The Stovebolt Site Forums Project Journals Project Journals 1953 Chevy 3100 - Restoring the Basketcase

The bed looks great! It took me a while to see it, but black is a good color.

Hey Everybody, quick update time. I finished the fender repairs and hung it back on the truck. There was quite a bit of rot, which did correspond exactly to the rot that was repaired on the bedside. Then I mounted the taillights. The first pic shows that. Afterwards, I installed the wood stake sides. I had made them several years ago and had been storing them in my basement. Included on the wood is my 3rd brake light. It is a vintage school bus light that I restored. Second pic shows that. Given today's drivers, I feel like having the 3rd light is a safety must have because so many people are trained to rely on that light instead of the other tail lights. The turn, flash and running light functions work. The brake light function does not. I'll have to recheck my wiring instructions, the wires themselves, the connections, the switch and the fuse to make sure it is all done correctly. Somewhere there is a glitch.... Speaking of glitches, I decided to check for vacuum leaks while I was running the engine. This was based on a discussion that Sweet and I had a couple of weeks ago, out at the soccer field. No leaks found around the carb, but the rearmost intake port did have one! The front and middle ports did not. So, I guess that is at least a part of why the truck would die when I tried to drive it. It would accelerate fine, but die on deceleration. Looks like I'm in for a gasket replacement.... Sigh. Anyway, solid progress.

Mike - The idea with the third brake light is great. From your picture it looks like just 1 wire to that light. With the light housing itself mounted to the wood stake front panel, what are you using to ground the fixture??? Your one wire is power in, but you need a connection from the light fixture itself to the metal of the truck/chassis to complete the circuit.

Your progress looks great!

Gdads51, I modified the light socket when I restored the light. I "kit bashed" a f*^d socket repair kit. It included a ring with a wire attached. I took that ring/wire and added it to a normal socket repair kit, giving me both a positive and negative connection within the socket. I then ran the ring wire to the chassis for ground. The third light power wire connects directly to the switch with the rear brake light power wire. I'll post a Pic if I can find one. Bottomline, I needed 2 separate kits to make it work. If I remember correctly, the kit with the ring was a dual contact connector and wouldn't work with a single contact bulb.

Pics of light restoration supplies with ring/wire for grounding.

More light pics. Housing number, lens number and tested prior to installation. If I get any pushback from the police, I also have a solid red lens with no words.

Mike - Thanks for the level of detail. I didn't consider the fixture being refitted - duh. You've put a lot of effort into it and I don't see why anyone could give you any grief over having a third brake light.

So maybe I misunderstood your predicament to be that it was only this light wasn't working. Was it all 3 not lighting up, or just the center one???

Gdads51, none of the 3 lights come on when activating the brake pedal or the switch itself. The lights light up when the running lights and headlights are on. The hazards work properly as do the turn signal lights. I checked the fuses and all are good. Im starting to think its a bad switch, even though its new.

You won't get any pushback from the cops since you aren't legally required to have a third brake light in the first place. You aren't even required to have brake lights on each side of your truck, either.

Your truck left the factory with one tail light/brake light on the left hand side. There is no law requiring antique vehicles to be modified in order to meet present day standards.

As for your switch, test it. New parts today are generally junk from China and may or may not work at all straight out of the box.

I disconnected the leads from the switch and jumpered them together. The 3rd brake light came on, the left and right lights did not. The 3rd light is a separate wire that runs directly from the switch to the light. Now I'm wondering if there is a break in the wire that runs to the left and right lights? The only concern I have with the police is that the light says STOP.

I don’t think the stop will be a concern .The light may be an old fender light from a police car but the ones I have seen say police stop .

That doesn't matter. A lot of cars in the 1930s had brake lights with the word "Stop" molded into the glass.

Ok, i took some measurements this morning. Here are the results:
Verified switch feed wire voltage: 11.5v
Verified switch functionality: 11.5v on outbound side
Error at driver side light: 0.15v
Error at passenger side light: 0.15v
3rd light lit as appropriate

Driver side leg is direct from the switch. Passenger side leg is tapped off of driver side.

It would appear that there is a problem with the wire that runs from the switch to the driver side light or possibly with the tap to the passenger side. I'll look at the easier one to investigate first, the tap. If that looks OK, I'll inspect the length of the wire and either fix or replace as appropriate.

Am I miss interpreting or missing something?

If both sides are "bad" then the problem is between the switch and the tap for the passenger side. It could be at the tap but I suspect it is upstream.

I see your light is mounted on wood .How do you have the light grounded ,I know you have it working but maybe a loose or not good enough ground may be making the weird conditions.

