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[ Joel ] You're watching Powernation!
[ Eric ] Today on Music City Trucks we keep rolling on this '93 Dodge W-350 and get our fuel system dropped into our freshly coated frame. [ Joel ] Plus we show you how to lay down a two tone custom paint job on your next project. [ Eric ] And we finally get this hopped up 12-valve dropped back into its new-old home. [ Joel ] All that and more happening today on Music City Trucks. [ Music ] Nothing cooler than an old pickup, am I right? [ Music ] [ Eric ] Underneath all this dirt there's probably a pretty good truck. [ Music ] [ spray gun hissing ] [ Music ] [ Joel ] Well guys today's the day that Project Nightshift gets its color back. I've got the cab and the doors in the booth with a fresh coat of sealer and we're ready to lay down some color. We kinda went back and forth on which direction we wanted to go but at the end of the day we decided we're gonna keep this thing all Mopar and paint it only using Hellcat or TRX colors. The first step in our paint project is to lay down a base coat and cover our cab with some of that aforementioned Hellcat Black. This pallid palette is really going to help dictate the shade of gray we're looking for on the two tone transformation of this darkened dually. This particular black paint is laying down smooth and clean. So it's looking like we're only going to need a couple of coats for us to get that perfect amount of coverage and make all of that sealer disappear. Now your paint selection is pivotal. Usually you can always count on the better your paint the easier your paint job, but no matter what you use I recommend getting some samples and doing a few spray outs to ensure you're getting the results you want within your budget. You've got to remember that this is all just a balancing act, and you've got to do your homework and decide how to best spend your money and your time. If you spend a lot of your time masking painting usually goes faster and vice versa. If you rush through all your masking then you're gonna have to spend more time and be extra careful with your paint. It all really does boil down to time, money, and technique. Typically most of us have limited amounts of one or more. Just remember to be proactive, plan, and choose wisely because prep and paint are arguably the most important parts of your build. Well guys we got a couple layers of black on Project Nightshift and it's already starting to look pretty sharp. We went through a couple of different variations on how we wanted to go with our paint scheme and what we decided on I think you guys are gonna like. Now earlier we mentioned that we are painting this using Hellcat colors. One of those is the graphite silver, and from the factory that is laid on top of a gray base but we are using a black base. That's gonna give it more of a darker undertone for that sinister look we're going for. But before we start laying down some paint I've got to start laying down some tape. [ Music ] Basically what I'm looking at right now is I want the top edge of my tape line about parallel with the top of the door. I can't go off of this body line because it's not directly parallel with the rest of the truck. It actually runs uphill a little bit. So if I go off of this body line by the time the end of my tape line gets there it'll basically be too high and go up into that upper right edge, which is not what we want. We want these nice and straight. Another variation that we considered was actually going off of these two body lines right here but there's a couple of problems with that. One is that about three quarters of the way through the door here this body line completely disappears. By the time you get to the back edge of the cab corner there's really no tape line or body line to go off of. By the time we get it back on the chassis and try to line it up with the rest of the bed it just wouldn't look right. I think our best bet is to just go off of that factory paint scheme. Before we sanded this down I measured out the distance between this body line and the bottom edge of this tape line. Really all it is is a matter of taking this three quarter inch tape and use this to run along the top edge of this body line. Right now I'm just feeling the bottom edge of that tape and the body line at the same time. Making sure I got a nice, consistent feeling all the way down. Right here is one of those spots I can feel the body line or the tape is sitting too far down on the body line. So I've got to peel it back just a little bit. Pull that edge up just a smidge so it's more consistent all the way back up the door. Go back over it. Yep, that's what we like. Now that we got our bottom edge pretty much established just move it on up just a little bit more. [ Music ] Get that as close to the top edge with the other masking tap as possible. A very, very mild overlap. Like a sixteenth of an inch at the absolute most. [ Music ] Now where we're sitting I like to take a step back and just look at the big picture. I can kinda see where the top and bottom edges of that silver's gonna lay, and that is pretty dang close to where it was from the factory. It's gonna be complimented with a nice red pinstripe. I think where we're sitting right now I think we're good to lay out the other side. Coming up, get out your silver because this truck is about to transform.
