Newish 720 owner here

[poor-mans-720]

first for me two... but understandable... didn't you just do the power steering convert? maybe that was two much for the remaining two bolts, lol...

Gotta love those late night emergent road side repairs...

[Smyrna720]

first for me two... but understandable... didn't you just do the power steering convert? maybe that was two much for the remaining two bolts, lol...

Gotta love those late night emergent road side repairs...

 

Well, that's kind of my thought. I'm thinking the 4 bolts fell out long ago and like you said, adding the power steering was just enough to make 'em break. No worries though!

 

 

Not only did I get another crank pulley, but I also got the correct PS idler pulley (not pictured), the correct turn signal switch I needed, 2 PLASTIC kick panels to replace my fiberboard ones, package tray, non broken ash tray, the panel that goes under the steering column, park lights so I can put my bumper back on, some kenwood speakers so I can have a radio and a factory tach. I figured somebody would want it so consider it for sale.

 

In fact, if you're reading this thread, I have a couple things for sale. I have a factory tach, the black fiberboard kick panels mentioned earlier, rear bumper, factory non tilt column, wheel, my old dash and a few others. If you see something you want, give me a ring. I appreciate the folks that follow this so y'all get first crack. Do me a favor, email me at joshhohensee at yahoo.com instead of PM. I get email updates on my phone, so I get it quicker.

 

Anyways, the blue panels are in the process of getting painted black for install and the crank pulley should be on by the end of the day. Moar pics to follow.

[ratsunissan]

howd you fix the drip from the heater?

[Skulptr]

i have a factory tach up for sale ;)

 

and i have had 4 radiators between my 2 trucks, and all of them had the bracket come apart on one side or the other. one actually completely broke free, smashing into my fan, and of course, screwing me over.

 

and i have seen a crank come apart. happened to me actually, but not on my 720. on my pathfinder, the crank has the harmonic balancer rubber in between 2 layers of belt tracks. and that rubber got old, and on the freeway, the SOB gave up and slid off the half that was bolted to the engine, killing feed to my alt, water pump, and power steering. no one had heard of that happening before, and it only happened cause i added the a/c belt back on. old crank pulleys should always get checked before adding something to them that they arent used to running.

[Smyrna720]

howd you fix the drip from the heater?

 

Huh? Are you talking about the side falling off the heater core? I replaced the heater core. Or are you talking about water leaking in when it rained? For that I just used some blue RTV and sealed around the edge where fresh air comes into the cowl. There is a seam right there that I guess was leaking. Next time I have the cowl off, I'll take a picture. That might actually be this weekend. I think I'm going to paint my wiper arms back black.

 

i have a factory tach up for sale ;)

 

and i have had 4 radiators between my 2 trucks, and all of them had the bracket come apart on one side or the other. one actually completely broke free, smashing into my fan, and of course, screwing me over.

 

and i have seen a crank come apart. happened to me actually, but not on my 720. on my pathfinder, the crank has the harmonic balancer rubber in between 2 layers of belt tracks. and that rubber got old, and on the freeway, the SOB gave up and slid off the half that was bolted to the engine, killing feed to my alt, water pump, and power steering. no one had heard of that happening before, and it only happened cause i added the a/c belt back on. old crank pulleys should always get checked before adding something to them that they arent used to running.

 

Now, the rubber cracking and flinging the balancer off isn't really that uncommon. The elastomer strip just gets old and goes to shit. I've seen them fly off and I've seen them just slip and make it impossible to time. Depends on how lucky you get.

 

Have you ever fixed the radiators? I meant to get to it this weekend but I ended up not doing it. I'm thinking I want to leave the shroud on so I make sure I get the bracket in the exact correct spot, but I don't want to melt it. Any good ideas?

[Smyrna720]

One thing I'd also like to mention. Getting the balancer bolt out of the crank. Ho Lee Shitt. First I put the truck in gear, and in 2wd HI, stuck a prybar in the yoke coming out of the transfer case. Bent the shit out of my prybar. Second, stuck a big ass chisel in the yoke, bracing it on the underneath of the cab. This is when I got a 2 foot cheater pipe and really cranked on that mother. I was slipping the clutch! I ended up pulling a valve cover and running my prybar through holes in the cam gear. I was really afraid that I was going to either break the chain, the gear, or both, that's how tight it was. Well, it finally came loose. A couple taps with a small chisel and 2 screwdrivers later, the hub was mine. Surely there is a better way to hold the motor from turning when doing this... right?

