"Blast from the Past" 79' RV restore

Ron said:
you will have 20' of exhaust pipe running under the open cabin on the RV. You need attenuation. You will have drone. You may not care.
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well soon I will be able to let you guys know how it is and if I don't like it, I can change it easier now that I can drive it on flatter surface and jack it up some lol.
 
marty79 said:
I don't know if the big cab has anything to do with it but every vehicle/car/truck/suv or van that I've done exhaust work on, only when exhaust is dumped underneath does it make it sifnificantly louder
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:lol:
 
shawn said:
:lol:
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I don't know what's so funny besides all the "hyped" up loudness you guys were talking about. I was completely right about the sound...NOT loud at all..and these are Flowmaster Super 44 series. Every exhaust tech that has taught me has always said the shortest and least bends makes more power and louder sound...so why would 20ft of exhaust pipe be so loud?? It sounds good revved up but in the cab I still couldn't hear it at all. Only when I stood right in front of the pipe coming out the side did it sound "good" with nice v8 hot rod tone but still pretty quiet considering the mufflers.
The K5 with built 350 that these came off of was "loud as sh*t" when my boss built that truck so I know even more so the length of pipe makes all the difference.
Well anyway, it sounds great, drove good for now but didn't go far with belts about to fall off lol so parked nosed in the shop ready for front engine work this week!
 
Blaze said:
It'll still be loud with Flowmasters, but to each his own. You would get the same performance with some turbo mufflers but at a fraction of the interior drone and annoyance.
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Flowmaster Super 44 mufflers tested today...very quiet inside, couldn't hear it at wot just fyi so no, long ass pipes makes the exhaust quieter. sounds good next to it facing the pipes but inside nothing...wot inside only hear the loud engine and 4barrels kickin!
 
well I know it's been a while but I've been super busy and has taken lot longer to get this thing done/ready/usable BUT here it is.
It's not "All Complete" but it's ready for our next weekend fishing/camping trip so ........not bad for 37yr old clunker!!
I call it an "apartment on wheels" since it pretty much looks setup like a little efficiency apartment. It hasn't turned out the way I would want had I plenty of money to throw at it and wasn't focused on "weight" but I actually like this open simple setup and it's cozy.
Still have blinds/curtains to put up, seat covers, dog house carpet and little misc.
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Thanks guys I really like it. Had I intentions of selling, it would be totally different as weight would not have been an issue and I would have really like to do some custom cabinetry and framing like I used to do but it's a cool little apartment on wheels to camp in, go fishing, probably going to be an awesome Tow Rig and gas mileage should be up around 10....I HOPE lol. Thanks for the support guys. I hope i can cook up some BBQ for you guys on the next trips sometime having a legit setup and such!!
 
XJsavage said:
This thing turned out damn nice!! :bounce:
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Thank You Sir very much!!
ProbablyBroke said:
Looks great John. I'd be honored to pass out and drool on that carpet.

* I don't know anything about rv's and flunked out of civil engineering in 2011.
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Hey now, no drooling on it but you'd be more than welcome to sleep on it. That carpet is too clean/bright for off road parks...I admit...BUT for free can't complain and it's SO SOFT AND PLUSH ...feels better than the new carpet they put in my house!!
 
Looks good. When you get sick of the carpet go with vinyl, water and mud resistant!
 
Thanks guys for all the comments and likes!!
Today we brought a piece of history back to life...took a drive around town and down the highway a little ways and WOW, drove really good minus a few quirks. The thing got looks everywhere in town as I imagine people are amazed to see a old school motorhome looking vamped up driving down the road and sounding pretty good too lol.
Any Carb experts???? the 4 barrels are opening but not the top flaps?? so not all power is there of course....it's the Quadrajet and I have NO CLUE what I'm looking at.
Transmission is smooth as new but it doesn't downshift properly...it does not have a downshift cable so is it Vacuum operated?? any adjustments? If I can get these 2quirks worked out, it will be awesome I believe as it feels very strong already running on mainly 2 barrels and without it downshifting properly. It does downshift easy and smooth if I manually put it in those gears but when in 3/D, it did not seem to want to go to second or first. thanks for any help with this if I can even follow along on carb advise lol, I'm lost on carb tech and this one has many "things" to adjust all over it.
 
You won't see those top secondary flaps open if you're free revving the engine i n neutral. If you can drive it and look at it and they don't open while under a load then you'll need to check the vacuum cans attached to the linkage on the side of the carb. Those vacuum cans and t the choke linkage can keep the air doors from opening, but like i said, you have to drive it to see them open.

