1986 GMC S-15

[chilliwak]

Nice progress on getting the old motor out Andrew. Even though it will take some time to get back at it I am sure things will go smoothly. All these era GM trucks are pretty much built the same. Good luck on your exams and thanks for posting pics of your truck. Cheers, Chilli..

 

[Darkrider]

Just a question for ya... What is stopping you from simply reusing the original 2.8 heads on the 3.4?

 

[Andrew_S]

^ I originally had planned to have the motor completely ready to swap in minus the parts I had to swap over (oil pan, timing cover, water pump) to make the process quicker. All the iron heads on these 60* v6's are identical from 86 onward, so nothing was stopping me. I was planning on rebuilding the heads anyhow and had hoped this would have expedited the process as the camaro heads were in decent shape.

I recently sold a set of penske shocks and was bullshitting with the guy and mentioned what had happened with that other shop. Turns out he's notorious for messing up peoples builds and said he used to have a good reputation but it's ******** now. The guy that bought the shocks suggested a local guy to me who has a shop 1 min from my house. I dropped off the heads and valves there on friday. He's going to clean up the valves, grind them, and do a little port work on the heads for me. Mostly just smooth out a few really harsh corners on the intake side. Said it should be early this week and he'll be done so that would be great. I was bullshitting with him for a couple hours about all kinds of stuff and he was a fountain of knowledge. The guy is in his late 60's and just does the stuff for fun now, not for money.

The replacement OE timing set came in on friday.

Finished stripping down the 2.8 on Saturday,

I was hoping I could use the camaro y pipe and manifolds as they are a nicer design and slightly larger diameter but the y pipe is completely different. S15 right, camaro left.

I sure do miss having a sandblaster and parts washer at my disposal. I went to work and blew off some of the greasier stuff in the washbay. It's a boiler fed pressure washer that gets up to +150f so it does a decent job

It's got enough jam that it stripped the factory undercoating off the cross member.

I'm doing this more because I'm bored and waiting on parts.

Gave everything a coat of paint,

I know an aluminium intake sheds heat better unpainted but I just couldn't put it back on the way it looked,

finished product in the back,

got the oil pan, water pump and timing cover mounted up. Once the heads come in I'll be able to give them and the block a nice shot of black.

lastly I picked up some random bolts from the junk yard that were crusty off the '86 and needed replacement.
Scored some 4.3 injectors as well which are key to this build. Scooped both up for $5! way better then the $210 the parts store wanted for both of them.

 

[chilliwak]

I like the look of the black painted motor Andrew. You also seem to be very resourcefull in finding parts for a good price. If anytime you are by the junkyard and see a drivers side rear window for a 94 2 door fullsize Tahoe or Yukon then please let me know. I need one for my rig. Keep up the good work. Cheers, Chilli....

 

[Andrew_S]

I like the look of the black painted motor Andrew. You also seem to be very resourcefull in finding parts for a good price. If anytime you are by the junkyard and see a drivers side rear window for a 94 2 door fullsize Tahoe or Yukon then please let me know. I need one for my rig. Keep up the good work. Cheers, Chilli....

Thanks! I have a thing for black under the hood. I was back at pick n pull this afternoon and checked for you but no dice on the rear window. I'll keep my eye open for you though.

Oh man! Is that an Edelbrock 4bbl intake?

It is indeed. I was originally going to use it on the 3.4 but I don't think it would work out well with the TBI. If I ever do the 4.3 tbi swap maybe I'll try it out at that time.

Managed to squeak in a few hours this afternoon.
Took some quick measurements of the old cat for reference,

Then while doing some errands I stopped by work and hacked off the ends with a stihl gas axe. This was the best way I could come up with to maintain the heat shield and exhaust mount that stems off the transfer case cross member. Just need to fit a piece of pipe off the middle and one end and the cat delete is done.

Stopped by the parts store and ordered the cam & crank sensor freeze plugs as well, a whopping $1.80.
While I was there I got a price on a new knock sensor as I snapped the tab off the plug clips onto, I just about choked when he said $112.

