Well WTF, do I post my 3500HD project here or not

Not much of an update though it does account for a pretty good chunk of my evening; started painting the frame with POR-15 until I ran out. Had a guy over here swapping in some front drop springs and rear drop shackles on his big block regular cab/sport side project; while he kept himself busy with that I grabbed the paint can and went nuts.



I'll have to go tomorrow to grab another quart so I can finish the frame and suspension parts. I intend on painting pretty much everything on the frame, including the inside walls as much as I can reach without getting it all over me.

It was a good thing I ran out of paint though because my renters brought over some fresh-off-the-grill fajitas that went great with the Negra Modelo beer that was in my fridge. And I still have a nice big fat one ready for breakfast.

Richard

That POR-15 really is some great stuff! I used it on the entire frame of my first truck project and its still on their 7+yrs later and looking great with no cancer rust coming through.

A little more work done;

Pretty much finished up frame painting. I did the underside of the rails which was a major PITA, and the insides of the rails. Got POR-15 all over me no matter how careful I was. I didn't do the rear two crossmembers because they're coming out; they're for the old rear-mount gas tank. The wrecker unit has its own rear crossmember...


Put the cab back on the frame so I can start thinking it might become a truck again. Plus, I needed the room back so I can move the truck over a bay and bring the engine/harness/dash/etc. donor truck inside to start tearing it apart.


Oh, I skipped painting some of the suspension stuff I guess because I'm just so damn tired of working with the POR-15. I still have half a quart left and will be using it at some point in the reassembly to do stuff like the core support, steering column support once it's installed, etc.

Richard

Been busy in the shop, not on the HD, but made a big decision on the paint...y'all might recall early in the thread I said something about rattle can black, well, forget it. I rent one of my buildings out to some guys that do a little paint and body, figured why not have them throw a little bit better paint job than that on it. Not doing anything show-quality by any means, it's still just a work truck, but I figured why not make it look like someone cares. Rolled it over to their side earlier today and they jumped on sanding and doing a little bodywork.

Smoothing a couple of small dings in the edge of the cab:


Repairing the better of my two crappy HD grille extensions. The center grille tab retainer was broken off; they salvaged one from another broken filler strip I had laying around and patched it in. They also fixed three big cracks in the lower portion of it. (I really didn't want to find out what the dealer gets for these new, if they're even available.)


Since the fenders, doors, and hood were pretty freakin' trashed on this truck, I grabbed the fenders and hood from my other HD, much better shape. I still have to pick what doors I'm going to use out of my stash. Also doing a composite headlamp '94-up GMC grille on it.

Truck will be painted my favorite color. Black. Should roll into the paint booth tomorrow morning; more pics to follow.

Richard

A few days ago I handed the painters some fenders, stripped doors (and I mean gutted), hood, grille, and fender flares. They've been bodyworking them for a few days and finally today -

Actual COLOR being sprayed on my panels!!! Not very exciting pictures, but I'm jazzed about the progress.

Just the insides of the hood, fenders, and doors so far - painted and cleared - exterior sides are finished with bodywork, primed, a little spot putty on them...





All the jambs, insides, etc. are being done so it looks factory black. Again it won't be perfect, yeah from under the hood you might see a speck of factory white in some of the holes, but no big deal as far as I'm concerned.

(They're doing the backside stuff out of the booth since it's not critical. The exterior side will be painted in the booth.)

Richard

Killa!

Thanks bud.. can't wait for this paint to be on, I've been trying like hell to stay out from up their ass because I hate it when people do that to me. I'm just hoping they get it done before I lose my motivation to put this POS back together. Not really looking forward to having to gut the donor truck for its engine, harness, dash, etc. and having to convert everything over since the donor is '96 and the project is '94. Two shitboxes couldn't hardly be more different.

Richard

Just some more paint pictures; there were a few issues and they're going to do some sanding and another spray, but the fenders, doors, hood, and flares have been done.







Richard

Got a few paint pics...I might ask them to take care of the dents around the rear windshield; might not. It didn't really show before paint but of course now with gloss black it's impossible to ignore. Again, this is a cheap paint job, I didn't ask them for the million dollar quality and I don't expect it. They've done a bunch of work on other flaws the body had. Oh, and those dents in the rear cab wall down low will be completely obscured by the flatbed so I told them don't worry about it.







Was rearranging the lot a little bit last night and here's a big part of why I need to build this thing. I had to move the other HD (which is the longer wheelbase, 84" cab-to-axle) parts truck...my poor '98 C3500 really isn't up to the job.



Can you say, frame flex? That's also the highest the wrecker could get it off the ground, when I started turning, the HD's right front tire was dragging the gravel. Lack of extra springs in the wrecker combined with weak frame = sux!

Richard

FINALLY some progress! Not a bunch but the only work I've done on it since rolling it back inside from paint. The hood, fenders, doors, flares, and grill are all sitting here nice and shiny black. I think they're having to re-do the grille filler strip.

I mounted the new style steering column support, located it with the hydroboost bolts and jacked it up with a block of wood to get the upper part as high as possible, drilled some new holes, and bolted it through the cowl and used nylock nuts. The holes from drilling the welds out came nowhere near each other so I was unable to re-use them (didn't expect them to come close anyway.) Grabbed the column out of the '96 C3500 donor truck and popped it in so I could check the steering shaft; it's 6" too short, will hopefully get one from a newer HD or I'll fab something up. With the hydroboost locked in, I also mounted up the master cylinder after draining the fluid and cleaning the reservoir.

I masked off the inside of the windshield and rattle-canned the top edge of the metal under the dash so no tan would be visible through the bottom of the windshield, and hit the surrounding areas too; everything inside is black now except the ceiling which will be covered by the headliner of course.



Took the dash out of the '96 donor truck so I could rob the harness. I figured this one would be the best bet since I'm using the engine, engine harness, etc. from the '96 as well. It's also a standard trans so I knew it would have all the knick-nack junk like the clutch safety switch connector. This is too much work to have to double-back and get one from another truck because some stupid connector wasn't there. Plastic caddy from some cheap old Sears toolbox makes a nice spot for throwing all the screws, clips, etc. since I'll need them again soon.



I also popped the hood off the donor so I could pretend I was getting ready to pull the engine. That's next...maybe tomorrow.

Richard