• Welcome to The Truck Stop! We see you haven't REGISTERED yet.

    Your truck knowledge is missing!
    • Registration is FREE , all we need is your birthday and email. (We don't share ANY data with ANYONE)
    • We have tons of knowledge here for your diesel truck!
    • Post your own topics and reply to existing threads to help others out!
    • NO ADS! The site is fully functional and ad free!
    CLICK HERE TO REGISTER!

    Problems registering? Click here to contact us!

    Already registered, but need a PASSWORD RESET? CLICK HERE TO RESET YOUR PASSWORD!

1982 k30, sticking around

red

Being a lake bum in Texas
Messages
2,028
Reaction score
1,761
Location
Lake Brownwood, Texas
Well missed my old 87 crew cab and have been looking for a truck that is tough enough to survive me for a long time. Finally found one. 1982 GMC k30 crew cab dually with 6.2/th400/np205. Mechanically it needs a new CDR valve, oil dipstick tube resecured, and the AC system fixed but that's it.

Started off with a 2500 mile round trip from Utah down to Midland Texas, sold the house and had to pick up some things. Rigged up a 4500 lb mile marker winch in the bed before I left.








Plan for this truck is to be my daily driver and offroad rig. So taller tires to get the highway speed up (averaged 18.6mpg cruising at 60mph with the 235/85/16's), 2-3" of lift, rear locker. Maybe upgrade to an overdrive transmission. Figure the cooling system will get upgraded but no performance upgrades planned at the moment. I do have a chinese knock off hx35 sitting in storage.

I actually like the long bed but it creates a problem with where I live, have to park it inside the garage which is only 18ft 6" long. The truck is 19ft 10" from bumper to bumper so the bed has to be shortened. Starting that tomorrow.
 
Midland Texas! I still call that part of the country home. (grew up a couple hours west of there in the Big Bend area)
 
  • Like
Reactions: red
Down around Alpine or Presidio? Took my old m35a2 deuce and a half to Big Bend and played around on the trails there including Black Gap (first turn sucked ass with the manual steering but easy after that).

I went to high school in Midland then returned there for a couple years after the military.

Spent today removing the bed and stripping things off the rear chassis. From the front bumper to the back of the cab is 11ft 9in, leaving a maximum space of 6ft 9in before running out of room in the garage. Want some space to make sure I don't accidentally bump the wall of the garage so planning to cut the bed down to 5ft 6in and get rid of the stock rear bumper which will leave 15in of clearance.







 
I like the cordless tool section you got there. That's good idea for a charging station for the batteries too.
 
Down around Alpine or Presidio? Took my old m35a2 deuce and a half to Big Bend and played around on the trails there including Black Gap (first turn sucked ass with the manual steering but easy after that).

Grew up around Fort Davis, so Alpine was the nearest "big" town. That is where we would go if the one little general store, or the one grocery store in Fort Davis did not have what we needed.
 
  • Like
Reactions: red
I like the cordless tool section you got there. That's good idea for a charging station for the batteries too.
The shop belongs to a friend of mine, he lets me store my stuff there and work on things when needed. One day I'll have a shop but for now my setup is portable (tool trailer being built next with welder, air, etc).

Good progress again today just not as visually noticable.





Second fuel tank removed and relocated for now onto the frame behind the cab to keep the truck mobile, will eventually install a 40 gallon tank from a suburban. Shackles removed from the stock hangers, will be running a shackle flip kit from 'Offroad Design' which should arrive either tomorrow or saturday. All the small brackets removed from the frame that will be in the way, and all the rivets removed from the spring hangers. In total about 40 rivets removed today.

Parts left to remove are the brake hose and the driveshaft. Then raise the frame, roll the axle/suspension forward, secure it, and chop the frame. Reassembly will begin after that. Goal is to have it complete by the middle of next week.

I had been planning on cutting the bed to size but think I will go with a flatbed instead. Have a military m103a2 trailer (10ft long flatbed) that would make a great donor bed for the truck.

 
http://flemingmetal.com/

When I owned a truck equipment company, this is who we bought our components from for making flatbeds.
Not sure on their pricing vs competition, been a lot of years. But the quality of the rails and crossmembers were top shelf.
 
