That V8 tho...

[Jeff V.]

Well, that sucked. But at least it's done.

The fuel feed pipe was actually the easiest part to remove. I'm still going to replace it, but I took it off just out of curiosity, and to make it easier to remove the pump. That plastic overflow fitting was a pain. There was a lot of corrosion, and I was trying really hard not to break it.

But that lock ring. What a piece of shit. Can anyone design a fuel tank closure that isn't total garbage? It took me twice as long to pull that damn thing as it did to drop the tank. The special tool I bought was absolutely useless. I basically had to chisel the damn thing off. At least the tank itself is sturdy enough to take the abuse.



Once I got the pump out, I checked the level sensor. It was physically jammed at the halfway point. Hmm. I pulled it out of the pump carrier, took the cover off the side, and found this:



Now it makes sense. The tank skid plate was missing one bolt, and another one was snapped off. So someone had the tank down, but they hadn't gone inside. They replaced the tank pressure sensor, and snapped the nipple off when they did it. In a one in a billion shot, the broken part floated down and off to the side and lodged inside the small opening for the level sensor. It's nuts.

I'm glad it's all getting replaced anyway. I don't know how much life was left in that pump at 192k. Speaking of the pump, I pulled it out of the carrier to see if there were any markings that I could use to find out the flow rate. There weren't.

I'm gonna get that pipe ordered and start in on the AC evaporator tomorrow. At least it'll be easy to reinstall the tank. I used a trans jack to get it out. We took roughly 14 gallons out of it. I can lift it back in pretty easily now that it's empty.

[DCIV]

Nice. New pump is the way to go!


Coop

[vr4]

Hammer and chisel. Always.

I don't even play with the removal tool unless it's the oe cast one. The stamped steel ones are garbage

[ChargerX3]

Yea that’s just asking for a follow up visit.

[Jeff V.]

I got a Chinese copy of the cast one. Big heavy bastard with a 1/2" drive. I put a breaker bar and a jack handle on it, and it wouldn't budge.

Granted, I was having to sit on the empty fuel tank to keep it from spinning around, so my leverage wasn't the greatest. After seeing how corroded it was, I don't think it would have mattered even if I had had Vira come out and help. She was instrumental in helping me get it out of the truck earlier in the day, and she was off spending time with her mom by that point. I didn't want to bother her.

The new fuel pipe will be here Thursday.

[ChargerX3]

Are the tanks interchangeable between your two trucks?

[Jeff V.]

Yeah, but why would I do that?

[Jeff V.]

Turns out pulling the dash was only the halfway point. I was hoping I could get the HVAC case apart and swap out the evap core without going any further. I was wrong. More wrong than I realized. The whole thing has to come out. So that meant draining some coolant so I could pull the heater core with it. Fortunately all those fittings came apart super easy.

I want to smack someone at GM. You need to pull the center console in order to remove the floor vent and free up the HVAC case. No big deal right? Wrong. You need to remove the seats. The back of the console is held in by the seat brackets.

I managed to get the case separated enough to remove the blower motor, which gave me enough room to wiggle the case out without pulling the console. But I'm lucky I didn't damage anything. I'm going to have to do it the right way and pull the console in order to get it back together safely. As you can see, I ran out of daylight.



I also need to fix up some of the wiring related to the aftermarket alarm. It wasn't really bad, but it wasn't the way I like it. Some of the splices were pretty crappy, and it needs some grommets where it goes through the firewall. There's also quite a few cut wires I need to identify. I thought about just deleting it, but I kind of like the idea of having remote start.

Oh, did I mention we want to take it on a short trip next weekend?

And it's supposed to rain on and off all week?

I feel like I may have over-reached.

[Duck Vader]

[ChargerX3]

Wowzers! That’s a lot to tackle in a weekend!

Was your ac not working?

[DCIV]

There is a blend door somewhere in there that you should prob replace while your at it. I was told the same with my avalanche but mine ended up being an easy one.


Coop

[Jeff V.]

Was your ac not working?

Post 107.

There is a blend door somewhere in there that you should prob replace while your at it. I was told the same with my avalanche but mine ended up being an easy one.

I can reach the motors with the dash in. I'm kind of wishing I had done the heater core though...

[DCIV]

How hard was it to drain all the coolant? I’m gonna do that in both the escape and avalanche.


Coop

[Jeff V.]

I didn't drain it all. I took out maybe a gallon. The heater hoses are the highest point on the system, so it didn't take much. There's no petcock, so I just pulled the lower radiator hose and let it go into a bucket.



The seats and console are out. The evap core is replaced and the module is back in. The heater core looked fine, so I don't feel bad about not replacing it.







Vira is going to go pick up a fitting from her dad so I can pressure test it with nitrogen before I tear the front end apart to swap the dryer. I'm moving on to wiring repair now. The orange truck has the same cut wires this one does. I guess it was prep for optional equipment. Lights, maybe? Anyway, it's not something I need to fix. I'm going to clean up the alarm wiring and then move on to putting the dash back in. I think I'm going to put the dash cross member back on to the dash shell and put it all back in one piece. It should save me time if I'm able to do all the different bolts while it's on a bench instead of in the truck.

[DCIV]

Why not just pull a vacuum on the ac system to see if you have a leak?


Coop

[Jeff V.]

Because with pressure, you can look for bubbles.

[Jeff V.]

I take back anything even slightly positive I might have said about the wiring. It's pure shit. All of it. It looks like there's been at least two different alarms installed in this truck. The harness for the steering column is hacked up so badly I'm just going to replace it. I'm surprised it even runs.

Most of the connections were just twisted and taped off.



This was the power feed for the remote start. Why in the hell would you put three different kinds of wires together in such a short span?



This one was at least soldered, albeit poorly.



These are just a few samples. It's a big part of why I'm not done. I have to fix all this garbage. I gave up on putting the alarm back in for now. I'll add it back in later, after I know I've got the harness back to a good place. I put some convenient pigtails on a few of the chassis harness connections that won't be accessible once the dash is back in. It was really difficult to get to them even as they are now. But now they're routed down by the parking brake where I can get to them much more easily later. I've still got to fix about a half dozen connections in the dash harness. Then I can start reassembling the dash. At least I can do the dash harness on a bench.

On the bright side, the AC system seems to be holding pressure. I let it sit overnight. I'll check it again later today.

[Duck Vader]

Ooph

[aaronatstate]

This is what the wiring looked like on the ignition switch in my Stealth. When I replaced it, I was shocked at how bad it was, and should have replaced it a long time ago.

[ChargerX3]

[quote=""aaronatstate""]This is what the wiring looked like on the ignition switch in my Stealth. When I replaced it, I was shocked at how bad it was, and should have replaced it a long time ago.[/quote]

Same here on my white stealth. They even hacked up half of the ECU wires. It sucked to go back and replace them all.