My K1500 DD Tow Pig

[Supercharged111]

Redid the left front painting behind the control arm and painted the right side front and front front today. Also tried shoving some bushings into the bottom main leaves that I'd forgotten over the weekend (just plastic slider dealies) when I built the packs but it turns out that the replacement leaf anti-rotation brackets are somehow narrower than stock so back in the leaf pack went as it was and torqued down for good. Tomorrow I'll get after the 3 cab mounts on the driver's side and see if I can't finish cleaning, priming, and painting the center section of frame on both sides. After that, it's align and blow alcohol induced victory donuts for 'Murica!

 

[98BlackSierra]

Love everything you've done so far man. Reminds me of the work I've done so far on my '98. The leafs, bushings, and other hardware will be next on my list.

 

[Supercharged111]

You rust belt bubbas ought to love this. No paint over rust and scale, just nice clean metal and hopefully it stays that way for a bit.

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Got lazy on the axle tubes and just targeted the pig, it was the dirtiest anyway. The whole diff had been wire brushed and cleanish and painted way back in 2012. I didn't win 'em all though, this remains.

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I intend to cut a piece of exhaust scrap in half and sort of weld a shell around it to buy time.

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Lucky me I had a new mount from the junk truck kicking around to replace one I didn't realize was broken on this truck.

 

[Supercharged111]

And onto today's activities which were tying up some loose ends. The biggest chore was taking a hack at the alignment. I definitely got it close. . . on the 3rd try. Common sense dicates that, if you only change parts that disrupt the alignment on the right side, then only right side alignment corrections are necessary. That approach ended up with my steering wheel being off by 45 ****!ing degrees. So 2 hacks later and I guessed my way damn close to where I need to be. I just need a few more miles to validate whether or not a leftward drift exists. I set the truck at -.4 degrees of camber and added caster to the right side to eliminate the rightward drift, though I may have added too much. More wheeltime will tell. Toe is a smidge north of 1/16" in.

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[letitsnow]

I want to hug your frame. Weird, I know...

 

[Supercharged111]

I want to hug your frame. Weird, I know...

Not really. My hatred for rust exists because I grew up in MI. Once I left I realized rust isn't normal. Today I tweaked on the alignment. The dead zone was way too tight, which made it difficult to feel the road when the steering began take up. Ended up being the box's input bearing preload too tight so I backed it off a smidge and put a little back into the over center. That helped, but the camber I added to the right side (which also removes some caster) didn't quite do the trick as the truck still drifts left, so I'll take a smidge more caster out of the right side tomorrow in hopes that it finally goes nice and straight down the road. It's not far off and now that the preload is right the road feel is much improved with a properly functioning EVO system.

 

[Supercharged111]

Well I took out a smidge of caster Friday and it still drifts left. I'm now reminded of why it pulls in the first place. I get impatient with the small changes, crank the thing, and overshoot the adjustment. I'll just keep making small changes on weekdays until it's rigjt.

 

[Supercharged111]

Turns out my Friday adjustment undid itself when I cranked the nut back down so I just redid it on Monday and it's so close I can't tell if it pulls left, right, or at all. Steering wheel is off, so I'll correct that and call it. I think I can crank the over center down a bit more because the bearing preload was excessive to begin with. Too bad the box is in the truck, can't check rotational torque the right way now.

 

[Supercharged111]

Well that exhaust hangar ripped off completely and fell the **** off so I had to go rummaging through garbage to fix this for free fiddy. Here's the damage.

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Crap scraped together to fix said damage. That's a 3" ID piece of pipe cut in half that I clamshelled around the pipe.

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Ended up bending this to 90 degrees to line up with everything.

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I fingered the rear most hanger took some damage too. Turns out it too had completely broken, but gravity was holding the entire mess together.

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Forgot to snap pics of the finished product. I propped the exhaust up (after cleaning that **** off) and got the hanger to line up real nice with the pipe. I made a single pass along the break you can see in the above pic at the lowest heat setting, then turned it up 1 and made 2 more passes and got a nice thick bead on. Unfortunately the break you can't see has a nice big gap, so I'll either weld in a piece of filler metal tomorrow or cram it full of muffler cement. Also going to hammer the **** out of the ass end of the truck with the pressure washer tomorrow. I do not like what I see, I had all that **** off back in September. Whatever they use here is far worse than salt.

 

[Supercharged111]

I couldn't get my face as close as I wanted to the work so the welds all look like **** but I got a good wrap on the front mount.

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For the rear I just bent a small piece of flat stock and welded it in place to cover the small gap.

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Then I rattle canned those 2 parts and gave the underside a decent spraying with the pressure washer.