Gary Lewis

Ok, in the immortal words of Baldrick, I have a cunning plan. In the pic below of the kit that I bought you can see item #72308, the next to bottom hose/fitting combo. That's supposed to be the one for GM TBI. And below that you can see item # 71408, which has smaller fittings on it than 72308, but it has a shut-off valve. It appears that the hoses all have the same threads on the ends. So I'll just swap the hoses from one unit to the other and be able to turn off the flow from the pump and find out how much pressure it can provide - without crimping the hose.

I don't know if this one is forged or cast, but it is in two parts. Here are some pics to prove it.

Jim - That's exactly what DeWayne said - the failure mode on the regulator is to return everything to the tank. And while that would fit our symptoms, so would a pump with very low pressure. The kit that I saw used had a brass adapter that went between the inlet to the filter and the filter itself and then a port for the gauge off that. I thought that was pretty slick but the kit was $122 and had little else in it. The kit I bought was $50 and has "everything and the kitchen sink" in it. But the part for TBI is a hose with two female connectors on it and a tee in the middle for the gauge. Apparently you put it in place of the filter. So over lunch today after church Steve/FoxFord33 and I thought through the testing plan. I'll put the hoses in place to bypass the filter, hang the gauge off of it, and fire up the pump by jumping 30 to 87 at the fuel pump fuse. If the regulator is working properly and if the pump is healthy I should see 12 - 15 psi. But if the pressure is lower I won't know if it is the pump or the regulator. However, if I squeeze the hose in the adapter shut after the gauge then the pressure should climb if the pump is good. If the pressure doesn't climb the pump is bad. So this kit actually is better than the other one as there isn't a way to really test the pump since you can't compress the brass fitting. Dane - Thanks. This is something I enjoy doing and this young man is learning something at the same time. Win/win.

Vivek - I only have a MAPP gas torch, and that's not going to get it warm, much less HOT. Jim - I may have to resort to that blade. But I have a few more things to try first. Yesterday I had a few minutes so I tried my battery-powered grinder with a 5" cutoff wheel on it. But since the cut from the smaller wheel was narrow the larger, thicker wheel kept binding. So I took a wide chisel and drove it into the gap and was able to get the gap wide enough that I could get the larger wheel in. That worked for a while but I finally overheated the battery and since I was essentially out of time I quit at that point. The next thing will be to put that wheel on the 110V grinder and see what I can do. I'm probably about 2/3 of the way through the crank and with the oil pump off I have good access so hope to be able to get most, if not all the way, through. But there is NO flex yet. The rear main doesn't wiggle. Hitting the flywheel doesn't cause any movement, although I have to be very careful as the whole thing is resting on two jack stands & a 2/x4 so I can't hit too hard. Maybe when I get as much cut as I can I'll be able to rotate the flywheel with a pry bar and get the crank to let go. But, there are no parting lines on the crank so I think Bill is right - it is forged.

Dane - We may do that. But this is a learning exercise for the young man who is going to drive the truck. His parents have asked that I teach him how to repair things, not just get the truck running. So we are going slowly and methodically. For instance, they said it would click when you tried to start it. So they took the battery to the parts store and it tested good. But when I got there it wouldn't even click. So we put the meter on and had 12.45 volts, which I told him was adequate. But nothing worked at all and there was no voltage on any fuse in the main fuse compartment. So we started checking the battery cables. The one to the alternator was good. The one to the starter was good. But there wasn't one to the cab on the battery. We found it dangling, apparently not having been reinstalled when the battery was removed. We pulled all the positive cables and cleaned them with a wire brush, and reinstalled everything. Then it cranked and wanted to start but wouldn't. Gas gauge showed 1/2 a tank, but the gas had been put in back in January. So we pulled the air cleaner, put some new gas in, put the air cleaner on (with an explanation of why) and it started but died when that gas ran out. Maybe the gas is bad or there isn't enough for the pump to pick it up? So we put ~3 gallons in the tank and the gauge read 1/4. Tried to start it and nada. Put gas in the engine and it ran until that ran out. Put another ~3 gallons in the tank and now it reads 1/8. And it still won't start w/o priming, and it then dies. Watched a Youtube about low pressure and it explained where things are as well as that the pumps frequently fail. So we cracked the connection before and after the filter and got gas both places. Called DeWayne at the parts store and they don't have one, but he did said that the pressure regulator frequently fails and routes all the fuel back to the tank. Then it was time to discuss this with he and his mother. I explained we could drag out the parts cannon and start firing or I'd be happy to buy a test kit and we go through the proper procedure to find the problem. The latter is what they want to do and they are buying the kit that will be mine when we are done. Got the kit in this morning and it has soooooo many parts we should be able to make it work. But the instructions on the GM TBI are poor, so it is going to take some research to figure out where all we can test. Hopefully we can test before and after the fuel filter, which will determine if the pump is good and then if the filter is plugged. If both of those are good then it should be the regulator.

Wow! That's a lot to take in! But you have a lot of options, so I'll bet you can find a combination that results in several good trucks. On the ZF5, they are known to rattle in neutral with the clutch out. That might not be a problem.

