Trick to pulling the front bumper? 77 28 ft

[Jjona5]

So it seems like I need to pull the plastic to get to the drivers bumper pad to remove the front facia but I can't take that off until the plastic is out. I didn't plan on removing the bumper until I realized my hoist is a little short of pulling the engine.

[martin300662]

Bumper needs to come off to get to the plastic, which typically means burning out the bolts, at least it need on Peanut and my old parts donor.

[bkahler]

Unfortunately the front bumper does have to come off. As Martin suggested the odds are you'll need to use a cutting torch to melt the heads of the bolts. I had to do it to Peanut and my Argosy as well.

Use a small cutting tip with a small flame and just point the flame tip in the center of the bolt head and melt it. It doesn't really affect the aluminum bumper.

Brad

[shepherd57]

You can also just drill the head off if it is the Phillips style
It is usually a 1/4 I find that way there is less damage to the bumper. either way works

[bkahler]

Originally Posted by shepherd57

You can also just drill the head off if it is the Phillips style
It is usually a 1/4 I find that way there is less damage to the bumper. either way works

John, I tried using drill bits to remove the heads of the screws and after the 4th drill bit I said screw this and got the torch out!

I believe Martin had the same experience I did when he was removing the bumpers from the donor.

Brad

[Jjona5]

Got her out. Entirely too many bolts. Looks like I'm going to have to raise up the rv some more in the front for my lift to get that engine out. Missed it by that much...

[bkahler]

Pictures?

[Jjona5]

Will take some tomorrow. Hot day and I was ready to leave once the engine wouldn't come out

[Jjona5]

Originally Posted by jjona5

will take some tomorrow. Hot day and i was ready to leave once the engine wouldn't come out

[Jjona5]

Originally Posted by Jjona5

Attachment 288396

Wrong direction for some reason.

[bkahler]

Originally Posted by Jjona5

Wrong direction for some reason. Attachment 288397

On the 74 to 76 Argosies you can't remove the front frame member like you did on your 77. On the early Argosies the Airstream added framework is welded to the GM frame member. I don't believe you needed to remove that frame member as I was able to remove a 454 from a 345 and the front frame member was still in place.

When are you planning on lifting the new motor in place?

Brad

[Jjona5]

My lift couldn't get in there far enough with the lift I was using. My shop has an overhead crane which was zero help with this thing. Forgot how terrible the little hydraulic units are. I'm probably going to clean under the hood and probably re engineer a little bit under the hood before the new engine goes in. Also going to wire wheel, prep, and paint under there while the engine is out and redo the brake hard lines throughout the rv. Already did the back two but not the long run to the back.

[bkahler]

Prior to installing the 454 in my Argosy I decided to do a little clean up as well. That task eventually morphed into a complete paint job of the chassis front to rear and everything else underneath! Lots of work but worth it if for no other reason than it's nice to crawl underneath and work on it without having crap fall in your face every time you bump something

[Jjona5]

Yeah I always manage to get things in my eyes when I'm under a vehicle even when I wear safety glasses. I had planned on getting under there today to wire wheel, scrub, and clean the engine bay, wheel wells, and everything back to the transmission to paint. I've managed to get sick though so the weekend is probably going to be a wash. I'm going with por15 silver/gray in the engine bay because I don't like dark colored engines or bays. Might paint the engine chevy orange so I can see any leaks easily.

[bkahler]

If I had the chassis painting to do over again I would probably go with a medium gray color, at least in the engine compartment. The engine itself is painted silver but everything else is gloss black. At times it's kinda like looking into a black hole

Brad

[Conway]

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[bkahler]

Originally Posted by Conway

[IMG][IMG][IMG]06-24-17023jpg[/IMG][/IMG][/IMG]

Unfortunately your picture didn't make it....

[Jjona5]

8.1l setup is in, didn't have my tap and die set with me and needed to chase the threads for the engine mount brackets and called it a day. Will go back tomorrow evening or monday to get her bolted all the way in. Good news and bad news. They sent me the wrong output housing and I didn't notice until I had completely installed it. The rest of it including the output shaft was correct though and I don't think I'll need to modify my driveshaft which will be a large cost savings. I didn't paint the engine yet as I don't really have a good history on it and if it has issues I'm just going to pull it and have it rebuilt. After selling the 4x4 stuff I'm actually going to almost break even on this deal if you don't count the wiring harness/tuning I'm buying. So machine work for a 16v v8 won't kill me. Plus I wanted better rods, pistons, and a cam anyway

[bkahler]

I'm surprised you won't have to shorten your drive shaft! I had to remove about 2-3/4" to get it to fit.

Got any pictures of the 8.1 stuffed in there?

[Jjona5]

So it looked fine when I uploaded it from my phone but then it turned the other way on the site. So I rotated it 90 degrees on my phone and now its 180 degrees off. Let's try again on my computer. Nope still won't work.