[ Joel ] Now with our stripes laid out we're ready to go ahead and lay down some silver. What we're using is Chrysler code PAU, kind of a graphite silver, and I think it's gonna look pretty sharp once we get it out there. Oh yeah, that silver's gonna make that stripe really pop. Before we go to spray this on I want to talk to you about the importance of using the proper reducer for your application. Usually when I'm in there it's hovering around that 70 to 80 degree range, which is always good to know exactly what temperature is in the booth or wherever your paint environment is because it will effect which reducer you use. If it gets around that 85 degree or higher range we're gonna have to use a warmer reducer. If we don't what will happen is the paint and the reducer will start to evaporate as it's coming out of the gun causing dry spots. Reducer helps to break down the paint into smaller, more uniform droplets as it exits your gun improving atomization and reducing the risk of any defects. Reducer can also have an adverse effect on adhesion. When that happens that's where you can get popping, blistering, or even the dreaded premature paint failure. They don't make a pill to fix that, and honestly there's nothing worse than being unable to get your paint to lay down properly. Also you want to make sure to check your gun too because you can have perfect paint conditions and do everything right but if your gun isn't taken care of it'll all be for nothing. You don't take care of your gun you can get things like orange peel or gun clogs and that will quickly turn a dream paint job into a waking nightmare. Fortunately the silver is having none of those issues, laying down smooth and coming out of the gun just as I had hoped. Even if you keep a squeaky clean gun and slap on a perfectly applied paint job you still may see some distortions or swirls if there's any dents, dings, or damage you may have missed while you were sanding and block. That pretty new paint will conform to the shape of any imperfections, making them clearly visible. So just try and take your time, plan accordingly, and remember to crawl, walk, and then run so your paint won't. We've got four coats of our silver laid down and it actually turned out better than we could have imagined. The next step is to unmask this whole thing and there is a technique that you need to do so that you don't cause any unnecessary damage. Just want to take your time and literally pull the tape off of itself. Start in the corner here. [ paper crackling ] [ Music ] [ Joel ] Now it's not gonna matter too much right now but as you can see I'm pulling this masking tape directly back onto itself. I'm not pulling it at a downward or upward angle. Just straight across. [ Music ]
[ Music ] That technique I was telling you about earlier about pulling the tape back onto itself this is where it's very, very critical. You've got base coat meeting base coat you pull away at an angle it'd be easy to pull that silver back up onto itself and it would create a big tear in it. You have to redo everything you just did. A little nerve wracking. Like diffusing a bomb. No matter how many times I do this I still get nervous. [ Music ] That's cool, I'm cool. Nobody moves, nobody gets hurt. [ Music ] I've pretty much got everything masked off for our custom pinstripe, and this can be kind of a daunting task that'll really test your patience but it is a crucial step. Basically what we've done is used this blue pinstriping tape to layout exactly where we want it, and then we masked on the top and the bottom side. Next thing we're gonna do is peel off this blue and start laying down some cool color. Same rules apply here for our pinstripe tape. You want to slowly pull it back on itself so you don't encroach on your mask that you laid down for your stripe. This tape is designed to not pull anything away from the surface along with it while you remove it. I shouldn't have to say this but be sure you're using the painter's tape when doing this. Don't just grab some duct tape from your junk drawer or your paint job will be just that, junk. [ spray gun hissing ] [ Joel ] Now this may be the fastest paint job I've ever done. This red is RED red! You can see also as I'm spraying on top of this tape that it turns into an orange shade of red. That's because the yellow is serving as the base coat like I was telling you guys about earlier. Your base coat will completely change the color of your paint. Kinda like when you were coloring with crayons as a kid. Mix red and yellow you get orange. Mix yellow and blue you get green. Just do your research before you start or else you might end up with a batch of brown glop that you did not intend on getting. You know what? We may have to change the name of this truck to the silver bullet cause this gunmetal gray is looking pretty bad ass! [ Music ] [ Eric ] Up next, we're going clear and busting out our purple performance powerhouse. [ Joel ] Purple trans, purple trans.
