Before/After Off Road Trucks

[vtblazer]

Okay, Yukon's post got me wanting to see how your trucks have "morphed" into what they are today but with a twist towards off road/wheeling.

I traded a BB swb 2wd truck and a 4x4 blazer for my current off road ride.
It looked the part when I got it but there in-lies a different story.

Anyway, started with 38's and ended up with 42's currently.
Some body/engine/tranny/drive line/axle mods along the way too.

Post up and show your hard work.

[Burt4x4]

Nice!
I got mine in 93 - 72K5/350/SM465/NP205/D44/GM12 & 33" Mud Rovers

This is how it looked when It was a daily driver.

Then I tossed the gerry can/swing out tire carrier and went to 35" SSRs

Everytime I brokedown I would upgrade with the strongest parts I could buy.


Rubicon = 1 Burt = 0
I lost the battle on this trip, blew my rear driveline off at the diff & blew a front axel u-joint. Again upgraded all parts that broke.

Drove to Moab 2002 and fell in love with that place.



In 2004/2005 I became a Trailer Queen = no more need to build for Hwy use.


On craigslist I found two BBCs, 350 bucks for both! Sold the smaller 402 for 175 so the 454 I only paid 175 "running when pulled". Score!
Rebuilt the 454 = board 30over, decked the block, shaved the heads & intake for true alignment, balanced the engine from dampner to pressureplate, slapped on Edlebrock MPFI Performer.


Next

Dana 60 Highsteer/crossover & 14bolt disk = 1Ton swap

Running Irok 37" now and locked front & rear with H1dbl beadlock custom wheels, oh and 4.56s now too.
thats all for now...

[Zoomad75]

Good Thread! Here's a few of mine....

First is the K5 sitting in DirtyLarry's backyard with the swiss cheese 350. Next is with the install of some used 33's for a little more height without the lift. After that is with the newly installed 4" lift/shackle flip and finally is running Tomichi Pass with the added 35" Mud Rovers.

More mods to come as time and $$$ allow!

[68K20 x Drill]

A hard disc explosion may have eaten all my before pics, but I have some more looking to do.

[vtblazer]

Whoa, only three other guys who wheel their trucks?

[Slick71]

Not Quite...I wheel mine too, but mostly in mud and a few trails locally. I bought this thing 10 years ago..then sold it to a buddy. He had it for a few years and then it got stolen! The idiots disassembled it and when it was recovered 4 months later...I bought it back! Lots of time and work getting it back on the trail!

[vtblazer]

Great story.

[Zoomad75]

DirtyLarry's got some good pics showing the progression of his rig. I'm sure he'll chime in tonight when he gets to his hotel. If he don't I'll poke fun at him until he does!

[DirtyLarry]

Well, geez….I actually don’t have any pictures of what my K10 looked like when I first got it in January 1997 with little ½ axles and bald 33” tires. It was missing a rear bumper too. I was just another poor collage kid with no money for a camera to take pictures.

Here are a few milestones though….

Picture 1: Truck loaded up on trailer to move from Southern Colorado to Detroit after college graduation for my first real job with CMD. I actually had to remove the 33” front tires so it would fit on the trailer to make the 1800 mile ride to Motown…

Picture 2: Truck unloaded and posing in front of GM World Headquarters. The picture was actually taken in the parking lot of a casino in Windsor, ON, Canada. Zoomad and I worked on the 14th floor of tower 400 for a couple years doing neat GM stuff. Well, sorta....

Picture 3: The morning after the beast got a fresh layer of Pontiac Montana Quasar blue metallic. Grand Rapids, MI 1998

Picture 4: Rochester, MI driveway shot after picking up the truck from the Rhino lining shop sometime in early 1999. Those clowns at the Ziebart dealer at 12 Mile & Woodward in Royal Oak, MI did the worst job in the world rhinoing the rockers, bed and bumper. I could do a better job with a hot mop full of roofing tar with a 12 pack in my belly than those idiots did. I still cuss those idiots everytime I think about them.....ummm, like now! I think this was also right after we swapped in the SM465 to replace the TH350. I remember the guy at the Ziebart dealer coudn't drive a stick very well. Stoopid city boys.

Picture 5: Truck back home in Colorado after years of upgrades. This picture was taken on the Detroit locker/Detroit true track validation run through a deep ravine about a 2 miles from home. Much nicer playground than living in Detroit.

[vtblazer]

Ah, the memories...
Trans cover was the first to receive some attention.

The pics show the process from what it was to what it is.


Really liking the tales, keep em coming!

[vtblazer]

Originally Posted by 68K20 x Drill

Cupholders!

...Scrap metal!

Find your pics yet?

[68K20 x Drill]

Cupholders!

[Prerunner1982]

I want to play too....

Ok my "transformation" isnt as drastic as some...

Before


After



And then the frame broke...

[-Greg72]

Hmmmm........


Let the metamorphosis begin (continue....)

February 2001: First Day as a 1st Gen Owner




4" Lift, 35's, 1/2-Ton axles, rear drum brakes, cheezy aftermarket seats, 396BBC.....


After a while (and a dollar or two)...



