Ryans Budget 58 Build

[Crash0637]

Hey guys,

Bought my project back in June of this last year. Since then I have been lurking on this site daily. I thought it is about time for me to document my build. Hopefully my build will help inspire others in their projects.

The intention is to build a budget minded truck while still building it without cutting many corners, or hopefully any! I have been gathering as many parts as I can within my busy two job schedule.

The build list is as follows 5.3 4l60e swap, jag ifs, S10 4x4 axle swap, for the basics. A few body mods, a good bit of rust repair, and paint


The day I got it

[Crash0637]

Got it home and couldn't do much with it for the first few months due to my two car garage being shared with the truck and my boat. The g/f wasn't to happy either! Managed to sell the boat without to much hassle, and freed up lots of space for the build. My garage at its current state is cramped with truck parts everywhere. But I think I am at the worst stage having it stripped down to the frame.

During the tear down I discovered much more rust than I originally thought was there due to someones very heavy bondo work. Glad I got the truck for a steal



These are more of the tear down photos and rot






Notice the fiberglass work in the photo below, it fooled me at first

[Crash0637]

I spent a few sessions in the garage with a wire wheel on a grinder taking off many layers of paint to make all of my rust discovery's. I think it has had somewhere in the ballpark of 5 paint jobs over the years. With all the paint and bondo work sitting in Florida's damp climate outside has not done the truck much help. The last owner had it sitting in a field for over 15 years before I got it. He claimed he never even drove it.

While I am under no illusion when I purchased it that it needed a ton of work I didn't expect there to be as much rust as I found. I guess all of the layers of paint had me fooled. In the beginning I thought new floor, steps, cab corners and a few other patches I would be in good shape. The cab was just toasted. upper and lower cowls were trashed, the a pillars needed a ton of work, upper door jambs looked great until I ground out a gallon of filler from each one exposing giant holes! The whole cowl on the drivers side would shift when the door was being opened.



The carnage:

[Crash0637]

I eventually decided that I needed to find a replacement cab and at least a set of doors. While on the hunt for those parts, I started researching the other parts on the build. I want to do an LS swap, IFS. I couldn't afford to go new and stay on a budget so off to the junkyards I went.

While looking at a ton of other builds and searching I decided on the Jag IFS out of a XJS It was priced right and seems like it will be a great match. I would like to give kudos and THANKS to NoClassic and OneOffStroker for their builds and answers to some of my questions regarding this swap.





Next on the list is the power plant. I went with a 5.3 and 4l60E out of a 02 Silverado with only 88k on the clock. It came complete with harness and accessories.

[Kim57]

Welcome.
This should be a nice build.
Good luck on the cab search.
Kim

[Crash0637]

Thanks Kin57, I actually have sourced a cab and set of doors already. I am planning on posting more of the pics and story late this evening.

[RockinKees]

Sounds like a cool project!
Succes and be sure that you keep posting the pics!!

[Crash0637]

Haven't posted in a while. On to the photos and progress

New cab








Notice all the rust on the ground!!



Old cab wasn't of much use, I cut out all the good pieces and scraped it.

[Crash0637]

Manage to get it down to bare frame without to much fuss and sent it out to the blaster.



Raw steel here





Primer

[slammed57]

comin along nicely ryan....those engine lifts were the best inventions...what would we do with out'em

[Crash0637]

Installing the jag IFS, I boxed the front frame rails trimmed up the front crossmember to make room for the jag stuff. Also I spent some time cleaning up the jag crossmember. I took off all the un-need things like the motor mounts, and mounting points.

[Crash0637]

Originally Posted by slammed57

comin along nicely ryan....those engine lifts were the best inventions...what would we do with out'em

Wait till you see my cab hoist I built!

[Crash0637]

I have had a lot of fun building this truck, but one thing I lack is having dependable friends that are willing to come over and move heavy cabs around. So I decided I would try and fab up something that would make it easier for me to do it by myself.

What I came up with is a mounting system that bolts to the cab floor at the seat bolt locations. Made out of 1x1 square stock. I then set up up with some threaded rod to be able to move my cherry picker back and forth to find the balance point. I know it is a bit rudimentary but it works!

[OneOffStroker]

Nice job on the IFS install. I'm glad I could inspire someone!

I like that cab host as well, it works pretty slick. If I didn't keep the doors on mine, I would probably do the same. I just run a 4x4 through the Windows and strap my host to that...seems to work ok.

That KX in the back of your garage looks sad. You should get out and ride that beast. I have a 2003 KX250 and a 2001 KX85 that get out all the time.

[RockinKees]

Nice progress!!
Keep it up!

[Crash0637]

The bike is a 2001 kx250 I bought it as a basket case in a bunch of pieces. Got it for a steal of a price. I did a full engine rebuild with new top and bottom end. New plastics and powder coat. While in the process of that build I managed to mess up my lower back real bad and am afraid to ride it! I just sold it a couple of months ago. The proceeds are going into this project though.

[Crash0637]

I got the engine installed recently. Took a little thought to come up with motor mounts. Also I had to remove the crossmember I believe that was the factory trans crossmember. I am still amazed how NoClassic managed to put in his 5.3 swap with this crossmember in place. I bought the laptop out to the garage and was staring at his build scratching my head wondering why my motor and trans just wouldn't cooperate like his did.








This picture is hard to see, but this is the factory crossmember I removed to make the swap work. I went to war with this thing! Not sure on how many rivets were holding it in place, but I also ended up removing the old front leaf spring attachment points too. Does anybody know the magic way to remove the old rivets?

The only thing I didn't try was adding heat, as I don't have a torch set.....yet








I would love some feedback on these mounts from some of the fabrication pros out there. Good or bad. This is what I came up with, I used the factory 5.3 truck mounts and fabbed up 4 different pieces of plate steel on each side, they are welded directly to the boxed frame rails.

[Kim57]

Nice progress.
Everything is looking good.
Cool cab lift.
Kim

[OneOffStroker]

Mounts should be plenty strong, but beware that it is already difficult trying to get the Jag steering rack to mount up around almost any type of exhaust, so hopefully that mount doesn't compound that problem any.

[Crash0637]

Ok, so I haven't updated on the truck in quite sometime. We all know that life sometimes gets in the way of our builds. A few things changed. I had the opportunity to change careers, and in the process lost a good bit of wrenching time.

So I have done some things to the truck, got the front sheet metal back on, bought a terrific set of used doors out of California, put the bed back on, started working on mounting the fuel tank and rear sway bar.

I need to get some photos of the work thus far, but I tend to get carried away in the garage and forget to document my progress.

I promise to update more and follow up with some photos in the next few days!

[dug224]

Love the cab lift bracket! Looking forward to updates...dug

[Crash0637]

Oh how the time has past. I just realized it has been almost two years since the last post. A lot has changed for me. I moved across country from FL to TX following the wife and her pursuit of her awesome career. The truck has always been a passion of mine and I have made some progress over the last stretch too.

I got the 5.3 running and actually drove it around the block the other night. Most mechanical's are in place and I am starting on the rust repair.

[Crash0637]

Starting with the passenger step area, this is how far I got tonight. Pretty much has able to remove the old step and see how bad the rest of the repair is going to be.

[Crash0637]

Here's a few shots of the trip from FL to TX that I thought were pretty cool. I'm not sure why they are sideways though

[gabe2000]

Welcome to Texas!!!