Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

I guess now is time to share a little bit on the progress made on the 454. We took the block down to my dads old workplace, who is being kind enough to let us use this equipment on a block that really didn't deserve it. This is my first engine build of any kind so getting to see all of this was really cool. In the end the block is bored .060 over and has two sleeves installed.


This is the first cylinder that received a sleeve. These sleeves were all installed because of some relatively severe rust damage to the top of the cylinder walls, which can be see in the next picture. I was pretty bummed that the block turned out this bad and we both learned out lessons. Probably should have taken the heads off before leaving but it was cold and we were a long way from home.


Installing the sleeve was pretty straight forward. Take out all the material in the cylinder until the sleeve fits, leaving a step at the bottom so the sleeve doesn't somehow suck itself down into the block and grenade everything later. Little bit of WD-40 and a hammer was all it took.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

Now, once that sleeve was done.. you guessed it. One more sleeve, fun!! We actually spent about 12 hours at this shop just doing the cylinders and decking the block. I understand why usually sleeves aren't worth it now....

You probably get the picture from here. It was the same procedure as the last. Once it was said and done the block looked pretty good but I was concerned about how obvious the sleeves looked, and to my surprise after decking the top of the block you'd never know the difference.


And after a long 10-12 or so hours of work, I had a really clean and brand new looking block. Then my dad and I had to go to actual work. :waah:

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

I really enjoy following your process on this truck. It's going to be really nice and a lot of fun to drive. You guys are doing a great job of working your way through it. I thought that 454 was going to be a lost cause but I'm glad you had a way to save it. You turned it into a sculpture, nice work.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

It was a little less than ideal, I bet it would have cost anyone else a fortune. Thanks for reading!

Well, since I have the big block on the way I decided that it would probably be a good idea to do dual tanks. This is something else we always just kind of joked around about (kind of like the big block) that ended up coming true. 16 gallons with a 468 doesn't sound like I can pass a gas station. Two saddle tanks means 32 gallons, sounds a lot better!!

I bought a patch from Krazy Ray here on the forums, the same guy I also bought my bed floor cutouts and also this really nice core support. There's not even battery tray rust on this one!!

We did some rough measuring of the center of the hole on the passenger side (where my original tank was) to line up where the new one on the driver side should go, it worked pretty good. I can't believe we cut a hole in the bedside after all that work!!

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

It had started to get busy around here and has absolutely stayed that way. We still find time to (routinely) visit the body shop once a week to see what the status is. It's taken a loooong but I get it, he's busy and this is just the deal I set up to save some money. Well, finally after some months.. SOME COLOR!!! I was excited. It looked great, little bit of peel but it hadn't been touched since it left the booth. Cab was still primer but it was looking good!

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

Time for the next little installment, the continuation of dual tanks. As always, it took a bit of research on our part in order to get all of the correct parts. I am planning to use the new Holley Sniper EFI unit on the new engine and that complicated the whole thing a little more than expected.

I bought tanks and sending units off of Rock Auto. These are for 1987 trucks so they have the baffle in the tanks. (it looks like a disposable turkey pan) The point of the baffle is so that the electric fuel pumps will always have fuel around them. They were Spectre brand and really reasonably price, made in Canada.

Part # SQ GM11C for the tanks (Rockauto)
Part # SQ FG05M & SPE FG05N for the sending units (Rockauto)

I then did some research and decided that walbro 255 LPH pumps would work for me. (Part # GSS342 on Amazon.) I also got two little installation kits that were really useful.

Some other minor things I got from rock auto was passenger side tank straps since mine were a little rough. The driver side tank brackets and straps I got from KrazyRay blew my mind and were in great shape. I didn't even paint them.

The tanks went on pretty straight forward, holes were already on the frame. I used some anti squeak tape on the straps, but it really didn't want to stick due to the tanks wax coating.

There was some wiring to be done on the sending units. The '87 plugs were no where near the same as the ones on the pumps, as you can see in the follow pictures. So, we replaced all of the electrical in the sending unit with the wire that came with the installation kit from amazon.


One thing to note is that we had to "dimple" the bottom of the tanks so that the electric fuel pump wouldn't rattle against the tank and cause an annoying resonance.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

Here's something I found a little interesting, both of these filler necks are from 1978 trucks. The difference is one is East Coast and the other is from the West Coast. My truck has a little flapper in the filler neck and the one from the West Coast does not.