7" Lift, 38's, 1-Ton axles with 4-wheel discs, long travel shocks, Detroit Locker, Crossover Steering and High Steer, Ram Assist, Rebuilt 396BBC....Stock seats re-installed.


Present Day: (Oooops, I'm regressing!)



Back to about a 4" Lift (Removed 2" BL), 1-Tons, Crossover Steering, 38's....replacing 396BBC with a 502BBC/TH400/Atlas-4 combo. 4-Link rear suspension replaces leafsprings.....adding a full tube chassis, and yes, FIXING RUST!!





It's a labor of love..... and a relationship that's approaching it's 7-year anniversary.

[johnnywagon]

Still try'n to track down some "before" pix from the P.O. What I can tell ya is it was once Hugger orange & 1/2 ton....obviously.

The P.O. is a paint & body guy and a good friend. He is, shall we say, a little "eccentic". I remember back in the day he was pretty proud of his fishing skills and had large vinyl lettering made for the back side glass that said: "MASTER BAITER" with a little fish logo. No kidding, he has quite the sense of humor. Last time out wheeling in the cold I could still make out the faint outline of the lettering on the cold frosty glass.

[Zoomad75]

Thats funny John!

The last owner of my K5 was pretty rough on it. All that is left of the original 350 is a chunk of connecting rod cap (which I put on the key ring to remind me how not to drive it).

There's a funny story behind me getting the truck in the first place. Back up a few years and I had been working back with DirtyLarry for a little while. I'm about a month out from moving from Detroit back to Colorado and Larry calls me to ask me about what he thinks his old 350 is worth out of his 78 (not to soon after his 454 swap). I shoot my thought on price and start asking questions. What's this for? He then tells me about this 75 K5 that a mutual buddy had bought for Larry to get as another toy, but Larry got shot down from the wife so he sold it to a kid for $500. I'm respond with thanks for keeping me in mind, now he sold it! Larry goes on to tell me that the kid had the K5 for all of a few days and grenaded the engine so that's why he's asking about his 350. I asked if our buddy is still owed any on the truck itself and it turns out the kid still did owe a couple of hundred on it. Now we really start thinking. Sight unseen I make the call to go for it. I didn't tell my wife either, which is abnormally bold for me. Couple hours and a few phone calls later the horse trading is complete and Larry's got his marching orders to go get the K5 and park it in his backyard until I get out there a month later.

My wife wasn't enthused when I told her, but since the company wasn't going to pay to move 4 cars back to CO I had to sell two of them. Money from one car covered the K5 to which I forked right over to Larry upon arrival to Pueblo.

Life before then showed it had at least one decent owner with access to car-quest parts as it had fresh pads, tune-up and MSD Super HEI module. So he was good at maintenance, but he sucked at welding. He installed some NASTY Toyota seats that were booger-welded to the stock seat brackets. Sometime in it's life it got treated to a paint job from Two tone medium green/white to all white with about 50 pounds of bondo added to the quarters.

All in all it's a great truck. It may be cosmetically hideous, but it's stone simple and dead nuts reliable. It's going to get an injected engine sooner or later be it TBI 350, 6.0 or 8.1, it's just going to take some cash. Maybe once it can run out of it's own shadow I'll fix the quarters!!

[vtblazer]

Bump-n-it cause there's gotta be more...

[bad_turbo]

first pics are of my burb a year or so ago when I got it. Last pics are of it now. Seems to of gotten more offroad time before I started modifying.

[FormerMember]

...

[vtblazer]

Originally Posted by grendel

Heh, I'd post, but it's not a Chevy... well, it's not a Chevy frame or body. The rest is...

Definitely post up, it's a big world and trucks are trucks.

[rgv72blazer]

Here goes a whole mess of crap

I got my '72 Blazer in Feb '02. Ugly paint/seats...32s, 350/th350/205/D44/12 bolt.





Not long after, decided to semi restore it...slap some 35s on it as well



And not long after that, decided to start wheelin' it...





But after a night of too much drinking, I got too brave jumping some hills and crushed the rockers, blew the rear blocks, blew the front axle, and tranny was slipping...so decided to build something a bit more capable...



So, the build has evolved into what I'm hoping will be a pretty capable trail rig. The specs will be a SBC 350 running on propane, 700R4 with a full reverse manual valve body, 203 to Lomax via a NWF doubler complete with cable shifters, 1410 yokes throughout, 52s in front and 64s in the rear, D60 front with 5.86s, detroit, yukon shafts, D70 rear with 5.86s & detroit, 44s on widened H1s, narrowed and chopped firewall, full 'cage with boxed frame, tubed out rear section, and the list goes on & on...







& how it sits right now




It's been a long trip, but I feel like I'm already on the home stretch...

[shortbed70]

Now thats what I'm talkin about nice trucks. I'm a member of 2wd club so I just look.

[FormerMember]

...

[va_tlc]

wow nice pics guys,looks like fun

[vtblazer]

Latest version:

Pulled the hard top off for the last time, it will never be installed again.

Next mod will be a rear taper.
Have a set of swb bedsides to install, a different fuel cell and cut down the cage to fit.

The fuel cell sitting in the bed in the pic is the one that's going in after the taper job, currently it has a 'between the frame rails' cell w/skid plate.