I knew I'd feel stupid when I solved this issue. Literally all it took was a firm tap with a rubber mallet.

 

nice job!! keep it commin!

 

Thanks! I wanted the dash in by the end of tonight, but we had a bit of a snafu. The wires on the 98 didn't match up properly
So we ripped, and I mean RIPPED, the harness out of the trashed dash that came in my truck, and then we spent about an hour and a half taking the harness out of the 98 dash, then replaced it with the one from the trashed dash. Which was kinda nice, because now I have the newer light switch that I like

Pre-dash teardown


What a mess


Post-dash teardown


The dash for sure gets tossed in tomorrow, along with the fixed seats I got as a graduation gift
I'm praying it will only take a couple hours, and then maybe we can throw in the motor too

 

Last night wasn't as productive as I had thought it would be, but we still got the dash painted and completely put back in. If it isn't raining all night, then we are going to try to drop the motor in. And, of course, we hit another snafu last night. The seats my Dad got me for graduation, wrong seats haha. They are for a 95, not a 2001. So, back to the drawing board on those, but oh well. At least we didn't trash/sell the old ones

The 1995 dash bezel is SUPER close to the roller on the 2001 light switch. Still works just fine though.


All back together, the paint we used for the dash was a little lighter grey than the rest of the interior. I personally think we should have used black and called it a day, but I'm still happy with it.


We had to cut out the VIN plate from the old dash and then make a new cut out for the plate that is attached to my truck.




When I opened the box for my 5inch exhaust, I seriously just sat there and stared for five minutes. It's freaking awesome!
I'll update again tonight when we are done working.

 

Well, no update last night. Why? Because we barely got anything done. It took us way too long to get the motor entirely back together, and it started raining super hard from about 8-12, so we were just stuck in the barn the whole time. Oh well, we still got a whole lot done. But tonight was what really took the cake. From 9:30-12:20.... ALL of that time spent solely on putting the motor in the truck. We used a Bobcat and a couple different methods of trying to drop it in, all with pretty much no success. It was ridiculous, but with a lot of pushing, pulling, prodding, and scratching, we got er done!

A HUGE thanks to Colton and Brad for helping us figure the mess out!











It's all starting to come together! Now we wait on the transmission to get back from the shop, I'll start hooking up everything else motor related tomorrow and hopefully get most if not all of that taken care of. Then we have to worry about some fuel issues, the driveline, and exhaust. Am I crazy for thinking this should be done by Tuesday night?
Also, I've got some fuel questions. Because this was a gas truck, it has a different fuel sending system, but how different? It seems like there are some weird pump things on the passenger side of the engine compartment, where the second battery box would go, and they run down the frame all the way to some other pump looking items that then run a line into the gas tank. The pumps on the frame rail look almost like a Fass pump you'd see on a 24 valve. Can I just tear all that junk off? It seems like the only two lines I need both run straight up the driver's side frame and right into the motor.

One last thing: we bought a flywheel from a guy, and the only bolts he had for it were for a manual transmission flywheel, and they are definitely way too long. But, could we use the flywheel bolts off of the 360 V8 we pulled?

 

The lines on the passenger side are for the charcoal canister (emissions) which is under the cab. DOnt need it on a diesel and u can take it off.

 

I figured I could. Plus it makes more space for the second battery box. Does anyone know much about wiring? I found another wiring issue last night. The harness for the motor isn't going to hook up to my 2001 relay/fuse box. I'm talking to the guy with the 98 12 valve and trying to swap him harnesses, but before I do, does anyone know if it will for sure work?

 

In the past few days progress HAS been made, I've just been too tired/lazy to post anything. We had the timing advanced to 18 (stock was 13) yesterday, and today I picked up the (wrong) oil pressure sensor that I'm hoping to replace tomorrow. I also got some new intercooler boot clamps, and picked up two that were wrong as well
I did a quick search while I was at Earl's, and the interwebs told me that from turbo to tube it was 3 inches and from tube to intercooler it was 3.5. Wrong, it's 3.5 for turbo to tube and 4 for tube to intercooler. Thankfully Cummins and Earl's are within 5 miles of each other, so I'll just kill two birds with one stone
Our transmission is finally finished!!!
The mock up for the exhaust looks B.E.A.UTIFUL!
So tomorrow, I wake up (actually in about four hours) at 6 to go to Truck Parts Unlimited? I can't remember if we are going there or this other car place that specializes in diesel. Anyways, we are road tripping over there, hopefully be back by or before noon. Then my dad heads off to work and I head downtown to Cummins and Earl's, and as soon as I'm back I get to work putting the front end entirely back together FINALLY! We get so close and then find something stupid to have to fix
First we had radiator issues, then the guy that was supposed to time the pump three weeks ago decides he's able to do it one night but shows up the next , and then last night after the pump got timed, realized that we bought the wrong fan pulley
If we don't find everything we need tomorrow, we might possibly be in some trouble haha.
We found out that the only difference from the diesel and gas fuel sending units is that the gas unit has a pump at the bottom of it. So we yanked that hunk of crap out and we are making a custom fuel tube/pickup line for it tomorrow and then hooking up the fuel system, and possibly putting in the transmission and exhaust. That's a tall order for procrastinators like my Dad and myself, but as long as we have all the parts, we might stay up until 4 just to get the dang thing to fire!
Night, I gotta be up soon!

 

Very nice man

 

Well. It's been an up and down climb the past few days. We got everything we "needed" Saturday. Well, except for the proper wiring... again. When we got the transmission all hooked up, realized we couldn't hook it all up. The harness that we had traded for awhile back, the 98 12 valve one, it was from a manual. Why is this an issue? The transmission is a 47re, which I have come to find out is an electronic transmission, and my PCM, being a manual, doesn't have ANY of the four connectors on the transmission.
We had a pow-wow with some diesel gurus in the area, and came up with a couple solutions. The $0 limit, the $200-$300 range, or the $600-$1,000 range. Our first choice was the cheapo range, which included this: we took the V8 harness and canabalised it, taking off all of the transmission sensors. We traced them all down to their proper plugs and pulled them all out. Then we added it all into the 98 harness.
So anyways, we've put some serious time into this wiring splice, and we aren't sure if it's going to work or not. If it doesn't, I think we are going to buy a transmission controller from PCS, which can run upwards of $500.
As of right now, we have everything but the transmission figured out. And the water temperature sensor
What's left- add in batteries and the starter, finish hanging the exhaust, add the front drive shaft, add the fuel tank with our modifications, and then pray to the Lord Almighty that our transmission splice worked. I think our first startup could potentially be tonight!
Right now I'm actually in my new apartment for school livin' it up! Up until I get this truck done, as soon as my classes are out, it's off to the Jeep and off to home to get more crap done haha.
Photos below.


Wiring up some transmission connections.


The view from my new apartment!