Welcome! Sounds like a big project! Good luck; will follow along!

Tim

 

Thank you! It is a very big project. I am excited to work on it more.

Over the course of Sunday and for a few hours each night this week I have been working on the harness that will power the engine internals. It is still a work in progress but here it is so far.
[photo="medium"]95788[/photo]

The black box has three relays in it to give ignition power to the under hood electronics. There are 3 relays for engine control. 2 of them turn on the various components, one of them sends a signal to the PCM when the brakes are not compressed. The last one is needed for the torque converter or so I am told.

The black box also has 2 relays (of 5) that will control the electric cooling fans. Those two relays do the following, when the A/C is on the low speed will kick on, when the A/C is on and the low speed temp switch for the fans is closed it will kick the fans to high speed, the high speed switch should hopefully never activate at that point but if it was to it would be ignored. However if the A/C is off the low speed temp switch will activate low speed and the high speed will activate high speed.

The black box also houses fuses for the brake signal and fan signal (10amp), the neutral safety switch on the 4L60E (includes reverse lights)(20amp), the transmission (10amp), Fan 1 (30amp), Fan 2 (15amp). Both fans are wired so they could take 30 amps if need be. I am just following the wiring diagram provided by GM for the fans I salvaged out of an early 2000's v6 GM car.

The other 3 relays will control the speed of the fans. Per GM these fans run in a series (for low) and parallel (for high) setup which requires 3 relays. Once I have the wiring complete I will draw up electrical schematics and include them in this thread for the whole electrical system.

I also have hooked the old coil wire up to use as the ign lead to trigger the relays that need triggered. It will provide no power to the box besides triggering the relays. I have 2 red wires currently coming out that will be the power for the fans. I will run these off of the factory 1998 Suburban UHFB. The power for the rest of the relays also comes from the factory Suburban box and will have big blade fuses in there.

That is my update for today. Hopefully the weather this weekend will be nice so I can pull the bed off and start looking at the gas tank mounting. I might be changing what I do depending on the test fitting.

 

Just a short update today. I finished up the wiring of the relays for the fans. I also tested the setup last night on the bench (video to come). Everything worked as I was hoping it would. For being my first time working with relays I am sure catching on it seems. I used the diagram for the high/low on the fans from GM but the computer controlled the fans in the early 2000's v6 GM cars so I had to come up with the wiring for the A/C on my own. I wanted to make sure that if the fans were on for the A/C they would kick up when the switch would close for lower temp to help with keeping it cool. The computer that I had only has a fan signal for an auxiliary fan so it being computer controlled is unfortunately out of the question without more programming if that is even possible.

I have heard that BMW makes a two stage temp switch for 85 to 97 BMWs that activates one switch at 195F and the other at 210F. I think that is the route I will take to get these fans going with the temp. I realize that I will have to tap a port since BMW doesn't use standard threads. But that is a discussion for another time though.

Once I have edited the video of me testing the cooling fans I will get it posted on YouTube and share or imbed (if allowed) the video in this forum.

 

Here is the video of me testing the wiring the other day.

Yesterday I decided not to get too carried away with removing the bed. There was rain in the forecast so I decided to work on the engine instead.

Last weekend while I was cleaning up the garage I decided to open up a box that I had received with the Suburban. I didn't know what was in the box but I knew it was gaskets of some sort. Low and behold it was the intake gaskets. I was in shock. Money saved!

Friday I cleaned up some of the engine parts that were removed. I started on the intake with some engine degreaser, shop rags, elbow grease, and as little water as humanly possible. The intake was cleaned. I also did the valve covers. They are going to need something other than just a good cleaning. They have some pretty significant rust on them. Not a big deal though.

Saturday I moved over to the engine. I started by cleaning the heads up where they meet the intake. I did this with carb cleaner, shop rags, wire wheel, and a razor blade. A lot of people don't like the wire wheel part but just know that I didn't press down hard on the heads with the wire wheel. I just pressed hard enough to make everything smooth. It worked out great!

Once I edit it up I have a video on that as well.