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As far as the transmission goes I'm assuming it's got a turbo 400 3 speed. They use vacuum to control the normal upshift points, in other words if you floor it and there's little vacuum it will delay the upshifts so the engine can tach up. If you're grandpaing it around at 1/4 throttle it will shift earlier at a lower rpm. Turbo 400 transmissions use an electric signal to force a downshift into "passing gear". There should be an electrical connection just above the transmission pan on the driver's side towards the rear of the transmission. If you apply 12v to that connection the trans will force a downshift. It should have originally got its power from a switch on the carb that the linkage depressed at wot. One wire from the switch goes to the trans, one goes to an ignition hot source.

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So if you are having down shifting and secondary issues i would be looking for a vacuum leak!!!!! They both require vacuum to work right.....
 
snappy said:
So if you are having down shifting and secondary issues i would be looking for a vacuum leak!!!!! They both require vacuum to work right.....
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The down shifting is most likely electrical, probably a bad or disconnected switch, no vacuum would affect the upshifts. The vacuum cans on the carb, also called choke pull offs, can affect the secondary air doors, but generally will have other symptoms like flooding.

I'd be willing to bet that unless he's driving with the engine cover off and no air cleaner physically watching the carb (which I don't recommend btw, one backfire then you're battling an interior/clothing fire at 55 MPH) that the secondary air doors are opening properly. They will NOT open free revving in park unless they are totally out of adjustment. It takes the engine pulling some serious air under load to overcome their spring tension.

Id bet a huge rv with a 454 would be hard pressed to get over 30 MPH on just the tiny tiny primary barrels of a quadrajet carb. It'd be struggling to breathe over 2000 rpm! I say the carb is probably OK. It just feels like it's running on just two barrels because youre pushing a 9000 lb brick through the air with 215-300ish hp (unless this things been built like a race car 79-newish 454s were in that range).

I say the carb is most likely good unless he's physically verified it's not opening under load, then check the linkages on the side of the carb like I said in the other post, they do things like keep the secondaries from opening if the choke is on, and delaying the opening until vacuum can bleed out of those pull offs to prevent bogging. If any of that linkage is misadjusted or binding it'll cause problems.

As far as the transmission, check for 12v on the wire going to the drivers rear corner of the transmission with the key on, engine off, throttle floored. If there's no voltage, work back towards switch. Common to see wires melted on exhaust, or bad switch, or blown fuse. If there's no wire to check, then there's your problem, LOL. It'd probably not run at all if there was a big enough vacuum leak to affect the transmission shifting.

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Tim C said:
The down shifting is most likely electrical, probably a bad or disconnected switch, no vacuum would affect the upshifts. The vacuum cans on the carb, also called choke pull offs, can affect the secondary air doors, but generally will have other symptoms like flooding.

I'd be willing to bet that unless he's driving with the engine cover off and no air cleaner physically watching the carb (which I don't recommend btw, one backfire then you're battling an interior/clothing fire at 55 MPH) that the secondary air doors are opening properly. They will NOT open free revving in park unless they are totally out of adjustment. It takes the engine pulling some serious air under load to overcome their spring tension.

Id bet a huge rv with a 454 would be hard pressed to get over 30 MPH on just the tiny tiny primary barrels of a quadrajet carb. It'd be struggling to breathe over 2000 rpm! I say the carb is probably OK. It just feels like it's running on just two barrels because youre pushing a 9000 lb brick through the air with 215-300ish hp (unless this things been built like a race car 79-newish 454s were in that range).

I say the carb is most likely good unless he's physically verified it's not opening under load, then check the linkages on the side of the carb like I said in the other post, they do things like keep the secondaries from opening if the choke is on, and delaying the opening until vacuum can bleed out of those pull offs to prevent bogging. If any of that linkage is misadjusted or binding it'll cause problems.

As far as the transmission, check for 12v on the wire going to the drivers rear corner of the transmission with the key on, engine off, throttle floored. If there's no voltage, work back towards switch. Common to see wires melted on exhaust, or bad switch, or blown fuse. If there's no wire to check, then there's your problem, LOL. It'd probably not run at all if there was a big enough vacuum leak to affect the transmission shifting.

