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Yes 6' beds had trailing arms, all 2WD half tons had trailing arms unless specifically ordered otherwise. When I was contemplating the 4WD coil thing I was looking at how hard it would be to adapt a Ford twin beam front diff. The problem really was that without an electronic differential transfer case you don't really get a more usable 4WD system. It's still a binding, bucking bronco on dry pavement with anything but open diffs and with seriously compromised handling.

I did the big 4WD on 37"s in my Suburban, it's awesome and you feel indestructable, but I'd rather have something now that makes me hang on around the turns... and not because you feel it's going over, I had a 215CI aluminum Buick V8 in a 1976 Buick Skyhawk back when I lived in Philly and loved that car on the river drives and down in Chester county. Eventually the Belgium block of Germantown ave ate that car :whine:, tore the whole front suspension apart.

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Im thinking full locker, cable actuated, on the rear....dont know yet for the front.

I ran into those little v8 s, when i was restoring english sports cars, great motors. But, i don t think there was ever much in the way of speed parts, like the small blocks. Did that buick have the trans in the rear? Thought i remembered something weird like that...

Actually, i agree with you on going fast around turns, thats my next project. Right now my black suzy fills that need, with the high foot pegs i can really lean into turns

I hate to say this, but, i may be looking into that goofy PB stuff for the crossmember and arms. Nate may not know what i m talking about with 4WD...lol

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My chassis is a former 4WD and is currently in Porterbuilts shop, so he has the measurements. I would think if you went that route you could shorten the trailing arms a couple inches and make it all fit.

The secret to performance parts for the Buick engine was to follow it's history, mine was full of aftermarket Triumph TR8 parts, which is where that engine ended up in the UK. Was used in Range Rovers, Rovers, Triumphs, and others.

The 215 came in Skylarks, the rear transaxle was in the Pontiac version the Tempest. This is back when GMs were "based" on the same chassis but could be mechanically very different. Like the 66-70 Riviera and Toronado, same platform and about as different of drivetrains as you could get, one torsion bar FWD the other coil sprung RWD. I used to have a '66 Toronado too, err actually two, beautifully styled car and a tedious beast to drive around town, was only really happy doing 100mph. I had a Offenhouser dual quadrajet manifold in that car, talk about torque steer, holding the wheel while stomping that car off the line was like trying to hand hold a drill press head to drill a hole.

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Oops, i did nt mean to offend you! When i use the term "goofy", i mean differant, as in the disney character Goofy.
You re build intriques me, as far as what is possible, and all the different directions one could take

That s what i was thinking on the trailing arms, there is a short straight at the rear of them, and was hoping to cut some off. I don t know if the OEM crossmember bolts directly to the frame or not, seems like it would be difficult to get up in there w/o spreading the frame rails rails. So, i was hoping PB s was a three piece, brackets being separate.....

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who? what? me? why would you think that would offend me? I pretty regularly refer to my project as goofy, crazy, etc... well, because it is.

The Porterbuilt trailing arms are straight, at least the ones not used for frame dragger drops are. Here is mine:

Attachment 1299123

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Nice, does that crossmember bolt in? Or welded?

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It's a bolt in.

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I promise, no OEM part was damaged in this post...this center cap is a reproduction POS.

https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5585/...fbd14bfa_c.jpg
20140917_111932 by [url=https://www.flickr.com/people/97391199@N06/]

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20140917_114107 by [url=https://www.flickr.com/people/97391199@N06/]

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This why you can only have 4" BS on 4WD with disc brakes, caliper is just as close. Another 1/2" and it would hit

https://farm6.staticflickr.com/5564/...3b2e9a6d_c.jpg
20140915_114006

Yeah, i know my suspension looks like sh!t.....that s for another day

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The caps look really good, and I get the brake clearance thing, my brakes clear my wheels by an 1/8th of an inch.
Attachment 1302726

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Can you take a pic of the othe side, i know you have that pin drive adapter going on and would like to see the finished product. Are you going to address the brake heat, maybe cooling ducts...

Yeah, the caps were my second choice, couldn t bring myself to cut holes in the poverty caps, plus they covered up too much of my wheel

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Well, I haven't even posted these in my own build thread, because I'm kinda waiting to see how this all plays out, but I'll give you a peek. The chassis is in AZ at Porterbuilt, a lot of the parts didn't fit very well, and they are working it out.
Attachment 1303320
Attachment 1303318
Attachment 1303319
I don't really feel the need to do brake ducts, it's being built to drive it hard, and I may do weekend autocross with it, but I don't see me doing track days with it. Too much into all this to risk some yahoo crashing into the side of it. Anyway this is where you really need brake ducts where you are doing hard braking turn after turn with no high speed air circulation, I think the heat sink of 18x10 wheels will be enough for what I'll be doing with it.