I then mounted the intake to the engine using torque and bolt order specs I found online for my engine. That seemed to have gone well.

After that I used the carb cleaner to clean the grease off of the engine and its brackets I know I could have used something else but the carb cleaner did a pretty good job. Here is a pic of the engine after yesterday's work.
[photo="medium"]95820[/photo]

Those brackets still have to come off so I can do the water pump but the water pump is a project for another day. The water pump that I pulled off has nothing wrong with it so I am debating on whether to put it back on or not. It is a fairly new pump. I helped the original owner put it on a few years ago. Not sure how many miles that was.

I did discover a few hurdles that I have;
- I have to figure out what I am doing for a power steering pump. The one that came off of the engine is shot.
- In my research I found that the Vortec exhaust manifolds will rub the frame. I have also heard some people say that older SBC manifolds won't work but others say they will. I don't want to buy a set until I know for sure.
- A change in exhaust might interfere with the oil cooler/filter setup. If it does I will have to eliminate the cooler but would rather not.

That is my update for now. Today I hope to get out to the garage again and do some soldering on the electrical system. I am still trying to figure it out but I might be doing some plugs so I can unplug one part of the harness from the rest. Not sure yet. We will have to see what happens.

 

Well I went and did it last night. I found an 82 C10 for $500. The interior is in decent shape. It has most of the stuff under the hood that I still need and it has the instrument cluster I was looking for! After talking with the guy it sounds like he will hold onto it until I can gather the money up to buy it which is great. I think in total I will get about $750 - $1,000 worth of used parts out of this C10 before I get rid of it.

 

I am still here. I had an extended weekend of 5 days total. I did a bunch to the truck. To the outsider it wouldn't look like much but it was quite a bit. The front clip is off and sitting in the garage. The layout for the boxes is mostly complete. I will get a pic of that and show it in the next post.

I also was able to pretty much merge the two harnesses together. I have some work left to do but we are close to having the wiring part taken care of for the cab and under the hood parts. I removed the harness from the cab last week and added the wiring I needed to it. I also found an auto dimming mirror with compass and ambient air temp that has been added to the project as well. Though I am trying to keep most newer technology out of the cab, having something like that is nice. It will also give just enough of a hint that something is not normal.

With the made progress I am strongly thinking about moving forward with the body work to the bottom of the cab. I have decided that I am going to do some sort of liner like maybe bed liner for the bottom of the cab and up the firewall. I am also going to flow that right into the cab on the floor and up the back of the firewall as well. I won't do any area in the cab that would be visible once the new carpet and interior is in. I think that would help with road noise and also help protect the cab from rust in the future. Now I just have to chose the right kind and brand of liner to use. If you have suggestions I am all ears.

I am also bouncing around the idea of keeping the saddle tank as well and putting an electric fuel pump in it. Not sure what I will do quite yet but the idea has come up. I won't be able to finish the wiring until I decide what route I am taking with the fuel system since I will have to plan the fuel pump wiring around that.

This week I plan on finishing the wiring in the cab and under the hood. This weekend I might get to bench test the harness! After that I will move on to the wiring under the truck. Again I need to decide what I want to do with the fuel system first.

I have videos of all of this progress but I have to edit them before I can post them up. Once they are edited I will post them on here as well.

Another thing:
While I was removing the harness I found this. Not sure what it is. If anyone can shed some light, please do.

 

I am still here. I had an extended weekend of 5 days total. I did a bunch to the truck. To the outsider it wouldn't look like much but it was quite a bit. The front clip is off and sitting in the garage. The layout for the boxes is mostly complete. I will get a pic of that and show it in the next post.

I also was able to pretty much merge the two harnesses together. I have some work left to do but we are close to having the wiring part taken care of for the cab and under the hood parts. I removed the harness from the cab last week and added the wiring I needed to it. I also found an auto dimming mirror with compass and ambient air temp that has been added to the project as well. Though I am trying to keep most newer technology out of the cab, having something like that is nice. It will also give just enough of a hint that something is not normal.

