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The switch wotks because the 3rd brake light on the cab works. Just the tail lights not working. Maybe a relay or hazard flasher maybe bad. But hazards work so i doubt thats it. Issue is the relays have had some wire changes for some reason. And im not sure im even looking at the right relays.
Did you hook the ground up at the rear of the truck? There is a ground that's connects on the drivers side frame rail, I'm not sure on the 97 but on my 2000 it's just behind the rear axle and the lights won't work if it's not connected.
Yep. Even checked it again today to be safe. I might pull them and clean them up and reinstall. But again, the bulb works with blinker and hazards, its the same wire to the bulb. So it should be good. Just not getting the power from the switch to wire that goes to the bulb. The brake light power to the rear lights does go through the hazard flasher. But hard to believe the flasher is bad since the hazards work.
Well here it is all finished. Minus brake lights working. LOL Who needs brake lights anyway? I have some small stuff left to do like mount the tach, remount the fuel pressure gauge, get the brake lights working. That might be it other than clean it up more and get the wires at the ecm cleaned up.
Took my son for a ride of about 5 miles and everything worked great. Its a little sluggish in 1st gear but pulls hard in 2nd and 3rd. Nearly chirps the tires on the shift to 2nd which is saying a lot being I have the ET Streets on it and the engine is stock.
Ran the battery cables through the bottom of the box and bed so there are no cables visible from the outside. Came out pretty clean.
Its a little sluggish in 1st gear but pulls hard in 2nd and 3rd.
One thing you might consider is the stock lq4 programming, mine would not go into power enrichment with the stock programming. Maybe it would but, but it was on a long delay and ramp rate so it didn't really help from a dig.
That's a good looking little truck. I always wanted a swb single cab 10, I'm just to tall and now to wide go fit in one lol. Was the brake light issue related to the multifunction switch?
Well its inspected and road worthy. Found a bad ground at the relay was the issue with the brake lights. Hard part was finding the relay. Didn't have a manual that tells me where it was. Got it inspected with no problems. So now I have a guy. I was worried about a couple of things being too non street. Also on the sluggish running. Lone Star Dyno hooked it up just to check codes and he found the 3 brand new coils I bought from summit, which are factory replacement Delphi coils were throwing codes for misfire. So I have sent those back and having them send me a full set of MSD coils. That should make it run a little better too. He replaced the 3 coils with a set of round coils to see if it would run better and it did. I need to get traction bars on the rear. I am researching which ones I want to run. I can feel it wrapping the leafs up in first gear and trying to power over the wrap. Feels like it wraps up the leaf and chirps the tires past it over and over until it hits 2nd.
So now its on to some weekend cruising and getting into some action with these guys that just buy their power that comes in the new cars. Haha. I wish I had some mommy and daddy money too. This truck would be much faster.
Well its inspected and road worthy. Found a bad ground at the relay was the issue with the brake lights. Hard part was finding the relay. Didn't have a manual that tells me where it was. Got it inspected with no problems. So now I have a guy. I was worried about a couple of things being too non street. Also on the sluggish running. Lone Star Dyno hooked it up just to check codes and he found the 3 brand new coils I bought from summit, which are factory replacement Delphi coils were throwing codes for misfire. So I have sent those back and having them send me a full set of MSD coils. That should make it run a little better too. He replaced the 3 coils with a set of round coils to see if it would run better and it did. I need to get traction bars on the rear. I am researching which ones I want to run. I can feel it wrapping the leafs up in first gear and trying to power over the wrap. Feels like it wraps up the leaf and chirps the tires past it over and over until it hits 2nd.
So now its on to some weekend cruising and getting into some action with these guys that just buy their power that comes in the new cars. Haha. I wish I had some mommy and daddy money too. This truck would be much faster.
Please update with your trac bar choice when you make one, I'm looking into it preemptively for mine, Lakewood or Caltrac. Congrats on getting it going, enjoy the miles!
First let me say I HATE my laptop. I typed up a nice long reply and it changed my page and I lost it all. So here I go again. And this one is abbreviated. LOL
Installed the cheap set of Lakewood bars to help with spring wrap up. Seemed to help a little.
Went to the track last night. Truck weighs 3350 with me in it and 3160 no driver. Made 2 passes. 13.69 at 102 with a 2.09 60ft. 13.99 2nd pass at 98mph. 2nd pass was .03 faster 60ft so should have been a faster total ET. After calculation it looks like its putting out 280hp which sucks. Yes its stock with 175k miles on it. But add the exhaust and base tune, it should still be around stock hp which would have run about 12.30 in the 1/4. Its all stock including the converter. Its struggles until about 200 ft mark and estimated 3k rpm. I don't have a tach in it yet, so its just a guess. If it would pull like it does after that certain rpm it would run in the 12's easy. Its a dog off the line.
I beat a 2015 5.0 mustang so that makes me feel a little better but now good enough. I planned on running a mid 12. So, now what do I do? I am pulling the drivetrain for sure. Just need to figure out what route to go. I like compression and big cams. But high compression is not good for turbo, or is it? And I don't want to waste money building it now just to spend money again on a turbo setup. Plus I need to know if turbo engines are consistent in case I want to bracket race. I don't think they are.