Kevinski, I modified the housing when I restored it. I added a ground connection so I could mount the light on wood and still use the chassis for ground.

Just run a temporary jumper in place of that wire. It can come out the window and along the side of the truck if necessary. If it works, you can decide whether to replace the entire wire or search for the problem. If it still doesn't doesn't work, you can look elsewhere.

I put a jumper wire from the switch directly to the taillight. Depressing the brake pedal caused the brake light to work. I think I'll just run a new wire from the switch to the taillights. Probably also run a dedicated wire to the passenger side instead of tapping into the driver side wire.

Okay good job .

Hey everybody,

It's been a while since my last update. Lots to tell, none of it good. Bottomline up front, I made a significant mistake while testing to try and isolate my electrical issue. Likely a combination of a bad test setup and an erroneous placement of the multimeter probe. POP! All gauges were destroyed! Spent some time trying to find out where the short occurred. The only thing that I found was a nicked wire on the dome light. I fixed that, easy enough. Currently in the process of tracing the rest of the wires, looking for evidence of a short. New gauges and switches are in hand and will be installed as I go through the process. The new gauges are different from the ones I had previously. Those have gone up in price significantly and I couldn't afford to replace them in kind. These will work. The issue is new sending units. Water temp and oil pressure are no problem. The gas gauge sending unit will require removing the seat, so that I can access the gas tank. What a PITA. The new gas gauge runs on different ohm levels, so the new sending unit was a must. That brings me to the current state of my truck dash...blown apart! Everything is out, again. Wires everywhere. Sigh. The ultimate culprit in this goat rope? A cheap Chinese turn signal switch. When I disassembled the switch, I found that the inside was coated with a sticky, thick grease that resembled cosmoline. Once that was removed and the parts reassembled, the switch worked as required. Super frustrating, but I'll get through it. Now that the winter freeze is abating, it's time to get back to work. More to follow.

A cheap Chinese part? I don't believe it. China is known for only producing the highest quality parts.

Were the destroyed gauges the originals or original style? What are the replacement gauges?

I know, right? Who'da thunk it? The gauges that were destroyed were New Vintage. The replacements are Dolphin. I'm just not a fan of the original gauges. It's purely aesthetic.

That's an expensive do-over. I hate to hear that.

I've been blessed throughout this process. That one was the first (I hope only) time that my mistake cost me real money. Most mistakes can just be redone. Smoke check something and it's all over but the crying.

Sorry the hear about your challlenges. I'm curious how the dome light short resulted in blowing the gauges, seems like the gauges should have been isolated from that ciruit but maybe I am not thinking about your version of wiring correctly.

I'll be interested to hear how the Dolphin gauges work out for you. I considered them but went a different direction so I have often wondered if I made the correct choice.

WICruiser,

There were 2 things at play. I think I had set up my test wiring incorrectly and the common denominator was the dash lighting circuit. I'm pretty sure that I touched the multimeter probe to the wrong points. The power surged through the built in lights and then throughout the gauges. At least that's what I'm thinking. I really don't know for sure. What I do know is that after the pop, every time that I turned the truck power (not the engine) on, the gauges all went to their full position. Max oil pressure, max water temp and fuel to completely empty. Also, the dome light, turn signals and running lights wouldn't work. I think I've got the rear end lights and dome light sorted out. I'll try out the gauge lights once I fully sort out the under dash wiring. Still, the only damage that I've found is that one, chafed wire. Very strange.

I would try to test each item or circuit individually before hooking up everything all at once.

Good advice, Otto. I will do that.

Hey Everybody, Time for a quick update. I've been working on completing the repairs from my self induced electrical nightmare. I'm most of the way there now! While the dash was apart, I took the time to finish wiring up the heater blower and lighter socket. Neither of which had been started before the problem. The blower motor was an easy job to complete. I've tested it and it works as it should. The lighter socket was also easy, once I figured out that my wire harness instructions had mislabeled an accessory wire. The instructions stated it was ignition switched but turned out to be a direct wire to the battery. So, it was hot as soon as I put a fuse in. Long story short, I removed that pin/wire from the connector and found a pin that was ignition switched. Now it works correctly. I'm not a smoker, so this will serve as a phone charging port. Plus it has a built in voltage display. I like it. The rest of the wiring under the dash was redone to accommodate the new gauges. Everything is now buttoned up and the dash has been reassembled. The only remaining job is to replace the gas tank sending unit. Once that is done, I'll power up the gauges. All of the other electrical connections have been tested and verified as correctly installed and functional. All of the sending units have been replaced (except for the gas tank). It's been quite an effort, but its almost done. Then I'll be back to where I was last fall: is my engine usable or not? OY!

