mezzoni28
Junior Member
My 17 sport is creeping up on 100k, only 500 miles to go! So I wanted to do a long list of preventative maintenance to get ahead of things.
Rotors and pads were done maybe 15k ago with the power stop z36 kit which I’m very happy with. Also put in new brake fluid at that time.
I started off doing transfer case fluid and front and rear diff fluid with amsoil products. Easy peasy.
Next were spark plugs, replaced with oem NGK. This did the most part went well, tight spaces for sure but with some patience they all came and out new ones back in without issue.
Transmission pan/filter and fluid. Ordered the ravenol kit off blauparts. Nice kit for a good price and I believe ravenol might make the oem fluid as well. My one complaint, the bottles have a weird nozzle design that doesn’t really fit up with the pump they give you. Needless to say my driveway does not look how it did last week.
Installed readylift UCA that I got from nick@gotexhaust. He was quick and helpful as always. The UCA installation was easy and they seem to be nice units. All I need is an alignment now. Should’ve got these back when I put my 5100/eibach spring combo in but didn’t.
So did the suspension max sway bar links. Another thing I should’ve done back with the shocks and springs but didn’t. Ride quality is definitely up with fresh bushings.
Now the big bad part of this whole project. The exhaust manifolds. Driver side was in tact. Passenger side had two broken bolts on the rear. Broken flush with the head.
To make a long story short, after failing to drill them out, even with the template from Amazon (which is very nice btw) I resorted to buying welding shield and borrowing a 120v welder from a buddy at work. After MANY failed attempts, I finally got both bolts out. I went thru about 20 nuts and washers between the 2.
End result and what worked best, dremel a simple into the bolt, place a thick washer that I hit with the dremel to get some of the SS coating off, fill that with weld material. Hit that with the flap disk, then held my nut up and filled that thing up. SLOWLY worked it 1/8 turn loose, 1/8 turn tight, and keep repeating and repeating then 1/4 turn, then 1/2 etc etc.
Very few times in my life have I felt as accomplished as when that second bolt came out.
I put BD diesel manifolds on, saw good things about them. Definitely seem to be an upgrade overstock and can’t justify the price of LT’s or a tune. Passenger side isn’t bad at all. Driver side sucked, but I also left the steering column in place. No leaks at all from the manifold to head. Manifold to cat both sides leaked. Took both sides apart and cleaned with 120 grit sandpaper, spread a healthy coating of high exhaust temp form a gasket. Tightened back up as evenly as I could. Started it up a day later (as recommended on the packaging of gasket material) and still leaked. Devastation wasn’t the word…
Eventually however; once coming Fully up to temp, leak went away, and now on cold starts it still is leak free, SO, mission accomplished! My truck no longer sounds like a rolling piece of junk!!! Very Excited to have all this behind me now.
Side note, I’ve never welded, and one local shop I called wouldn’t install the bd diesel manifolds cause they were customer supplied, and another wanted 1200 dollars to do it labor only! So I was pretty determined at that points to make it happen lol
Thanks for reading my book, hope I inspire someone else to take it on!
Rotors and pads were done maybe 15k ago with the power stop z36 kit which I’m very happy with. Also put in new brake fluid at that time.
I started off doing transfer case fluid and front and rear diff fluid with amsoil products. Easy peasy.
Next were spark plugs, replaced with oem NGK. This did the most part went well, tight spaces for sure but with some patience they all came and out new ones back in without issue.
Transmission pan/filter and fluid. Ordered the ravenol kit off blauparts. Nice kit for a good price and I believe ravenol might make the oem fluid as well. My one complaint, the bottles have a weird nozzle design that doesn’t really fit up with the pump they give you. Needless to say my driveway does not look how it did last week.
Installed readylift UCA that I got from nick@gotexhaust. He was quick and helpful as always. The UCA installation was easy and they seem to be nice units. All I need is an alignment now. Should’ve got these back when I put my 5100/eibach spring combo in but didn’t.
So did the suspension max sway bar links. Another thing I should’ve done back with the shocks and springs but didn’t. Ride quality is definitely up with fresh bushings.
Now the big bad part of this whole project. The exhaust manifolds. Driver side was in tact. Passenger side had two broken bolts on the rear. Broken flush with the head.
To make a long story short, after failing to drill them out, even with the template from Amazon (which is very nice btw) I resorted to buying welding shield and borrowing a 120v welder from a buddy at work. After MANY failed attempts, I finally got both bolts out. I went thru about 20 nuts and washers between the 2.
End result and what worked best, dremel a simple into the bolt, place a thick washer that I hit with the dremel to get some of the SS coating off, fill that with weld material. Hit that with the flap disk, then held my nut up and filled that thing up. SLOWLY worked it 1/8 turn loose, 1/8 turn tight, and keep repeating and repeating then 1/4 turn, then 1/2 etc etc.
Very few times in my life have I felt as accomplished as when that second bolt came out.
I put BD diesel manifolds on, saw good things about them. Definitely seem to be an upgrade overstock and can’t justify the price of LT’s or a tune. Passenger side isn’t bad at all. Driver side sucked, but I also left the steering column in place. No leaks at all from the manifold to head. Manifold to cat both sides leaked. Took both sides apart and cleaned with 120 grit sandpaper, spread a healthy coating of high exhaust temp form a gasket. Tightened back up as evenly as I could. Started it up a day later (as recommended on the packaging of gasket material) and still leaked. Devastation wasn’t the word…
Eventually however; once coming Fully up to temp, leak went away, and now on cold starts it still is leak free, SO, mission accomplished! My truck no longer sounds like a rolling piece of junk!!! Very Excited to have all this behind me now.
Side note, I’ve never welded, and one local shop I called wouldn’t install the bd diesel manifolds cause they were customer supplied, and another wanted 1200 dollars to do it labor only! So I was pretty determined at that points to make it happen lol
Thanks for reading my book, hope I inspire someone else to take it on!
