What did you do to your non-G Body project today [2024 edition]

[CopperNick]

About the only thing that will make your weed dead for good is to dig the roots up once you've whacked the ever loving S*** out of it and burn them. As long as the roots are intact, it will come back to haunt you. Other thing is that if you assassinate your side and the neighbors remains intact then it will try to grow back into the space you've just created.

Thought here would be to make friends with the local contractor who does the mowing and trimming for the road shoulders out in the counties and along the interstate and find out what they use for weed control and where to score it.

 

[CopperNick]

Not really warm enough to do some more painting so elected to slide under my non G-Body G-10 Body and do the transmission pan swap and consequent ATF change. When I did the t-box drop, what I used for the ATF was B&M Trick Shift. However, during some reading on the subject of ATF, I learned that the T-shift formula was originally designed to be used with Ford!! automatics which apparently used heavier clutch packs or thicker friction disks which could tolerate the clunk variety of shift feel.

Don't misunderstand here, the 700R4 is a sturdy box and this one came from a C-10/20 so supposedly fitted with the heavier bits and pieces but on initial start up and pull away, the first or initial first-second shift alway got felf in the seat of the pants. As the box warmed up, that shift did get smoother and less like a race box but I had always had it in the back of my mind that it might be a good thing to do the ATF change because along the way I could swap in an aluminum oil pan with the drain plug which would make keeping an eye on things a lot easier. Good thing i did because while extracting the fasteners from the old pan, I discovered that one of the transmission mount bolts that secure it to the crossmember had EVA-d the premises. and the other was close to following it. Not sure if this was a memory lapse on my part from the wrestling match that I had to go through to do the transmission swap in the first place or if I only did use one bolt because that was the default method that the factory used but now I have a "while I'm down there" plussie to add to the to do list.

The other item was a back to the welding deck exercise to manufacture a cradle adapter that will fit over the OEM lift plate on my new floor jack. Having the adapter allows me to stack a spacer into place when I have to deal with a lift that needs to be higher than the jack can fulfil on its own. My first floor jack has had a stroke and now will only lift the arm every second pump on the bottle. Culprit is probably a seal on the jack's piston rod that has either worn out or been damaged by life in fast lane. While fixable, the price for the labor was more than the cost of a replacement, so the replacement, on sale at the time, won.

As for the adapter, it is just a couple of short sections of angle iron with a short length of flat plate sandwiched in between and a short section of 4' ID round tube for a collar that will fit over the resident lift plate and keep the whole gizmo from trying to escape.


Just a little bit of fun on a cold and rainy day.



Nick

 

[83MonteCarloSS]

Not really warm enough to do some more painting so elected to slide under my non G-Body G-10 Body and do the transmission pan swap and consequent ATF change. When I did the t-box drop, what I used for the ATF was B&M Trick Shift. However, during some reading on the subject of ATF, I learned that the T-shift formula was originally designed to be used with Ford!! automatics which apparently used heavier clutch packs or thicker friction disks which could tolerate the clunk variety of shift feel.

Don't misunderstand here, the 700R4 is a sturdy box and this one came from a C-10/20 so supposedly fitted with the heavier bits and pieces but on initial start up and pull away, the first or initial first-second shift alway got felf in the seat of the pants. As the box warmed up, that shift did get smoother and less like a race box but I had always had it in the back of my mind that it might be a good thing to do the ATF change because along the way I could swap in an aluminum oil pan with the drain plug which would make keeping an eye on things a lot easier. Good thing i did because while extracting the fasteners from the old pan, I discovered that one of the transmission mount bolts that secure it to the crossmember had EVA-d the premises. and the other was close to following it. Not sure if this was a memory lapse on my part from the wrestling match that I had to go through to do the transmission swap in the first place or if I only did use one bolt because that was the default method that the factory used but now I have a "while I'm down there" plussie to add to the to do list.

The other item was a back to the welding deck exercise to manufacture a cradle adapter that will fit over the OEM lift plate on my new floor jack. Having the adapter allows me to stack a spacer into place when I have to deal with a lift that needs to be higher than the jack can fulfil on its own. My first floor jack has had a stroke and now will only lift the arm every second pump on the bottle. Culprit is probably a seal on the jack's piston rod that has either worn out or been damaged by life in fast lane. While fixable, the price for the labor was more than the cost of a replacement, so the replacement, on sale at the time, won.