What lighter did you use? I have a space in my dash and I could certainly use a charge port for longer trips.

GM cigarette lighters of this era were connected to a "hot all the time" source of power, not switched. I hooked mine up that way, through a 5 amp fuse, to use with a USB-type charger for my phone. That way I can charge my phone with the engine off.

I like the look of the cigarette lighter knob when I'm not using the charger, so I removed the heat element from the lighter to prevent accidental overload on the 5 amp fuse.

Utah york, I used the lighter socket that was a replacement for my 1953 truck. I got it at one of our normal vendors. The first pic is with the cigarette lighter installed. It definitely gives it a vintage look. The second Pic is the usb adapter for phone charging. I got it off of Amazon. Originally, I was going to use a hardwired usb charging port that was made for automotive applications. It turned out to be just a hair to big for the factory hole in my dash. I didn't want to enlarge the hole, so I went with the lighter socket and adapter.

Bill, I wanted to protect my battery. One of the early electrical issues that I had was a slow discharge of my battery. Turned out it was a direct battery connection. I've since fixed that! Putting the lighter/charger on the switched circuit was just a personal preference for me.

this one has a voltmeter

Yup, the one I'm going to use has the voltmeter, too. It's not energized, so you can't see the display.

Hey Everybody,

Time for a quick update. I pulled the old gas tank sending unit out and replaced it with the unit that came with my new gauges. As I mentioned in my last update, the new gauges required a sending unit that operated in a different ohm range, so the old one had to go. I don't know why these aren't standardized across the industry, but they aren't. The most difficult part of the job was getting the old one out of the tank. It barely fit, but after some jiggling and twisting, I got it out. The pic shows the new one in place. It's not very exciting, but everyone likes a pic of what's being worked on. Here is a link showing the gauges come to life after I finished up the wiring. So this officially puts me back to where I was in November, plus the additional wiring projects of the heater blower and cigarette lighter (used for the USB charger). Where was I in November? Wondering if my engine would cut it or not. So, now that my wiring is fixed and my brake and turn lights work, I'm ready to try and drive the truck and see if the engine continues to belch smoke or finally settles down. When I say "belch smoke" it's not an exaggeration.... Before that, I'll do a quick oil change, reinspect everything one last time and then let 'er rip. Wish me luck!

Nice looking gauges!

Hey Everybody,

Another quick update. I got the oil changed this morning. I was surprised at how black it was, considering that it had very little run time on it. It had been in the engine since last year, so changing it was in order. I did a quick "pre-flight" check on all of the things that I had touched since last fall. Everything looked good, so...there were no more excuses. It was time to fire it up! Attached is a pic of the new gauges with the engine running. Everything was working as it should. The "belching smoke" is shown in this video. Disregarding the smoke, the engine sounded like it was running well, so I said "give a hoot, don't pollute." No, I didn't! I said screw it, I'm driving it! Down the driveway and to the stop sign, then back to the garage. Twice. Then parked in the garage. Went inside to do something, came back out and fired up the truck again. No hesitation to start. Drove it down the driveway, to the stop sign, then left and down the street. Actually made it into 2nd gear! First time ever (for me)!!! Three point turn and back to my garage. Parked in the garage. Odometer shows half a mile driven in total. This is huge for me!!!

Now the not so great. The engine stumbles and wants to die when decelerating. It actually did die 2 or 3 times. It fired up on the first try on those times that it did die. Then there is the matter of the old girl being quite a handful! The engine sputtering doesn't help and the muscle memory for driving a manual transmission is still there, but it really seemed like a lot of stuff was going on all at once! I'm sure I'll get used to it once the engine issue is resolved and I get some hours behind the wheel. I'm guessing that I'm getting the true 1953 experience! I also discovered that 1st gear is not forgiving when driving. It seems that the truck only wants to use 1st to get rolling and then get it into 2nd. 2nd gear was much more forgiving. I haven't bucked a vehicle since 1977 when I was learning the manual transmission. That is, until today! LOL, it was funny. 2nd gear it is! Dang, I'm close!

Congratulations on reaching this milestone! Sure you still have a few issues to work out, but celebrate your success, at least for awhile!

Thanks, Phil. You are right! This was a huge day for me! If someone were to look back at those pics of where I started, they'd know how far my truck (and I) have come! As they say, "You can't knock the smile off of my face!"

Congratulations!!!

The busier I get trying to make enough money to survive, the less time I have to work on my rig and the further out that driving it again, seems to get. Need to make some time to finish the exhaust, rear brakes (at least I got steering and front brakes sorted) and make the signals work again. Oh, and get the new to me tires I have, mounted on the brand new wheels and deprecate the remainder of my widowmakers.