[ Joel ] Well our custom paint scheme turned out about 99 percent awesome. We did have a little bit of bleed through on our silver on the top of this base coat but that's an easy fix. All we have to do is dust in a little bit of black. Let that flash. Lay down some clear coat. This thing's done. You ever notice when you're laying down clear coat that it creates this foggy effect that's swirling around and filling up the room? Well that's from all the solvent evaporating into the air when you paint. Clear coats typically contain volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, and those evaporate quickly during the painting and curing process. As those solvents evaporate they turn into a liquid that creates vapors that then disperse into the air when you're spraying. That chemical reaction creates a mist or fog of fine particles that become visible, giving you that bug bomb look like you're fumigating for cockroaches. This is why it is critical to wear your p-p-e when painting. You also need to make sure you are spraying in a properly vented area so that haze doesn't linger and get into your lungs. Now I think it's pretty clear though that this paint job is just as cool as we envisioned. It's like a dingy dark mirror reflecting back the pain that resides in my soul as I begin to realize that I still have to do this for the rest of the truck. [ Eric ] Today just keeps getting bigger and bigger for Project Nightshift because now that this chassis fully prepped it's time to get our Cummins dropped back in. [ Joel ] It's a lot cooler in here than in that paint booth. [ Eric ] You ready to get this thing back in? [ Joel ] Sure, let's give it a whirl. [ Eric ] About time. [ Joel ] Ready? [ Eric ] I forgot how heavy this thing is. [ Music ] Yeah! [ Music ] Whoa, she is in! [ ratchet clicking ] [ Eric ] Is it just me or is this thing sitting a little higher up than it did before? [ Joel ] It just seems like that cause you only got one shoe on. Just let the crane hold it for us for now until we get that transmission in. Purple trans, purple trans! [ Eric ] Now that we've got the engine dropped in we need some way to get that power down to the wheels. Obviously we don't want to reuse this old transmission because even though we could have rebuilt it to handle the new power output that's a lot of extra work when we could just go to ATS Diesel Performance, pick up this full Allison 1,000 kit. [ Joel ] There's a lot of good things about these first gens. For one, you've got Cummins power, heavy duty axles, a stout frame, but it always seems like the Achilles heel was these 46-RE transmissions. However an Allison, that's got a whole different reputation altogether. These things are tough. Good to about 300 horsepower from the factory but the Stage-4 performance one we got is good up to 1,000 horsepower plus. [ Eric ] Of course this wouldn't be a complete kit with just the transmission. So it has come with almost everything we need to complete this installation including a standalone transmission cooler, fancy mounts, all of our linkages and bracketry we're gonna need, a fresh SFI rated flex plate, and this fancy shifter handle with a manual shift button and a towing mode that's gonna run through our t-c-m and all of that data is gonna be monitored by our standalone can-bus. [ Joel ] One more thing you need to know about this kit is it's actually a drop-in for a second gen Cummins, not a first gen, but you can actually make it work using a second gen adapter plate and rear crossmember. [ Eric ] All that's left is to get this thing dropped in. [ Joel ] How are we gonna get it off the table? [ Eric ] I'll go grab the forklift. [ Joel ] Good idea. [ Eric ] Up next, we play the match game and freshen up a 30 year old tank.
[ Eric ] We've got our Cummins mounted back to our frame and we've got our transmission and transfer case ready to go, but like Joel mentioned we do still need a second gen adapter plate and crossmember before we can actually install it. So while he's out hunting that down I'm gonna take care of some other frame mounted components like our brake lines and our fuel system. This fuel tank is plastic unlike most other old trucks. So there's no reason to replace it unless there's a hole in it or something crazy like that. Our first step is gonna be to get this tank cleaned up because as it sits it would not look right next to everything else we've got back on the truck. I'm gonna start by spraying it off with some air using a multipurpose cleaner and wiping it down. With the majority of this sprayed off with the air I'm just using a scraper real quick. Get some of this heavier gunk off. That way we're using less of our shop towels and try to get this thing wiped down cause those add up. [ Music ] It'll take a little bit of elbow grease doing this. Sure, you could take it outside and pressure wash it, but in an effort to minimize the risk of water getting in the fuel I'm just gonna clean it in here. Even if you're not cleaning with water it's still a good idea to plug up any ports on the tank that might allow anything to get in. A little bit of multipurpose cleaner shouldn't kill anything but better to be safe than sorry. Now that we've got our initial cleaning done on this fuel tank I'm just doing a quick scuff cause this obviously is not gonna be a real fancy paint job like what Joel's doing over there in the booth. This just needs to be scuffed enough for our undercoating to latch onto this plastic and not come off. That just about does it for getting this thing scuffed