[CDA 455]

Very nice ejection seat. :toothless

Just needs a yellow and black striped ejection seat handle. :thumbup



Looks good!

 

[fodder]

Just needs a yellow and black striped ejection seat handle.

Great, now I need to find a DB5 or fighter jet at the junkyard for a donor handle...

 

[CDA 455]

Awesome! :thumbup :ford

 

[fodder]

The install isn't quite finished yet -- waiting on a different fitting -- but I added a Saginaw PS pump to the 4-bolt steering box upgrade ... not for any real reason at this point (hydroboost is of interest down the road), other than having found a Saginaw accessory bracket on an E-van, and then the topic of Chevy offset reservoirs coming up in the Junkyard Finds thread. Previously, I had figured the Saginaw would be a super tight fit with my York compressor mount, unless going remote reservoir. As it turns out, I probably could have gotten by with just the offset version, not the long neck offset one. It ended up having loads more clearance than I expected.

Econoline bracket and Chevy S-Series long neck, highly offset reservoir for clearance below the York. The regular Saginaw reservoir alongside it is positioned at roughly the same mounting angle, showing how offset the Chevy truck reservoir is.

I was expecting to have to rotate the fill neck away from the York, but it worked perfectly rotated toward it. Along with my super convenient transmission dipstick tube, I feel like I'll be checking my PS fluid daily now! The long neck version has a metal dipstick built in.

Edit: I went back and checked the VIN, since there was no door (thus no door sticker) and the insurance window sticker simply said '98 S-series. It was a S10, not a S15.

 

[fodder]

One thing to be aware of, that isn't 100% clear in the previous picture...

With the offset Saginaw reservoir, the return hose from the radiator's tranny cooler (I used it for the PS cooler, since I added an external transmission cooler) is a bit tougher to access (hasn't been cut shorter and hooked up to the pump in the picture). The lines to the steering box are also tougher to get to.

 

[fodder]

The execution never quite works out like it came together in my mind... Stupid long neck reservoir!

Oops, so much for loads of clearance (as positioned). The Saginaw long neck reservoir doesn't fit so great once the intake tube is back in place.

Reservoir neck rotated out of the way, everything buttoned up and coexisting happily. I might move the supply hose over to the left of the reservoir neck to avoid hitting, and wearing out, the intake snorkel. That should stay well clear of the belt.

Rear view of the Saginaw (and York) setup. The PS supply hose has a 90 degree fitting for a gentle approach at the pump end.

I topped it off with Type F ATF, as the pump/reservoir had already been drained and the fluid in the steering box was still pretty fresh. I was surprised at how noisy the pump was...did I get the worn out Saginaw to disprove my theory that a used JY pump is likely to be just as good as a used stock pump of similar or greater age? I kept adding fluid to the fill line and turning the wheels back and forth, probably waking the dead, until the level finally stabilized and everything went whisper quiet. My radiator cooler is probably bigger than the stock spaghetti tubing cooler and took longer to fill up.

 

[dash_cam]

when i first installed my JY sag pump, it sounded like the dead were screaming to be released from it. i feared it had been contaminated and ruined, so i shut it down to hopefully prevent any damage to my JY steering gear. much to my disappointment, the new reman pump sounded the same for about 30 seconds then went relatively quiet. perhaps the JY pump was good after all. we'll never know.

 

[fodder]

Sounds like that must be a characteristic of freshly installed Saginaws. I was expecting noise from having broken in new rack & pinions before, but I was mildly concerned that it persisted as long as it did. Did you turn the wheels [back and forth] to get it settled in? I've been told that's the best way to pull the fluids through the system and purge air.

 

[dash_cam]

yea, perhaps that's just the way it is. i did turn the wheel back and forth to get the fluid moving until it stopped making noises.

 

[fodder]

Passenger door panel dyed to match the driver's door (no more flaky spray paint from the PO), and '80-86 metal window crank and door handle added while it was apart.

I was thinking about hollowing out the door handle to do away with the '70s/80s look, and maybe rough it up enough to see if paint would stick, but decided to see if the window crank is compatible first. Sure enough, the splines and everything are a perfect match. With the two pieces, maybe it fits together well enough to hold off on modifying the handle... I wouldn't mind making the crank knob black like some of the aftermarket ones, but it appears to be riveted on and not easily replaceable.

 

[dash_cam]

What dye did you use?

 

[fodder]

Duplicolor Vinyl and Fabric Dye. It's a bit shinier than factory finishes, but it holds up well with decent prep and since I redid the atrociously painted dash with the same stuff, it doesn't have to match anything non-shiny.

 

[fodder]

I picked up a spare fill tube and dipstick for the offset Saginaw reservoir today, since I like to have spares of non-standard stuff, so for those curious about it, here's what it looks like removed from the reservoir:

 

[zainyD]

I use the same filler neck with my Saginaw conversion. Good to see somebody else posting pics. Like you, I made a short metal brace which bolts to the top of the A/C compressor to secure the filler neck from flopping around. I pulled my filler neck off a S10 Blazer, but I'm sure there are many others that have the same configuration.

 

[fodder]

There's a less local junkyard I've only been to once, more than a year ago. I had a sudden urge to go there this week... I planned to go Wed, but the morning got messed up so I put it off until Thu. When I arrived, I spotted an aero-nose F150 way off to the side and veered off course to start there instead of ending there. Turns out, it had the elusive 40/20/40 front seats. The seats themselves were moderately ratty and of no interest to me, but I spotted the passenger seat belt receiver I've been looking for:

That's way better than the floppy bench seat receivers that need to be wrapped to other stuff in order to stay somewhat upright. You want the receiver to be where it should be when you go to reach for it. Unfortunately, someone had already taken the driver's side receiver. There's a reason my Spidey sense was tingling on Wed...

