As the project rolls along. Very, very slowly. Drive train build.

[Noiseydiesel]

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Well, here I is, playing with the toy. '94 7.3 idiT crew cab dually. The Mishimoto brand transmission cooler for a 6.0 Ford being used for the Allison showed up and after some looking at it, I decide to mount it in front of the A/C Condenser. This gives me about an inch each between the trans cooler to the A/C Condenser to the radiator.
The Allison is in town waiting to get picked up, the engine is still somewhere in Jersey? Hope it all comes together in another 3 weeks. Bwa-Ha-Ha-Ha. . . Yeah. I don't think it will for various reasons. Next step might be rebuilding the Dana 60 front axle with the new E-Locker and everything else.
The next problem will be reverse shackle bracket. It seems the one I have is for a 4X4 frame and not the 2WD conversion that I am doing. Fun times don't end on this toy.
A fun thing coming up past that is the addition of a front hitch along with the reverse shackle bracket. I believe the front hitch might not be an option yet. The hits keep rolling.
Oh yeah, we won't mention the 105 degree weather 2 days ago or the heat wave(s) that are in season. I was hoping to get this done in 16 days and now looking at 4 weeks which hopefully will be before the rains set in again.

Rain In Oregon? It's Pasteurized! It flows from Pasture to Pasture. . . .
Oregon has a UFO. It comes out once a year. It's called "The Sun".
Oregon has enough rain to get a town named "Drain".
Oregon is so exciting it has another town named "Boring".
How to identify a native Oregonian? When they take off their shoes, they have webbed feet.
"Welcome to Oregon. A nice place to visit, please don't stay."
Tom McCall, Oregon Governor, 1967-1975

i go now, this project has me looopey.

 

[Noiseydiesel]

Loopey? No, not me. I did manage to put a gear into the BW 1356 transfer case upside down.
Naturally I got it all glued back together and it failed the bench test. So tonight it's back apart and tomorrow it will get back together after I put blue thread lock on the pump and then a trip to town to pick up the Allison transmission. Rain promised tomorrow night and that should be gone shortly after it arrives.
I did have a desire to put a front hitch on this toy and I am finding it will have to be a custom built unit. The "off the shelf" units won't work on this application.

 

[Noiseydiesel]

Lets see now, the project rolls along. the E4OD is out and the Allison got picked up from the freight depot. I got it home in the back of the truck and used the official tractor with pallet forks to offload it. I opened the one other box with the torque converter in it and then closed it up and covered it with a tarp in preparation for rain (?) tomorrow morning.
The wife saw it and exclaimed, "It's a lemon! Just like your truck!!"
Thank you dear. yes. I love you too.

Now waiting for the Dana to get rebuilt by me, the front end to get assembled and then when the engine shows up, it gets assembled and the real fun begins.
I did volunteer to repaint the truck yellow if she desired.
She passed.
For now.

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[Old Goat]

I love reading through your project threads.
Keep on Keepin on.

I don`t remember reading of someone using an Allison trans before. Maybe it my old age.

Our Daughter and family lives in Tigard, I tell her
one way to tell some one from Oregon, is they have Moss growing on their north side.
Yeah, this heat wave is a real cooker,even here in Nv. this year for sure and then the Ca. smoke, like fog most days.

Goat

 

[Noiseydiesel]

Tigard, I have lived and worked in Tigard and surrounding area. I have been from Portland to Woodburn in employment adventures.
Today was unbox the trans and take a quick look as it started to drizzle and then box it all back up again and cover it with a tarp again. Found a torque converter, adapter plates, flex plate, wiring harness and a few other goodies. . .Even found some instructions.
Now if i could only reeead. . . .
Today's project should be the front steering linkage and ?
I should unbox the E-Locker for the Dana 60 for a look see but if the drizzles stop and the steering gets done, that Dana should be my next project as I wait to hear about the engine fiasco.
My portable work bench on the pallet forks is the bottom pic. Not shown are the two bars to hold up the forks and the carriage.
Time to find the packing list and check the inventory.
I suspect there might be a shortage.
I hope not.

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[Noiseydiesel]

Well the mobile work bench is in play once more. Today was a day of putting out little fires here and there and not much was done. I did get the steering linkage put together and that went easy enough. Got the Dana up there and cleaned it out a bit.
I was surprised to see no side shims on either side when I finally got the carrier popped out. Someone was mentioning no decent engine stand. I have a unit I picked up some years ago and it needs a gear rotation device added to it. That needs to happen before the engine comes back or at least before I pick up the engine with the hoist. Finances just squeezed shut tonight and now here i sit thinking about a few other things. Gotta love it.

