My K5 Blazer Story.

[Zoomad75]

I’ve had this Blazer for just a little over 10 years now. It’s nothing special by comparison to other trucks here on this forum, but it’s mine. I've posted about this truck before but never put it all together in one thread. I’ll go back all the way to the beginning and bring it back up to the current form and future plans. Here it is on a run..



It starts back in 2003. I was a year into a major career change after leaving my position in the Fleet Dept within General Motors. You’ll see a reoccurring theme here with a particular cohort in crime of mine, my buddy Larry. You see, he and I went to college together and held similar career paths leaving our little town of Pueblo, CO for the motor city. I wasn’t into the 4wd side as much in college as I was more into going fast back then. Working with Larry professionally and personally as well as some other alumni had me wanting a 4wd to put in the stable with my Nova. Old Iron in Detroit is few and far between so I held out as time and money was tight for my growing family out there. Still, even without a truck I worked on the Nova and helped Larry out when he needed it. I helped Larry convert his beloved K10 from and auto trans to sm465 4-speed in his car-port outside one winter. We froze our tails off. Still, as most have seen by his quality of work, by the time he finished it looked factory.

Things were changing within GM and Larry jumped ship for a startup company building step van and class A motorhome chassis that was sold off from GM in ’98. He went to the service side with a handful of other GM folks at the time, including the guy that hired me in to Chevrolet out of College. This was pre-9/11 and GM was doing ok, but not stellar. My attempts to get out of Detroit back to the west as a GM employee failed as there weren’t many positions open.

Then 9/11 happened. I had a 19th floor window cube view over the Detroit river and there was still a plane unaccounted for. Fearing Detroit might be a potential target, all the downtown high-rise buildings were evacuated. Scary stuff. The coming weeks inside GM forshadowed new problems that my long term GM coworkers couldn’t imagine. My drive to get back home to be near family kicked into high gear. A call from Larry a few months later had a solution. He got a promotion and the boss told him to find a replacement. Happens to be that the “boss” was the guy that hired me into Chevrolet 6 years earlier. I got the job and set up to move the family back to Colorado the next year.

That job had me on the road traveling to visit dealers and in some cases had me traveling with Larry too. Needless to say among the countless hours of “windshield” time and many frosty beverages in different hotel rooms together I really was itching for a 4wd truck. We had many discussions about his K10 and what I would like to find once I move back. Fate is a funny thing as I got a call from Larry about a month before the move was going to happen. Another buddy of ours had a Blazer he just sold to a kid a week before and promptly blew the 350 up in spectacular fashion. Larry had just finished swapping a 454 into his K10 and had the old tired 350 he just pulled sitting in the corner of his Dad’s shop. He wondered what he could get for it to sell to the kid. The story got a little fuzzy as the kid still owed our buddy part of the $500 he bought it for. I thought, if the kid can’t pay for the rest of what he owed on the truck there’s no way Larry is going to get any money for the engine. The light clicked on in my head, why don’t I buy the truck? Larry was out of town attending a Nascar race in Dallas, but he liked the plan and kick started the phone calls to make it happen. I had to sell my winter beater before I left so the money I got from that funded the K5. So in a matter of minutes and a couple of phone calls I had bought my K5 sight unseen. That wasn’t the most ideal thing to do but the spec sheet was right for what I was looking for. It was a 1975 Full Convertible K5 Blazer. Factory 4-speed manual with a 205 t-case, Dana 44/12 bolt axles with 3.73’s. It even had a tilt column. It was dirty and had a fair share of rust in the quarters, rockers and fenders, but the floor and rocker boxes (unique to the 73-75’s) were solid. Larry went to pick it up and bring it home to his place until I got back and then sent the pics to me. He backed it off the trailer by bumping the starter in reverse and the engine commenced to spit lifters out onto the deck of the trailer through the gaping wound in the pan.

We moved back and priority #1 was finding a house to buy so the K5 had to wait a couple of months. Once settled in, we hatched a plan for a quick weekend swap to get the K5 running. Larry towed it over to his Dad’s shop and we proceeded to yank the swiss cheese 350 out in short order. This wasn’t going to be pretty, but we did power wash the engine bay to make less of a mess of ourselves. We swapped HEI and carb off of the old engine to the one that used to be in Larry’s K10. Bonus, the dizzy had a fresh cap and rotor along with a brand new MSD super HEI module. We both surmised the reason of the old engine’s failure was a combination of high rpm (granny gear/4low) while playing out on the hills outside of the local Dragstrip in town. The MSD module let that engine bounce the tach needle north of 5grand without any hesitation, as I’ve found out in the years of driving it. We got the truck running by Sunday afternoon and I drove it home.

