Ol2Stroker

Swapped my steers over to some real wheels and put it back together in the front. Getting back to the part that really needs attention. She's lost her fifth and fenders. Broke a shock mount in the process so I unbolted it. Also got rid of the bent rear crossmember. Pulling airbags etc. Got a set of REAL headlights mounted. That's how a Peterbilt is supposed to look. Still coming apart however: Oh man this can't be good. What is all this? And so it begins... Typical I get done sandblasting at 3am just in time for rain. God I love NY (sarcasm) The plan was to primer Saturday but ended up getting rained out so we had to make a mad dash and primer AND paint for 14 hours on Sunday, as this was to be the last good weekend of the year and it's gonna rain on Monday. UGH. Wouldn't have made it without my wife's help. At least it came out good!

As you can see the back half of the truck needs.... everything. lol We also had a bunch of work to do up front. The radiator has always had a leak at the seam right above the lower outlet. Out she comes. On top of that the single rounds and rock shields looked like complete shit and had to go! This poor radiator was in ROUGH shape. Here you can see where the leak was. The corrosion in this area was so bad it actually snapped all the bolts above that outlet. Core is filthy but appeared in good shape otherwise. First trip to the store. Ugh. The bleeding begins. Decided to pull a front wheel and have a look. Not too shabby. Cleaned up nice!

Been awhile... though I had a buyer for this but as is typical money never appeared. Was only selling it so I wouldn't have to see it sit any more so I decided since I didn't need to sell it we'd make a better choice. First lets get the old girl pulled out of the weeds. Next lets get it turned around and in a spot we can work on it a little easier. Lets get to work shall we:

My buddies is sick. He swapped in a hot 8v92 @ around 700hp currently.

ugh that doesn't sound like any fun at all.

Little bit of cold start fun on the old 8v92. Enjoy!!!http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJvzsFevEKc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIP7x18AsKshttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANEDZXY-vLs

Looks awesome!!!

WOW that driver sure isn't scared of them things. I'm honestly really impressed at how little that cab was moving in the test course, he was sure givin 'er!!!

I wonder if it's just a case of the engines sucking at lower power levels and kind of came into it's own in the 600hp spec.... it's odd that they stated reliability improved at 600hp over the 500hp setting so that leads me to believe that whatever they were using in the 500hp version and below is why they were unreliable???? I dunno just curious because I always heard they sucked too.

I just used some armor-all leather wipes and some leather cleaner??? Did the water pump job Friday and got all the fluids back in on Saturday and got her running again. Easy job woulda been ALOT nicer inside in a heater bay instead of outside in 15degree weather. UGH I hate winter. Even still I had the pump off in under 40 minutes. Confirmation: Turns out the old pump does have a weep hole but it was very small and plugged. Also totally invisible to check in this application. Had a bunch of minor leaks when finished which were all hose clamps not tight enough. Think I've got em all squared away and I moved the truck to it's winter location. I'll check again tonight.

2 strokes are easy to get parts for and yes that's a 453T

I love this kind of thread, I love seeing what people are building in their shops... I just finished this build for a customer but he needed it back to finish fab so we didn't get to run it yet. I'll shoot out to his place for first start and to set the final tune up.

You replacing the injector harness only or the entire engine side harness?

Me too!!! Really got lucky here! Finished up the stereo,cb, and speaker install on sunday. I can't wait to get this thing on the road.Some fresh speakers behind the factory covers in the cab and in the sleeperSounds awesome and looks good in there.

So the following day after I put coolant in the truck and ran it to temp I went outside to show my buddy the truck who hasn't seen it yet and opened the hood and checked the coolant. Radiator empty..... uh oh. Pulled dipstick.... way over full. You know where this is going.... pulled drain plug got 5 gallons of coolant before i got any oil out. LOL Pulled the pan off today.8v92 Coolant in pan video No traces in airbox or under valve covers. I believe I'm a victim of an old style water pump with no weephole.Water pump on order.

Not much for updates I've been busy rebuilding the transmission in my bulldozer and reinstalling it. It's starting to get cold here so i dumped the water out of the truck and got some coolant in it and ran it to temperature to circulate. Sure starts and runs excellent!!!! I got the new radio, cb and speakers in the mail last week, only had time to throw the speakers in quick. Hope to tackle the radio and cb soon.

GOD DAMNIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I want one of these with a nice bunk like that and 8v92 power so bad!!!

First post?!?!?!?

10-4 i'll throw the traps back in. definitely don't want those little bastards back!

I did have traps set the first few nights however you gotta bait the traps and it's getting cold I don't want to attract the mice BACK to the truck.

What a weekend. The rabbit hole went pretty deep as it turns out.... or should I say mouse hole. Ended up completely gutting the interior of the truck. They tunneled through all the foam everywhere. Wasn't going to do the sleeper originally but glad I did. Pulled the headliner down and out fell this mess onto the cab floor: Picture does it no justice it was like 5" deep. A dead mouse also fell out, I hope he died a very slow and agonizing death. Once we were all vacuumed out I spent lots of time fabreezing and cleaning the foam etc. fabreezed and cleaned the back of all the interior panels also. Then while I had wiring exposed I decided to chase the things that didn't work in the truck. Nothing in the sleeper worked so I started by chasing the lighting circuit and found I had no power. Found a broken wire in the harness where it comes in to the sleeper from the cab. Bingo lights work!! Figured out the heating controls back there too and now all that works. Next I decided to figure out why all but one of my clearance lights didn't work. UGH. UGH that'll do it. Gotta order clearance lights. Also the headlights didn't work at all, one click of the high beam switch on the floor and bingo we've got headlights. Needs a switch, I have no high beams no big deal. I chased some wiring in the dash and got all the gauge backlights working too. I need to buy the infrared switch label illumination from peterbilt as that doesn't work real well. Once I was done chasing electrics and now that the interior had a day to air out I decided to re-assemble and clean the interior. Here's a good before and after shot of the cleaned up interior. Sleeper door is before, panel next to it is after. Put on my sweet chrome nut covers my buddy gave me LOL Swapped the steering wheel from the junk black foam one to this nice white one my buddy gave me. Interior cleaned up fantastic!!!! I need a bushing for the bottom of this Fuller remote shift assy: Peterbilt part number for the assembly is 05-05930 if anyone can cross that to a fuller number and get me a parts breakdown??? Thanks in advance. It's an RTO12513

Started to clean er up. Found a few bonuses in the bottom compartment of the sleeper door that wouldn't open. Noticed a small amount of mouse nest while vacuuming under the cab's passenger rear interior panel. Had to see how far the rabbit hole went. Just vacuumed for now, they're tunneled behind all the interior panels in the foam far as I can tell. Spring it'll get gutted and dynamatted etc. For now a vacuum will do. Nothing on earth I hate more than mice, they're even worse than Prius drivers.

Awesome old truck!!! Helluva Birthday gift!

Been through 2 sets of hands that wanted it for a project but nobody ever did anything with it. Not sure why it was originally parked but I've gotta hunch I'm going to find out! lol. I believe it needs an air compressor for starters.