gstubbz's trucks

[skylark]

You've been busy!

 

[Supercharged111]

You're SOL if you wanna wrench on cars in the AF, that whole deal has been slowly getting removed from AF life. Most gov't vehicles nowadays are leased from GSA and have a maintenance contract which is fulfilled 100% off base. At best you'd be doing oil changes once a year on the few remaining true gov't owned vehicles. Maybe the AGE vehicles too. Aircraft maintenance on the other hand is pretty diverse. You have crew chiefs, hydraulics, electrical and environmental (my first job), multiple shreds of avionics, and weapons for the most part. There are backshops too like sheet metal, metals tech, NDI, egress, etc. E&E merged with avionics recently, so there is that. I got sick of long shifts and no weekends which is why I left aircraft maintenance. Sucks because I enjoyed the job itself and I was a good fit. You'll be shocked to see how many people think they know what they're doing, but are really just shooting from the hip.

 

[Supercharged111]

So now that we made it back, here is everything I know about this HD and my plans for it.

When Kyle and I got back, we were both sitting in the ConeTruck and the sun was starting to rise just after 4am. We were both so tired we passed out, and Tyler saw us and took this photo at 6:21am. I was the tard in the passenger seat passed out with my “Truck Legends” hat on!

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You sure you didn't pass out from that erk and jerk in the middle?

 

[gstubbz]

Damn u been busy. Sucks abt throwing the rod. If you weren't couple hours away I'd lend ya a hand. Neat idea abt the victim list haha

Most of the time it's just me doing my own thing, fortunately when I actually truly need help pulling an engine or something it's available to me! I wish I had clones of me because I could get more done lol. And I liked the victim list idea, good way to document it all!

You've been busy!

Very!! I've been in this busy mood lately and it seems like I am always doing something and haven't really sat down and relaxed. One thing after another!

You're SOL if you wanna wrench on cars in the AF, that whole deal has been slowly getting removed from AF life. Most gov't vehicles nowadays are leased from GSA and have a maintenance contract which is fulfilled 100% off base. At best you'd be doing oil changes once a year on the few remaining true gov't owned vehicles. Maybe the AGE vehicles too. Aircraft maintenance on the other hand is pretty diverse. You have crew chiefs, hydraulics, electrical and environmental (my first job), multiple shreds of avionics, and weapons for the most part. There are backshops too like sheet metal, metals tech, NDI, egress, etc. E&E merged with avionics recently, so there is that. I got sick of long shifts and no weekends which is why I left aircraft maintenance. Sucks because I enjoyed the job itself and I was a good fit. You'll be shocked to see how many people think they know what they're doing, but are really just shooting from the hip.

Thank you for the heads up! The recruiter told me he wanted me working on airplanes but didn't give me any sort of explanation about why I couldn't work on vehicles. I think what I may also be interested in would be something along the lines of fabricating, I like designing and building things. I tried hard not to mention my experience with computers and programming because I ruined that hobby and am sick of working on them although I know that's another in-demand job currently. Sounds like a different way of living in the AF and I'm iffy about it, I feel like having all of these trucks back home is a burden on me while I'm away for at least four years.

You sure you didn't pass out from that erk and jerk in the middle?

Actually the plan was to start drinking when we returned from the trip, but we each took one swig from it and that was it. We were so dang tired after all of that!

 

[Supercharged111]

Take a look at metals tech, they do fab work, repair, and welding.

 

[gstubbz]

Another long update! – This is a span over the last week though. Believe it or not it takes me around an hour to write each one of these!

I’ve been loading up scrap metal usually every time I go out to Doyle and take a load back home with me, although I haven’t been able to make a ton of money off it, I believe it’s 10 cents a pound. Bringing in 600-750 pounds each trip is only netting 20-35 dollars depending on how much aluminum I’ve had. Wish it was a little more but whatever, maybe when I start bringing in more weight after I start cutting up cars it’ll be worth more!

I used the green truck to grab metal and throw it all in a pile so it’s easier for me to load up in the dodge. With 600ish pounds in the bed the truck hits the overloads!! I never realized how bad they squatted because my dodge still has a ton of suspension travel after a ton of weight is thrown into the bed.

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I saw this when I was at the scrapyard one of these days, 96-98 K1500 third door, stripped down and just a cab and a bed. Sad to see too, looked fairly clean but the roof of the cab is thrashed now!

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Friday night wasn’t too crazy, helped my friend Kyle load an 84 F150 ECLB on a trailer and haul it to this guys house in Janesville, and while I was there I saw this neat truck. 80s Suburban 2500 “Custom Deluxe” ex-USFS truck with a 350/SM465! I asked about it and he told me he would sell it but didn’t give me a price. I would so own something like that!

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Saturday was a bit of a long day for me. Kyle and I went to the Sparks Pick-N-Pull and didn’t notice anything really great, and had some time to burn so we went to the one in Carson City. I didn’t see too much I wanted, Kyle bought a bunch of ford stuff though. I did however see three GMC Denali trucks, and one in a cool blue metallic color I’ve never seen before. Also saw a truck with “YeeYee” spray painted on the tailgate and it was funny to me!

