Hey Kyle! I was here in the very beginning of this thread and now I'm back! I hope you have been enjoying your K5, I read through the whole thread twice and can't find if you ever did the TBI swap... your truck looks awesome!

I hope to be able to pick your brain as well some other member's as I get back into my 74 K5 project. Cheers@!

 

I think I have everything for the swap, but decided that I was going to be doing the entire dash, HVAC, and front doors from the 90'burb at the same time. I also have gotten the wild idea to build a shop next to my house and have been in saving mode for that. The shop will facilitate my various projects. Besides, I have a lot of fun driving the K5. So much so that it seems like a shame to tear it apart right now.

 

No real update. I still drive the truck a few times every week or so. The top is leaking so the rain lately has kept me from driving it daily.

I'm still collecting parts. My latest find includes a used top in somewhat rough, but manageable shape for $75. And two 32-spline NP205's for $240 (one has a cracked case, but good internals aside from the blown input bearing). Seeing as how I have an extra NP203, my plans on doing the NP203/NP205 doubler setup are coming closer. I will be picking the parts up tomorrow after work.

Here's a few pictures of the parts:



The white NP205 is coming with the TH400 adapter and all of the cross-members.

 

Great find! I hope to build a K5 one day... one of my dream projects is a classic truck with a modern powertrain. (engine wise anyway) 6.2L Vortec in a K5 anyone? lol.

I can't wait to see your progress once you get into tearing the truck apart. That and I'd like to see you finish that Chevelle too!

 

I keep on finding these deals to spend my money on. At some point I need to stop looking for deals and start pulling the truck apart, but I still need quite a few parts so...

I am going to go back down to that '74 Jimmy and see if that guy will part with it yet. I'd really like to get that torn down (the body is junk), refinish the frame, and then start mocking it back up with the suspension setup the way I want it to be. That truck has an SM465 & NP205 in it as well...but with the super low spline count input on the NP205 so that's where the cracked case 205 comes in.

I'm still looking for an economical dana-60 (something in the $200-$400 range). The guy I'm buying all of this stuff from tomorrow had a DRW D-60 with 4.56's, but wanted $650 for it. I can buy whole 1-ton trucks for $300-$400 and get most of that back when I scrap the rest of the truck.

 

The top and transfer cases are now at my place. The top is in even better condition than I expected it to be in. The underside is as white as fresh snow. There is one spot on the inside of one of the rails that is busted out, but I'll take out the broken stuff and hand lay in more fiberglass. I can even make a compression mold for it given the area (just clamp wood or metal on either side) to add strength to the repair.

I want to take the top apart as much as possible to redo the side joints. The sides are loose, but I have never seen one of these tops that didn't have loose sides.

The cracked case on the one NP205 is a bad crack that runs from front to back near the front output shaft so it's junk. The gears/shafts still look new inside so that was well worth the $40 I paid for it. The other NP205 is very nice. No play in the outputs/input. Nice engagement. Ready for a home-made twin stick I think!!

 

Can't.handle.anticipation

 

4 months later.. (from the last time you posted about it) hows it coming along? Did you finish it up or still looking for parts? And hows that chevelle looking? That really got me peeked. Took a looky-loo at your personal site, the chevelle out of storage looks good from the front. Loving the red with the white SS stripes. You keeping it that color? I know a bit off but i love muscle cars they make me giggle like a school girl after her first kiss.

 

I'm still driving it whenever I can. Just dumped $90 worth of fuel into it!

Picked up a few more emblems & two of these:


I'm going to try & paint one of them to the color scheme I would like to use on the truck in the end.

$5 each & $13.50 for shipping!

Cell phone picks in my somewhat dimly lit back living room. I'll take better pictures with my T1i later if I get some time.

I am thinking about taking the Chevelle back to it's original color, green mist (45):

 

Time to rebuild the drag-link on the K5! Driving down to the FD last night and I was stuck behind a rather slow driver doing 45mph in a 55 zone and oncoming traffic was heavy enough to keep me where I was. 45mph is an unusual speed for around here. I'm usually driving slower or faster.

At that speed, the steering wanted to drift, then snap back in the opposite direction. Go faster and the problem went away (probably due to the gyroscopic effect of the tires wanting to stay pointing straight) and slower wasn't that big of a deal either.

So two new drag-link joints will be going in once I get the Tahoe back up and charging properly.