As for the adapter, it is just a couple of short sections of angle iron with a short length of flat plate sandwiched in between and a short section of 4' ID round tube for a collar that will fit over the resident lift plate and keep the whole gizmo from trying to escape.


Just a little bit of fun on a cold and rainy day.



Nick

I read something similar. I used to run Truck shift so after reading that article I started running Type F in my 200-4R. Haven’t had any issues.

 

[CopperNick]

Finished the transmission work this afternoon. The pan did live up to its advertising by fitting as it was supposed to, but..........
the fact that it came with thicker walls meant any clearance that used to exist between the rear rail bolt holes and the adjacent crossmember summarily disappeared. The only option was to clearance the crossmember flange by excising a thin strip of material from the forward face of the crossmember immediately adjacent to the pan where the leading edge rolls over into a curved shoulder. The slice i took was about a 1/2 inch wide and deleted most of the curve while giving me an unobstructed shot at the bolt holes. I still have to go back and clean up the cut edges to sanitize them somewhat.

Since tomorrow is dedicated to a pre-booked call in, any picture taking will have to occur after work; assuming I have any residual energy left to take the shots.


Nick

 

[CopperNick]

Wrote Friday off and today is trying to write me off. Did manage to head out to the welding deck for a couple of hours to finish my latest shop project

This is my new and latest floor jack, a 3 ton Big Red unit. Just before I went south for my micro Vay-Kay, they came on deal and were still available at the sale price when I got back. The store actually still had a few left in the back and drug this one out for me. Hefty suc*** at around 50-60 lbs but it is a 3 Ton lift which is a lot better than the one it is to replace. The only thing that I was not impressed with was the size of the cradle and the height of the teeth. So.........


I came up with this...........

The side rails were made from 1-1/2 inch x 1/8th angle iron and the rest of the floor for it was 1/8 flat plate. The end tabs are the sectioned out pieces from the 2 pairs of long arm vice grips that I modified for length to enable them to position and clamp a section of fender more precisely. Not overly visible but there anyway at the back of the welding deck is a cookie tray that is the recipient of surplus bits and pieces that have no immediate purpose but remain interesting just in case

A shot of the tray and the sections of 2 by that it supports. They are physically attached to each other using deck screws. The screws allow me to dismantle the stack and repurpose the layers if need be.

A close up of the stack to give you some idea of how much spread/support it is designed to provide.

In order to locate, secure, and keep the tray from moving around on the jack's lift pad, I came with with idea of using a short section of pipe. A fast phone call over to my buddy's place and some digging around, plus a trip to the dry saw netted me this 1/2 inch wide piece of 1/4 inch thick, 4 inch dia internal pipe; suitably nasty and rusted mostly because it probably came out of the outside rack behind his shop which is also home to various varmints including feral cats.

The choice of the 4 inch internal dimension was not accidental. A fast measurement of the jack pad gave me a width of just under 4 inches. From the top of the teeth to the arm is about 3/4 inch so getting it cut to the half inch figure lets the tray float on the pad and not get jammed or frozen by the arm.

And here sits the tray, comfortably located on the lift pad. It spins around quite easily and the end brackets keeo the wooden insert in place so it can't slide out during a lift and cause problems

And the final construct. The stack fits snugly but not tightly inside the walls of the tray so that it can be removed as needed. In this picture you can see that the tray has been rotated out of alignment with the lifting arm but the tray and its contents are linearly central in terms of their location on the pad. The monosyllable translation for that is that everything is in a vertical line that, if visible, would go right through the pivot point for the lift pad. Keeping the weight to be lifted as in line with the jack as is possible is the goal here and I think I may have gotten close. I personally don 't smoke cigars so no help there. The only modification that might help the cause would be to remove the pad completely and substitute a bolt or stud the same diameter that would then be welded into the center of the pocket. I am not inclined to go with that idea simply because it reduces the stablility of the fixture to just whatever the bolt can provide and to get the rotation to surive, there would need to be spacers and shims fabricated to raise the tray up to an appropriate height. That is taking something simple and over engineering it for no real practical gain.