So I ran back to pick n pull and snagged this one off a buick century. Great thing about these motors GM put these 60 v6's in an absolute ton of cars right up to 2000ish. So even if there aren't any s10s in the yard there is an abundance of other buicks, pontiacs, etc etc.
Replacement knock sensor = $2.49 - nothing to complain about there.

lastly I scored this for cheap this afternoon. I've been playing around with the idea of cannibalizing it in the future and hooking it up to the truck for onboard air. I find it really hard to justify the $400-$1000 arb units. If I pull the tanks off this compressor it's tiny and would be really easy to package. It puts out 5 cfm up to 40psi and 4 after that up to 90, then maxes out at 150psi. Either this or an a/c compressor, haven't decided yet

 

[Andrew_S]

Well exams are over, and school is over for that matter. Just graduated with honours and am now a Civil tech.
time to finish this up as it's now camping season.

Played around with the idea of running a remote mount oil filter w/ cooler for a minute.
Picked up two different styles at the yard to get a better idea of what I wanted to do. Decided to hold off for the time being.

Got my heads back from the shop. Beyond stoked with the level of service this gentlemen gave me.
He ported the heads, checked the valve guides, cleaned up my valves and ground them so that they were all at the same installed height, and a bunch of other stuff. When I went to pick them up he gave me a full on lesson on how to properly install valve springs and check the installed height. When we went over the heads the installed height was about 40 thou short so he checked the springs installed pressure at the "short" height and instead of being the suggest 98#'s it was 103. Which was absolutely nothing to worry about.

some before /afters of the heads

"swirl bump" wiped out and the hard turn at the valve was smoothed out significantly,

should get a fair bit more air through now,

fresh coat of paint,

on another run to the yard I spotted this beauty. Grew up in one of these.

minty.

changed out one of the u-joints on the front driveshaft,

Had to burn out the old nylon factory insert to get it out,

this was a 5 min job with the vice,

new flywheel on, opted to install the engine without the heads or intake to make access to the bellhousing bolts easier,

The install went so smoothly. Everything just fell into place. Almost to a point where I was saying to myself wow this is to easy, something has to be wrong? Quickly found my mistake a few minutes later trying to bolt the torque converter to the flywheel and it was a mile away.

So back out it came,

 

[Andrew_S]

Pretty tough to get a torque converter to seat in the crank when the old pilot bushing is still there....

Tried to use the bread method to hydraulically remove the pilot bushing but it wouldn't budge. Ended up just knocking it out with a cold chisel.

Next up I got the heads on and valve lash set,

swapped out the old 2.8 injectors for the newish 4.3 ones

broke this vacuum break valve during the removal and picked up another one from the yard for $2.50

Starting to come together, intake and tbi installed,

Made my own primer tool out of a 5/16" socket and the old 2.8 oil pump shaft

I was fairly confident I hit everything with a generous amount of assembly lube but this was good insurance, so before I stabbed the distributor in I gave the oil pump a spin for a min or two.

New aluminum rad from the yard. Can't remember how much but this thing was a smoking deal. I want to say like $45?

Until recently I did not know you should only run distilled water in aluminium rads.
It was time for fluids and I didn't want to start my new rad off with bad water.

After buttoning up a lot of stuff I tried firing it last night with no success. This morning I woke up with a fresh mind and just twisted the distributor about 10* and it fired right up. I was so stoked to hear it run. Sorry for the shaky video, this was taken while I was doing the cam break in.
Untitled by Andrew Schwerdtfeger, on Flickr

Went to set the timing with my inductive timing light and when I pulled the #1 plug wire it left the connector on the plug...
Better now then out in the bush I guess. I had the spark plug gobbed in dielectric grease too... Quick surgery and it was fixed.

Getting down to the nitty gritty now. A lot of stuff not pictured happened in between the fire up and this pic. Brakes bled, new lines, exhaust disassembled and reassembled twice due to stupid mistake, etc, etc. Really excited to go for a test drive tomorrow hopefully.

 

[Darkrider]

Bet you are stoked that..

 

[BPD53]

My favorite part is that the "mistakes" in the build are included. It's nice to see an honest build thread that depicts reality.

Oh yeah.....btw

Congratulations on your graduation Andrew!

 

[chilliwak]

I am glad to see your truck together and ready to rock Andrew. It must be a great feeling with all the work you put into it! Some times you have a snag along the way but in the long run everything works out. I bet you are stoked to go out for a rip. Thanks for posting pics and updating us. Cheers, Chilli...

 

[BlueLantern]

Congrats on finishing school! More congrats on getting this back up and running. My first car was a Celebirty! It was a 2 door Eurosport, so you know it was super fancy

 

[Andrew_S]

Bet you are stoked that..