up. Now I'll try and wrangle this whale off the transmission stand and get it hung up so I can actually get to the whole thing and get it painted. [ whale song ] [ Eric ] I tried to hang it up like I planned on but clearly this guy didn't make it. It's a little more full and a little heavier than I expected. So we're just gonna have it sit here on the table, hit it with a quick spray of some rubberized undercoating. It's gonna make it look good and help keep it protected. Here we go, oh god! [ aerosol can hissing ] Eric ] Like I said, this stuff does spray out a little bit heavy but you can get around that by increasing your speed as you're sweeping across your piece. [ aerosol can hissing ] Eric ] Make sure you touch up any light spots as you go. [ aerosol can hissing ] [ Eric ] Right at the end! Any time you're painting anything, especially if you're using aerosol, you want to look for what's known as tiger stripes, and what that is is dry spots in between your sprays of paint. If you do see that just give it a nice, light dusting in between those two lines and you'll be just fine. Watch your head coming in here. There we go! [ Joel ] Spiffed this thing right up! [ Eric ] Crazy what a quick coat of paint will do. [ Joel ] It's subtle changes that'll really elevate a build. [ Eric ] Of course the one time these things don't want to come out of the jack. Maybe because it's something on there? Up, down, spun around. If we get one strap in then we'll just put a stand on the other side so we can get this jack out of here. I think we're making some progress there. Thankfully this thing isn't still mostly full of diesel fuel. Be a little heavy if it was. Get that out of here! I don't care where it goes but it can't stay here. [ drill humming ] [ Music ] [ Eric ] Get this guy dropped in here. Snug ole fit there. There we go! [ Music ]
This paint came out real nice. [ Joel ] Looks pretty sharp if I do say so myself. Gonna look real good on top of this chassis. [ Eric ] We're not quite there yet. [ Joel ] Even after we get that on here we've still got to get that big, heavy transmission behind this Cummins. A few things to do on the brake lines. I did find that adapter plate and crossmember. Those are on the way, but as much work as we've gotten done still got a lot of work to do buddy. [ Eric ] Yeah but I think we knocked out some pretty big ticket stuff today. The engine's in. We're just waiting on some parts to get the trans in. I'd say we're in pretty good shape. [ Joel ] All I know is it's five o'clock and I think we've earned ourselves a couple of cold ones!
Show Full Transcript
[ Eric ] Today on Music City Trucks we keep rolling on this '93 Dodge W-350 and get our fuel system dropped into our freshly coated frame. [ Joel ] Plus we show you how to lay down a two tone custom paint job on your next project. [ Eric ] And we finally get this hopped up 12-valve dropped back into its new-old home. [ Joel ] All that and more happening today on Music City Trucks. [ Music ] Nothing cooler than an old pickup, am I right? [ Music ] [ Eric ] Underneath all this dirt there's probably a pretty good truck. [ Music ] [ spray gun hissing ] [ Music ] [ Joel ] Well guys today's the day that Project Nightshift gets its color back. I've got the cab and the doors in the booth with a fresh coat of sealer and we're ready to lay down some color. We kinda went back and forth on which direction we wanted to go but at the end of the day we decided we're gonna keep this thing all Mopar and paint it only using Hellcat or TRX colors. The first step in our paint project is to lay down a base coat and cover our cab with some of that aforementioned Hellcat Black. This pallid palette is really going to help dictate the shade of gray we're looking for on the two tone transformation of this darkened dually. This particular black paint is laying down smooth and clean. So it's looking like we're only going to need a couple of coats for us to get that perfect amount of coverage and make all of that sealer disappear. Now your paint selection is pivotal. Usually you can always count on the better your paint the easier your paint job, but no matter what you use I recommend getting some samples and doing a few spray outs to ensure you're getting the results you want within your budget. You've got to remember that this is all just a balancing act, and you've got to do your homework and decide how to best spend your money and your time. If you spend a lot of your time masking painting usually goes faster and vice versa. If you rush through all your masking then you're gonna have to spend more time and be extra careful with your paint. It all really does boil down to time, money, and technique. Typically most of us have limited amounts of one or more. Just remember to be proactive, plan, and choose wisely because prep and paint are arguably the most important parts of your build. Well guys we got a couple layers of black on Project Nightshift and it's already starting to look pretty sharp. We went through a couple of different variations on how we wanted to go with our paint scheme and what we decided on I think you guys are gonna like. Now earlier we mentioned that we are painting this using Hellcat colors. One of those is the graphite silver, and from the factory that is laid on top of a gray base but we are using a black base. That's gonna give it more of a darker undertone for that sinister look we're going for. But before we start laying down some paint I've got to start laying down some tape. [ Music ] Basically