, children may be present.

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tristessa
Trusted Air-Cooled Maniac
Location: Uwish Uknew, Oregon
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by tristessa » Wed Jun 12, 2013 3:25 pm

Gypsie wrote:And it's still spelled "Brakes"... :pirate:
Except when you break the brakes. :cyclopsani:
Remember, only YOU can prevent narcissism!

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Gypsie
rusty aircooled mekanich
Location: Treadin' Lightly under the Clear Blue!
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by Gypsie » Wed Jun 12, 2013 4:35 pm

would they then be baroque?...
So it all started when I wanted to get better gas mileage....

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Mike Boell
Old School!
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by Mike Boell » Wed Jun 12, 2013 5:45 pm

This is classical.
Mike Boell
1975 FI Westy
Oregon City

SOME PEOPLE ARE LIKE SLINKIES - NOT REALLY GOOD FOR ANYTHING BUT THEY BRING A SMILE TO YOUR FACE WHEN THEY'RE PUSHED DOWN THE STAIRS.

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tristessa
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by tristessa » Wed Jun 12, 2013 8:09 pm

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METAL!

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Remember, only YOU can prevent narcissism!

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Xelmon
Sedna of VW lovers
Location: LA or Portland, OR
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by Xelmon » Wed Jun 12, 2013 10:05 pm

Alrighty then, break it down. :D
Image

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Xelmon
Sedna of VW lovers
Location: LA or Portland, OR
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by Xelmon » Sun Jun 16, 2013 10:49 pm

Alas, there was simply too much to do to make it Maupin.

As I am still tired and things were moving at a rather rapid pace, pics are few and far between at the moment. I'll take that, and video, tomorrow!

Here are some highlights;
* The exhaust has been fitted
* The linkage has been fitted to perform the shifting. It's functional, still needs a good bit of fiddling. Lokar makes it very nice to adjust to be honest. :)
* Tires have been all fitted
* Brakes and lines have been completely replaced on all 4 corners.
* Carb has been reinstalled, and a leak has been fixed... And I just figured something out.

That hole used to be the barb... So that my vacuum switch for the 200R4 would work! AAAUUUGGGHHH, oh well, that's an easy piece to get, I hope.

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Moving on with the list:
* Tires have been installed
* Initial fire up done, runs
* You guys know how I rolled and the fan was bent on the radiator pipe? Well, it had hairline cracks with a drop leak. Those have been brazed by dad, so radiator is good too.
* Park/Rev/Forward tested, works.
* Maiden voyage around the block done

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Now comes the trouble...

* The van will accelerate, although hesitantly. I am thinking that I'm running very rich ATM, as I did have a few particles come up and hit me as the dog house was up, and the air cleaner was completely off.
* Once I take my foot off the pedal, it very much hesitated to re-engage the transmission. Sometimes it even felt like it was slipping, and I had to rev it - relatively - quite a bit for it to catch again. Sometimes it did, sometimes it didn't. (!!)
* It will also refuse to shift up from 1st.
Finally as limpy as it was, I swung it back around the corner to home.

Notes:
* This is supposedly a 0 miles rebuild, so it should be completely redone. That said, 1st result on google yields a mention that the governor spring is busted. That's not happy news, as just got done filling the thing with ATF.
* After futzing around with things, I noticed that the throttle pedal will actuate the carb only about half way. The carb and the TV cable are 1:1, so the TV cable is actuated only half-way too.
* I'll have to check for vacuum leaks on the carb and such tomorrow. Maybe it had a vacuum leak before, and now that it's perfectly buttoned up it's running pig rich?

So, we shall see what tomorrow brings. Either way, it is going to be another long long day.

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ruckman101
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by ruckman101 » Sun Jun 16, 2013 11:55 pm

Rest Grasshopper.


neal
The slipper has no teeth.

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ruckman101
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by ruckman101 » Sun Jun 16, 2013 11:56 pm

Don't get me wrong, appreciated the update.

neal
The slipper has no teeth.

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hambone
Post-Industrial Non-Secular Mennonite
Location: Portland, Ore.
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by hambone » Mon Jun 17, 2013 6:05 pm

Well, I was offended anyway.
http://greencascadia.blogspot.com
http://pdxvolksfolks.blogspot.com
it balances on your head just like a mattress balances on a bottle of wine
your brand new leopard skin pillbox hat

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Xelmon
Sedna of VW lovers
Location: LA or Portland, OR
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by Xelmon » Tue Jun 18, 2013 1:47 pm

Oh you guys. :P

Great news though! After dropping the pan, swapping the governor, cleaning the pan, and running around it still refused to shift.

Today I made a call to Transmission Exchange, and Steve there told me to do a bit of adjusting on the main cable... AND BOOM!

It stop, it goes, it shifts, it runs!
Too bad it didn't make it to Maupin. :|

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hambone
Post-Industrial Non-Secular Mennonite
Location: Portland, Ore.
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by hambone » Tue Jun 18, 2013 1:52 pm

Good job! Now don't kill this one. :cherry:
http://greencascadia.blogspot.com
http://pdxvolksfolks.blogspot.com
it balances on your head just like a mattress balances on a bottle of wine
your brand new leopard skin pillbox hat

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Xelmon
Sedna of VW lovers
Location: LA or Portland, OR
Status: Offline

Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by Xelmon » Thu Jun 20, 2013 12:52 am

After much futsing around, I'll be honest I am a hint burned out on this project.
The big drive was to get it running for this weekend for a cross-country drive to the East coast.