So one of the things that I had to deal with to complete my 700R4 ATF pan swap was that the aluminum pan had both thicker walls and thicker gasket rails. This meant that the OEM bolts could not be re-used as they were both too short and the heads crashed against the pan walls.

My solution was to visit the ARP site and see what they had to offer. In so doing I learned that they do not offer a direct bolt kit for what I was doing. But they did offer blister packs of bolts in various lengths and head options so, based on nothing more than actual availablity, I went with what you see above, 8mm x 1.25 thread pitch x 20mm long. There is no SAE matching variant but the length comes in at about 7/8 inch which was perfect, giving an equal amount of bolt in the flange and in the case. The factory manual quotes the torque value in either inch/lbs or N/m and I do happen to have that type of torque wrench in the downstairs master box so they managed to be given the correct torque into the bargain. For the gasket I went with cork/cork composite and doused it liberally with Perma-Tex spray a gasket; multiple coats to make sure the gasket would seal as expected. For those who might suggest alternative methods, I can only point out that when I dropped the factory pan that I had originally installed using Spray a Gasket, and which never leaked for the whole time it was resident, it can out intact! No residue or cork bits left on the gasket rail. Just to be sure I did wipe down the rail with CFC free Brake clean and then wiped it again with a clean dry cloth.

At this point the new pan is in and waiting to be filled. That is on hold because I now have to drop the crossmember because I need to finish off the relief that I had to cut in it to get to the rear row of bolts. The stock pan clearance was tight but manageable, the aluminum pan eliminated the space completely. Not going to get into what I had to do to get the necessary clearance back but I am not going to be real happy about it until I can put the member on the bench and clean up my surgery.

And that about sums up the last few days of this week.



Nick

 

[86LK]

Not really warm enough to do some more painting so elected to slide under my non G-Body G-10 Body and do the transmission pan swap and consequent ATF change. When I did the t-box drop, what I used for the ATF was B&M Trick Shift. However, during some reading on the subject of ATF, I learned that the T-shift formula was originally designed to be used with Ford!! automatics which apparently used heavier clutch packs or thicker friction disks which could tolerate the clunk variety of shift feel.

Don't misunderstand here, the 700R4 is a sturdy box and this one came from a C-10/20 so supposedly fitted with the heavier bits and pieces but on initial start up and pull away, the first or initial first-second shift alway got felf in the seat of the pants. As the box warmed up, that shift did get smoother and less like a race box but I had always had it in the back of my mind that it might be a good thing to do the ATF change because along the way I could swap in an aluminum oil pan with the drain plug which would make keeping an eye on things a lot easier. Good thing i did because while extracting the fasteners from the old pan, I discovered that one of the transmission mount bolts that secure it to the crossmember had EVA-d the premises. and the other was close to following it. Not sure if this was a memory lapse on my part from the wrestling match that I had to go through to do the transmission swap in the first place or if I only did use one bolt because that was the default method that the factory used but now I have a "while I'm down there" plussie to add to the to do list.

The other item was a back to the welding deck exercise to manufacture a cradle adapter that will fit over the OEM lift plate on my new floor jack. Having the adapter allows me to stack a spacer into place when I have to deal with a lift that needs to be higher than the jack can fulfil on its own. My first floor jack has had a stroke and now will only lift the arm every second pump on the bottle. Culprit is probably a seal on the jack's piston rod that has either worn out or been damaged by life in fast lane. While fixable, the price for the labor was more than the cost of a replacement, so the replacement, on sale at the time, won.

As for the adapter, it is just a couple of short sections of angle iron with a short length of flat plate sandwiched in between and a short section of 4' ID round tube for a collar that will fit over the resident lift plate and keep the whole gizmo from trying to escape.


Just a little bit of fun on a cold and rainy day.



Nick

I read something similar. I used to run Truck shift so after reading that article I started running Type F in my 200-4R. Haven’t had any issues.

I just did some quick reading on the Type F vs Dexron thing. I got the following blurb from a Corvette forum posted around 2001. I also saw some similar posts bout what Type F has in it vs Dex (seems to have less friction modifiers)

The type "F" was designed for use with Asbestos clutches, the type found in Ford till 1977. From then on paper type clutches are used in everything. According to Borg Warner, Raybestoes, & Hydramatic, the type "F" fluid has apx. 12-17% less holding power on dynamic clutches and bands when compared to approved Dexron 3. Ford type "F" has more static holding power,(neutral to drive) but this is not a problem with any 700R4 or 2004R transmission. When GM transmissions come in that have ran type "F" fluid, we have seen faster wear on parts. I would stay away from type "F", B&M Trick Shift or equvilant. If you like synthetics use Amsoil (best) or Red Line (2nd best).