what I'm looking at right now is I want the top edge of my tape line about parallel with the top of the door. I can't go off of this body line because it's not directly parallel with the rest of the truck. It actually runs uphill a little bit. So if I go off of this body line by the time the end of my tape line gets there it'll basically be too high and go up into that upper right edge, which is not what we want. We want these nice and straight. Another variation that we considered was actually going off of these two body lines right here but there's a couple of problems with that. One is that about three quarters of the way through the door here this body line completely disappears. By the time you get to the back edge of the cab corner there's really no tape line or body line to go off of. By the time we get it back on the chassis and try to line it up with the rest of the bed it just wouldn't look right. I think our best bet is to just go off of that factory paint scheme. Before we sanded this down I measured out the distance between this body line and the bottom edge of this tape line. Really all it is is a matter of taking this three quarter inch tape and use this to run along the top edge of this body line. Right now I'm just feeling the bottom edge of that tape and the body line at the same time. Making sure I got a nice, consistent feeling all the way down. Right here is one of those spots I can feel the body line or the tape is sitting too far down on the body line. So I've got to peel it back just a little bit. Pull that edge up just a smidge so it's more consistent all the way back up the door. Go back over it. Yep, that's what we like. Now that we got our bottom edge pretty much established just move it on up just a little bit more. [ Music ] Get that as close to the top edge with the other masking tap as possible. A very, very mild overlap. Like a sixteenth of an inch at the absolute most. [ Music ] Now where we're sitting I like to take a step back and just look at the big picture. I can kinda see where the top and bottom edges of that silver's gonna lay, and that is pretty dang close to where it was from the factory. It's gonna be complimented with a nice red pinstripe. I think where we're sitting right now I think we're good to lay out the other side. Coming up, get out your silver because this truck is about to transform.
[ Joel ] Now with our stripes laid out we're ready to go ahead and lay down some silver. What we're using is Chrysler code PAU, kind of a graphite silver, and I think it's gonna look pretty sharp once we get it out there. Oh yeah, that silver's gonna make that stripe really pop. Before we go to spray this on I want to talk to you about the importance of using the proper reducer for your application. Usually when I'm in there it's hovering around that 70 to 80 degree range, which is always good to know exactly what temperature is in the booth or wherever your paint environment is because it will effect which reducer you use. If it gets around that 85 degree or higher range we're gonna have to use a warmer reducer. If we don't what will happen is the paint and the reducer will start to evaporate as it's coming out of the gun causing dry spots. Reducer helps to break down the paint into smaller, more uniform droplets as it exits your gun improving atomization and reducing the risk of any defects. Reducer can also have an adverse effect on adhesion. When that happens that's where you can get popping, blistering, or even the dreaded premature paint failure. They don't make a pill to fix that, and honestly there's nothing worse than being unable to get your paint to lay down properly. Also you want to make sure to check your gun too because you can have perfect paint conditions and do everything right but if your gun isn't taken care of it'll all be for nothing. You don't take care of your gun you can get things like orange peel or gun clogs and that will quickly turn a dream paint job into a waking nightmare. Fortunately the silver is having none of those issues, laying down smooth and coming out of the gun just as I had hoped. Even if you keep a squeaky clean gun and slap on a perfectly applied paint job you still may see some distortions or swirls if there's any dents, dings, or damage you may have missed while you were sanding and block. That pretty new paint will conform to the shape of any imperfections, making them clearly visible. So just try and take your time, plan accordingly, and remember to crawl, walk, and then run so your paint won't. We've got four coats of our silver laid down and it actually turned out better than we could have imagined. The next step is to unmask this whole thing and there is a technique that you need to do so that you don't cause any unnecessary damage. Just want to take your time and literally pull the tape off of itself. Start in the corner here. [ paper crackling ] [ Music ] [ Joel ] Now it's not gonna matter too much right now but as you can see I'm pulling this masking tape directly back onto itself. I'm not pulling it at a downward or upward angle. Just straight across. [ Music ]