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[Booyah45828]

Where'd you get the tranny goodies from? CAC? Interesting that you're using the GM bell vs the SAE one. Will you gain more floor pan clearance that way? What did the adapter/trans/etc run ya? I assume it's a 6 speed version? I assume for throttle input you're going to use the ford tps sensor with a interface box to give the allison tcm a digital signal?

Keep the updates coming, and don't get down on yourself with the timeline. Only the smallest projects I take on ever seem to meet the timeline I think they should.

 

[Noiseydiesel]

ALL the trans toys came from Custom Automatic Conversions out of Florida. i got the entire kit from them rather than pick a part here and there and hope it all works. Today is drill a hole in the diff housing for the wiring and see if I can at least get the ELocker installed. The front suspension is still waiting for me and the thought of removing rivets is not really appealing but needs to get done soon enough. The front suspension kit came out of Sky's Offroad design in Springfield, Oregon.
Considering the lack of clearance getting the E4OD out from under the truck and the potentially larger size of the Allison, I believe the front suspension will be added after the Allison is back under the truck and hopefully sitting on the harbor junk trans jack on top of a chunk of plywood.
The Transfer case will be added to the rear of the Allison once it is up in place. Somehow I don't believe I desire to fight the trans attached to the transfer and trying to slide this all up in place with down pipes and whatever else.
This undertaking is going to exceed the 1st of Sept time line in light of the additional need to replace some rear shackles to accommodate the Superduty springs I picked up for the rear. Hopefully when this is all done, it won't ride like a box of rocks.

Cost of the Allison kit was in the neighborhood of $14K and the suspension kit parts came in around another $2K. Add another $1200 for the '04 F350 4400# springs and Then another roughly $4K for the Dana 60, E-locker, installation kit, brakes, rotors, Budd wheel adapters.
That about covers most of it. That's about $21,200. I could go through my receipts and get the other $30-$35K, spent so far but that might be a bit gauche.

Ah, yes. I also desire to add a hidden hitch in the bed soon enough, Considering I also need to install the body bushing kit, it will probably get done at that time. Add another what? $1,000? However, as stated, that is a bit gauche.

 

[Noiseydiesel]

Well I found out that the Dana 60 uses shims between the carrier bearing and the carrier. This makes switching shims a real joy.
On and off and on and off and on and on and on it goes. . . . Not me.
I also found that American Gear is the cheap version of Yukon Gear. One uses Timkin bearings and the other was Toyo(?) The difference being the Timkin can be pressed on directly to the carrier without any spacers or shims to keep the outer cage from collapsing during installation.
Yukon uses Timkin. I had great success doing the rear diff with Timkin bearings when installing the True track differential on the rear of this truck.
Back lash was about .005 and close enough for me.
Tightening the carrier bolts is fun, One large pry bar, the second truck for a work station, the third truck being full of parts for the first truck.
Oh yeah, the official extension pipe for the torque wrench. Naturally I borrowed the wife's nail polish to mark bolts with. No, she didn't notice this action. I got it put back before she saw what I was doing and the diff was installed.
Tonight the Yukon cover is temporarily laid in place and waiting for installation tomorrow.
Tomorrow is also a phone call to Promar and see what the status is on the engine.
I did like removing the inner axle seals and all the dirt that fell into the clean diff housing. Okay, grab a garden house and start again. I felt smart for not having done that from the start. I did get a 1/2 inch hole punched in the case for the wiring and the last thing I did tonight was use a copious amount of RTV to glue that in place and seal it up on the outside of the case.
Tomorrow should be knuckles and ball joints and then the axles and hubs. Oh yeah, New rotors, calipers, pads in there someplace and the fun continues tomorrow.
I also need to contact Skys Offroad and get the rear shackles for the 2004 Superduty springs coming this direction.
Well this is late enough now, time for bed and start again tomorrow.
A few of you are shocked by the cheater bar on the torque wrench. It still clicks at the head and not the back of the wrench. That bar on a non moving part just gave this tired ol' body a bit more leverage. You think I would call the wife out to help while using her war paint to mark parts with?
I am nuts, but not quite that far gone. Yet.
Y'all have fun.