Since the old guy in our group has offered his small SUV which gets the same mileage, is a lot quieter, and has A/C.
Never the less, here is the story...

Reading through other forums, I've read that the governor may be at fault for my lack of shifting... So off came the pan, and in went a new governor.

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Needless to say, I was a bit tired and sick at that point, so I didn't use the vacuum pump. Herpa derp!

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Honestly it was a good thing that I dropped the pan... There was a fair bit of watery sediment in the bottom! I didn't do any crazy driving, took it all very slowly, so I'm damn sure that the sediment didn't get washed up into the tranny.
New filter and gasket were installed, along with the new governor.

Then of course I did the calls and all that. The long and short of it is that stock rebuilds have this small ball and L piece in the tranny, near the 'throttle valve' as it's called, what adjusts the oil pressure. Well, in the case of a 'throttle valve cable' failure, the transmission maximizes oil pressure and saves the tranny, instead of letting it drop to low/zero and burning it up.
Well, the adjustment was done, and bam, everything worked.

So much so, that after a bit of running around Tuesday, I had a good bit of driving on Wednesday. :)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FIJcatS-5o[/youtube]

Before she was quite lazy, and slow to start. Now if you're not careful, the damn thing will jump!
She shifts up to 3rd in very short order, and I have hit 4th around town. Gives the van a veeery low rumble.

And at this point, may as well show the van's cabin in it's current form. :)

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This is the piece that I fabricated on the Friday of Maupin, around 1AM at PSU. Came out pretty well, although I do have to make some adjustments.

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And of course the cross member that Tris made. Came out OK, eventually I'd like to sit down and redo it so that it doesn't look so... Haphazard.

Otherwise the van has been running great. I do have to deal with a massive vacuum leak, still, runs great. :D

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hambone
Post-Industrial Non-Secular Mennonite
Location: Portland, Ore.
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Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by hambone » Thu Jun 20, 2013 2:26 pm

Best color ever!
An suv cross country? What a choice...
http://greencascadia.blogspot.com
http://pdxvolksfolks.blogspot.com
it balances on your head just like a mattress balances on a bottle of wine
your brand new leopard skin pillbox hat

User avatar
Xelmon
Sedna of VW lovers
Location: LA or Portland, OR
Status: Offline

Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by Xelmon » Thu Aug 08, 2013 3:39 pm

Wow... It has been a while since I've done any updates!

Partially it's the fact that I had a lot going on, the other is that after I did my trip back to PA I was rather worn out.

First thing's first, the vacuum leak had to be attacked. Turned out that the float / butterfly gasket got damaged and had a 1/16 x 1/4" hole in the side. I got a new gasket set, however I noticed that it was still a loose fit... Out with the RTV!

Took some high-temp RTV and rubber gasket material to thicken it up, so that I can remove material from it.

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Threw the jack on the top of it, just so that it got some extra pancaking action. Worked well too...

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It did slip a bit though. Oh well, out with the razor and drill!

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In about 10 minutes or so I cleaned her up, and shaved off around the bolt holes.

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Install and presto! Tight enough that a razor can't fit through it now! :D

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Since that operation has taken place, I have noticed a few things...

* The engine has smoothed out at idle. It can be the fact that it is "properly" tuned now, however I have a feeling that the brand new torque converter was to blame. It was very rough not too long ago, however with about 1000 miles under it's belt now, I have a feeling that it's wearing in. Transmission pan and fluid inspection with a filter change are slated for next week.

* After a trip to the Oregon coast, I was shocked that I only got 14MPG!
AAAAA!!!! I should be getting better mileage than the Powerslide I had! Here's the numbers;
4650lb's (Measured on a truck scale)
Tires at 34 / 45 PSI front / rear
200R4 with a 3.08 rear end, converter lock-up was not hooked up
Didn't lead foot it
Idle AFR per LM1 was 14.1

Since then I have thinned it out to 14.7 at idle, so it richens it up for load conditions plenty. I'll have to play with AFR under load, as I didn't get a chance to do that.

* Returning from the same trip, the front left sagged pretty heavily, even more so than usual. So, I called around and I can get new springs for $200 a corner, or do a slight rearch and helper spring for $100 a corner... I'll just pull the ones of the white van and call it a day.

* At around AFR 14.7, so stoich, the carb gives off this slight whistling sound. I have figure out that the idle-mixture adjust is what causes this, and if it's full rich or full lean the whistling goes away completely. I didn't have at the last van. Is this OK, or is something a bit off with the carb?

* On the same trip to the beach, I had something really odd happening. Rolling down the hill, engine idling, there was this shaking around 50-53mph. Like, the whole chassis was shaking a good 1/4 - 1/2"! Only when I was going down-hill with foot off the gas.
Gas it down hill? No more vibration. Uphill? Like a boss. Idle? Sounds wonderful.
A fellow said that the bearing on the pinion gear on my rear end is out. Is that it, or is it something else?

* Also, the engine diesels, and even turns backwards if it gets a bit too warm. I have a feeling that this has to do with the heat riser valve spring simply missing... So, I'll throw that on probably today, see what it does.
If that doesn't work, what could it be?

That's all I got for now! :D


And also, It's chopping time... Time to get parts off of the white rig.

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Xelmon
Sedna of VW lovers
Location: LA or Portland, OR
Status: Offline

Re: Viva La GMC!

Post by Xelmon » Fri Aug 16, 2013 1:33 pm

Great news guys! Even after getting lost in the woods, and everything else, and running around town I got a much improved 16.5MPG! Hook up that converter to squeeze out a few more, and I may very well hit that magical 20 soon. :D

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