[Skulptr]

i break my crank bolt using the starter. at least on my pathfinder i did. breaker bar on the frame rail, crank starter, and bam. but it might not work for this engine.

 

 

i didnt fix mine, i just went and got another one. i didnt want to risk doing anything that would compromise the pressure handling capabilities of the radiator. but, if its copper or close, you could probably solder it just like copper piping in a house.

[Smyrna720]

i break my crank bolt using the starter. at least on my pathfinder i did. breaker bar on the frame rail, crank starter, and bam. but it might not work for this engine.

 

 

i didnt fix mine, i just went and got another one. i didnt want to risk doing anything that would compromise the pressure handling capabilities of the radiator. but, if its copper or close, you could probably solder it just like copper piping in a house.

 

Well, if I ever get the motivation of replace that balancer, I'll use the starter to break loose the balancer bolt on my truck. That's a good idea. And yeah, I'm probably going to solder the radiator too.

 

 

I did get a little done this weekend though. First thing was getting the truck aligned. I ran a string around the tires and found it was toed out a TON from lowering it. I brought it back in to about 0 toe. It's a little squirrely because it should have a little toe in it, but it drives way better now. It doesn't absolutely jump across the road anymore. It would grab a rut in the road and just shoot you across. Had to keep your butthole tight! I'll align it in a couple months when I have the steering and alignment class in school.

 

Next up, I finally got that new driveshaft in with the new carrier bearing isolator.

 

 

I also spaced it up another 1/2" or so with a nut underneath the isolator bracket and my other spacer.

 

 

It's got a driveline shake at about 70-75mph so I need to take a look at my angles and such. I really need to get some wedges and get the pinion angle back down. Time and money man, not enough of either.

 

FINALLY got a radio in the damn thing. Pulled it out of my long parked 1996 Caprice. Fuck it, why not.

 

 

Put in my junkyard speakers.

 

 

 

I had to do some modifications though... The tabs where the speakers would have gone from the factory, got beat in to complete the rest of the radius of the speaker hole. Know what I mean Vern? I should have taken a picture, but it was hot as shit and I was sweating my ass off. Also, I had to take a drift and a hammer, and ever so slightly deepen the pocket so that the magnet would fit. We're talking like 3/16ths of an inch. Maybe. THEN, I drilled my new holes and mounted that shit up. I used all the factory wiring except for the right speaker. I couldn't find the pigtail to connect to the dash harness. I just wired it into my adapter so as to not hack up the factory stuff. I'll take a pic of that when I have the deck out again, which will be soon since I need to re-secure the cage. The deck sits a little crooked.

 

Next, I got all my plastic stuff painted up and some of it put on.

 

Package tray. Cool little JY find.

 

 

Pass speaker grille:

 

 

I'm still waiting on putting the driver side grille on because I've been having intermittent radio issues coming from the fuse block. Most of the terminals look like complete SHIT. White oxidized crap. I think I'm going to go to radio shack and just de-ox it the shit out of it. That should work, right?

[Smyrna720]

Well... Got a little work done.

 

Fixed the intermittent radio issue. It was the blue connector under the driver side of the dash. I followed the wiring schematic and it led me right to it. IF YOUR CIGARETTE LIGHTER AND RADIO DON'T WORK, CHECK THERE. I wish I would have done that first... sigh.

 

Well, the day started off crappy enough. Rain, rain, rain. Instead of mowing, I was going to clean the garage. Well, I got out there and saw my bumper in the scrap pile, and decided, I'm gonna put that back on. THEN, when I popped the hood, I said, I'm gonna fix that radiator. Then I said, since I got the radiator out, I might as well throw that new balancer on there. And since I have the belts off, I'm gonna put the correct belt tensioner on there. WHEW! I didn't mean to do all that, it kind of just happened.

 

Next thing I know, I'm using screw drivers to gently pry the hub off.