Kinda out of my price range at the moment. This is temporarily one of those mods where pennies add up hahaha.

Today was spent getting the axle into place and secured. Removed the driveshaft, disconnected the brake line, removed 2 bolts holding the suspension in place, then rolled it forward into place.








This makes for a 5ft long bed ending just past the rear shackle hangers bringing a total truck length to 16ft 10in and a wheelbase of 11ft 9in.

After deciding just where the axle will go and getting it centered up drilled all the mounting holes along the side of the frame, bolted it up, and replumbed the brakes back in. Wires are routed back along the frame waiting for the lights/trailer plug. The shackle flip raised the truck rear 2 3/4" which is just about perfect for my plans with a total of 4" suspension lift.

 
I'm probably anal but when I rebolted the hangars to the frame I made sure the non threaded part went clear thru the frame so it was a snug fit in the hole and no threads to mash over and give extra clearance.
 
Frame is chopped and now the chassis is ready for the bed. The donor flatbed is ready to be pulled from the trailer chassis and planning to cut it to size tomorrow.

 
Those were 2 long cuts to make as straight as possible by hand. Deck is 1/8" plate.




Heave ho




Bolted down with 4 bolts









Have a few more things left to do for the main parts of the bed. Want to make a headache rack at the front, the plate for the rear, and lights. Will also mount the small winch in the rear along with a toolbox and spare tire carrier along with a few other things.
 
Kinda looks like it should be a dedicated 5th wheel hauler.

Maybe enough material from the trailer to do most of the headache rack.
 
  • Like
Reactions: red
Kinda looks like it should be a dedicated 5th wheel hauler.

Maybe enough material from the trailer to do most of the headache rack.
Pretty sure what was the rear section of the trailer bed is enough metal to make the main part of the headache rack, at least up to the bottom of the window.

Fired up the m816 wrecker to carry over the donor scrap metal parts to start today off.




Used part of it to make the rear panels. Pic of the first one welded into place. Only welded to the bed, not the frame.





Been a couple years since I've touched a welder but not bad considering.





Was too dark for pictures but have both of the rear panels made/installed. Also installed and wired in the tail lights/brake lights. Plan for tomorrow is to mount the license plate/light, and find out why the brake lights ain't working. Truck has the standard 4 wires (brown, yellow, light green, dark green) and chassis ground. Marker lights work, left turn signal and right turn signals work, getting power for the reverse lights (reverse lights won't be here until next week), but for some reason the brake lights are not activating when I step on the pedal.
 
Fixed the brake lights and the truck was mobile enough to get to the house finally.








Reverse lights will be here in a few days, same design as the marker/brake/turn lights and will be positioned just inside of them.
 
So I'm more than a little pissed off at my landlord/one of the roommates. After doing all that work to shorten the drivetrain/bed so it fits into the garage (only reason I cut it), he decided to buy a new car and is determined to find a way to park it in the garage, where the pickup currently sits. The reason the truck gets parked in the garage is because of everyones work schedule, I'm the last to leave every morning and the first one back (usually). Yea, I've been ****ing livid at him since he mentioned that. Losing the garage space isn't the big deal, waiting until after that amount of work (5000-8000 dollars if a shop did it) to make that kind of decision, that's the damn problem.

The bed is already traded off in exchange for some bucket seats from a mid 2000's yukon so I'll have to decide between a flatbed or searching for a regular side longbed. The frame section/rear bumper/hitch is just sitting in my steel scrap pile right now but I'm very seriously considering taking the truck back out to full length again. Haven't cut the driveshaft yet or bought a suburban fuel tank either so other than the bed all the parts are still here. At least extending the truck doesn't require any rivet removal, just some welding and reinforcements.
 
photobucket, once again, sucks! none of the pics show up.
sucks about the roommate also. think i'd find another one.
 
Easier to drive the shorter truck anyway. Do you really need it at full length? And move out to help make the pain of a new car payment sink in. You don't need that kind of BS.
 
Back
Top