I've been working on getting my 1991 dodge W-250 auto ready for paint. The bodywork has been a long road but the body is true and straight now. I got the bed put back on and pulled the truck outside for the first time in a long time.

I did find that the speedo wasn't working. I did some digging and found the dreaded broken speedo gears. I'll have to do some research and get some new ones ordered.

I've been collecting grilles for the truck. I'm taking one of the more damaged grilles and going to paint match it to the truck, just to give the old girl a few different wardrobe options. This meant fixing all the cracks and removing the peeling chrome. I was able to remove most of the chrome by using a small propane torch. The chrome wrinkles up and you can peel it off.

Then while I had the plastic welder and hot stapler out for the grille, I fixed all my interior trim parts. A little body filler to make them smooth and a coat of SEM "camel" color interior paint had them looking good.

Finally, I got my seats back from the upholstery shop. I had them finished in a high-grade vinyl material to match the interior plastics. The seats are from a 90's suburban, I was able to just cut down the stock chevy floor mounts and line up with the outside stock bench holes. An just drilled new holes for the inside holes on each seat. pretty simple

 

Progress!

Do you have a lift in the front?

Um, is that a blue carpet in the spice interior? Or just the black mat that appears blue on my screen?

 

it’s a blue carpet. The out side color will be blue. Hopefully darker carpet last a little longer. Then the truck has a 2” lift. Alcan springs.

 

Progress indeed looking good .

 

Finally... the flatdeck is perched on the rails. As minimal as it looks, it easily twice as heavy as a pickup bed.

Now to attach it...

 

Drove mine for the first time in over a year the other day. Despite sitting it fired right up same as it always does. I moved it from my garage to my fathers to put front brakes on. Hoping that finally solves the issue of a less then optimal pedal. If not, I will bypass the RWAL even though it hasnt been a problem to date.
Ordered calipers, rotors, pads, and flex hoses from Rockauto and will finally throw the front shocks on ive had for two years.

 

Over the weekend I did some wiring on the truck I bought off our own DTR guy, Nonrev a couple of years ago.
The truck was pretty dailed in when I got it. Props to Vern on that!
I have only had to do minor fiddling with it to be a perfect summer driver the past two years, so I have not started a thread on it.

The fusible links had some fuses spliced in and butt connectors that had started to corrode. After looking at it for a while and figuring out the best way to fix it.....I decided to just swap the complete engine bay wire harness.
I searched through my large collection of wire harnesses and found one box covered in 10 years of dust, that was labeled '92 LE engine bay harness complete, with the word MINT written on it in capital letters. I took it down and inspected it. It really was mint. So in it went.

The electric windows, power door locks, and heater fan work again!

So I took it out for a ride and got it inspected today, as the non functioning windows made it fail the state inspection last week.

It was a perfect holiday weekend job to do...not so hard that I couldn't have a cold IPA while swapping out and cleaning up the wiring.

 

Does a claw hammer count as a window opener?

 

Depends on the outside air temp

 

Or the water depth.

 

Ted Kennedy might know, but it's a little late to ask him......Ben

 

Well at least I see a few new posts from the DTR gang.
Nobody else doing anything to their 1st gens?

 

Replacing the front brakes did not solve the sinking pedal. Not upset found a frozen caliper and just a good refresh on the front brakes was in order. Gonna try bypassing the RWAL next, see if that get it running again. Though with diesel at 6.19 and climbing, it may not run much anyway.

 

Been getting it out lots in the hot weather lately down here in SE Texas! AC still running cold on the 134 conversion. Need to tackle brake pedal going to floor issue as well. Thinking about selling to let someone else enjoy the ride as well! Getting some cancer spots again too! Hard to combat those down here. Should I advertise here or I also heard about bringatrailer.com . Anyone familiar with that site?

 

Bugger that, FrustratedFirst. Hate to hear. Hope it all goes well.
I’m in east Texas now, just moved my daughter to Irving from GA.

All I’ve done to my 1st Gen is think about her and miss her plus lament the fact that I’ve missed several opportunities to use her. Hmmm, sounding like the makings of a country song maybe …