However, the rear storage cubby of my center jump seat still interferes a bit with the 40/20/40 seat belt receiver stalk. Not nearly as much as with the regular Bronco receivers, but enough that I wasn't happy with how it pushed the plastic sleeve in toward the passenger seat, causing it to hang up when the seat is moved. I moved it over the driver's side, where it's almost a perfect fit. It's somewhat goofy having the longer center belt receiver being on the outside, but I can use that one or just use the proper inner one and press the release button from the inside. I might also see about deconstructing them, eliminating the center seat's belts from the mix and just sticking with the GMC ones bolted to the jump seat. If that works, I could flip the passenger belt around to sit the right direction for the driver's side.

After doing the rounds, I figured I'd swing back by the F150 and double check that someone hadn't thrown the driver's seat belt in the back. To my surprise, the truck itself was gone! In the hour or so I was there, they had moved it to the shop to pull the engine. That makes me think it hadn't been in the yard for long, so I may have literally missed the other receiver by a day.

Whew, that was a long-winded description of something as mundane as seat belts.

 

[fodder]

I finally found somewhere suitable for the Bronco II emblems, having decided against the grill (too big for the oval) and fenders/tailgate (too small without accompanying lettering, too irreversible) locations:

That adds a nice subtle touch of bling. They don't sit quite as flat as hoped for, because of how the b-pillar covers curve out by the seat belt anchor. It would look weird to offset the emblems to put the hoof in front of the curve, since the other one faces backward and would have to be offset to the rear for the same solution. Yuck. I might have been able to make it work by moving the tail all the way to the top of the trim, but that wouldn't have looked as good. As it stands, you can only see they're not fully flush if you look at them parallel to the surface.

 

[fodder]

Here's a couple long-postponed project updates...

Insulating the air intake snorkel falls squarely into the "I've got it, might as well use it" category. I'm still skeptical that it'll make enough difference to be worth the time and cost, but why not try and eke out every bit of performance? I bought the stuff (Thermo Tec Cool It aluminized heat barrier) a while back, but wanted to make some improvements to the snorkel first, addressing their tendency to reduce the opening:

Old accordion snorkel above, "new" smooth walled snorkel below; the latter always seem to collapse in at the outlet end.

I used truss head screws for as low a profile as possible to fit into the air box, cut some brushed aluminum strips (so it would feel as sexy on the inside as it looks on the outside!), and loctited the adjustment screws in place to keep the plastic mouth from ever caving in again and cutting off airflow. All the snorkels I've seen are pretty bad in that respect, so figure if you've got one that looks okay now, it probably won't for long.

I opted to add the support bracket that bolts to the radiator core support for the accordion versions of the snorkel. (I had previously cut it off a crushed snorkel.) The reflective barrier adds about a third to the weight of the snorkel, so I feel better knowing it's supported at both ends and won't wear out the connection to the air box. The snorkel itself probably isn't a concern now, with the bracing of the heat wrap, but I've seen the plastic nubs that lock into the box be pretty worn, and I want it to last a lifetime.

However, the neck of the inlet on this version sits ~1/4" further to the right (passenger side) than does the accordion version with the support bracket. That makes it a much tighter squeeze into position, but also provides less room to mount the bracket. I ended up mounting the bracket in a slightly different spot and using the flexibility of the thin metal to reach the mounting hole.

The inlet side of the snorkel also tends to collapse in a little bit, but I've found through experimenting on a bad one that the issue can be eliminated by trimming some of the material where it passes through the core support:

Rather than waste materials from invariable screw-ups, I made paper templates of each flat-ish surface. I figured multiple sections would be much easier to make follow the many contours. I adhesive sprayed the snorkel before applying the heat wrap, which has its own adhesive backing, following some recommendations I'd seen. I also cleaned it multiple times, more than what is pictured. The heat wrap edges were all finished up with foil tape.

I'm not sure yet if I'll do the airbox and/or intake tube. The MAF intake tube doesn't lend itself to any adhesive wrap, being a ridged and accordion surface, so it would need some sort of loose sleeve. The downstream y-tube and twin TB hoses could be wrapped.

Also done at the same time, as the snorkel had to be out of the way, is this lil' vacuum reservoir barely visible below the coolant/washer reservoir and headlight:

I believe the posts were deleted (over-zealous moderation) detailing the reason, but in doing the silicon vacuum line replacement, having eliminated the smog system (modern 3-way cat) and its related vacuum wiring, and not having cruise control, I found I was left with nothing connected to the vacuum reservoir according to my hood's routing diagram. That was contradictory to the info in the tech write-up in the vacuum line replacement thread, which is the Q&A part that got deleted.

Anyway, I experimented with adding it back in and didn't notice the difference. Having a '95 engine & PCM in a '92 truck, I can't help but wonder if anything like EGR might have different vacuum requirements... I took the big canister out of its temporary position at that point, and was on the lookout for something small that I could find a permanent home for. I found the above round reservoir on an '80s Ford truck a couple weeks back. The ports aren't labeled which is which, so I just looped them to each other to stay clean until determining that. I found that its mounts are perfectly sized to the two holes in the fender liner in that location, and the space available looks like it was designed for it.