That's funny, Jeff!!! I say that because I just drove Big Blue for the first time in a while and had the same experience - I had to turn the subwoofer down. It is amazing how the bass differs from song to song on the same album. I was playing the Beach Boys Greatest Hits album and some cuts have serious bass and others don't. In fact, it varies so much that I'm going to install the level control that the sub came with so I can adjust it easily. As for what I did with my truck today, I used it as a rescue vehicle for a Chevy pickup. Some friends at church have a '91 Chevy 1500 that won't quite run. It is a TBI system and if you pour some gas in the throttle body it'll run until that gas is gone. The fuel pump is running but not enough gas is getting to the engine. It only needs 12 - 15 psi, but the pumps are known to get weak and the fuel pressure regulators are known to fail in full-return mode. So I'm going to order a gauge set and measure at the input and then the output of the filter and that will tell us which part is failing.

Well, if it is forged I'm gonna have a problem. It'll probably eat saw blades and I can't get far enough with the little cutoff wheel to get through it. Maybe with a bigger cutoff wheel I can?

I'm almost as deep as I can go. A bit more and I'll be there. As for smacking it, the main part of the crank is well supported so I need the flywheel end to tilt away - and crack off. That's why I'm thinking that using a chisel to wedge it apart is the way to go. That will tilt the flywheel away and, hopefully, break the crank.

Bill - I'll follow up on that oil filter idea. Thanks!

Jim has a way with words. To me "slice" implies "like a hot knife through butter". This is more like a dull knife through cast iron. I first tried a bi-metal sawzall blade and all that happened was the blade turned blue and the teeth departed. Then I remembered that cranks are frequently nitrided to make them hard on the surface, and while I don't know that this one was, it sure is hard. So I then took to the cutoff disc and got about as far as I could reach with it, as shown below. I can get a bit farther with the cutoff wheel, but after I get as far as I can I'll try the sawzall again to get the other half of the crank. But if that doesn't work I'll try a chisel to see if I can break the crank. And yes, you see hammer marks on the rod. I've tried to move it down but everything is frozen. NOTHING is moving.

Keep us posted, Bill.

Good luck! My experience with Sky was great. Hope yours is as well.

I'll send Bob a message. But anyway, we have an easy plan that could be included in the "plug and play 3G harness instructions". «If your Voltmeter arrives reversed, simply swap the R/O and Y/LtG terminals in the cluster connector». Yes, we need to know if Bob has changed which stud will be positive for the future, or if yours snuck out the door when he was having other problems. And yes, we can add the pictures to the documentation and explain how to reverse the wires if needed.

I've not been part of the conversation of late, but if you don't run EGR then a NOS vacuum control valve wouldn't be needed. But maybe you are saying if you had it you'd run EGR?

Yes, your voltmeter studs are reversed from how Rocketman was making them. You can see Big Blue's on the left and Big Bro's on the right. We need to know if he's changed going forward or just dropped the ball - again. Will/dirtymac had the same problem back in May and said this about a discussion he had with Bob/Rocketman:

I'm really happy it worked so well! But we need to discuss the voltmeter problem in the writeup. I saw the pic of the studs, and that's key. We may need to mod the wiring diagram to say swap these wires in the cluster connector if your studs are the other way 'round.

I've seen videos of that before. Waste of a good truck. But it is unusual.

Be careful with the terminology. There were actually distributors with two vacuum ports - one for advance and one for retard. I don't think you have one of those, but that's where my mind went when you said "vacuum retard". But to answer the question I'd say "Probably not". The vacuum advances that came with engines with EGR had full advance with not much vacuum. So unless you really get into the throttle heavy you'll probably still have full advance. That's where the adjustment comes in. You turn the Allen wrench to put more preload on the spring so it takes more vacuum to get full advance. And you keep doing that until the pinging stops.

Welcome! Glad you joined. That's really interesting about the truck. But 1FD means it was an incomplete vehicle and someone else put something on to complete it. Yes, I'd like to see pics. Where's home? We have a map, which you can see at Bullnose Forum/Member's Map in the menu, and can add you with a city/state or zip.

Give the guy a try?

DONE! These terminals are very easy to get out and swap, it took 2 seconds each.And yes, it works! Perfect!

Yes, swap the R/O and Y/LG in the cluster. Apparently the gauge is backwards. I'll check that out tomorrow. But congratulations!!!!!

The front floors for the Bullnose trucks are in two varieties: Regular cabs and crew cabs have the same front floor Supercabs and Broncos have the same front floor. These were the only ones that got bucket seats from the factory, and these won't bolt into a regular or crew cab floor directly.

Ohhhh! I love the clocking on your 3G. Everything is easily accessible. Anyway, yes you can use a shorter belt. For every inch of a shorter belt the distance between the pulley and belt decreases by ~1/2". So if you currently have 1/2" of clearance you need a belt 1+ inches shorter, the "+" being so you have some room to adjust. So maybe 2" shorter? Perhaps buy two or three belts and return the one(s) that don't fit well?