What did you do to your non-G body project today? [2020]

Put my Trailblazer up in the air again, went to use my 4x4 last night in the snow and no joy. Determined that the transfer case is working as I got it into 4-low with no trouble. So I bought a front axle actuator. Went to install it to find that the actual bearing housing is fractured and the half shaft is laying down from the axle itself. I have no idea why this happened, she runs on the highway and city streets exclusively and No four wheeling shenanigans. Went to buy the part and nobody has it locally and had to order it, not to mention $6-700 pricing depending where you order it from. So I bit the bullet and ordered it with RockAuto.com for $355 and tax plus 17.99 expedited shipping to have it this Wednesday. All told $396. Looks to be pretty easy to replace, just have to bust the ball joints apart and then get to the housing, I’ll replace the actuator motor while I’m there since I already bought it. 170k and it’s starting to nickel and dime me, but I’m hoping to hang onto it for another year and pay down a bit of debt before I upgrade to the new Canyon / Colorado quad cab. Will get it fixed up this week.

Wageslave said:

Pulled the Grand Cherokee into the garage for some long overdue tasks. I finally changed the rear O2 sensor out that has been seized into the port for the last 6 months. There is a lot of truth to the statement that the worse a penetrating oil smells, the better it works. Aerokroil has to be the smelliest crap that I have ever had the displeasure of using, but it does work.

As a bonus, the last person to change the sensor cut the pigtail off and directly wired the sensor in. I was going to replace the pigtail and do it properly, but that plug costs $36 and will likely never be unplugged again.

I also bought a new battery and new negative clamp so it will quit turning my battery clamps into white fuzz.

More money down the Jeep hole...

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A Oxy / Mapp gas torch works well on frozen parts.

Tore down the front of the impala motor today. The car was in storage for ~13 years before I purchased it in 2018, and I’m actually a little surprised it wasn’t leaking worse. The o ring seals pretty much crumbled apart and all the radial seals were rock hard.

old80cs said:

Put my Trailblazer up in the air again, went to use my 4x4 last night in the snow and no joy. Determined that the transfer case is working as I got it into 4-low with no trouble. So I bought a front axle actuator. Went to install it to find that the actual bearing housing is fractured and the half shaft is laying down from the axle itself. I have no idea why this happened, she runs on the highway and city streets exclusively and No four wheeling shenanigans. Went to buy the part and nobody has it locally and had to order it, not to mention $6-700 pricing depending where you order it from. So I bit the bullet and ordered it with RockAuto.com for $355 and tax plus 17.99 expedited shipping to have it this Wednesday. All told $396. Looks to be pretty easy to replace, just have to bust the ball joints apart and then get to the housing, I’ll replace the actuator motor while I’m there since I already bought it. 170k and it’s starting to nickel and dime me, but I’m hoping to hang onto it for another year and pay down a bit of debt before I upgrade to the new Canyon / Colorado quad cab. Will get it fixed up this week.

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If it is anything like the carrier bearing assembly on the AWD GMT360s make sure you loosen the transmission cooler hardlines from the oil pan to gain access/wiggle room. And pray that the splines on your intermediate shaft are still sound when you pull it apart, and will hold up until you trade up... that was a hard part for me to find/expensive pill to swallow when I had to change mine out.

There are also splash lube mods you can do to help keep the carrier bearing assembly happy.

superbon54 said:

Tore down the front of the impala motor today. The car was in storage for ~13 years before I purchased it in 2018, and I’m actually a little surprised it wasn’t leaking worse. The o ring seals pretty much crumbled apart and all the radial seals were rock hard. View attachment 133977 View attachment 133978

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Wow! Your's looks really clean. Must be low mile. I spent a lot of time this weekend cleaning up the front of my engine.

The damn closet project is done. I was hoping to throw a lot of car parts in it, Wife was hoping to put holiday decorations in it, which is why we have LS PCM's and carbs next to Christmas sleighs. Converted the pull cord light in the ceiling to switched, installed the floor molding and hung the shelves.

Hit up the 'ole 15% off bag sale at the hardware store Saturday and got most of the supplies to get 220V out to the garage so I can get back to welding. Plan to work on that this weekend so hopefully I can be back to garage life in a few weeks.


Was gone for the first week and a half of the month to Ireland and London. Rented a car in Ireland and drove from Dublin to the western side of the country, down to the south and back east. All the rentals are stick there and she can't drive manual so I was driving the whole time. Bit of a learning experience never being in a RHD car before and getting used to the roads and shifting with my left hand but overall it wasn't too bad. Had a little hundai Kona or something. They had one of the new Euro only ford focuses parked next to the car we got and I wanted one of those BAD for the week but it didnt happen.

Rural Ireland is a pretty cool place. Acutally somewhat similar to Wisconsin or PA geography wise. The roads off the main highway are WAY narrower though and not built at all for winter. Speed limits are way higher than you would want to drive and its more up to your discretion unlike the US. Took the tube in London and a shuttle bus out to stonehenge. Overall a pretty fun trip.

Texas82GP said:

Wow! Your's looks really clean. Must be low mile. I spent a lot of time this weekend cleaning up the front of my engine.

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It’s got just over 40k, and it’s been a garage queen it’s entire life. I spend maybe 20 minutes cleaning everything up, most of the mess was relatively new so it wasn’t bad. I could see on the opti where the coolant was dripping on it. It worked fine so I might just send it as is.

I really love the way these last b bodies ride. Effortless is the best word I could use to describe it.

In the forested parts of the UK, the tertiary roads feel like driving through a green tunnel. It almost seems like they have a vertical mower that cuts the foliage to match the edge of the pavement. Shoulder, what shoulder?!? Agree with all the comments about the shifter, etc. but it's funny that the pedals and turn signal and wiper levers are all in the same positions. Parallel parking was like dressing yourself looking at a video camera image rather than a mirror. But just beautiful, once you get out of town.

Some smaller projects continue. We decided to try some epoxy finish on the counter top in the pantry. It's a piece of butcher block we stained. Only have one coat on it here. Could sand it and put another coat on it to get rid of the little imperfections but ultimately it goes in the pantry.
This is where it goes. I'll wrap the ugly 2x4s to dress it up.

I managed to add some negative camber to my Camaro axle today.



I went from .1 positive to .2 negative. .5 negative would be ideal, but it looks like there is a bit of cross talk between the 2 sides. The right side is about .5 which is as far as I want to go, but it wouldn't take any damn toe. 1/8" of toe in would really help this car. Has anyone else been down this road?