Got the backside of the hood and the firewall sprayed last weekend (11/7/09).
removed the dry tarry rustproofing that was under portions of the cab, collected stainless steel screws for various reasembly from Ace Hardware, and installed hood cowl seal last week (11/9-13/09).
Got the hood back on the truck this past Saturday, but it's not properly adjusted (11/14/09).
And I also got started on the front disc conversion on this past Saturday - CPP says an afternoon, but I am guessing it will take me more like 12-16 hours (my work includes upgrading to roller bearings and upgrading tie-rod ends - and it's my first time disassemblying and reassemblying a chevy truck front end).
The kit so far assembles well, although the instructions leave a bit to be desired - for example, they don't really label left and right caliper plates and you have to guess which plate goes on each side - they have an angle built into the plate, so they are side specific. From my research (0.5 hour of looking at truck magazines for pictures), I gathered that the plates angle inwards toward the center of the truck (a simple label/sticker would have been really nice). I hope I'm right or add an hour for disassembly and plate swap. Also, they don't give torque values for the nuts, so I guess I gotta do some more research on that...
Ball end removal on my steering arm is the most challenging part of the work - all my tricks have failed on these press parts - spent over an hour with no results...tonight I will try drilling and heat in conjunction with 5 lb sledge and small punch. Hope I don't smash my fingers and i wish I had a vice for this work.
also noted that steering repairs need to be made to the steer box, as well - I can wiggle the arm coming out of the steering box pretty good...but that's for another day...