Filler necks are something that we haven't really come to a conclusion on. We're thinking about welding the ends off of later model filler necks or using 2 sizes of hose and an adapter from this website. The reason you have to do this is that the filler necks are fatter on the later trucks and these are '87 tanks. My bedside does not have doors.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

Time for a quick little detour on what's going on with that crusty old big block. Last time I posted about it we got a LOT done and it looked brand new. It sat in the corner of the garage for a few months until we found time. In the meantime we were figuring out dual tanks and I was collecting parts. I ordered my camshaft, pistons, and rods. Original plan was to use the original rods but I found a GREAT deal on some used rods on ebay.

I know what you're thinking, USED RODS?! Well, I was a bit skeptical too but it was worth the risk, in the end I got a set of 8 Eagle SIR6135B rods for $100.00 + shipping, they had ARP rod bolts already. They magnafluxed great, too!

I got some Wiseco forged pistons from Skipwhite on ebay, found here. Part number KP430A6.


The camshaft I got from Chris Straub over at Straub technologies. It was recommended to me here on the forums. They were pretty easy to work with. I told him what I wanted out of my engine and he told me what I needed. I'll be honest and say I got "It'll be there next week" emails for a few weeks. That's alright, though. I was in no hurry. It's a hydraulic roller cam. 510/510 216/228 112LSA. Should ride very nice!

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Sorry for the picture of a screen, but it's all I have available to me at this moment. Here is what the dyno simulator we picked up says we should be around. I'll have to get a new picture later with more accurate information entered.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

WOW you guys are doing this truck the right way.. nice.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

What is the plan for the 8 ball?

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Thanks!


Haha, I figured someone would point out the 8 ball when I made that post. I'm not sure how it made it's way into the pic. Those boxes are on the pool table. We have an old 8 ball that's been drilled to go on a shifter somewhere though..

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

A few days after those rods got in I "forced" a free morning open and steered my dad and I over to the machine shop for another round of machining. We got the block honed and we also go the rods numbered and magnafluxed during this visit.

We have one more trip to do still where we get the cam bearings in and the bottom end balanced. I am planning on using the flywheel I got for the small block on the big block, but SB is internal balance and the BB is external. I bought a external weight kit for it, found here. (Part # 560222 from McLeod)

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

The following weekend, I was ready to get the block off the ground and on the stand. I'm pretty cheap if you haven't noticed yet. I like my money and I like to hunt for the bottom dollar deals. We have an engine stand that really didn't like to roll and was really floppy with the small block, I convinced my dad to weld it up, add a brace, and attach some larger more heavy duty casters. I now have my "4x4" engine stand ready for service.


And of course immediately after that was done we picked up the bare block and put it on the stand. I wanted to paint it and I wasn't set on a color nor did I want to wait. GM blue isn't easy to come by and I have about 7 cans of Hawaiian/Medium Blue mixed up (from Sherwin Williams) in the garage.. soo body color it is. Kind of looks like ford blue but I'm ok with that. I finished up the can of high heat primer from when I previously painted the small block.


Kind of a big difference from what it was when I got my hands on it in the first place!

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

Back to fuel lines! I bought fuel lines from inline tube because I thought it would be easier but some thought was still required. This picture sums up what we decided we needed to do.


The fuel line installation was pretty straight forward, just used adele clamps to mount them up to the truck the same way we did the stainless brake lines in the past. They are rubbing against the engine mount but we pushed them in as much as we could and added some of that felt backed tape. The crossmember behind the rear cab mounts is something I quickly bought from off the forums and once again it was a California part that really didn't need any paint. After installation we were waiting on the arrival of the rubber lines, gmachinz's dual tank wiring harness, and the oetiker clamps.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

While we waited for the fuel parts to arrive I was looking for things to keep busy. Some time ago we had come across a private yard that was REALLY overgrown and not organized in the slightest. It went like this; You give him a couple dollars and he tours you through his dad's land first, and then his. The grass and briars are about chest high and I made the mistake the first time by wearing shorts.

We went here a few times for all kinds of small parts, glass, etc. The last trip in we found this new truck he hadn't showed us before and he probably forgot about himself. It was a GMC Royal Sierra and it had a broken grille like mine. The first two pictures are my original grille which is only missing one piece with no cracks, and the last picture is the one I got from the yard immediately after pulling it out.


