FSM will tell you how to identify them. The last gen 2 I bought was for sale due to the cams being swapped. The truck would start with ether but stumble and die.

Well,

Just a little update. I got everything back together and fired it up.

I have some problems though...

The throttle cable is to short? I have no idea how that happened.

The valves are really loud.

It still smokes a little.

Once it warmed up the radiator hose was hot but the lower one never got warm. Does this mean the thermostat never opened? or i have it in there wrong? i feel like it should have been warm enough to open. its a new OEM unit.

on the positive side the timing was good! The engine sounds powerful. Its very responsive.

But, I'm supposed to start school in Oregon soon and need to get on the road : (

So Incase anyone was wondering if you flip the bracket for the throttle the wrong way it will be a little short and you will idle at about 2k rpm ..

I cut the old thermostat so it would be wide open and was gonna through it in real quick to see if thats the problem and when i disconnected the lower radiator hose from the T-stat housing i was expecting a rush of fluid and nothing came out but i could see fluid in the hose so then i removed the cap and stuck my finger in the radiator and it was empty! its really stained green so just looking it looked like there was coolant in there but it was low.

so i topped it off and started it back up .

when the engine was cold it didn't smoke at all! then when it warmed up it did a little after taking it for a spin it has mostly stopped smoking so it must be burning off all the oil that was in the exhaust.

also the valves are much quieter now.

So it looks like the job is mostly done.

now its time to move onto the front CV boots

The noise was likely the valve lash adjusters. Hopefully they pump up and stay good. I'd probably suggest running synthetic oil from here on out, as long as you're not burning any. There was likely a good amount of oil residue in the exhaust, maybe some coolant as well. A good spin on the highway should clear that up.

When you take the front end apart, take a good look at the bushings in the front of the lower a-arms, since they seem to take a beating on these trucks. They can be pressed in/out with relative ease. The same cannot be said for the bushings for the rear of the lower a-arm, since they remain in the frame. Thankfully, they last a long time, and they are a complete B!tch to replace; I wouldn't bother.

The idler arm is the weak point in the steering. If you have any slop or wander, start there. I've replaced all my steering parts with ones with a lifetime warranty since I kind of beat on mine off-road.

My valve guide seals appeared on my front porch today, so thanks for ordering those for me. Do you still have the other 12 you got from me or did I space out on where I put them if you brought them back?

Good job getting through this job, man. It's not the easiest engine to do all that work to, so congratulations. It should run well for the next 60K miles until you just have to do the timing belt parts again. Hope those parts helped.

John B.

I just wanted to drop a note in here to say this Joe guy is straight up cool. He brought back my manuals and another 12 valve guide seals that he had borrowed and left them in my '95. Just like he said he was going to do.

I like that in a person.

John B.