Project: Modify everything, even the aftermarket parts to fit...

Congrats on the new job. What industry is it?

I'm an airline mechanic more or less.

Good news, bad news time. Good News, I can now park my Blazer and build it up properly, the right way, no compromises, full bore, and not have to worry about having it running and driving again by monday. Bad news, I spent every cent of money I had put aside for my Blazer on a new truck. New to me anyways.

I bought a 2007 Silverado 1500 4.8L automatic, standard cab short bed for my DD. With the cylinder deactivation and the 3.23 rear gear ratio, I should be able to get notably better fuel mileage than my Blazer has been getting since it started acting up again. Two weeks of 12mpg and a 60 mile drive round trip for work each day sealed the deal for me. I just can't spend 17-18 dollars on gas, EVERY DAY.

Having had a bit of time to stew on the blazer as just a project truck, I've decided to go full tilt on it, no exceptions, no matter how long it takes. My new truck does need a few things, so I'm about a month and a half out from being able to order any parts at all for the blazer, but I can park it and tear into it, get a few bucks selling off what I'm not going to use any more, which is going to be a long list. It's basically going to get stripped to a bare frame, main body and rear axle and everything else will go. I plan on getting started on the teardown this weekend. Have to clean the garage a bit more, then I'll have the room to pull it in and start pulling it apart. I'm insanely excited for this stage, finally. Parts list is likely to stay close to the same, but done right.

Anyone in AZ need any first gen parts or a set of 07ish Land Rover 19" wheels?

Congrats on the new ride!  Looking forward to the full-on blazer build

updates?

Haven't been able to touch it actually, aside from getting a book out of about two weeks ago. I've had A LOT going on and just haven't had time or space. I've put three guns through my shop, one restoration and scope install, one "sporterizing" and my glock, and I've had the cutlass to work on, which has not become cutlasses. They've only taken presidence because they're on someone else's dime instead of my own.

Still no updates, but I should be able to pull it into the garage and start the tear-down on it this weekend. I'm no excited it's inexplicable. I probably won't have much if any time this weekend to actually work on it, but it'll be in the garage ready to go. I'm still waffling a bit on which way to go with it. I might have a solution though. Build up the stock chassis as far as I can go without going away from a stock style suspension and build a custom four wheel independent suspension full tilt chassis, with ECM in the engine compartment, and run a wire bundle to a large aircraft sealed connector, so I can swap the body back and forth between the two chassis.

Awesome man, I was just thinking about this project a few days ago and was wondering where you were at with it.

Well, we've blossomed from one 1973 cutlass at the shop, to a second, that was to be for parts, then got rolled into just a driver build, and just this week, we picked up a 75 for the shell, and they're about to head out to the body shop. Was supposed to be happening today, but my sister needed to borrow my truck and my dad to help move a couch, so I doubt they'll be going over today. One can hope though. I've got a lot of parts stacked up, and I've decided to pull the body and get it fixed at the body shop, while I start on the frame. There are going to be a few weeks of teardown first though. It's getting completely stripped to nothing.

Update-ish. The 75 is about a week out from the body shop. Kind of a long story there. It was ready to get pulled and taken over, when my dad decided it just wouldn't work, so it has to get slapped back together before it can go to the body shop and we're going to just turn around and sell it after a fairly cheap paint job.

However, this weekend I'm picking up a cherry picker, engine stand and engine for the blazer. Getting all 3 for $250. The engine is a 305 out of a full size that only had 60K when pulled, and ran like a top. I'm going to go through it and do new bearings and a hone, but that should be all it needs on the bottom end. Top end is still up the air, it's going to depend on what I can get for a steal. I'd really like some L98 heads and a dual quad intake so I can run dual duals inline. The blazer is officially going to become a V8 DD. The full tilt project is going to have to go on the back burner again as I'm going to be moving to go back to school next summer and can't have a huge pile of parts sitting around that I'll have to drag with me.

So I'll have to get a second blazer for the full tilt project. I've always wanted a pair of identical cars, one DD and one full race, but that can't really be told apart. But it's all speculation till I manage to get back out in front of this thing.

Got everything home safe and sound. Was a hot day though, just got around to getting out to ID everything the only good news is that it is at least a roller block like the guy said. Everything else was BS. Turns out I have a completely stock L03 which was an 87-91 TBI 305 from a third gen. Swirl port heads and all. But a roller block for $100 isn't too bad, and I can sell the heads and what-not to make back some of it. A bit of elbow grease and I should be able to get most of my money back just on the heads.

