My version of the s10 swap

[BlueJeep]

Time for some cab repair. My goal is to get the cab all sealed up to reduce the possibility of leaks and noise, and my plan is to weld up all the holes I don't need and fix the rust. It really was a pretty good cab when I started, but there are always surprises that the sandblaster finds...

Got the cab out of the trailer:





Here's some of the things that will occupy my time in the coming month(s):

[BlueJeep]

Here are the surprises that showed up while blasting:



And this one, underneath the back window on the inside panel. I speculate that this is from the rear cab seam not being sealed. 60 years worth of water must have found it's way in here and caused this:



I've started filling holes in the firewall. These are just tacked and ground so more tacks to come, and I'm saving the heater hole for last because for right now it provides great access for me to stick my arm in and get at the back side of the rest of these.

[rgunlock]

Nice job. Mind if I ask what you use to cut your patches? They appear to be very good fits.

[OrrieG]

Progress but lots to go too. Patches...cut big, I use a diegrinder to fine tune. I have a variety of hole saws for the round ones.

[BlueJeep]

Originally Posted by rgunlock

Nice job. Mind if I ask what you use to cut your patches? They appear to be very good fits.

If you're talking about patch panels, I'm using a 4.5" grinder and cutoff wheels. For the firewall ones, I'm tracing them on 18ga. scraps and freehanding them in the bandsaw, then fine tuning them with a 50 grit roloc disc. They are very tight, I'm trying to minimize the weld and minimize heat. I'm even cutting little 1/4" diameter plugs for the small holes...

[panelrodder81]

Three questions, one is did you absolutely have to move the motor back? I ask because I'm a tall guy and my other truck is a panel truck so just moved my seats back for my height. If you don't HAVE to move the motor back I was hoping to extend my firewall forward to fill the space and gain some inches of interior space.

Second question, during reassembly did you simply just hook everything back up from the S10 (minus the stuff you deleted) and run it?

Third, are you using the big fenders that were original to the truck? The look to have the smaller wheel openings that the one on my 1ton.

One suggestion is, if your S10 is new enough to have OBD2 port you could keep the classic gauge look by using a cheep android based cellphone and install a program called Torque and then get a bluetooth obd2 adapter. This will let you setup a digital dash board that you can put in place and then remove at will. This is the direction I am planning to go when I start my swap.

And thanks for the inspiration!

-Panelrodder

[BlueJeep]

Originally Posted by panelrodder81

Three questions, one is did you absolutely have to move the motor back? I ask because I'm a tall guy and my other truck is a panel truck so just moved my seats back for my height. If you don't HAVE to move the motor back I was hoping to extend my firewall forward to fill the space and gain some inches of interior space.

Is it absolutely necessary....maybe not....but you would have to do some butchering (ie. re-engineering) under the hood. Your radiator would have to move forward and the fan would have to be on the front side of that. I tried to show this with my earlier pictures. My buddy JR who is 6'9" is comfortable in this truck with the 88 seat. I think that would be far easier than extreme firewall mods. Having said that, the s10 firewall was 6" farther forward than the 49 one with it's cab-forward design.

Second question, during reassembly did you simply just hook everything back up from the S10 (minus the stuff you deleted) and run it?

Yes, basically. There was a huge loop of wires under the s10 dash that went from the driver's side over to the passenger side and then back to the driver's side that I cut about 4 feet out of too to clean things up.

Third, are you using the big fenders that were original to the truck? The look to have the smaller wheel openings that the one on my 1ton.

The fenders are original. From all my research, they didn't get the "big bolt" front clips until 1 1/2 tons. This one being a 3800 had the small front clip and a 9 foot bed.

One suggestion is, if your S10 is new enough to have OBD2 port you could keep the classic gauge look by using a cheep android based cellphone and install a program called Torque and then get a bluetooth obd2 adapter. This will let you setup a digital dash board that you can put in place and then remove at will. This is the direction I am planning to go when I start my swap.

Nope, this one's a bastard. It's like OBD 1.5 or something...it has the OBD2 plug but it's not OBD2. It's a 1995 with the TBI 4.3 and 4L60e. The New Vintage gauges get me a classic-enough look, however I may have to get a smart phone for a radio so I can stream Pandora in it some day!

And thanks for the inspiration!

Not a problem!

-Panelrodder

-Chris

[BlueJeep]

Here's some old school bodywork that was done to the truck. Basically, pound a screwdriver through the sheetmetal, pry the dent out, braze the hole shut and lead up the remainder of the dent. This is the main reason I'm replacing this cowl panel, plus I'm getting rid of the vent.

[BlueJeep]

I've finished all the firewall holes I'm going to fill, and moved on to some holes in the floor and the kick panel and cowl panel on the driver's side. I'm not going to finish welding anything until I get my hinges rebuild and the doors hung so I can get the gaps where I want them. Here's my progress:

[BlueJeep]

And a little farther:











Next up is filling all the extra holes in the toeboard and fitting panels for re-assembly. I'm still having fun with this!

