Gary Lewis

Yippee!!! Progress! But be careful in that heat, please. As for working the 81, I sorta understand. I rented a man lift recently for work at church and it was heavy. But the trailer it came on was massive. While the 460 in Big Blue didn't seem to care, the weight of the rig, the little tongue weight it has, and the lack of brakes on the trailer made it a handful.

Gary, I sent an email to Ford Media. We never know... I'll copy you. Thanks, Jeff. But I've not gotten the email copy. No biggee, just wanted you to know. And, by the way, John/Machspeed called and will take the photographer role. Not the videographer, just the still shots.

Good job, Ron. Thanks for sharing. Do you hear any noise through them? Do the valves flutter?

Thanks for looking guys. And Jim, I hope you are right! I'll pass that on to him.

Looking good! And I don't think the oversized holes will make enough difference to worry about. And the mountains look great! Reminds me of when my son and I took BB to NM. Lots more snow than expected, but we enjoyed it.

Yes, that is very well done!

Just had a call from John/Machspeed that he cannot find the information on where he ordered the decals. I've done some searching and haven't found it either. Can some of you search for the info on here? He's pretty sure he posted it, but I have an appointment and need to be gone for the rest of the day.

Yes, and yes. But the shipping isn't bad.

I'm not sure you've said what carb you are running, but I wouldn't put brake cleaner in a Holley. My worry is that the power valve won't survive. Anyway, it sounds as if whatever clogged the fuel vapor separator has also clogged the fuel pump, or at least the sock on the end of the pickup. The old-school trick of blowing the sock off the end of the pickup by placing compressed air in the line coming from the pump would be my next trick. But that was usually done on a system with a mechanical pump and I don't know what it'll do to an electric pump. Also, you should have a selector valve on the frame below the driver, and it is possible that is part of if not the problem. So I'd pull the fuel supply line going to the selector valve and turn the key on to see what happens. You should get a good supply of fuel, and if so then the selector valve may be the problem.

Feep! I'll hit him with that tonight at church. Which reminds me that he texted night before last to ask about the bulb that was in the OD switch you apparently sent him. I'm guessing the bulb is out and he's looking for a replacement. And today I was supposed to look at presumably the same switch I took out of Huck, the 1990 half-truck. I forgot, but we think we can replace it with an LED. And we'll figure that out together as I need it as well. Anyway, this stuff does evolve. As does my understanding of how to put things on the website. Early on I made individual pages, but now I know I can put tabs on pages. So, that brings me to what I think needs to be done. Let's start with the immediate problem, dash bezels/gauges/wiring, and I'm wondering if we could consolidate things onto one page. But I don't know where to put it. Nor what all to put on it. Can you, or others, come up with ideas on that?

The show is now just over 2 months away and lots of things need doing now as well as then. And some of those can be done remotely, so can I get some help? Can people sign up? Please? Here are some of the things that will need to be done: Swag: We need someone to hit up the vendors for swag. (Some define that as "boodle, booty, bundle, graft, money, and plunder", but here we mean things like tee shirts, gift cards, fridge magnets, and even catalogs.) Heretofore I've hit up the likes of LMC, Jeff's Bronco Graveyard, Dennis Carpenter, 4WP, etc. But I think we are missing some opportunities and would like someone to take this over and start campaigning ASAP. Dinner Zoom Coordination: I think we are going to do a Zoom session so members who can't come to the show can meet some of us that can. I can do the setup as I do that at church, but I'll need someone that will get the members in the room to come up and introduce themselves as well as ensure that those who are remote are included. This won't take any knowledge of the technology, but it probably should be done by someone at the dinner. Maybe could be done remotely? Facebook Live Streaming: I'm also thinking we'll do Facebook Live during the show, although this is still under consideration. But we will need someone who is au fait with doing this. Shouldn't be all that hard but there should be a set format, such as where the person is from, what his/her truck is, followed by a walk-around of the truck - I think. So it needs to be done by someone at the show. Photographer: We'll also need still shots of both the dinner as well as the show, and especially the awards at the end. John/Machspeed - I've tagged you 'cause you said you'd be the photog but I don't want to assume you'll do it. In fact, you could do the Facebook live and/or the Zoom coord.