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[Noiseydiesel]

Well this is fun. I just got of the phone with Promar and reportedly the engine I sent back has been sitting for a shade over two weeks waiting to get un-crated. Supposedly it will be looked at next weeks and I suspect with best case scenario, I might, might see it back in another two weeks from now and that puts me into the first week in September. So much for get.ting this done by the 1st of Sept.
Well today will be assemble the rest of the Dana 60 and then see what falls out of the tree. Living pretty much in the middle of a forest, leaves me wide open for things that fall out of trees. Sometimes i can move fast enough to miss them other times. . . .
That might explain the knots on top of my head. Well, maybe one or two of them. . . .
I really should read the Allison instructions and find out what fluid I need and what not. The budget has run dry for this toy and the broker is tired of hearing from me in the need of further funding. I was foolishly expecting my monthly income to rise up to afford this disaster.
Foolish me counting chickens before the eggs hatched. Now i get to back up ten yards and punt.
Meanwhile the wife has been desiring a back up generator for the house and the price of propane tanks has gone nuts in the past year.
Not to mention a real electrician to wire this up versus me with "What's this wire do?".
A return once more to the trenches of being broke 99% of the time. Oh well.

 

[Booyah45828]

I really should read the Allison instructions and find out what fluid I need and what not.

Most likely something that is tes295 certified. The list of approved fluids can be found here here under the TES295 tab.

We use Shell Spirax S6 ATF A295. You can likely find alternatives if you look. Allison has a house brand available called transynd, that's made for them by castrol I believe. Valvoline syngard would likely work as well, and it's on the shelf at most napa stores. It's just not certified by allison. I'm sure schaeffers, amsoil, etc all have a compatible product as well.

 

[Noiseydiesel]

Wow, u smart n' stuff. I am just mostly stuff and usually full of it.

I remember working a Shell service station many years ago and doing oil changes on customer cars using Shell oil. Regular customers would come in for the oil change and most of them right at 3,000 miles and the nasty, stinky cr^p that drained out the pans was revolting.
The owner got a better deal from Mobile oil and he switched brands.
Same customers came back in 3,000 miles later and the dino grade oil, NOT synthetic, was coming out about as clean as it went in. It didn't break down near as much as the Shell stuff.
Shell oil? Hmm. . . .
Castrol is another story with a better outcome.
Havoline? Right up with Shell in my book but for a different reason.
Time to get busy, already made a trip to town for stainless fasteners and details later.

 

[Noiseydiesel]

Yesterday afternoon was fun. I go the Dana 60 front axle a bit closer to done. New ball joints on it with fancy lock pins instead of the common cotter pin. I even replaced the roller bearings inside the hub and all the seals.
Things were starting to roll along fairly well and then I got to the Budd wheel adapters and found they are secured to the rotor with 14 MM, 12 point bolts.
A trip to get a new 12 point socket, mine was dead with age and back home to watch the sun go down. Wrap it up, cover everything and call it quits for the day.
Good news!
I lost the install instructions for the Allison. So a phone call to Florida for some new ones and another call to Promar to find out they should get started on my engine next week. They have only had it a shade over 2 weeks now.
Rain season starts here in another few weeks. Usually right at Labor day. Good news is it only lasts until Memorial day weekend.
Typically a beach mist to a soft rain. Not really going to stop you from going outside, but everything, everything is wet, soggy and mushy.
Including the driveway I am working in.
Hopefully I get the engine back asap and by the 1st of Sept, I will pick up 2 sheets of plywood to facilitate a hard surface to roll the trans jack on as well as the engine hoist.
I figure best case scenario I might see the engine on the 3rd of Sept. By that time the front suspension will be done and the trans under the truck waiting the engine to show up.
I had fun pulling the E4OD out wit the transfer case, now the Allison will go back initially WITHOUT the transfer case. I also get to fab Transfer case linkage. That might be entertaining.
Today should be finish the Dana 60 hubs and maybe look at grinding down some rivets of the front end for the 4X conversion.
Then eventually I get to investigate a front hitch that the reverse shackle kit is now in the way of getting that mounted. That front end will be a mass of steel when I get done playing.
Well it;s now Saturday 6:20 am and time to run into town for breakfast with a few buddies. Catch y'all later.

 

[IDIBRONCO]

I will pick up 2 sheets of plywood to facilitate a hard surface to roll the trans jack on as well as the engine hoist.

And here I was thinking that this was a high dollar project before!

 

[Noiseydiesel]

High dollar project that has it's roots in a beer budget. My broker is amused by my folly.
Today was breakfast in town with her van that took me to town with metal to metal brakes along the way.
Stopped off at the parts store on the way home and doing her brake job that took up enough time.
I finally got to the Dana 60 front rotors and hubs and seeing as how I have new rotors, time to change them out. Ford decided to use Flange bolts with 12 point heads (9/16-12 X 1.25) holding the rotors to the Budd wheel adapters. 16 of those needed due to age and figuring the next time they need to be changed they would be absolutely stuck. Good luck finding less expensive new ones.
Well, it's late and I am about to fall asleep sitting here.
Tomorrow is either decide to use the old flange bolts or play with the reverse springs front bracket. It needs a mod to fit the 2WD frame.