With the made progress I am strongly thinking about moving forward with the body work to the bottom of the cab. I have decided that I am going to do some sort of liner like maybe bed liner for the bottom of the cab and up the firewall. I am also going to flow that right into the cab on the floor and up the back of the firewall as well. I won't do any area in the cab that would be visible once the new carpet and interior is in. I think that would help with road noise and also help protect the cab from rust in the future. Now I just have to chose the right kind and brand of liner to use. If you have suggestions I am all ears.

I am also bouncing around the idea of keeping the saddle tank as well and putting an electric fuel pump in it. Not sure what I will do quite yet but the idea has come up. I won't be able to finish the wiring until I decide what route I am taking with the fuel system since I will have to plan the fuel pump wiring around that.

This week I plan on finishing the wiring in the cab and under the hood. This weekend I might get to bench test the harness! After that I will move on to the wiring under the truck. Again I need to decide what I want to do with the fuel system first.

I have videos of all of this progress but I have to edit them before I can post them up. Once they are edited I will post them on here as well.

Another thing:
While I was removing the harness I found this. Not sure what it is. If anyone can shed some light, please do.
View attachment 128284
View attachment 128282

it looks like it may be a dual battery isolator common in rv's and work trucks back in the day.
...or possibly some sort of old school stereo gear, lol. full disclosure: posted before reading entire thread. my bad

 

What is that?what were the connections on it?

 

Is it from the 76? It looks like two power transistors or power diodes. He didn't get a good pic of the component side. I'm gonna guess it's part of a discrete CD ignition. There should have been a good sized aluminum canned capacitor somewhere, too.

Ted

 

Lol,msds' first attempt

 

Lots of'em from the '70s were homemade. It's a very simple circuit. The precursor was a Dwell Extender. I made one for my Goat in '69. It electrically closed the points 50 msec after they opened. It gave the coil lots more time to build the field.

Ted

 

I totally forgot to post the picture of the plug that was on the end of the cable that is attached to this thing. The wiring went toward the drivers side. This was located directly above the glove compartment and it was bolted to the under side of the dash.

Thank you guys for your input thus far. The other side of the unit is covered by a metal bracket. I will take it apart sometime soon when I am not that busy with other things.

Here is the pic

 

guna wager a guess here. (i did read all your posts but i dont really remember.) is it possible that it came from under the dash? if so could it be the day time running light module? iv never screwed with one or seen its plug but it looks similar. its located on the right side under the dash on the drivers side.

Al

EDIT.... maybe i should actually pay attention to what you wrote... LOL. .... wiring went towards the driverside and was located above the glove box on the underside of the dash.... i guess it could be the drl module in a different location but i dont know. my 97 burb is where i said it is and well im not sure on my 98 sierra but the mosquitos are out so im not checking.

EDIT i went and looked... its definitely not the drl module. it dosent look anything like that.

 

?any name or # on it?

 

There is a hand written number on the metal bracket someone made for it. The number is 6270663. Other than that I don't know anything about it. I can't get a good picture of it because of that metal bracket but it does appear to have capacitors of some sort under that bracket which could support the CD ignition theory. I will take the bracket off of it tonight after work and get some pics of it without the bracket.

 

There is a hand written number on the metal bracket someone made for it. The number is 6270663.
<snip>

That's not the phone number of the Wild Goose Bar & Grill in St. Louis is it?

Ted

 

So that being part, would you see a splice into coil to distributor wire?and was this for fuel economy or the start of someone"suping it up"?

 

Thanks, Tim! That connector does look like it would go to a radio.

Ted

 

So it has been a while. I have been busy with projects, other than the truck, but I did pick up some parts today. And by parts I mean an entire parts truck. That 1982 C10 I mentioned in a previous post. It is actually a 1981 C10.

I plan on pulling the interior, factory bucket seats from what I can tell. I was disappointed that the backs don't fold down but I can't win at everything. From what I hear, finding a truck with factory bucket seats from 73-87 is very rare. I tell you that these will eventually have to be reupholstered but they are in surprisingly good shape otherwise. The console is also in fairly good shape. For their age anyway.