First let me say I HATE my laptop. I typed up a nice long reply and it changed my page and I lost it all. So here I go again. And this one is abbreviated. LOL
Installed the cheap set of Lakewood bars to help with spring wrap up. Seemed to help a little.
Went to the track last night. Truck weighs 3350 with me in it and 3160 no driver. Made 2 passes. 13.69 at 102 with a 2.09 60ft. 13.99 2nd pass at 98mph. 2nd pass was .03 faster 60ft so should have been a faster total ET. After calculation it looks like its putting out 280hp which sucks. Yes its stock with 175k miles on it. But add the exhaust and base tune, it should still be around stock hp which would have run about 12.30 in the 1/4. Its all stock including the converter. Its struggles until about 200 ft mark and estimated 3k rpm. I don't have a tach in it yet, so its just a guess. If it would pull like it does after that certain rpm it would run in the 12's easy. Its a dog off the line.
I beat a 2015 5.0 mustang so that makes me feel a little better but now good enough. I planned on running a mid 12. So, now what do I do? I am pulling the drivetrain for sure. Just need to figure out what route to go. I like compression and big cams. But high compression is not good for turbo, or is it? And I don't want to waste money building it now just to spend money again on a turbo setup. Plus I need to know if turbo engines are consistent in case I want to bracket race. I don't think they are.
Man, bummer about the time. Not sure about where I'd start either, but you certainly have plenty of options with a stock drivetrain.
So Lakewood, huh? Would you choose them again given the option of that versus CalTracs?
I like the Caltrac design with the slider myself if I weren't going to build a ladder bar setup. Which I will soon. But for a bar that works good with a car that's not a ton of power then the standard slapper bar type like Lakewood will be fine.
The Sanderson shortys are choking the life out of that 6.0. I have a 94 with a LM7 5.3, with a cam, and it runs best of a 13.2 with a 2.2 60'. I am swapping out that, to a LQ4 w/ported 799 heads. That will net ~ 10.1:1 compression. That is about a sweet spot for a turbo setup. You can go higher or lower, but that seems to work well. I am hoping to boost mine as well next year. I already have a Turbonetics TC78 for it.
With 175k miles on that, I wouldn't boost it, but thats JMO. I am a little worried about mine staying to gether. Mine has 87k on the short block, and since I ported the heads, they have a fresh valve job on them. I have seen time and time again, tight heads, take out a loose bottom end. I hope it doesn't happen, but guess I won't be surprised if it does.
I really like your truck!!!! Nice build! If it were mine, I would cam it, change out those headers for the S&W's, and get it tuned.
I really don't think the shortys are hurting it that much at all. They are better than the manifolds that come stock, plus I have no cats and basically open mufflers. So they should flow better than stock. Now I also know they aren't as good as a full header. I didn't buy the full header just because I knew I was going to change this up pretty soon. And then that would have been 500.00 more wasted on the header cost.
As for the turbo setup. I plan to rebuild the engine before that happens. I wouldn't add any power boosters to an engine with this many miles. My luck is it would pop. My plan is 11.5:1 compression. I'll buy a nice race cam for it to run NA for now and then when I get the turbo system all built I will only need to buy a new cam and its ready to go.
Thanks for the compliment on the build. Its a work in progress and I wont be happy until its fast enough to be a real handful going down the track on a small tire. Sooo, maybe 800+hp. I just started another business so funds are tight. Hopefully I can have it done by the end of this year.
I completely understand what your saying on the headers. The Sanderson have been in trucks running in the 10's, so it's not the end all be all one fix. I still have them on my junk too.
My advice is, do research on c/r. 11.5:1, is not going to do you any favors on a boosted build.
Nice build. I'm doing finishing touches on a lq4 6.2 80 mm turbo with a 4l80e. It has stock spindles in the front with bell tech v6 spring and it's way to sagging in the front. What springs did you use stock v6 springs with one coil cut off? Or did you change it. I like the stance of yours.
Last edited by autoaddictions; 07-30-2015 at 10:50 PM.
Thanks. The front is all stock and has the 4cyl springs. I cut 1 coil off of them. I am starting to buy the turbo parts. Going with a twin GT45's A2W all bed mounted.
05-10-2015, 11:18 AM
I was worried about a couple of things being too non street. Also on the sluggish running. Lone Star Dyno hooked it up just to check codes and he found the 3 brand new coils I bought from summit, which are factory replacement Delphi coils were throwing codes for misfire. So I have sent those back and having them send me a full set of MSD coils. That should make it run a little better too. He replaced the 3 coils with a set of round coils to see if it would run better and it did. I need to get traction bars on the rear. I am researching which ones I want to run. I can feel it wrapping the leafs up in first gear and trying to power over the wrap. Feels like it wraps up the leaf and chirps the tires past it over and over until it hits 2nd. 