Basically we broke a good piece off of this abused donor and made it match the best we could before using plastic adhesive.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

I'm going to apologize now if the last few posts have seemed inconclusive or lacking in content but I am really excited to share the paint on my cab! It looks GREAT and I really like how the raptor liner came out on the underside.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

That is awesome work your doing on that truck. Great find and repair on the grille. Now you just to get it cleaned and painted, and it will look great.
The paint job, WOW!! I bet your getting pretty excited about it, no doubt. Keep them pictures coming.

BTW, remember your tan seat? I'm sure you do, LOL. Well here it is all restored and recovered. I recovered it with Silver Velour Deluxe & Black Vinyl.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Speaking of seats, I know you found some 90's style seats for your build. I would really like to see an original seat in your GMC. But that's just my opinion, lol.
Here's what a GMC seat would look like. But of course it can be covered in blue, so it would match.
GMC seats are just a tad different than the Chevy, because of the stainless steel hinge plate.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Sorry TK, I know you do a pretty good job on the seats but I'm sold and keeping my 60/40 bench. I like it a lot better than the solid bench seats. They will be mounted on a solid rail and will slide like a solid bench, though. I do think I am going to have it reupholstered with a matching medium blue vinyl and Highlander blue plaid from older 67-72 trucks on the inserts.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

That's fine, I didn't mean it that way, about you getting a seat from me. I was just showing you what the GMC bench seat looked like. You are going a great job on the truck. This is just my opinion of course, but I like seeing the original seats in the truck. Even your tan bench seat wasn't truely original, because it was more for the 80's.
But what ever you do, it will look great!!! Keep up the great work.:metal:

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

While my truck wasn't perfect, it was in very good shape for something that was still being used. Very straight. I believe somewhere along the line, and more than likely the man I bought it from, decided he had to sell it so he took things for his other truck such as my original hood, chrome front bumper, and my seat. :(

I did get a very nice carburetor because we viewed the truck early and he hadn't changed it out yet.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Great work replacing all that sheet metal. Everything looks really clean. Gorgeous truck really.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Thanks! Been a long time coming, or that's how it seems to me anyway..

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Paint is looking spectacular.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Thanks! Picking up some painted pieces today and hopefully I'll get around to updating the thread.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

HUNTER'S 1978 GMC C15 SIERRA BUILD THREAD

Time for that promised update on the cab!! We scheduled a date to "drop off" the frame and have the cab set on. There was some confusion and we ended up taking it home, which was exciting and really confusing as not everthing has been fit yet - but I'll talk about that in the next update.

We woke up early and borrowed a trailer on a rainy Friday morning. We had the cab on the frame in our garage and the bed at the body shop and everything figured out by around noon. The bodyshop isn't far but it's not real close either.


THIS IS THE FUN PART!!! I am VERY MUCH done with the cleaning and painting of absolutely everything. It's time to get this thing back together one piece at a time! Once we have our ducks in a row we should be able to knock it out quick!

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Your right , this is the fun part!! Can't wait to see the progress as it unfolds.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

It's been a little while, I plan on updating this later tonight. Happy thanksgiving!!

edit: I had trouble organizing my photos after transferring and organizing, I'm sorry guys. I'll get it together tomorrow. :(

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Hunter's 1978 GMC Build

Sooooo.. onto that "fun part" I was so excited about. The very first thing we did was jack the truck up in the air on some ramps and test fit some doors. We masked off the areas around the doors and where the fenders bolt up to protect the paint.


At this point, you might be wondering where those fenders came from. For one, those chinese ones in the box are GARBAGE. They needed to be slotted in every direction and the sharp edges nicked the paint and then me - so NOPE to those! A few months past I was browsing craigslist for parts and I found this truck that said it had fiberglass fenders. They were rough but they were cheap and repairable. I picked them up in a heartbeat - AND WOW DO THEY FIT GOOD! I'll look up the pictures I have of that truck and share them here.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Hunter's 1978 GMC Build

Sorry for the low resolution photos but these are mostly from his craigslist ad, besides the bottom picture. I bought the fiberglass fenders and then he just started handed me things - he wanted it GONE! I brought some interior pieces and the door panels as well. I probably should have grabbed more and regret not doing so.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Hunter's 1978 GMC Build

Now that we've taken the scenic detour there for a moment, back onto my blue truck. After doing some research on different sound deadening material I went with a cheap solution off ebay but made sure that the material was butyl instead of asphalt or whatever else they use. The company I used is called GT Mat, it was really easy stuff to apply and I took my time with it. I laid down a few sheets a day over the course of a week. The difference only one sheet made was pretty phenomenal. I cleaned up the edges with some 3M insulation tape.