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thank you very much for all this advise. I found out on some research today that mine has the detent switch on the gas pedal and it works fine but i realize the gas pedal wasn't going down all the way because of carpet and just very stiff pedal (which I'm going to fix somehow, very annoying how stiff this gas pedal is).
On the Carb: I can tell when it's regular 2bb power and when the 4bbl kick in...the problem is when the 4bbl open...you can hear it like all 4bbl carb cars that loud humming sucking air sound but no extra power hardly and twice it bogged down badly and then picked back up. The only time I felt the full power of the engine was one time when I manually put it in 1st gear and floored it really hard and the sound and the feeling was there as for such a heavy beast...it shot up to 40 pretty quick for what it is, very impressive actually but even then I could tell the motor/carb/4bbls are still out of adjustment. I'm not very familiar with carbs but I've owned lots of them and always had some old timer experienced carb guy tune them up and from those experiences I've learned when a carb is good and when one is out of adjustment/not running properly.

Do you know if I take the carb itself in to a carb guy, can he look at it, adjust/fix/figure out what it's doing or not doing or does it need to be on the engine running? I ask cause you can imagine it's hard to pull this 25ft beast into most shop parking lots lol. thanks for all your help very much.
 
You'd be better off finding someone who will work on it on the engine. You can set baseline adjustments off the engine but you can't fine tune anything without it running.

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If I had to take a wild guess the kickdown switch for the tranny is probably on the gas pedal and it's a simple 12v in and out so it's easy to test so start with a test light at the 1 wire on the Trans while someone holds the pedal on the floor.
FYI do that without the engine running.


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oh and up-shifting is perfect weather slow or fast takeoff...downshift to 2nd is/feels proper and to first is a little off but I've read on many older forums that these TH400 can be tricky to pull a 3-1downshift at 30mph...1st tops out at 42 when hammered all the way down in D so i guess would make sense to go from 3-1 at 30mph would be little hard. I'm gonna call around some places and see if anyone can take a look out in the parking lot of their place.
@mysterync you by any chance work on carbs? You are close and you have space lol. let me know and will swing the business your way, thanks!
 
BUCKEYE PERFORMANCE INC. said:
If I had to take a wild guess the kickdown switch for the tranny is probably on the gas pedal and it's a simple 12v in and out so it's easy to test so start with a test light at the 1 wire on the Trans while someone holds the pedal on the floor.
FYI do that without the engine running.


BUCKEYE PERFORMANCE INC.
828-779-2242
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yeah i found that out already today and seems to work fine, thank you sir.
 
Tim C said:
You won't see those top secondary flaps open if you're free revving the engine i n neutral. If you can drive it and look at it and they don't open while under a load then you'll need to check the vacuum cans attached to the linkage on the side of the carb. Those vacuum cans and t the choke linkage can keep the air doors from opening, but like i said, you have to drive it to see them open.

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what if I use a spring to hold open the top secodary plates while driving it...today i held them open while idleing and didn't affect it so any reason why I can't hold them open with a spring to see if that cures the issue...revving it while in P does open the secondaries under WOT but not the top plates and the 2bbl top plates never open all the way either, even WOT they stay 3/4way open only...stupid carbs and all their plates LOL
 
The secondary top plates actually control the fuel metering rods so no you cannot force them open and them work properly. If the choke plate is not fully opening the secondary flaps will not open due to a mechanical lockout on the right side of the carb. Get the choke adjusted so that it fully opens and then I can walk you through the rest.

BUCKEYE PERFORMANCE INC.
828-779-2242
 
The front barrels top plate is the choke. It needs to be full open once the engine warms up. If it isn't that can keep the secondaries or back barrels from opening. The actual throttle plates should open with the gas pedal after the choke opens, but the air doors should not open. Air flow into the engine is what opens them, they also act as the venturi which is what creates the vacuum which pulls fuel from the bowl. If you hang those air doors open it will bog or stall when you step on the gas because the engine will get all air and no fuel.

You need to find someone local who can work on a qjet carb (it'll probably be an older guy, LOL) or go pick up a book, either from Haynes or "How to rebuild and modify Rochester Quadrajet carburetors" by Cliff Ruggles and study up on how they work. Many perfectly good carbs of all brands have been ruined by someone rigging something or adjusting things they have no business doing, but qjets especially get a bad rap.

If you're hearing the loud intake air sucking noise from it then those doors are working, but again they ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO OPEN UNLESS YOU ARE DRIVING. They will NOT open revving it in your driveway.

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BUCKEYE PERFORMANCE INC. said:
The secondary top plates actually control the fuel metering rods so no you cannot force them open and them work properly. If the choke plate is not fully opening the secondary flaps will not open due to a mechanical lockout on the right side of the carb. Get the choke adjusted so that it fully opens and then I can walk you through the rest.

BUCKEYE PERFORMANCE INC.
828-779-2242
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This

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