'98 Busurban Storm Chase Vehicle Build

The Bususrban is going to be parked for quite a while as I just shipped out the transmission today.

I think there is about a 50/50 chance I'm never going to see it again, so I expect to be driving 'Ol Yeller 60 miles a day for the next few months until I get this all sorted out.
It's kinda hilarious how many times this truck has saved my ass when the vehicle that is supposed to be my daily driver breaks. Usually 'Ol Yeller is just holding on by a thread just enough to get me too and from work, but for once I actually put the truck together right.

It drives so nice, I just wish it had A/C like the Burb (maybe I'll install one of these vintage air A/C systems in the truck).

jjester6000 said:

The Bususrban is going to be parked for quite a while as I just shipped out the transmission today.

You must be registered for see images attach

I think there is about a 50/50 chance I'm never going to see it again, so I expect to be driving 'Ol Yeller 60 miles a day for the next few months until I get this all sorted out.

You must be registered for see images attach

It's kinda hilarious how many times this truck has saved my ass when the vehicle that is supposed to be my daily driver breaks. Usually 'Ol Yeller is just holding on by a thread just enough to get me too and from work, but for once I actually put the truck together right.

You must be registered for see images attach

It drives so nice, I just wish it had A/C like the Burb (maybe I'll install one of these vintage air A/C systems in the truck).

Click to expand...

Several guys over on GM square body forum have used those and like them.
Ol Yeller is kinda like my Burb. We bought it to be a swap meet/toy show/weekend/work truck, that you could go to the wrecking yards in and not be too concerned about putting grungy car parts in. Then both of the nice, AC and heated, newer daily drivers quit, and ol' Burb just kept on going....

. . .

So as some of you may already be aware, I'm entering a new era with this truck. I'm turning it from a high mile beat up work truck into a pretty decent rig.

So anyways, I picked up this full manual kit from a '98 K1500 pickup for about $800. I had to drive about 5 hours each way to get the parts, but it was worth it.

It's an NV3500 with a decent NP241 T-Case.

I already got the clutch pedal/master cylinder installed as well as the hole cut in the floor.

All I'm waiting for now are about $400 in clutch parts from Rock Auto. As soon as that arrives, I should be able to put the truck back together. I plan to be driving it by the weekend.

So I've been driving the truck for a week now, and I've started to notice some things about the trans.

I knew coming in that there would be a 50/50 chance that I was getting a bit of a worn out trans, and despite how tight the shifter is, it is showing some signs of wear.

First of all, the synchro for second is kinda worn out, so it grinds when downshifting unless you rev match and double clutch (not really a big deal for me).

The thing that is sort of worrying is the fact that it sort of wines in 1st and 2nd, from 3rd forward, no issues.

I'm not too worried about this, and I'm pretty sure I'll be able to get quite a few miles out of it before I actually need to do anything about that.

With that being said, is there anything you guys think I can do in the mean time to help it out?
There is this video by Thunderhead289 in which he puts some Lucas STOP Slip in the 5spd trans on his Ford Ranger and it quieted down some wining. Do you guys think it's worth a shot? I'm just running the syncromesh fluid with no additives right now.

So I decided to give the truck a bit of a shakedown by taking it storm chasing in Iowa last Saturday.

The truck did fantastically. I rolled into Des Moines Friday night and ended up putting about 600 more miles on the truck the following day just within the state of Iowa. My forecasting skills weren't the best, so my first target of Mason City didn't work out, so I had to race back south to catch up with the action.

Me and several other chasers ended up following this one storm for over 200 miles until it fizzled out as it moved into Illinois.

It never dropped a tornado (as far as I know) but produce some crazy wind gusts (one of which blew one of my mirrors clean off due to the fact that it was held on with self tappers) as well as quite a bit of hail.

(After repairing it with panel bond adhesive)

This hail also took a toll on my already destroyed windshield.

(I didn't really run into anything bigger than 1/2 An inch, so the hail dents are minimal.)
Overall a great test for the truck.

Oh yeah, and I'm going again tomorrow

I just bought myself a new set of hub caps.

I found them at a junkyard in southern Illinois.

They are off an oldsmobile of some sort, but I think they look downright classy.