The Rotten Mule (AKA: 'Mulo Podrido')

[Boyd]

I originally planned to wait until I had made much more progress on this truck since I'm only able to work on it a few hours a week. But I've came here several times asking questions and I figured it's only fair that I introduce y'all to 'Mulo Podrido'. Besides, I know how short this board's attention span is if one doesn't update their build thread often enough.


The Premise:
Turn a lightly abused, completely original, zero-option, '72 Chevy Short Step into a fun, cheap, weekend cruiser that looks just as cool in the Home Depot parking lot picking up landscaping supplies on a Saturday morning as it does at the local drive-in on a Friday night. And do it as cheaply as possible.

The Plan:
V8 in place of the I6. Automatic in place of the "stick on a steering column". Power steering and brakes replace the manual stuff. Static 5.5"/6 drop. Aftermarket tilt column. And toss the stock 15" steelies for 20"s. All for less than $6 grand.

The Patient:


The Operating Room:


The Instruments:


And finally, because after all, I'm in Texas, a Ranch Style tool tray!

[Boyd]

The Bad Organ:
I would have kept it, but it was tired and needed new rings and possibly a valve job.


The New Organ:
I bought this off of a fellow board member who recently did an LS swap. Basically, I got everything I needed to go from a 6cyl/man to a V8/auto for $1k. Not a bad deal.


Prepping for Surgery:


Surgery Begins:


Bad Organ Removed:

[Boyd]

With the engine out, I removed the manual trans cross member.



I originally thought I was going to have to raise the cab to get to the top rivets, but I ended up removing the cross member support pieces first, then grinding and chiseling out the top cross member rivets from underneath.

[OARNGESI]

Looks like a solid project i really like the look of the ps in your avatar

[67chevy1series]

lets see som ore progress im not convinced

[Boyd]

Originally Posted by OARNGESI

Looks like a solid project i really like the look of the ps in your avatar

Thanks, here's the full size chop.




The wheels in the pic would most likely cost me more than my total budget of $6k so I'll actually be running a set of Boss 338s in 20x8.5f/10r.

[Boyd]

Originally Posted by 67chevy1series

lets see som ore progress im not convinced

Here you go!

With the engine and trans out, I began scraping all of the caked on grease from the engine cross member, frame, and a-arms. The guy I bought the truck from purchased it at an estate sale from the original family a few months prior to me buying it. The old man who originally owned it must have greased this thing once a month...there was grease caked everywhere ! That's a good thing though.


Here's a shot of what came off of just the engine cross member, there were equally large piles of old grease from each side of the front suspension.


Began removing front suspension components




The truck had a brake job done on it not too long before I bought it, so I elected to leave the rotors and calipers alone to help keep costs down. I did, however, replace both upper and lower ball joints.

Here's me cranking down on the ball joint press I rented from AutoZone.






CPP 2.5" dropped spindle installed

[gixxerpymp]

Lookin good man... Love the garage.

[67chevy1series]

man that garage shpuld be in GOTM ( garage of the month) butnice tols to i can honestly say i had to go to kragens to get my ball joints taken out and to put new ones in thanks i am now convinced and jealous

[CheyenneShop]

looks like a lot of fun

[Slick67]

Cool Project, keep operating!!!

[bigguy69]

[huero]

Wow!
Kinda the same deal as my build. Just chopped the manual trans mount today!
Subscribing.

[Zoomin]

Fun project! I really like how fastidious you are. I let the junk fly, the rev up tbe leaf blower.

[bill c]

looks good.. got to love the steep sides...

[Boyd]

Originally Posted by 67chevy1series

man that garage shpuld be in GOTM ( garage of the month) butnice tols to i can honestly say i had to go to kragens to get my ball joints taken out and to put new ones in thanks i am now convinced and jealous

Thanks! The truck was actually on hold while I finished the garage. It was my "had to have" when we built last year.

[Boyd]

Got the blazer tank installed (and ran into a problem - more on that later).



To get the fuel from the blazer tank to the fuel pump, I used 2 pieces of steel brake line from AutoZone. One 4' piece and one 6' piece. I used a compression union to mate the two pieces and used short rubber line to connect to the pump and sender.

I used a piece of rubber fuel line to cushion the steel line to keep it off the c-notch (pics of the notch later).



For clamps, I used 1/2" rubber lined conduit clamps.



I cut a small piece of rubber fuel line and inserted it into each clamp to make up the difference in sizes between the clamp and the steel line. I used factory holes in the frame, and some hardware I bought from Lowe's.

[Boyd]

Oh, and that problem I ran into with the blazer tank?

The filler neck is directly under the bed support brace.




I ended up redrilling the mounting holes in the frame and pulled the tank back towards the rear bumper by about 3".



For the blazer tank users out there. What did you use for a filler? I want to mount my filler just under the bed floor and use a billet fuel door from a Dodge Ram to cover the cap, but there's only about 3" (at the most) from the top of the frame to just below the bed floor.

[FRENCHBLUE72]

Love the stepper project can we get some more pics of the whole shop really diggin that corragated metal along the bottom.

[VA72C10]

nice project. will be following along!

[Boyd]

Originally Posted by FRENCHBLUE72

Love the stepper project can we get some more pics of the whole shop really diggin that corragated metal along the bottom.

Thanks. I got the tin from a guy off of craigslist who had just torn down an old barn. Here are a couple of pictures of it going up.



I started in the corner where my compressor is. Here's a before:



And after:



Back wall (for reference, the truck is to the left in this picture)



Garage fridge



Close up of workbench



Left Wall



The shallow cabinet in the middle of the wall hides the electrical panel, sprinkler control unit, and the uverse box.



Right Wall (I built some cabinets out of scrap material that I scavenged from the contruction going on in the neighborhood, I'll eventually paint them red.)



The bottom cabinets hold pool items on the left side and car cleaning/misc on the right.

[Boyd]

And just to keep this thread on point, I've made a little progress on the truck. (sorry for the blurry pic)

[butternut1972]

Cool shop dude. cool truck too!

[oldblue1968chevy]

sweet garage and nice truck

[RCbowtie69]

Sweet truck & garage