 

[CopperNick]

And THANK YOU! Mr. 86BLK, for that bit of historical research and the conclusions to which it came. Took some finagling down at my parts store but I now do happen to have 2 gallons of Dexron III sitting in the cargo bay of the van and ready to pour in; also did the filter as a while I am there thing to do, (and killed the tips on 2! SnapOn O-ring picks trying to get that filter tube grommet out!!) Right now the refill is on hold until I finish dealing with the crossmember. Already put in a little time this AM to take the strip that I sectioned out of the member and prep it for re-installation. The plan is to turn it to face in the opposite direction, i.e. face inside as opposed to outside, and offset it inward by its own thickness when I weld it back in. The offset will move it completely out of the way but still leave room to access the bolt for the transmission mount. Once I get it tacked in I can give some thought to the shape I will need to create at either end, sort of an "S" to make it all look factory-ish.



Nick

 

[86LK]

And THANK YOU! Mr. 86BLK, for that bit of historical research and the conclusions to which it came. Took some finagling down at my parts store but I now do happen to have 2 gallons of Dexron III sitting in the cargo bay of the van and ready to pour in; also did the filter as a while I am there thing to do, (and killed the tips on 2! SnapOn O-ring picks trying to get that filter tube grommet out!!) Right now the refill is on hold until I finish dealing with the crossmember. Already put in a little time this AM to take the strip that I sectioned out of the member and prep it for re-installation. The plan is to turn it to face in the opposite direction, i.e. face inside as opposed to outside, and offset it inward by its own thickness when I weld it back in. The offset will move it completely out of the way but still leave room to access the bolt for the transmission mount. Once I get it tacked in I can give some thought to the shape I will need to create at either end, sort of an "S" to make it all look factory-ish.



Nick

anything I find and post, do not take for granted. I call it food for thought and reflection.
it is the Internet after all, and that post is 23 yrs old, so I'm sure things have changed!

 

[mclellan83]

Over the weekend ended up with a flat on the van, turns out it is a crack in the wheel when I thought I would be plugging the tire. So gonna give JB Weld a shot to get me through for a bit since there are winter tires on it that I want to burn off before getting tires put back on the other wheels I have for it

 

[CopperNick]

The daylight or ambient light for these sucked.

So this might need more than a mark 1 mod 0 eyeball to clearly make out but this is the post reconstructive surgery on my G-10's transmission crossmember. In its as manufactured by the factoy configuration, the flanges tulipped out to both sides. It was the thicker pan wall and that return on the side that faced the ATF pan that cost me the clearance that I needed to install and torque the pan bolts.

The immediate solution was to section out the offending portion of the c-member and carry on with the install.

So today I slithered back under the van, put the floor jack under the new ATF pan and ever so gently put some "up" on it, and dropped the c -member out to finish the job.

Not going to bother you with a melange of welding and grinding and DA surfacing pictures, didn't take any for one thing, and for another, you've mostly all been there and ground that, in one form or another so elected to cut to the chase.

Now, instead of a metal tulip look, both the returns face to the rear. I offset the curved chunk that was being re-attached to get some shoulder and meat to weld to and proceeded to burn the two back together. Managed passes on both sides (Bonus!!) but chose to leave the inside as is. Too much work to make it look pretty and no need to do it.

Picture #2 really shows the extent of the rework as you can see where the old curl abruptly ends on each side and the amount of clearance that has been created by flopping the return over to face inwards.

For the ends, I just sliced a couple of relief cuts in the curl to bring it in tighter to the old edge and created the rest of the curve using my MIG and my imagination. Knocked the whole thing down using a double sided roughing wheel and smoothed out the worst itchies with the DA and a 60GR. Black, anti-rust flat black, lots of coats.

The idea was to drop it back this afternoon but the weather stayed warm for about an hour and then on strike for better living conditions (or something, I dunno what) supposed to rain tomorrow. As long as it's dry, back in it goes and I can on with the job.



Nick