Time for an update..... It runs and drives! Then Monday morning it gelled up. Dang cold weather. More on that later....

After the rear suspension was modified, it was back to the front. Buttoned everything up, tying wires back and checking things to try not to over look things. I modified the header panel to install the 05 up head lights. I also had to modify the header to run an 05 grill too. We put the bumper on but need to remove the lower cross bar because the 05's don't have them. We also installed the first set of HID's.





Now we were working on wiring up grid heaters, which I skipped the delay relay for now to get this thing driving. Intercooler piping back on, had to make a long intake bolt since the soonest I could get one was 5-7 days.




Nick, my brother, ran wiring and installed the new back up light. Ya have to be able to see to back up this unit.



There was an issue of too much timing and this thing would fog you out of the shop. Luckily we have a timing light for diesels and could check it without tearing it apart. Also, for all the people that say there is only roughly 10-12* of movement on a VE is wrong. It'd more like 20*. Luckily we were able to retard the injection pump and that problem was fixed. Here's a pic of the tail pipe right after start up. 26* not plugged in 5 seconds on the grid heater. It started within one revolution too.



Also, the engine wouldn't rev up over 1500rpms. That was tricky. Put a pressure gauge on it and it read 0 with the lift pump on. The pump was flowing fuel but no pressure. Hmm I had been leery of my return set up so I made some calls with no real help. Nick went down to the fuel injection shop we use and Tom saved the day. Turns out that the return system on a VE is regulated with a banjo bolt that has 2 .012 holes in it. Yeah, mine was a -6 JIC fitting and -6 hose. No restriction. Nick installed a return line and the banjo bolt and it fixed it. Chaulk that up on the board as a lesson learned.

Next was some instrumentation. The wife did not want a pillar pod so I removed the old SOF 4x4 switch and added a boost gauge. I put the trans temp gauge next to the power point recepticle. I also installed a toggle switch for the back up lamp under the boost gauge, and added an LED that indicates the grid heater is on.



We buttoned it up and took it out for a test drive. It was freaking cold! -12 at 8:00pm and driving down the road the outside temp gauge said -40. It was dang cold. I put ten gallons of fuel in it with half a bottle of penray anti gel, and it had 10gal of fuel in it already with power service 911. Guess what? Monday morning it was gelled up. Not cool! Plus I thought the lift pump I put on there was bad. Here are pics of it sitting in the drive way. I've got some bugs to work out but at least it is out of the shop and mobile!