[ Music ] That technique I was telling you about earlier about pulling the tape back onto itself this is where it's very, very critical. You've got base coat meeting base coat you pull away at an angle it'd be easy to pull that silver back up onto itself and it would create a big tear in it. You have to redo everything you just did. A little nerve wracking. Like diffusing a bomb. No matter how many times I do this I still get nervous. [ Music ] That's cool, I'm cool. Nobody moves, nobody gets hurt. [ Music ] I've pretty much got everything masked off for our custom pinstripe, and this can be kind of a daunting task that'll really test your patience but it is a crucial step. Basically what we've done is used this blue pinstriping tape to layout exactly where we want it, and then we masked on the top and the bottom side. Next thing we're gonna do is peel off this blue and start laying down some cool color. Same rules apply here for our pinstripe tape. You want to slowly pull it back on itself so you don't encroach on your mask that you laid down for your stripe. This tape is designed to not pull anything away from the surface along with it while you remove it. I shouldn't have to say this but be sure you're using the painter's tape when doing this. Don't just grab some duct tape from your junk drawer or your paint job will be just that, junk. [ spray gun hissing ] [ Joel ] Now this may be the fastest paint job I've ever done. This red is RED red! You can see also as I'm spraying on top of this tape that it turns into an orange shade of red. That's because the yellow is serving as the base coat like I was telling you guys about earlier. Your base coat will completely change the color of your paint. Kinda like when you were coloring with crayons as a kid. Mix red and yellow you get orange. Mix yellow and blue you get green. Just do your research before you start or else you might end up with a batch of brown glop that you did not intend on getting. You know what? We may have to change the name of this truck to the silver bullet cause this gunmetal gray is looking pretty bad ass! [ Music ] [ Eric ] Up next, we're going clear and busting out our purple performance powerhouse. [ Joel ] Purple trans, purple trans.
[ Joel ] Well our custom paint scheme turned out about 99 percent awesome. We did have a little bit of bleed through on our silver on the top of this base coat but that's an easy fix. All we have to do is dust in a little bit of black. Let that flash. Lay down some clear coat. This thing's done. You ever notice when you're laying down clear coat that it creates this foggy effect that's swirling around and filling up the room? Well that's from all the solvent evaporating into the air when you paint. Clear coats typically contain volatile organic compounds, or VOCs, and those evaporate quickly during the painting and curing process. As those solvents evaporate they turn into a liquid that creates vapors that then disperse into the air when you're spraying. That chemical reaction creates a mist or fog of fine particles that become visible, giving you that bug bomb look like you're fumigating for cockroaches. This is why it is critical to wear your p-p-e when painting. You also need to make sure you are spraying in a properly vented area so that haze doesn't linger and get into your lungs. Now I think it's pretty clear though that this paint job is just as cool as we envisioned. It's like a dingy dark mirror reflecting back the pain that resides in my soul as I begin to realize that I still have to do this for the rest of the truck. [ Eric ] Today just keeps getting bigger and bigger for Project Nightshift because now that this chassis fully prepped it's time to get our Cummins dropped back in. [ Joel ] It's a lot cooler in here than in that paint booth. [ Eric ] You ready to get this thing back in? [ Joel ] Sure, let's give it a whirl. [ Eric ] About time. [ Joel ] Ready? [ Eric ] I forgot how heavy this thing is. [ Music ] Yeah! [ Music ] Whoa, she is in! [ ratchet clicking ] [ Eric ] Is it just me or is this thing sitting a little higher up than it did before? [ Joel ] It just seems like that cause you only got one shoe on. Just let the crane hold it for us for now until we get that transmission in. Purple trans, purple trans! [ Eric ] Now that we've got the engine dropped in we need some way to get that power down to the wheels. Obviously we don't want to reuse this old transmission because even though we could have rebuilt it to handle the new power output that's a lot of extra work when we could just go to ATS Diesel Performance, pick up this full Allison 1,000 kit. [ Joel ] There's a lot of good things about these first gens. For one, you've got Cummins power, heavy duty axles, a stout frame, but it always seems like the Achilles heel was these 46-RE transmissions. However an Allison, that's got a whole different reputation altogether. These things are tough. Good to about 300 horsepower from the factory but the Stage-4 performance one we got is good up to 1,000 horsepower plus. [ Eric ] Of course this wouldn't be a complete kit with just the transmission. So it has come with almost everything we need to complete this installation including a standalone transmission cooler, fancy mounts, all of our linkages and bracketry we're gonna need, a fresh SFI rated flex plate, and this fancy shifter handle with a manual shift button and a towing mode that's gonna run through our t-c-m and all of that data is gonna be monitored by our standalone can-bus. [ Joel ] One more thing you need to know about this kit is it's actually a drop-in for a second gen Cummins, not a first gen, but you can actually make it work using a second gen adapter plate and rear crossmember. [ Eric ] All that's left is to get this thing dropped in. [ Joel ] How are we gonna get it off the table? [ Eric ] I'll go grab the forklift. [ Joel ] Good idea. [ Eric ] Up next, we play the match game and freshen up a 30 year old tank.