Also the vast majority of brake ducts do very little to really help cool the brakes, air has to have really good airflow in and really good airflow out, and not get caught up in the well and cause drag. Except for the pin adapter itself everything that contacts or is in close proximity to the brakes is aluminum which is a good heat wick. Maybe if I feel inspired I'll smear all the mating surfaces with Archtic Silver heat sink compound, probably take 20 or 30 tubes or so, hmmm, wonder if I can buy it in bulk?

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OK, so went back through your thread and I'm sure it's there somewhere, but your wood bed, it's built on top of pickup wood bed cross rails? It's one of those things that I consider from time to time, plan A is to line the bed (and make side panels) out of recycled HDPE sheet, you know the plastic lumber they make park benches out of, anyway you can get it in colored sheets, I'd do black, it's UV resistant and pretty indestructable. Plan B is to do a wood bed, probably Ipe, it's also tough stuff, but heavy, but I'd probably do it thin and over the steel bed if I did it. In either case I plan on using flanged aircraft track instead of the "official" strips, and use that for mounting bike chocks, back seat, etc... If I was to do the wood I may carry it over into the cab, glove door, door panels etc, give it a little English sports car flavor.

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Thanks for the EXCLUSIVE, ok folks you saw it here first. I thought i would like them, and i do. Still working out how to do it to 4WD.
Just thought that being in close proximinty to the wheel, the heat may cause damage to the tire bead, but im sure you covered all your bases

As far as the bed goes, i removed all the sheetmetal.PITA! Two crossmembers were rusty, so i had to replace them. One was the rear, and bought a 73 and later piece. It just happened to have a 3/4" notch in it that fit my wood perfectly,even had the holes in the proper location for the SS ribs, then just layed it on the front step up, and it was all level.

Had to enlongate the mounting holes and use fender washers on the wheel houses as they were now 3/4" higher, and moved the two seams up to match up again, but that was easy, as i just flattened them and rebent were needed.

When this oak fails, as im sure it will, i ll be putting a plastic in, as you suggest, or ipe

If you do it, i ll be here to answer your questions

Not sure if you can pull off door panels and glove box door in wood, seen it done and did nt look right, unless you do it like RR, and use a veneer, serious craftmenship at that company

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Actually the rotor isn't all that close to the wheel, it's the caliper that is close and heat is shed through the rotor not the caliper. It is all tight in there and I do plan on running Castrol SRF in the brakes which has the highest boiling point of any brake fluid available (it's also by far the most expensive brake fluid there is at $75/liter). I went for what I felt was the best comprimise in brakes, large surface area, mid priced rotors, cheap pads, and all commonly available. I did some sacrificing of performance in exchange for reasonable maintainability and specifically went with the transmission I did and configured it the way I did in order to suppliment the brakes with engine braking.

So are wood bed wheel houses and steel bed wheel houses the same? ...or is one shorter than the other? ... or do the wood bed pickups have a lower structure so the bed is at the same finished height? Anyway, like I said I don't think I'll do an exposed bottom bed anyway, whether it's plastic or wood, either way I think I want to keep the thickness to about a 1/2" as neither material is all that light. The HDPE sheets I don't think would work well unsupported anyway, certainly not at 1/2" thick, I think it'd get wavy from the heat of So Cal. Ipe is very dense and heavy and again I'd want to keep it to about 1/2" to keep the weight down.

As far as cab trim, yes I'd use veneer for that. Apparently with Ipe you have to scorch the surface before you laminate it or it'll seperate because of all the resins in the wood. It's largely replacing Teak now for boat decks and trim, and apparently is harder, more durable and easier to maintain, oh and will take a fine finish ass opposed to teak which is somewhat limited to oil finishes. I know in my (admitedly limited) exposure to marine finishes that teak really needs and thrives with OLD boiled linseed oil, but it's also not something you want to be in an enclosed space with. I wipe down my outdoor furniture with the stuff and you can't keep the rag anywhere inside the house it'll make your nose burn and eyes tear, even if it's several rooms away.

This is the aircraft seat track I plan to use instead of the bed strips, irregardless of whether I go wood or plastic:

http://cdn3.volusion.com/yuhfn.tlkhe...-100-PD4-2.gif

There is also end caps to finish the ends, and I think when I worked it out if I mounted it on the low part of the bed corrogations and used 1/2 inch thickness "decking" I could route the material to recess the track flush with the surface. The plan is to use this stuff for anything removable, so top, bulkhead, motorcycle wheel chocks, back seats, tie downs, maybe even removable bed body cross braces.