After I got that project completed I took some leftover speaker wire from a different project and laid out how I wanted my speaker wires to run.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Hunter's 1978 GMC Build

Now you might be wondering. "Speaker wire? Aren't you getting a little ahead of yourself?" Yes I am!! While I'm not a big music person I do love some GOOD SOUNDING background noise. When I go this truck that old AM was long gone and that speaker was NASTY.

Since I am going to be using a stock type AM/FM (courtesy of the man who sold me a door stop engine we resurrected) I didn't need anything too fancy so I picked up some rockford fosgates from Amazon warehouse deals. Basically returned speakers for some sort of visual damage. (They didn't have any.) I got R169X3 which is a 6x9 and a R1525X2 which is a 5.25 round speaker.

First thing's first! Let's see if these "used?" speakers work.


CHECK! They do. I was born in the late 90's, I had no idea how to use that dang radio. I had it on AM thinking the switch worked reverse of how it really does and thought I had a dead radio, I was bummed for a good 10 minutes. (It's still rock and roll to me was on, by the way.)


Boom! Just like that they were installed. I had bought bigblock73's cab corner brackets for 6x9's and then got them painted to match. (Notice the new door strikers... oops.)

I had to sit and think if I was going to talk about the 5.25" speakers as I did them a few weeks later after some other progress was made. I'm going to apologize now if I forget and talk about them twice. All we did was take some scrap wood we had around and cut them to fit the speaker hole in the dash.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Hunter's 1978 GMC Build

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP
Time to back it up!

I really should update this thread as I go along, I just get so darn lazy about updating it. Instead I make it harder and have to go backwards and forwards. You may have seen a back window in previous posts. I wasn't sure if I was going to talk about it because I simply haven't been happy with it.

It's a slider from CR Laurence, it looks really good but it's absolutely TERRIBLE to use. The screws on the latch have fallen out, and the slider is so stiff the truck was to tip over before I get the window open. The latch, well that's a CR Laurence manufacturing problem - they sent me a new one free of charge. The window not working is a GM manufacturing problem.

My window opening is smaller than usual and has a nasty jut in the frame behind the driver. You can see it in the rubber inside of the cab. I don't want to cut it because the paint is fresh and I don't want to start a spot of contamination. So like any sane human being we took the window frame out and went at it. Unfortunately I don't have pictures of this, it was dark out and I was DONE with this thing! We installed it like 3 times that night. It still is a little stiff for my taste but it's 210% better after grinding.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Looking great. Those fenders look like they fit amazing

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Awesome work as always. I remember that truck, the scenic route truck. You did score on a lot of good parts.
Now, if I may add. I would add a layer of foil backed jute on top of what you have put down already. And again, use your foil tape to finish it off. Maybe your already planning on putting it down. But if not, I would highly suggest it. You can order it by the roll from Home Depot online. It's a lot cheaper than the truck places. Then your carpet can go right over all of it.
Here's a pic of mine, you can barely see the FatMat under the foiled jute. There on the edge where your side sills go, I would not put any jute. It will make it harder to get the side sills on.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Thanks for looking!

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Didn't really think about that, my vinyl floor mat came with jute and it's just hanging out under there and doesn't cover much.

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

My carpet had jute attached to the back also. The foil backed jute from Home Depot isn't very thick. It can be thought of as helping with heat from under the truck and sound. It isn't too much that it will I interfere with the carpet or vinyl.

https://www.homedepot.com/b/Building...dfZ48tZ1z114ri

Re: The Hawaiian Blue 1978 GMC.
 

Time for a little picture dump, this is of the installation of the vintage air unit. Since the truck isn't fully together just yet, the installation is only half finished as of right now.

I had most of the plates and hardware painted to match the color of the truck, and then they were bolted on to the firewall with some silicone to keep my cab water tight.

This unit is really cool and cleans up the engine side of the firewall. You do loose a lot of glovebox space as a result but it doesn't seem like there's really any foot well loss as it's tucked under the dash. I will say that getting it up in there is a battle. It doesn't want to go.