[panelrodder81]

Originally Posted by BlueJeep

-Chris

Thanks for the info. I will have to get out to the truck I plan to use and get more info of it. I picked it up like two/three years ago and remember it to be a 1ton but it very well could be the 1.5 which would give me the larger fenders. I'm not sure I want to run the Big Bolt fenders on an S10 but it was my wife's grandfather's truck so I can't very well swap the whole front end out! Maybe I will have to go big with it.... we will see.

I just threw the idea out for the ODB thing because I think its pretty cool and I'm kind of proud of that idea! Hahaha. So if it doesn't work for you then I totally understand!

The truck looks great and I will continue to watch the project closely!

-Panelrodder

[BlueJeep]

More progress this week with the cab rust repair. Spent a lot of time fitting the kick panel, until I figured out to just cut off the bottom curved part, mount the main piece, and then fill in the bottom later (since the stamping didn't line up). This actually worked out really well for me because I was able to make the beads line up exactly where they needed to with the filler panel. Here's the pics:



Here's how the beads lined up:

[BlueJeep]

And welded in:





Still a little work to do here, but it's mostly done:



And some other fixes I had to make:





Until now I've had very poor experience using my weld-through primer. After reading a little on the metalmeet forum, I found another way to do it. I'm now spraying the "overlap" areas in the primer, then assembling and drilling for the spot welds and drilling partly into the bottom layer of metal. This cleans the primer off the bottom layer and allows me to put a decent weld in there. Without cleaning the primer off, it didn't "weld-through" worth a sh#t. I'm still not absolutely convinced it is necessary since it lasted 60 years without...but I really don't want to be wrong and have to do this again.

I'm also planning on seam sealing this area extensively and probably spraying on bedliner to finish it off.

[BlueJeep]

Almost all the holes in the floor are now filled:



And here's a teaser picture - mainly to tease myself because you guys already know what it should look like. This piece won't go on until the door hinges are rebuilt and the doors are hung so I can make sure the gap is where I want it.

[Warrens69GMC]

nice progress

[RCbowtie69]

Nice build,keep pictures coming,you are making some good progress

[BlueJeep]

A little from this weekend:

The passenger side was quite a bit quicker to do. Fewer holes in the floor to patch, and the outer cowl was in a lot better shape than the other side. I only have to patch in a small piece at the bottom, though the back side of it will get POR 15 on it before the inner panel is welded in for good.

On to the pics:

Here I patched a small piece where the floor is folded over the rocker:



And a small area that was rusted through on the floor. This is why I said in the beginning this was a good cab especially being from Iowa:



Inner panel all fitted up:



And lastly, I removed the "gills". Although they look pretty cool, they also allow a direct line for water and wasps to get into the cab. I found out the wasps part of that the hard way the first time I pulled it in the garage. The heater apparently was a very suitable place to build nests...and I used an entire can of brakleen to make sure it wasn't suitable any longer.



Still more work to do on this side, as I'll also be closing up the hole in the kick panel from the heater too. More to come....

[BlueJeep]

Not really in sequence, but since I've had some questions here are pictures of my body mounts. Since the cab is off, these pictures were easy to get. They're 3x5 3/16 wall tubing capped with 3/16 and a Jeep CJ poly bushing above and below the mount.





front mount:


rear mount:

[BlueJeep]

More progress. I now have the passenger side outer cowl patched up:



And coated a bunch of areas in POR 15:

[BlueJeep]

And after reading all about storing POR 15, I decided to try the jars and saran-wrap method:



Next up is spreading this liberally inside the cowl, and then closing up these areas. I think that between the POR, the epoxy primer, and seam sealer this truck should last 60 more years.

[yukon ratrod]

looking great. you know it blows me way at how nice the guys on here are getting their metal work. my friend your doing better then anyone ive ever worked with in my years. I just love to see that the time and dedication is being put in and bondos being used to finishthings up and not fill great big holes. keep up the good workmanship.

[BlueJeep]

Originally Posted by yukon ratrod

looking great. you know it blows me way at how nice the guys on here are getting their metal work. my friend your doing better then anyone ive ever worked with in my years. I just love to see that the time and dedication is being put in and bondos being used to finishthings up and not fill great big holes. keep up the good workmanship.

Thank you for the compliments!

I've never done this before, so this is all a big learning experience for me. I've been fabricating for years, but never with anything less than .125" so sheetmetal is a new game for me. I do realize that I'm probably doing more than I need to for what I hope to end up with, but if I didn't go this far I feel that I would be cheating myself out of a chance to learn something new. I'm excited to get to the point of being able to spread filler, but want to make sure I have everything ready and do it right the first time. More fun to come!

[BlueJeep]

Things are going back together for good. I have seam sealed some areas that will be inaccessible later, and closing up some holes.





Removing evidence of the heater and wasp entry point:

[BlueJeep]

This was from a couple weeks ago, but I see I forgot to add pics. I've welded the back seam of the cab, because it had allowed water to get in and cause some problems. I'm all about fixing problems now....





And close up:

[oldman3]

I see your build and you are doing the hard stuff. Going from a 3 to 5 window, very nice. My hats off to you dude. Your body line is not bad, just need to indent a little farther with a small die grinder. Jim