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I like the idea of the hold down, as i too want to carry my motorcycle, shifter cart, and jet ski(not yet bought) any link to that subject....

Can t say for sure on the wheel houses, as i ve never seen any separate listing specifying one or the other, although i do know the header for a wood floor is differant. Your method seems much simpler by putting it on top of the sheet metal

I agree on the smell, we just did our teak rockers on the front porch, i wouldn t mind using it on the bed of the truck, i have a 1/2 top also, but i wouldn t want to use it in the cab...

One of these days i ll build an index, to make it easier to find subject matter. Never thought build thread would get to 100 pages....

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My present problem, thought i d mount up my NOS spicer yellow knobs, wrong, seems the warn locking hub have differant guts, so ill scource the classifeds and see what i come up with.....

https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3859/...e18ee383_c.jpg
20140920_090341 by [url=https://www.flickr.com/people/97391199@N06/]

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Airline track, or L track, or logistics track or airline seat track is very standardised and available by lots of manufactures in quite a few profiles that can be mounted on the surface or flush. There is also lots of different locking gadgets that work with this track including single, double, triple and even quad point locking mechanisms with eyelet and swivel ring to attach tiedowns, or studs and threaded hole devices to use in custom applications.

Here are just some of the profiles available:
https://www.allsafe-group.com/upload...n_460px_01.jpg
Here is the link to that company:
https://www.allsafe-group.com/en/load-restraint/tracks/
...and a link to a more consumer oriented supplier:
http://www.uscargocontrol.com/Ratche...traps-Hardware
And here is a link to just give an example of the different fitting available:
https://www.allsafe-group.com/en/loa...ular-fittings/

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Thanks Scorpio for taking the time outta your busy life, some good reading there

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Perfect....all i have to do is rip about a 1/8" off my boards, and route about .010" off the top and should recess nicely. Recessed 'L' track should do it

Scorpio, you a plethora of interesting ideas.......ty

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Hey, gotta try and help out the other half cabber project. :metal:

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After months of changes, i finally decided on and mounted my OEM LS1 coil bracket to the valve cover with a 2" x 3/8" piece of alum. flat stock. Stock is mounted to the v/c by way of the 1/4 20 bosses on the v/c, and then bracket is mounted to the stock. 2 steps forward, 1 step back, as this now negated my PCV system, so, ill use a can w/ breather, and 2 hoses off of the v/c. Like wasted income suggested

Just waiting on my magna core spark plugs wires, supposed to be the least noise

https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2950/...e79aa012_c.jpg
20140926_104427 by [url=https://www.flickr.com/people/97391199@N06/]

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Decided to try my hand at machine turning, removed my layout marks, and left a presentable finish...

Wasn t to hard just will be time consuming, basically set my drill dress up at a 20 degree angle, set up a bench rest, stop. Using my digital read out, came down to the same measurement, then moved it along the rest by a 1/2" , and repeat by moving rest over to next row

Make sure drill press rotation is turning towards stop!!!

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20140928_091918 by [url=https://www.flickr.com/people/97391199@N06/]

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20140928_091331 by [url=https://www.flickr.com/people/97391199@N06/]

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With the coils mounted on the v/c s, i can finally get back into the wiring

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20140929_105209 by [url=https://www.flickr.com/people/97391199@N06

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Beginings of my canvas doors.....

I could use lower hinge with door poppers, or...put a piano hinge on the bottom of the door and rocker panel, then i could swing it down and use it for a step up

Plan is to add another door hinge for more support on the upper canvas door frame, and use a removable pick up shaped window frame. Window will zip out along the upper portion, but stay attached to the door canvas

Having this lower portion of the door stay will keep the law happy, as nothing can roll out of the interior directly on the highway. Ill probably cut it closer to the body line

https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3929/...d3b08b50_c.jpg
20141001_115214 by [url=https://www.flickr.com/people/97391199@N06/]

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Interesting, you're planning half doors on this build? I never would have guessed that one, and I'm not sure I get it. Aren't you planning to use a half top? Don't you live in Southeast Pennsylvania? ...or just Pensylvania in general.

These things all seem at odds with half doors:

If you were building a roadster I might get it,
If you were not doing a body off I might get it,
If you were doing a big lift and 44s I might get it,
If you were under 30 I might get it,
If you were in the southwest I might get it,
If you didn't have to deal with Pensylvania vehicle inspections I might get it,

Now I'm all about goofy details, but I'm just not sure I think this one fits your build. I think it may limit where and when you'll want to use the truck too much.

