our new burb

[85burb]

Took a half coil out and sits pretty good now. Very happy with it now. Hope my exhaust pipe will come in Tuesday so I can get it on the road.

[Nodnarb76]

Looking good!

[68Timber]

That's just right...

[85burb]

Thanks! Here is a picture of it next to my other burb....

[85burb]

Well I got the exhaust welded in tonight. Was my first real welding project. Other then laying on the ground under the truck with no room to weld the top and sides I guess it went ok. Sounds good too. Just the factory cat for muffler and a 3 inch factory style exhaust tail pipe after it. Got it all from Autozone. Total of 76 bucks. Considering I payed well over 1k for my 85 burb exhaust this one was dirt cheap. Was a little nervous welding inches away from the massive fuel tank. But I made it. Now I only have alignment and insurance and registration. Hope in a few weeks I can have it all done.

[RDrancher]

Looks great! I saw that you cut out half a coil, but what was done for a drop before you got it? Spindles? What about the back?

[85burb]

It was all factory before I lowered it. I took 2 of the 5 leafs out of each side in the rear. I keep the two top ones and the very bottom overload spring. The front I took out one coil and then a week later a half coil.

[RDrancher]

Thanks for the info. I plan on flipping the rear and doing a spindle / spring drop in the future, but just may use your method in the meantime. I have too many money sucking things going on right now as it is.

[85burb]

I looked into a flip kit and didn't look like it would work without notching the frame. So I just lowered it for free. Rides so smooth very happy with it.

[RDrancher]

Keep us up to date on it as you get more miles on the front springs. I'll be interested to see if it settles too much for your liking after time.

[85burb]

Will let you know. Drove it to work a few times and has not settled at all. I would be ok if it did. I think my shocks are bottoming out. They are factory length.

[85burb]

Finally got it aligned. Seems to be running rich sometimes then lean sometimes. I had a code for coolant temp sensor and found the sensor connector had spread pins. Replaced the coolant temp sensor and connector. That code seems to be gone. But I now have code 45 I think. Showing o2 sensor lean. I have read that the coolant temp sensor and map sensor are the most likely cause of rich/lean running. Picked up a map sensor and am going to give it a shot. Hope it helps. If not I will change the o2 sensor.

[85burb]

Well I'm pretty sure the ole gal has a leaking intake manifold gasket or leaking head gasket. It loosing a lot of coolant and not really leaking externally. If you rev it up on decell it white smokes a good bit. Also has a good bit of lifter and quite possibly rod noise. So I found a used motor from a friend and am gonna swap it out this weekend or next weekend. I plan on doing a ls swap soon so don't really want to spend any money on this motor so I hope it's better then the current one. Compleat tbi 350 for 200 bucks can't be too bad of a deal.

[WyattTX]

Just curious, why did the previous owner sell it so cheap?

[85burb]

It was traded for money owed. Had a broken flywheel the first owner thought was a rod knock. Guy I bought it from seen it was broken flywheel.

[WyattTX]

That explains it. That explains a lot. Nice find.

[85burb]

Well picked up the "new" motor today. Seemed really questionable at first sight. Looked at the truck it came out of and it showed 317xxx miles. So we will see how it goes when I start it. It's out of a 94 z71. Pressure washed it at work and it does seem to looked better then my current motor. Pulled the plugs out of both and the new motor seems overall a little better. Burns some oil but much less then mine. The old motor had a plug that was so dirty it was really hard to remove. Tons of thick black carbon caked on it. That exhaust port was pretty oily as well. Two of my old motors plugs had rust on the electrode part and were wet with water. Deff have some kinda gasket issue. Tomorrow morning I am going to a friends house to finally start the actual brand new motor in his 86 k5. Then I hope to finish mine up. Wish me luck!!

[85burb]

Finally had time to finish the motor swap. Had trouble getting it to run but that's fixed now. Was just the wires from old distributor cap were all shifted one terminal to the left. Fixed that and she started right up first bump. Sounded very good with no knocks or rattles. So I installed all the accessorys and trying to tidy up the wiring and plug wire roughing. Old owner just had them laid across the motor every ware. Ran them the correct way and looks way better under the hood now. First drive it had a major hesitation so I checked the timing at it was about 10 degrees before tdc with timing plug unplugged. Adjusted the timing and hesitation mostly went away. New motor has tons more power then old one. Got on it around a corner and it smoked the tire pretty good and was not even close to floored. Surprised the heck out of me. Forgot what kind of low end grunt the ole 350s have. So hopefully this motor runs good for a while. Need to get new fuel filter for it and maybe cap and rotor. Put new plugs in already.

[85burb]

Pic of new motor

[RDrancher]

Sounds like the new-to-you engine turned out fine. Glad to see you got it going again.

[85burb]

Well the old girl is gone. Traded a friend for a 04 gmc. He needed more seats and I just liked his truck. Feel like the truck needs more work then the burb but the truck is worth a bit more. Feel pretty good about the swap.

[68Timber]

The truck looks nice! Is mama ok with this?

[85burb]

Ya. She loves it. She loves them both but. It with a good friend of ours so we may buy it back if he ever sells it.

[Hoods69BadBowTie]

Dang cool looking burb but sometimes it's nice to trade up for something different and help a good friend out. What's all wrong with the 2004 GMC does it need a lot of work?

[85burb]

The truck is decent overall. Biggest thing is it needs lifters and prob a cam by the sound of it. Lots of small issues. Needed oil pressure sensor, e brake shoes, rear bumper install. Still needs missing rear brake pad hardware, tires, both inner tie rods, new headlight assembly's, and now new window tint cause it was too dark to pass inspection. Over all it was a pretty fair trade I think. It's scoots pretty freakin good and the cam I am buying adds about 50 hp at the crank. Should be a blast after I get it all fixed up.