Shaun - I don't mind doing this, but I'm not sure it needs to be done in conjunction with the show. However, maybe I'm missing something? Please advise. As for dial telephones and operators:

I need help! (Yes, y'all knew that, but if you are here then maybe you do as well?) This site needs re-organized. And I need help in doing so. The person(s) doesn't/don't have to do all the work, but we need someone(s) to come up with ideas to make things easier to find. I'll give you an example. The 1980 instrument bezels are a one-year wonder and Ralph came up with good pics of an 80 vs an 81, shown below. In them you can easily see that the turn signal arrows and Seatbelt/Brake warning lights have swapped places. That means you will get wonky results if you use an 80 bezel on an 81+ truck or vice versa. So I want to update the documentation with these pics, and I've found that similar info is in three places: Documentation/Interior/Dash: There you will find that the instrument bezel is base part number 044D70, but not much else other than the part numbers of the glove box. Documentation/Electrical/Gauges: Here you'll see part numbers for the gauges as well as the printed circuits, but nothing about bezels. But on the Printed Circuit Pinouts tab there are the pinouts for the 1981+ connectors to the gauge cluster as well as this statement: "These are the pin-outs for the printed circuit connections to the gauges. However, this is for 1981 - 86 trucks as pins 17 and 18 are swapped for the 1980 trucks. In fact, if you want to use a 1981-86 cluster in a 1980 truck you need to read this: HOWTO: 81-86 gauge cluster in 80 model (gauge models ONLY!)" Documentation/Interior/Instrument & Radio Bezels: Here we have the part numbers for all of the various bezels, but no pictures and no mention that while the 1980 instrument bezels will fit an 81+ truck they won't work properly. So I need HELP! I need someone(s) with good organizational skills to help me rationalize things. Any takers? Please!

Good report. Sounds like the Fox shocks are something to consider. However, according to 4WP those Fox shocks won't work for me. Here's a comparison of their lengths to that of the Bilstein 33-185552's that I have: Fox Bilstein Extended Length: 15.75 25.93 Collapsed Length: 10.65 15.91 Travel: 5.0 10.02 (I have 8" of articulation) So what am I missing? Also, my front shocks are eyelet mount, as you can see below. I used the shock mounts from the 1990 truck, Huck, I parted out.

Yes, washers and epoxy might do it. Thanks for the compliment on the bezel. I really like how it turned out as it not only looks good but it puts control of lots of things right where it is easy to find. Here's another view, although I can say that the wiring has been cleaned up since that pic was taken. Anyway, the switches get used and you don't have to go looking for where I hid them.

Another good pic. I'll see about placing the 1980 and 1981 side-by-side to show the difference and why the pinout needs to be changed to go from one to the other.

At $800 starting bid this one also has everyone sitting back and watching. But it would give an option to a Bullnose that is otherwise hard to find. Shame about the surrounds for the lights.

Not bad, depending on what it goes for. The starting bid of $110 has everyone sitting back waiting, but shipping is only $19.

Good idea. Let me see what I can do...

That's basically what I used to create Mission Control on Big Blue. Shame about the mounting tabs though. Perhaps they can be repaired?

That link doesn't take me to that item. Did it sell?

At $35 that's a steal - if it works. And if I remember correctly the main difference between this one and the later version is in the connector. Right? So this one could be adapted to the later trucks by changing the connectors?

Good picture, nonetheless. Wonder if it sold or will come back?

Yes, you can also use screws. But spreading the load is a good idea however you fasten them. As for everything being possible on your truck, you aren't alone as had his way with my truck. He cut a hole in the engine crossmember to weaken it, wired around the inertia switch so the fuel pump wasn't protected, bypassed the resistor to put full battery power to the fuel pump, etc, etc, etc. It took me years to unravel and put straight what he'd done. So I feel for you. Been there and it isn't fun. But you can eventually sort it all out. Hang in there.

I didn't buy the hi lift jack. My son thought it would be a good accessory. But in reality it hasn't been used much. Helped a friend sell Keith/FORDification an earlier pickup and none of the on-hand jacks would get under the axle to raise the truck because the tire was flat. The hi lift worked then, but I have a bumper adapter for it that is a j-hook that grabs the bumper. So it can be useful, but I'd put a hydraulic bottle jack several notches ahead of it.