[ Eric ] We've got our Cummins mounted back to our frame and we've got our transmission and transfer case ready to go, but like Joel mentioned we do still need a second gen adapter plate and crossmember before we can actually install it. So while he's out hunting that down I'm gonna take care of some other frame mounted components like our brake lines and our fuel system. This fuel tank is plastic unlike most other old trucks. So there's no reason to replace it unless there's a hole in it or something crazy like that. Our first step is gonna be to get this tank cleaned up because as it sits it would not look right next to everything else we've got back on the truck. I'm gonna start by spraying it off with some air using a multipurpose cleaner and wiping it down. With the majority of this sprayed off with the air I'm just using a scraper real quick. Get some of this heavier gunk off. That way we're using less of our shop towels and try to get this thing wiped down cause those add up. [ Music ] It'll take a little bit of elbow grease doing this. Sure, you could take it outside and pressure wash it, but in an effort to minimize the risk of water getting in the fuel I'm just gonna clean it in here. Even if you're not cleaning with water it's still a good idea to plug up any ports on the tank that might allow anything to get in. A little bit of multipurpose cleaner shouldn't kill anything but better to be safe than sorry. Now that we've got our initial cleaning done on this fuel tank I'm just doing a quick scuff cause this obviously is not gonna be a real fancy paint job like what Joel's doing over there in the booth. This just needs to be scuffed enough for our undercoating to latch onto this plastic and not come off. That just about does it for getting this thing scuffed up. Now I'll try and wrangle this whale off the transmission stand and get it hung up so I can actually get to the whole thing and get it painted. [ whale song ] [ Eric ] I tried to hang it up like I planned on but clearly this guy didn't make it. It's a little more full and a little heavier than I expected. So we're just gonna have it sit here on the table, hit it with a quick spray of some rubberized undercoating. It's gonna make it look good and help keep it protected. Here we go, oh god! [ aerosol can hissing ] Eric ] Like I said, this stuff does spray out a little bit heavy but you can get around that by increasing your speed as you're sweeping across your piece. [ aerosol can hissing ] Eric ] Make sure you touch up any light spots as you go. [ aerosol can hissing ] [ Eric ] Right at the end! Any time you're painting anything, especially if you're using aerosol, you want to look for what's known as tiger stripes, and what that is is dry spots in between your sprays of paint. If you do see that just give it a nice, light dusting in between those two lines and you'll be just fine. Watch your head coming in here. There we go! [ Joel ] Spiffed this thing right up! [ Eric ] Crazy what a quick coat of paint will do. [ Joel ] It's subtle changes that'll really elevate a build. [ Eric ] Of course the one time these things don't want to come out of the jack. Maybe because it's something on there? Up, down, spun around. If we get one strap in then we'll just put a stand on the other side so we can get this jack out of here. I think we're making some progress there. Thankfully this thing isn't still mostly full of diesel fuel. Be a little heavy if it was. Get that out of here! I don't care where it goes but it can't stay here. [ drill humming ] [ Music ] [ Eric ] Get this guy dropped in here. Snug ole fit there. There we go! [ Music ]
This paint came out real nice. [ Joel ] Looks pretty sharp if I do say so myself. Gonna look real good on top of this chassis. [ Eric ] We're not quite there yet. [ Joel ] Even after we get that on here we've still got to get that big, heavy transmission behind this Cummins. A few things to do on the brake lines. I did find that adapter plate and crossmember. Those are on the way, but as much work as we've gotten done still got a lot of work to do buddy. [ Eric ] Yeah but I think we knocked out some pretty big ticket stuff today. The engine's in. We're just waiting on some parts to get the trans in. I'd say we're in pretty good shape. [ Joel ] All I know is it's five o'clock and I think we've earned ourselves a couple of cold ones!