That said, if you were to go down that path, I'd personally consider using it as an opportunity to add some ridgidity to the body and weld the door bottoms in, and probably stylise the opening instead of simply just a lower half of a door. Kind of like the old Scout open door option:

Attachment 1307821

Re: PO has me PO'd
 

[QUOTE=skorpioskorpio;6863601]Interesting, you're planning half doors on this build? I never would have guessed that one, and I'm not sure I get it. Aren't you planning to use a half top? Don't you live in Southeast Pennsylvania? ...or just Pensylvania in general.

These things all seem at odds with half doors:

If you were building a roadster I might get it,
If you were not doing a body off I might get it,
If you were doing a big lift and 44s I might get it,
If you were under 30 I might get it,
If you were in the southwest I might get it,
If you didn't have to deal with Pensylvania vehicle inspections I might get it,

Now I'm all about goofy details, but I'm just not sure I think this one fits your build. I think it may limit where and when you'll want to use the truck too much.

That said, if you were to go down that path, I'd personally consider using it as an opportunity to add some ridgidity to the body and weld the door bottoms in, and probably stylise the opening instead of simply just a lower half of a door. Kind of like the old Scout open door option:


Well, i have never liked the 'half doors' , just seemed like an after thought. What i want to build is three separate pieces, to meet all weather conditions in the spring, summer, and fall. Winter, i ll run my full doors and halftop

I still have to run the idea past my inspection station, but jeeps have very similiar canvas doors and they run around here all the time.....

I see what you re saying, except the ref. to my age. In the future if need be, i can still heave my walker into the bed:lol:

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Hmm, what about fabricating a pintle and gudgeon type hinge that you can just lift off the door and replace it with various types? It's what Jeeps use.

..and I didn't mean to criticize your age, but then again you are the one who brought up making the door bottom swing down as stairs ��

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Definately a possibility, l m open to all ideas to finish the task at hand....

No offense taken here, one of the things i can t change in life is my age. The reason for the swing down doors is because my wifey is 5', which means i would have to lift her up every time she wants to get in. She almost always wears dresses, so entry/exit has to be ladylike

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Well, ladylike entry into a 4x4 is probably not going to happen no matter what you do, especially if your wife is 5 foot nothing, but I respect your attempt.

I do think though that maybe the approach is a full door and a cutaway door with an opening shaped more like a Jeep or the Scout pic I attached, and just have them as lift off interchangable. I know it means you always have to store a set of doors, but when you run in door off, roof off mode you still retain the structure of the body somewhat and you don't have to figure out how to rig up seperate latching mechanisms for half doors vs full doors because you have full door jambs either way. You could leave enough door structure to mount mirrors with no door top of any sort you have no place to mount a mirror unless you mount it on the edge of the fender and then it becomes unusable when you have a full door with vent glass frame unless you go way forward so you are looking at the mirrors through the windshield.

The only thing it doesn't address is the step issue, but that is an easy problem to solve without getting the door involved, 4x4 steps are not a rare feature.

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I like your idea of just dropping the bottom section of the door in from the top. VT Blazer once had a thread about 30 second door removal, basically just allow the pins to be undersized and remove easily...

Nope, not doing any cutaway door sections, sorry. Hadn t thought about mirrors though, Pa. only requires an interior mirror. Speaking of which, OnStar sells an after maket kit for 100.00, only requires ignition lead and 12v. Next is Serius XM

My plan to get the wifey in the 4X4, have her face me, her back against the passenger seat. If she ll give a little jump, and i grab her around the waist and lift at the same time, she should end up in the seat. If not, could end up one of those Viagra moments you see on TV:lol:

Finally installed my boxes under the dash, wires work much better aiming up into the dash

https://farm3.staticflickr.com/2943/...ca7a04ce_c.jpg
20141002_130408 by [url=https://www.flickr.com/people/97391199@N06/]

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On the subject of Sirius-XM (and GPS), I've wondered where do you put the antenna on a vehicle with no permenent roof or rear deck?

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I was thinking in front of the w/s, going to create a flattened area on the vent cover

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Yea, I think maybe that is too obstructed because of the windshield. Anything satellite is supposed to be line of sight with no obstructions.

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OK, with that said, i ll build a plate and mount it to the w/s drip edge, amazing how hard it is to type with a few whiskys.....

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Ok, rotated my boxes to have the cables feed out the top, sorta hides the harness better. Now i can finally start running wires again.....
Also, got the magnacor spark plug wires custom length, so, that is another check off the list


https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3949/...de213e56_c.jpg

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Negative. I have my sirus antenna right exactly where the fm antenna goes and have zero issues.

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Thanks for confirming that Dale.....

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Dale, this is on the Jimmy in your signature? What kind if antenna did you use? Is it GPS and Sirius/XM, or just Sirius/XM?

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Yes, on the Jimmy. I dont think its a gps one, its quite an old unit.