 

 

 

Here I am, making one balancer out of basically three. Both of my power steering crank pulleys were dented, and I still had the one I snagged from the JY the first time, so I threw that on there. NOW, since all the bolts are out, and I don't want a repeat of my balancer slinging performance, I'm taking preventative measures to ensure that it won't happen again.

 

 

 

Zing the crank bolt on with the impact and call it done.

 

 

Giggity.

 

I also installed the correct, factory power steering idler pulley I snatched from the yard last time I was there.

 

 

Then, I resoldered the radiator.

 

Wire brushed:

 

 

NOTE: This is really not clean enough. I had to burn paint off, brush again, blah blah blah. I should have cleaned it better the first time. Let that be a lesson to you.

 

Fluxed.

 

 

NOTE: Be sure to also flux during the soldering.

 

Fixed

 

 

 

NOW you can add the bumper.

 

 

I had to beat the shit out of it with a dead blow to get it straightened back up, and then I polished it up with some Meguiars compound. The chrome still looks like shit because it's all pitted up, but it honestly looks as good as it possibly can. Tonight, I'm going to put the stock park lights back in... I think. I have to take the stuff to class so I can fix one of the housings wires. That, and one of the housings is a little chewed up, so I'm gonna swap some parts.

[Smyrna720]

I am REALLY getting the hankering to do an L67 supercharged 3800 Buick swap. I need to find two motors though. I need a V6 Camaro 3800 shortblock, flywheel, T5, clutch and wiring harness. I need the Camaro block so I can keep the starter on the Passenger side, otherwise it would end up on the driver side. I need a 2.8L Blazer bellhousing, because the Camaro T5 bellhousing tilts the trans 15* to the driver side. . I need, obviously, an L67 supercharged top end, PCM and front accessory drive. I'll also be getting a Ford 8.8 out of a Ranger or Explorer. Then, I can put all my mishmash parts together and haul it out for minimal cost to me. I'll have to put a fuel cell where the spare tire is now, and rerun a fuel system, but that shouldn't be too bad.

 

I think it can work... The only thing I'm really worried about is trans tunnel clearance. Not sure what it's going to look like. With a smaller pulley, headers, custom intake, ancillary bolt-ons, and a custom tune from PCM4Less, I'll be hoping for 300HP to the wheels. Ought to make her scoot right on down the road.

[poopypants720]

Sounds like a frankenstein motor... Why not just grab the 4.3 vortec out of a newer blazer and throw a super charger on that n tune it?

[Skulptr]

what all did you use for soldering? i have an electric fan converson, so i'm sure its only a matter of time until mine break free of their mounts with the added weight of the fan pulling on it.

[Smyrna720]

See my thread here:

 

http://community.ratsun.net/topic/43520-my-truck-was-taken-and-i-need-a-lawyer-help/

[Meltor]

what did you get those plastic kick panels out of?

[poor-mans-720]

those are stock. My truck didn't come with them... Wish I could find a set. They look amazing, cleans every thing up in the interior.

[Captain Crazy]

Your garage looks like mine with the Rebel and Earnhardt Flags. LOL, I love that stuff. I'm from NC

[aarivers]

Truck is looking good dude. Looks better with the bumper on it and the black dash in. :thumbup:

[Smyrna720]

Well, yall ain't gonna believe this shit. I got the truck back. If you read the thread I posted earlier, you will see how it went away. Now it's back. It was legal, ethical and totally on the up and up. And I didn't have to pay to get it back.

 

Downside, there's a rod a knockin and it needs a motor now.

 

I haven't decided on Z24, KA or Buick V6. We'll see here in a couple months.

 

Either way, I'm just tickled to have the truck back.

 

And a shitty pic to prove it.

 

[Flailguy]

Where did you get new kick panels?? I need new ones desperately!

[Smyrna720]

Junk yard.

[izzo]

2 year old thread revival and op actually answered wtf

[Smyrna720]

[datzenmike]

2 year old thread revival and op actually answered wtf

 

 

[RedSquare]

It does, and it's a factory thing. Mine doesn't have on right now because I'd say either someone took it off to put the bumper that's on it now, or it didn't come from the factory with one because its a factory bumper. I dunno.

 

How it should look with the proper bumper.

 

 

.....

^My truck before I owned it. Just saying.

[Smyrna720]

^My truck before I owned it. Just saying.

That's a sharp truck!