New teritory for me. Need some help :(

[Rede]

Hmmm...the head work doesn't sound super hard, just a bit more involved then a simple cam swap.

There was a guy here who had a 177 BBC blower kit for sale for around 1800 which would eliminate the cam swap and likely make a bit more oomph.
But this is going to be a year round DD an I'm not sure how that kinda setup would like -50F temps.
Not sure if he's flexable on the price though as it's deffinately out of my budget.

I'll plug away and the little things I can do on the truck and think more on what to do with this motor...

I hear rumors of +4C for Sunday so that's certainly going to help motivate me
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[MrBeast]

Rede, I am going to take a moment here and pick your plans apart a little bit.

You sound very eager, and there is nothing wrong with that, but for a minute you should take a step back and determine if this truck is right for you.

Here are some things to consider, 1. It has mismatched tires/wheels front to rear, from what I gather the truck is a 1/2 ton with 38's very very bad combination. Expecially once you add the extra 300 or so lbs that 454 is going to put over your front axle. That Dana 44 is going to be very very short lived.

You are planning on using this truck as a driver, it sounds to me though like it has had some unknown work done on it, now granted I am not sure what kind of condition the truck is in because I have not seen it, but the warning signs of a cobbled togeather truck are there.

As well with a 6" lift, 38's wont fit with out some trimming or a body lift.

The Vortec Big Block is a good motor, but here is the issue with what you are wanting to do, the engine has non adjustable valvetrain, and for what you are wanting to do, you will have to do the conversion.

You can get conversion studs that are 3/8" on one side, and 7/16" on the other easy enough, and then you will need a set of rocker arms.

As well the Vortec has injector problems and you will want to upgrade them. The parts will cost you about 760.00

Going to the larger cam is also going to cause issues with your computer. you will need to have it tuned.

In your position I think your best bet would be to find a good running driving 4x4 pickup that has been well maintained, see if you can find a 1 ton, there are plenty out there, also you can get a dually and convert it to single rear wheel.

I started out doing what you are wanting to, it led to a lot of broken 1/2 ton parts, you can still break the 1 ton parts, but not as fast or as often.

I bet you can find a nice 1 ton pickup for less than 5 grand that runs good enough to drive, that will have a good body, in which is worth putting your time and money into.

If I was in your shoes, that is what id do, then id take that 454, get it rebuilt, get the adjustable valvetrain put in it, and then id put it in the truck and have it all tuned up. This would leave you with a very nice truck that got somwhat reasonable gas mileage.

When it comes to lifting your truck, you need to check out Off Road Design and DIY4X, they have the shackle reversal kits, and you can see how much the stuff costs.

[Rede]

I had someone else point out the mis-matched tires, however they both rotate 465 in one mile according to TSL's site so they shouldn't cause binding.
Fenders have been trimed, too far in some spots as you can see the inner fender peeking out.
These tires however aren't going on the truck again until I can find a Dana60 front diff and only for wheelin on the weekends.
I have 33"x10.5" kuhmo KL71's for the daily driving and they'll be used for the meentime on the trails fo now.

The 454 already has a Performer 2.0 carb intake on it and all the EFI parts have been removed. I re-used an Accel distributor with the oem brass gear machined and installed. And I bought a used holley 650 double pumper and I'll use either the new Holley fuel pump in my garage or a barely used Mallory pump. (I haven't looked up the specs to see which would be better)
Flowtech headers are also going to be ordered...if I ever get a quote.

The motor has only 136,000km on it, no signs of oil leaking (checked front/rear seals and heads/valve covers are still very clean), the intake and TB were also pretty clean inside. Pushrods didn't seem to have any varnish either from what could see and were still straight with no marks.


I'll admit that the truck does have hookey work that wasn't finished like the rear shackle robots being ground off on one side, but compaired to what's available locally to me, it's shape is par with everything else available.

I'll upload some pics this weekend, maybe tomorow if I have time.

Guess I'm just tired of watching my buddies havin a blast while I'm sitting around home, forced to watch tv with the wife...
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