New beast on the block! - '69 GMC 90" window

After much silence, I can finally talk again, as things are progressing steadily.

The Topic with my Crashed '68 panel

Well, today that changes... As I got a newer van!

Essentially rust free original paint van, of course non-running.

Makes ya wonder how many of them have been tagged as such.
It has a 250 with supposedly a Saginaw behind it. Don't know which one, will inspect later.

Began it's life as a school "bus" for the Center for Living and Learning located in Vancouver, WA, just across the river. At some point it was sold, and it was used as a punk rocker van. Last registered in '87, it has sat in a field until 2002 the owner of a salvage yard up North Portland bought it. Sat there almost untouched until they pushed forward a few months ago to do something with it, when my friend noticed it off of I-205. The rest is history.

Notice how the guy started cleaning the right side. Turns out that's just a rough clean, with a full clean she may actually shine again. The tires are hilariously incorrect.




Rear door comparison... Dad's handywork.



The bad side... Mmmm, green.



And the cabin. Seen better days. Do not worry, all of that on the ground is dirt, it's basically rust free there.



The engine on the other hand is absolutely horrendous... I was initially worried as the guy said that it's either a 230 or 235. After some - finally - close up inspection and seeing a Monojet, it's neither. It's a 250. My 250 will slip into this bad-boy with zero hassles.



Huh... Mk, I guess it sat for a while.



Ah, the gas tank. The guy didn't remember if I had a good one, and I kinda went "Ehm, not really" nice and quick. So he threw in a "has to be redone" tank... Honestly I just wanted it out of the yard and in my hands to pass along to a vanner in need!



And the oddity... A retractable step. The usual spot is only somewhat there with a plastic cover on top. There is a plastic battery box opposite side, behind the driver.
So, should I keep it?



So what do you guys say... Decent for $1000?



And of course this means that old whitey had to move. T_T
A friend has a big honkin' truck with a winch, so it made the operation very easy.



A 2 fer shot... One comes, the other goes...

Right on Xelmon, glad to see your getting back in the saddle. your new van seems pretty good. Looks like she'll clean up real nice. How much of your crashed van will you be able to swap over to help the orange one get on the road?

Ah, looks like you're a Ford fellow.

At this point, 100%. 67-69 changes were minimal.

That's the thing, the pattern is still present in the sheet metal, yet most of it covered up. It only has a small cut to access... Whatever it is, a control of some sorts I ass-...

Maybe there's an actuator connected to the door? I'll have to check later, it's in the right 'plane' of sorts.

Sounds about right. It probably hasn't worked in many many moons then.

Nice van!!!

Sair enough!! Get Her=DONE!!

GOOD LOOKING VAN the body is straight and solid.

JOE VAN wrote:GOOD LOOKING VAN the body is straight and solid.

To my folks dismay - still live at home, I'm a "young" vanner - I got it since the body was in such good condition.

Parts are collecting. On Xelmon's behalf, I scored a "0-mile" (never had fluid in it) rebuilt 200-4R tranny at the Portland swap meet last weekend. Delivered a pile of parts to him this afternoon as well -- motor mounts, tranny mount, u-joints, manifold gaskets, rear main seal, timing cover gasket, pan gasket, freeze plugs, rattle can of Chevy Orange engine enamel, vacuum switch for the lockup converter wiring project. Still need to get the torque converter itself, flywheel cover, dipstick, dipstick tube .. build a crossmember, do all the work.

As soon as he gets done with his studies & classwork he's gonna be busy.

.. and just realized I've never even made an introductory post here. I'll have to get on that. I'm one of the local "VW" crew in Portland but I was messing with old Chevys (pre WWWII) before that, and will be messing with them again in the future.

Oh hay tris!

VV-ers, meet Tristessa... He's the one who tipped me off to both the '68 Chevy and this GMC.

Welcome to VV tristessa.

Welcome!!!! Vanner is a vanner VV or VW

It's nice to have friends like that! Looks like a nice fresh start for you!

Dude! That orange deal looks great! I would even keep it orange for a while, it seems to be even decent paint!!! Great deal guys! As far as the step...If you can get it to work reliable and easily I would keep it. Mine wasnt quite as easy so I dumped it. NICE RIG!!!

SO what happened to the other van was it a (TREE)???? ........Those deep rims painted Orange and the hubcaps from your old van would look AWESOME on your new van.(Keep the van Orange it looks good and its the factory color) .........JOE.........

What happened to the other van:


Torque converter's been shipped, ETA is Friday .. but I'm gonna be off camping that day. Found a dipstick for the 200-4R at the wreckers last weekend, still need the flywheel dust cover but otherwise I think all the major parts to get the GMC together with the drivetrain & gas tank from the Chevy are on-hand.

I'm hoping to see things start coming apart/together before I fly out on the 5th...

Sadly progress has been slow, I was pulling 50 hour weeks at the Formula SAE lab, so I was essentially booked for a few weeks... Months there.

However, progress!
A few days ago the weather let up and it was the last decent sunny day per forecast, so I took it, and went ahead and painted the engine block!



I'll be the first to admit that it won't be perfect, as I missed some spots that have mud caked on. Then again, it was taking a long time to get it all clean.
After looking up some codes, the engine was cast June 24th, '68, and assembled on the 25th. Looks like they were flying at the time.



When I dropped the oil pan to check the lower end and clean it for painting, I found something awfully cute.



In the end I put the oil pan and valve cover back as it was getting a bit late, and the tape wasn't up to par.





And tara! Wonderful engine enamel! Have to wait some 7 days to really work with it, plenty to do in the mean time.

Cool van! Congratulations!!

engine looks great

Moving right along! Nice looking van you got there!

ENGINE LOOKS GREAT you are really moveing right along on the van. I did not see the picture of the white van until today. .MAN THAT SUCKES how did it wind up down there.? ...JOE...

@ Joe: Oohhhh, it was a combination of lack of experience and environmental variables, as the rock hard dirt road had gravel. The VW guys I hang out with still give me shit for that.

@ Thread:
I'll have to say that the more I swim under this van, the more obvious it becomes that this poor thing may have been taken care of for the first part of its life, then it was beaten and not taken care of...
I'll post pictures of the "Surface" rust later.

For now, progress!!

Today was spent with lots of good work instead of tooling around like yesterday, with projects such as removing the bars for the manual transmission, removing the steering column, and preparing for an automatic column switchover.
It also helped that it was magically good weather - like I hoped and predicted. As I was knee deep in grease and mud, all pictures are post-morten.

Before picture commence, it has to be said that the pitman arm was removed with an actual proper puller, $13, three twists, and it was off.

First off the 4 bolts that held the pedal in place... It should be mentioned also that I am preparing for the 3-o-a-T to 200R4 swap.



On the other side of the frame rail is the general fluster-cluck. The automatic was cake-walk compared to this. One of the transmission rods had to go out to the front, through the lowest slit, while the other went out to the back. I gotta hand it to GM though, overall it's a very solid system, and you have to really screw up to bend a rod.



Even the transmission linkage support bolts didn't snap, you just had to give it all to turn them, and whack it with a hammer. Even though things were rusty, things were looking good... Until I got to the throttle linkage.
I told dad to press the gas pedal, as I couldn't move it by hand... Well, he pressed it, and the rod was bending a bit. Then I just went to remove that whole deal, since it's obviously rusted. Turns out the gas pedal sleeve/housing is rusted into one/apart, with busting 2 outta 3 screws simply twisting off.
The linkage I'll do my damnedest to save, however the pedal and the sleeve are goners.



Interior at the moment... Pretty empty.



BWAAAAA God I love being greasy!