I swapped out the teeny Grant Steering wheel that came on it for a leather wrapped stock chevy truck wheel from a 93 S10 that my Dad had at the time. It got driven in this form to work out the kinks and see what kind of reliability it had. That brings up another theme of this build, being hand-me-down’s from others projects or garages. This truck has always been under a tight budget. So I’ve done a lot of junkyard scrounging, time saving up and the goodwill of friends that have helped with parts and time too. I did some ebay surfing and found a better cluster bezel than what I had to clean up the dash. I also swapped in a factory voltmeter to replace the dead ammeter that was in there at that time too. Like many my dash had been hacked for a DIN sized radio and I didn’t like the hole that was left. My Dad gave me the GM sized Pioneer radio/cd unit that he took out of his 93 S10 but I didn’t want to mount it in the dash. My new to me ebay bezel was uncut and I wanted a little more out of sight out of mind security too. So the radio got mounted in the center console on brackets I made out of angle iron. That still left a hole in the dash. That was solved on a visit to my Dad’s house when I told him to keep an eye out for a “radio delete” plate when he was at the junkyards. He said he had one in the garage from his old state truck. Sure enough he did and it matched the bezel exactly! Score!! A wally world speaker box rounded out the sound system, covered by a towel for stealth.

The K5 was proving to be pretty darn reliable by now. It was my airport runner when I was on the road and daily driver status when I was home. Two problems did develop. The seats were not comfortable at all. The 31” tires were unbearable on the highway combining with the 3.73 ratio for 3,000 rpm screaming at 60 mph. The seats were from a Toyota 4 runner that a prior owner had booger welded to stock brackets some time ago. They sat too low and were generally worn out for my taste. Enter my Dad again, as he had bought a 2002 Silverado on my GM discount shortly before I left GM. The truck didn’t have power seats and he wanted power. I found him a set of matching power seats for his with the harness from a local boneyard down here. We swapped the upholstery off of his manual seats and put them on the power seats and did the same to the manual seats. So I took the manual seats home and adapted them to fit the K5 tub. I couldn’t use the original tracks from the K5 for the flip forward/entry but the 02 seats have lots of travel to allow easy entry from either side. I made adapter brackets out of ¼” flat stock to bolt the seats down to the original mounting on the floor. As far as comfort goes, it was one of the most comfortable mods I’ve done to date. Added side benefit is the 3 point seat belts as the 75’s only had lap belts. The tires were rectified with a set of 33” Kelly tires that Larry used to have on the K10 and didn’t need anymore. That brought the cruise rpm down 500 at 60 mph but further illustrated the lack of power I was dealing with.

The 33’s fit with no lift and did ok if it was dry. They flat sucked if it was muddy, but they were free and Larry warned me about the crappy mud performance. He’s got his stuck to the axles with the same tires in the mud down by the reservoir. I had gone out wheeling with the K5 a couple of times by then. One time in the snow with the 31’s where silly RPM was the only way I could climb and another time on the same trail with no snow on it. Larry swore I would have 8 dents in the hood from the pistons jumping out of the cylinders from ratting on it so hard. These early trips solidified a need for more tire and more lift. So saving was the name of the game.

After saving enough for a lift kit, I pulled the trigger and ordered one off of JC Whitney’s website. I bought a 4” Rough Country kit with front springs, rear blocks, 4 shocks and the raised steering arm with free shipping. I didn’t intend on using the rear blocks as I had been doing a lot of online research about shackle flips for the rear. ORD was what I wanted, but couldn’t afford with everything else. I little more surfing and I found a pair of flip brackets for sale on a local 4x4 forum for cheap. Made by a now defunct fab shop by the name of Echobit, they bolt onto the existing spring hangers rather than removing them completely. They aren’t as nice as ORD’s but they have held up well under my abuse through the years. Once everything was in hand another weekend wrench session was planned at Larry’s place. As things normally transpire at his place the operation went off smoothly. An added hand (Bill) that weekend too that’s been a wheeling buddy all along. He’s the guy that found the K5 originally. The K5’s attitude was raised and the ride quality over what was on there. Somebody in it’s life had out multiple add-a-leafs on the rear springs to the point it rode like a tank. We pulled the rear leaf packs and yanked to garbage off of them and bolted them back up with the flip kit. Even with the rough country springs up front it rides surprisingly well.

