I got a $20 gift card for AutoZone, so I just picked up a 1 gallon jug of Purple Power, a tub of grease (I didn't have as much as I had previously thought) and a few other small things...

I've been busy with work and home stuff, so I haven't done much with the truck... I did start on the wiring, separating and organizing the relay circuits. I temporarily mounted the power distribution block, I still need fuses and connectors, and to figure out something for the keyed +12v.

I'm seriously considering doing what I had mentioned before, but modifying it a little... I would run a relay off of the coil wire, and use that to power another power distribution block to run the electric choke, the signal wire for the fuel pump relay, the hot side of the switch for the off-road lights (which is the signal wire for that relay), and to have an extra keyed +12v source for anything else I might add later.

Eventually, I would like to put together a system similar to yours Giovanni89, but make it waterproof. I'd be waterproofing the rest of the wiring in the engine bay at the same time (or at least making it water-resistant) and pulling out all of the extra wiring that used to run the stock carburetor and emissions crap. That's gonna be a little while, so for right now this should work just fine.

I'm going to go ahead and start putting the front end back together, even though I don't have the shim kit yet for the driver's side... I still need to replace the parking brake cables and a bunch of other little stuff before driving it again. I still have to figure out the A/C and mount the new tires before driving it long distance, but then again I need a little more practice with stop and go traffic. I moved the throttle linkage to a different position, so now I should have both wide open throttle and a less sensitive pedal at part-throttle.

I'm mildly concerned that the A/C is going to take quite a bit of troubleshooting and testing to get working again, but I'm determined to make it work. I did pull the ECU out of the truck, I don't know if it controlled the A/C somehow but I am willing to re-wire the entire system if necessary to get it to work. I'm hoping that it's just an unplugged connector that I didn't notice, but I'm well aware that one of the common problems is the module on the evaporator housing going bad. I'm just speculating right now until I can start testing for voltage with the multimeter, but if someone has an idea of where or what to start with, I'm all ears.

After I've got the truck running properly and reliably, I'm gonna need to figure out what to do about the lack of rocker panels. I don't know when I'm going to have the rectangular tubing and a welder to make the rock sliders I originally wanted, so I'm going to need a solution of some form to keep the jagged, rusty sheet metal from stabbing me in the legs and catching on my pants before I try driving it on a regular basis. Running boards would help a little, but not enough. I could try using the rocker panels I have, but I would need more tools than I currently have access to, including free use of a welder. I could order the correct rocker panels, but those are kinda expensive and I'm on a very limited budget. I could go to a junkyard and cut the rockers out of a truck there, but I'm going to want to grab quite a bit of stuff from there and those parts will add up very quickly.

If you made it this far, thanks for reading through my early morning brain dump.