Now the hunt for L98/ZZ4 heads starts. I've already got a crank and rods lined up to stroke it, and I can use the stock pistons which are actually nice flat tops with valve reliefs. For the time being it'll just be tear it down and clean everything up though. Sell what I can for whatever I can get.

The cherry picker ended up being a REALLY nice 2 ton unit and the engine stand is a 1000LB Rally stand, so I made out like a bandit on them for $140 for the pair.

Updated project name to reflect current goals.

Spent the holiday yesterday cleaning up the block. Spent about 6 hours total doing the last bit of dis-assembly on the block and cleaning off gasket material and some coolant build-up. After really getting into the water passages I'm finding a whole lot of crud built up, debating spending the money to hot talk it VS just spending the elbow grease to get it all cleaned up. Will need to get the crank polished unfortunately. Also debating porting the swirl port heads and popping them on, should be good for a DD, just a bit heavy and boring.

New Picture time!

Yesterday and today I actually got to work on the blazer itself, got the dash torn out, the body wiring harness torn out and got the body harness completely re-wired with all the old TBI harness stuff out as well as the courtesy lights and the radio wiring, the new TBI harness that got put in with the 4.3L is pretty much stand-alone, so I didn't have to screw with it much, yet.

Was back out this morning and got the engine bay/2.8 TBI harness out, but the guys who installed the 4.3 ran the wires from the ECM to the transmission across the top of the bellhousing and they are pinched in there pretty good, so I'm going to take another swing at it tomorrow morning, but that harness may just be trapped till I can get the engine and tranny out later this week. The truck is getting closer and closer to being completely gutted and I'm getting excited. The engine build is costing a small fortune though because every time I turn around I'm getting nickeled and dimed to death. Total investment should be right around $800 including fluids by the time I can fire it up, hopefully I can get a few bucks out of the parts I'm not using to offset this slightly. Pics tomorrow after I come back in from playing, I mean working on her.

The last few days have just been me throwing every penny I can squeeze at every good deal I can find for this thing. I picked up my 113 casting L98 heads and LT-1 cam yesterday. I have orders in across the web for Fel-pro head gaskets with only a hair over 3cc compressed volume, a full re-ring kit with main and rod bearings and a complete gasket set, a stock-style timing set and some wiring harness tape with no adhesive. I get paid again tomorrow and will have a couple bucks left after bills to get head, main and oil pump stud kits, an aluminum timing cover and hardware, new oil pan hardware and comp's locking cam hardware and if I get really lucky, I might have enough left over to pick up an aluminum single plane intake on the CHEAP.

As for actual progress on the truck I finally got the stand-alone engine harness out of the truck and what a cluster fuck it was. They ran it through the firewall just to the right of the stock location, looking at it from inside the truck, and a bit lower, which runs right between the inner fender and the exhaust manifold. So, to protect the harness from heat, a little, they wrapped it in about 10 layers of aluminum tape and bent some just retarded heat shield over it. It's no mountain dew cans, but it's the closest I've seen in person.

And I know I promised you guys some pictures, so I'm gonna go take a few for you all right now. Be back in just a little while.

Here you go, my rats nest of a TBI harness, what's left of the engine side of my body harness, my cab side body harness all done for now, and the piles of engine parts I have sitting in the garage, not including the 187 heads in the bed of my truck or the cam that's tucked away safely in a corner.

Blazer is in the garage, when I get home this afternoon I'm going to start stripping down the front clip to get the engine pulled. FINALLY!

Spent about three hours in the garage alone, just me and the blazer tonight. I definitely did not leave unscathed, but I do believe I made some progress.

Kinda feels like I'm talking to myself in here, but I'll keep updating. Ordered a lot of parts last week with my annual bonus. List of parts is as follows:

Speedway UCAs.
Steel LCA bushings
5.5x12" 600lb/in springs
Complete Poly Body Bushing kit
Poly Spring isolators to adjust ride height
ProForged Tall LBJs
AFCO tall UBJs
Ceramic Pads for the C5 fronts
Ceramic Pads for the 1LE rears
Drilled and slotted 13" C4 rotors for the front

It doesn't sound like much listed out like that, but damn was that a pretty penny, or so.