[Cautrell05]

This past week I worked on getting the transmission crossmember built. I could have just went with the regular style but I had a few different ideas I wanted to add. First off I needed a mounting place for the brake booster. I wanted plenty of room for exhaust and a way to run a 4L80 later without too much reworking. There is also what I consider a lot of chassis flex. With the cab sitting on the mounts but not bolted down a flat temp spare on the back will leave one of the mounts loose enough I can spin it by hand. Pushing down on the rear of the frame with my knee will visibly tighten it up.
One of the few benefits of extended breaks between work sessions is plenty of time to plan. What I had pictured was a six-point x-brace with the middle bars mounted on top of the frame supporting the transmission as well as my brake booster. The Next Step there was to take some time get some measurements and draw everything out. That way I knew exactly where things would fit rather than just start bending pipes and then finding out it won't clear. The left lower bar curves out and around the brake booster. A regular size booster won't fit under there so my options were either a hydroboost or a small diameter double diaphragm booster. I opted for the hydroboost cuz then I don't have to worry about cam issues and low engine vacuum.
I used 1 1/2" diameter 1/8" inch wall steel tubing. Should be heavy enough for what I need without adding too much weight. Getting it home was interesting. I have a flatbed trailer but getting it out what involved moving 40 feet of electric fence just to drive 6 miles and put one 20 foot piece of pipe on a trailer. It might have been redneck but I used my daughters S10 instead. It only hung out the back a little bit. Definite benefit of living in the country. Not much traffic on the way home.
Now that I had a plan and the materials I needed a bender. Sure not going to buy one for no more often then I would use it. Friend of mine owns an exhaust shop and let me use the one that he had. It is not a mandrel Bender but for what I'm doing it'll work just fine. Took just a little over an hour to cut and bend the pipes. The full-size drawings that I did definitely helped speed the process. It worked out really well to be able to bend the pipes and lay them on top of the picture and know that they'll fit without having to crawl under the vehicle 16 times with a long piece of pipe.