A few months later with a recharged slush fund for the K5 I upgraded to 35” tires. After much internet shopping I found what I wanted at the right price. I wanted mud terrains, but BFG’s were way over my budget. I found Dunlop Mud Rovers for about $150 per though Sam’s club locally. Those tires have proven to be an excellent all around tire. Quiet on pavement, great in deep snow and excellent on rocks with only 15psi in them. I’ve had them on for almost 7 years now and they still are holding up well with more than 50% tread left on them.

The K5 in this form has had a lot of off road time with multiple weekend mountain runs with my son and I. This was primary goal, to have something to getaway with. Despite it’s anemic power production, the 350’s been stone solid reliable. The q-jet carb has been dialed in and doesn’t stumble off road or at high mountain altitudes. The engine is burning oil, but things are in the works to rectify that..

That brings us up to about 2009 as far as the truck goes. The economy as we all know by then was really in the dumps and the RV industry is one of the first to take a hit when times get tough. Who’s going to buy a $150,000 motorhome when they can’t afford their mortgage let alone fuel for the coach? Having survived a number of head count reductions couldn't avoid it and I was laid off in May of 09. As luck would have it, one of my dealers I called on had an opening in the service department. I took a week off to catch up on some yardwork. I was writing service for a small town Chevy dealer now, but they are open 6 days a week. I ended up taking over the service manager position within a year. While my free time was certainly limited working 6 days a week, I still made time for some weekend runs or one day outings to go play. The clutch finally gave up the ghost in 2010 on the way to a local oval track to help one of my tech’s dial in his race car. I limped it home and saved up some funds to replace it. I got a deal on a clutch through the shop, resurfaced an extra flywheel Larry gave me and planned another weekend swap job. Larry offered up his place and help to do so. This is where having great friends really is special. Knowing I had to work that Saturday, he told me he’d get started on in that morning then when I get off work I can chip in. What I didn’t know is that he called in the help of our buddy Bill and had the engine out, clutch changed and engine back in before I got there at 2 that afternoon. They gave me the chore of bolting the headers back up as both of them were cussing them out when they took them off before. 90% of the work was done before I even got my hands dirty. It was a very cool thing for both of them to do for me and I truly appreciated it.

So the K5 hasn’t changed much in a few years other than general maintenance. With limited time off most of my free time has been spent following my son’s high school soccer or club soccer teams. That being said, I’ve been in another mode saving and collecting parts to give the K5 a shot in the arm. There are some perks to working at a dealership for sure. I’ve acquired a used 5.3L vortec engine after a customer had us install a GM Performance crate engine into his 2002 Silverado. The engine itself was well cared for with mobil 1 oil getting changed out like clockwork every 3000 miles. It’s high mileage, but didn’t use drop of oil before we pulled it. The engine is sitting in Larry’s shop currently. I’ve traded Larry a 8.1 L big block for a aftermarket wiring harness and pcm to run the 5.3. I’ve got a few more parts to collect but I’ve snagged some from take off’s from other jobs at work. More to come in the future on this.

As I stated early on, the body on my K5 is a bit crusty. Abnormally rusty for our dry Colorado climate for sure. Larry’s joked I could just get another tub and be money ahead. He’s right, but I tend to get attached to things. I had been keeping my eye out for something, but not actively searching. After all, I’ve not really cared about the looks as I didn’t want to stress about it off road. Still, it’s not pretty. So enter our buddy Bill again. He’s working on a 94 Blazer project he’s planning on flipping, but the engine was junk. He found running 2wd 89 GMC Suburban and picked it up for cheap. Only needing the engine, the rest was up for grabs. Bill and Larry yanked the front clip off in order to sell it and then they called me first. I negotiated a price and a couple of weeks later we loaded the clip, both front doors and all the goodies to make the conversion complete. I ended up with a good windshield too. So with those goodies and a rust free tailgate I pulled from a junkyard a few years back I’ve got most of the sheet metal to eliminate the rust. I think one of my Dad’s neighbors has a full Blazer quarter in his garage too. Dad’s checking on that for me.

That brings us up to date for the K5. We have a small snow run planned for new years day to go play. I’m planning on adding a 14b ff to the rear with a bump in gearing to 4.10’s just haven’t been looking hard as they are pretty common. I hope you all enjoyed the saga and stay tuned for the coming chapters. I’ve more free time this next summer so expect some wheeling/camping trips to come…





Final shot for now, my K5 on the cable due to my own stupidity. Long story short I had no reason to be on this rockpile with no lockers what so ever. Banged the rear driveshaft on a boulder and proceeded to twist it in half. 2 hours later on the winch and I was off the pile.