Hi, I’m a newbie, Bob Youngquist of San Diego, CA.

I’m “restoring” a ‘82 K20 I’ve owned for about 13 years. It’s a 6.2 diesel, TH400, 4x4, 117,00 miles, Power Pac (intake and exhaust), Gear Vendor O/D, Selectro front hubs. 3 fuel tanks (one behind seat), Helwig helper springs- rear, 2” Add-a-Leaf- front, etc. I’ve installed new glow plugs, injector pump, starter, batteries and fuel hoses. The body and chrome is perfect and it has a heavy duty Callen steel framed cap and a 3 point extended hitch receiver.

I’d appreciate any thoughts regarding potential problems with this vehicle, ideas regarding upgrades, or any other ideas that the members of this Forum may have.

I’ve very interested in reliability, since this truck will spend a lot of time in the California and Baja desert and will being doing some towing. I’m especially interest in thoughts about a rear locker.

It also seems to have slight coolant leakage; probably, the infamous cylinder head coolant port…? How serious is this problem?

Thanks,

Bob Youngquist
San Diego, CA

 

If you are restoring it are you going to rebuild the engine? If you are you shouldn't have a problem with you coolant leak so long as it's not a cracked, block/head. I have only really had experiance with one of these but it was so beat up and messed with we couldn't get it to start without a jump and had a lot of charging problems. But the wiring was messed up pretty bad. Other than that it ran and drove great. I do take that back I had 2. The only problem I ever had witht the second was that it spun a bearing. That could have been in part to a lack of oil changes though.
I think if you have all your electrical in good order and don't mix it up it should be a good pickup for you. It won't have as much power as the newer ones do though.

 

A locker in the rear is a good idea, a better idea is airlocks both front and rear, if you get boged down in the sand you can lock both front and rear at the flick of a switch, when you get back on a paved road unlock both for a smooth ride back home. Oh and no "clicking" when you turn a corner.