When I twisted the distributor it was just a shot in the dark. When it actually fired I was at a loss for words. Yeah super stoked.

My favorite part is that the "mistakes" in the build are included. It's nice to see an honest build thread that depicts reality.

Oh yeah.....btw

Congratulations on your graduation Andrew!

Man if it wasn't for the mistakes I would have half the pictures haha. I only learn one way and that's by screwing it up the first and sometimes second time...

I am glad to see your truck together and ready to rock Andrew. It must be a great feeling with all the work you put into it! Some times you have a snag along the way but in the long run everything works out. I bet you are stoked to go out for a rip. Thanks for posting pics and updating us. Cheers, Chilli...

Thanks Chilli, yeah really happy to see this getting wrapped. I started dismantling the Camaro in October/November, so it's been a long time coming.

Ahhh the Chevy Celebrity, my cousin had one with the infamous 4.3 diesel.

Wow seriously? I had no idea gm even made a 4.3 diesel, that's cool!

Congrats on finishing school! More congrats on getting this back up and running. My first car was a Celebirty! It was a 2 door Eurosport, so you know it was super fancy

Nice! I had to google it, that's a wicked first car!
and thank you. So happy to get on with my life.

Got everything buttoned up and went for the first test ride this afternoon. What a difference. Before when I hit a hill the truck would gear down just to maintain speed. It would be revving like crazy and not building speed at all.

Now it can just chug up the hills at low rpm and if I give it a bit of skinny pedal it just picks up and goes.
This is truly the motor these trucks should have come with.

I made the mistake of not test fitting the starter on the 3.4 block prior to installation. I just reused the single shim that was on the 2.8 but as soon as I fired it up and heard the grinding/whining of the starter struggling to disengage I knew I made a mistake. One more shim later and it's perfect now.

And a cold start video,

Untitled by Andrew Schwerdtfeger, on Flickr


Just in time for may long camping,

I've just got a few last things to scratch off the list, one being the cooling system is air locking and a small exhaust leak. Hoping to get it completely wrapped up and driving this week.

 

[chilliwak]

Well I guess congratulations are in order Andrew. Awesome your truck is back together and running like you want. Please post any pics you take on weekend adventures. Cheers, Chilli...

 

[Andrew_S]

^Thanks Chilli. Pretty good feeling at the moment.


Got some plates for the '84 so I've been working out bugs on both trucks in the last two weeks. Minor stuff, but time consuming.

The '86 had been running a bit hotter than I liked to see. I narrowed it down to this thermostat (brand new stant 195*) When I boiled it would only crack open at 195 and even at 205 it would barely open. It wasn't until it hit 215 would it open fully. Threw in the 185* thermostat out of the camaro and it runs at a perfect temp now.

Splurged and pick up an optima for the winch. I called around and just about everywhere was $375-$400 after tax. Then I found this local gem that sold me one for $286, exact same unit. Pretty stoked to save over $100. This is a huge upgrade to the dinky 75 series interstate. The new one is a 34/78.

One of the guys from work just retired and picked up this new rig. Not my choice of wheels but it's an awesome platform to build off of.

Did the first oil change on the 3.4 after a couple hundred km's. Oil filter looked good, some very very small metal shavings were visible if you hit them with a flashlight but nothing major at all.

I decided to replace the cat after-all. That was this afternoons project. Without the cat I was getting some backfiring in the exhaust when downshifting that was kind of irritating. Also I had to address a couple of exhaust leaks so I decided to replace it while I was at it.

Welded up the entire exhaust so it's leak proof now.

So I had 3 exhaust leaks. One at the donut on each manifold, another at the y pipe to cat, and another in the tailpipe.
I tried to reuse the old manifold donut gaskets but that just didn't work out. While I replaced those I also threw on the camaro manifold heat shields and reusable manifold - head gaskets.

new cat,

Now I'm just using it, picked up a yard of top soil. The bastard pack handled the load great.

Went for a drive with the wife to try and find some snow but didn't quite make it.

took a fun detour on the way home,

Hoping to get out camping this weekend.

 

[Bojak]

I just love your truck. It's so not 2018 it makes my knees week. Truly old school cool. I bet it's never transported a participation trophy and doesn't feel intitled to anything.

Congratulations on graduation and getting her back on the road.

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