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After those two little trips I went over to Mr. Kentucky’s house and traded him that Holset H2C turbo I had for a white GMC grille and two very clean grey buckets from a 92-94 suburban with armrests on both sides, and the driver’s seat is power. I mounted the GMC grille when I got back to Doyle. And yes, it seems I do have a very huge problem with white GMC grilles!!

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So now it was time to take Kyle home back to Standish, I also made a deal on some gmt400 parts that I needed to pick up later this Saturday evening which I’ll get to later. Anyway, I drop Kyle off and end up meeting with my friend Joe where then I needed to make a trip into Susanville and brought a tow dolly back for a friend, and saw this which made me sad! 88-91 C2500 RCLB ex-USFS truck that was a 350/sm465. Poor truck got tore up.

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I return back to Standish to hang out for a bit and went and drove around Joe’s Duramax for a few minutes, still needs a ton of work but he has been making progress on it.

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I made a deal on some parts off a 98 Suburban, I wanted a driver’s door but they didn’t have one since it was gone already. But I show up at like 10pm and they were still pulling them off for me. I bought both front fenders and the passenger door shell for $70. Fairly clean, and literally a block away from where all my gmt400 stuff lives. I may do more sales/trading with them in the future!

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[gstubbz]

I’ll separate this into two posts since this has been super long, but here is Sunday (the 19th) and Monday (the 20th)

Sunday morning I received word that the guy who wanted to buy the 94 K2500 6.5 truck finally had his money together, so I checked everything and loaded up then headed the 90 miles to his place in Termo, CA which is in the middle of the sticks. It’s closer to Alturas, CA than it is Susanville.

I stopped at this place which used to be the Termo store/saloon to take a quick break, and I noticed on one of the buildings there was a paper of some court date thing from earlier this month where if the owner doesn’t appear Lassen County can take ownership and destroy the building as it’s a “public nuisance.” I like old stuff like this, and to me it’s history of an old desert town. If it does get destroyed I’m glad I was able to take some pictures of the place while it was still there.

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Dropped the truck off and it’s sitting next to the owner’s old 89 K1500 RCSB he is going to sell so he can fund stuff to do with this diesel. I’m glad the headache is out of my hair now!

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While I was at his ranch I ran with him down to the irrigation pump, and saw that it was a Cummins 6bt. Super neat to see. Was worth taking a picture of. Told me the well is so far deep that they hope it never goes dry.

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When I returned back to Doyle I unloaded the trailer and decided to separate the engine/trans and clean up the nv4500 a bit. Still needs a little more cleaning but for the most part it looks really good now.

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- Monday -

This day was a dead day for me, didn’t do much at all because I was so tired I pretty much slept in for a long time. But I did tear down the Q&D 6.5 engine to see the damage. Looks like the connecting rod bearings decided to eat themselves, which then completely denigrated on the seventh cylinder which gave the rod play and ultimately what broke it. The other connecting rod bearing was starting to do the same and almost let go. The oil pickup tube was packed full of the bearing pieces, so that probably explains why the truck had no oil pressure the entire time. The crank is ruined but I believe the block and heads are still good so I’ll more than likely be keeping those.

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Extra discussion:

I used to never want to sell vehicles because I seemed to always have this attachment to them, but that has faded away with selling the 94 6.5 ECLB truck. I broke that barrier and I really don’t have an attachment to anything which is good! It’s just an object in my book at this point. And by this point I have owned many combos of GMT400s, so now it seems like if I end up with another K2500 ECLB it’s not really a huge deal because I’ve already owned at least two of those. Or a RCLB, I’ve owned three, etc. Figured that was worth sharing. Maybe it’s something to do with me wising up an itty bit around my 21st birthday, but who knows.

Saw photos of this truck on Facebook and thought it was neat watching a GMT400 drifting and getting jumped!

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This truck is also neat, I personally don’t know the owner but have some friends that do. This truck lives in Reno and it’s a straight drift truck, 5.3 LS and a T5. The camber is nuts and it sounds like it did pretty well in the drift competitions during Hot August Nights.

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So that’s it for this weekend of adventures. Every day felt like I didn’t have enough time to do anything. This was a long weekend of sleep deprivation! Just trying to get so much done with the little time I have.

 

[DirtBag]

Great update G! I always enjoy reading thru your adventures and finds.

 

[GarrettGmc]

Damn gavin your working more on multiple vehicles then I have one my 1 lately. Stay busy

 

[gstubbz]

Great update G! I always enjoy reading thru your adventures and finds.

Thank you!! I feel like this thread is more of my "weekend log/diary" than it is focusing on just gmt400s in particular. I don't know if everyone likes this format or not, but it seems like a few people here do at least

Damn gavin your working more on multiple vehicles then I have one my 1 lately. Stay busy

I'm all over the place, when I get fed up working on one vehicle I can go work on something else so I can change my focus fairly often! If I had all kinds of money I feel like I'd have less headaches in life lol