It has a 305 in it. Not sure about the condition but I soon will be. I am going to try to get it fired up here in the next few days to see if the engine is worth pulling. If not no big deal. I will still get my moneys worth out of it. $500 is what I spent. The A/C system, interior, gauge cluster, and the other things I got from it make it well worth it. I bet there are $1000+ in parts in this thing that I will get to use in the K10.

That is the update for now.

 

Wow. It has been a while since I updated but that is ok. Besides stripping that other truck down and pulling the bed off of the 76 only to discover I needed to go back to the drawing board, I haven't had much progress until this weekend.

But first, what I discovered when I removed the bed. Observation one, the guy I bought the truck off of didn't bolt the bed down. All of the nuts were only hand tight or were missing all together. However the frame looked really good. Observation two, the gas tank from my old suburban is around 1 to 2 inches too wide and will not fit. I am, instead, buying a saddle tank for a 1987 TBI style R10 or V10 truck. I will also be getting the fuel sending unit for the same year as it will have a spot to put a fuel pump. With some slight modifications I will have the setup I need.

The final observation was the holes for the receiver didn't match the receiver I had so I have to drill some more holes. 4 of the 6 holes did line up perfectly though. 2 more bolts and I will be in business!

This weekend I was able to get quite a bit accomplished on Saturday even though I had a mission with the rescue squad that I am on. I took the Vortec 350/4l60e combo and stuck them in the truck. Then pulled them back out when the motor mounts didn't line up with any holes. Finally today I was able to get the mounts setup the way I needed by drilling some new holes for the mounts. After that I put the engine back in again. Perfect fit!

I forgot to mention last weekends task. I have officially converted the cab over to a 4wd cab with the donor parts from the first red truck I had. I don't think I did too bad of a job given I have only welded 4 times in my life and I was using a flux core welder which everyone told me would burn through metal.

That is my update for now. I plan on being more active with this now that the temps are good outside. Also I am accumulating enough parts from different vehicles that I am going to have to start keeping a list of everything so I don't lose track of what each part is in the future. Basically this truck will have its own manual written for it describing everything from the wiring to the placement of different things to what part numbers go where. That way I can forget something and not be totally in trouble. haha!

 

here's an entirely different direction to go; newer vortec technology gone old school: a mid 90s 5.7l L31 vortec running a Carter AFB and genuine GM HEI dizzy.

i used flat top hypereutectic pistons to get a 9.4:1 cr and 1.6:1 rocker arms to bump the stock L31roller cams lift by 10%. edelbrock makes a better intake for this application than the Chinese knockoff i bought online but it seems to work ok. i put this combo in a 73 k25 GMC in front of a T350/np205 and couldnt have been happier. lots of torque and a flat wide powerband from idle past 5500 rpm. all that with the added bonus of old school simplicity - no computers, sensors, or modules to contend with.
i'm not posting as a better idea, ..just a different approach to blending old and new bowtie technology.

 

@b-rad That looks pretty good. My plan is to go fuel injected. Too far along to change that now.

Since the last time I was on here I have not done much. I got the fuel tank all set up and I moved the transmission cross member. I did order a bunch of parts. Over the course of the next few months I will be installing those. I will be ready real soon to install the transfer case and a driveshaft or two.

I think I will be able to drive it by the end of the summer. Even if it is just a few feet.

 

It has been a while since I was on here. I did somethings over the spring and summer that put the project on hold. Now it is too cold to work on anything in the garage. On top of all of that my best friend rolled his 97 suburban. He wasn't seriously injured in the accident so all is good. However, he did tell me that I could have the Suburban so I have another Vortec 350 fuel injected with a 4L60E transmission. The Suburban is sitting in my brothers barn at his farm right now. I have to get it and start taking it apart soon.

Before all of that happened though I ended up with a 1977 K20. I found it in Kansas for $900 and drove it home. It has a SBC 400 with a TH350. I have a few things to do to it but it does start up, run, and drive down the road which is more than I can say about the 76 right now.

I will start a new thread soon outlining my plans for the 77. As of right now I am going to leave it mostly stock but I do have plans. Stay tuned!