Looking for build advice

[grandpas66]

I have my grandpa's 66 Chevy C10 long bed that he bought new. It has a 283 with a 4 on the floor (granny 1st gear) and an open 4.11 rear end. It is mostly stock and in OK condition. It has been repainted (poorly), it had an under hood fire a few years back with a suspect rewire/repair job.
I am looking to make the truck into an almost daily driver with cross country capability. I have already totally disassembled cleaned, painted with POR15, and rebuilt everything in the front end and everything behind the cab. I also upgraded the brakes from no power, four wheel drums to four wheel disks, purchased from CPP. I don't think I will use them again. I have a set of wheels to get it rolling after the disk upgrade, but I am not sure I will keep them for the long term. I have a junk yard sway bar to add, I just need the frame mounting bracket.
I am looking at an LS (5.3/4L60e) swap. l would like advice from you guys about my plans. I am going to spend some money, but I am not going to get crazy. Here is what I have planned
Junk yard 5.3/4l60e with wire harness, CPU and gas pedal. Possibly more, see below
Fuel tank - Either blazer or move the rear cross member and go with a K5 tank. I like the idea of having 30 gallons, but don't like moving the cross member.
Fuel pump will be a late 80/early 90's in-tank pump off a EFI truck from that era.
Fuel lines - braided 6 AN and to engine and return
Fuel filler behind tail light
Electrical- New wiring kit- leaning toward Kwikwire 22 circuit with LED flashers, Halogen relays and expandable loom kit.
LED turn signal and marker lights
Gauges - Intellitronix digital dash kit - they are $400 ($300 on ebay) that is a lot less than the competition.
Tach adapter (from 4 cyl signal out of an LS to the 8 cyl signal that is standard)
Stock LS CPU flashed - source needed, if you have experience, good or bad with a source, please let me know
Stock LS harness modified - undecided if I will hire someone or do it myself. Thoughts?
Motor mounts- Performance Online gets great reviews in the forums - thinking I will go with them.
Driveshaft - Undecided if I should shorten my stock two piece, or take a donor single piece shaft to shorten. Thoughts?
Transmission - replace/upgrade the accumulators pistons to billet pieces
Trans cross member - undecided between modifying a donor or ordering a new from performance online
Trans cooler - at least needed temporarily, I might upgrade the radiator later
Exhaust - undecided between flowmaster 70 series and stock take offs from a modern camaro/mustang. I will run 2.5 inch duals with an H pipe. Any thoughts?
lower steering was added in the 90's, I will need a few adapters to connect the modern pump to the existing steering box.
Long term I will add an Air conditioner, Radio (not cutting the dash), change the rear gear (probably to a 3.73 - maybe a 3.43 (unlikely), upgrade the bench seat, add power windows and paint the entire truck top to bottom and inside out
Am I missing something? any guidance or the voice of experience is greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance

[PGSigns]

Wont touch on all of it but here are my thoughts. Use American auto wire for the harness. The classic update harness is the best setup. Look at the Boyd welding tank. It is not 30 gallons but the fit and function is hard to beat. I have had two and really like them. I did not want the tank handing way low and in harms way. On the LS swap I have the POL mounts for the 5.3 swap for the Suburban and thinking of going to the Dirty Dingo sliders to give me wiggle room on placement of the engine. Drive shaft I will just have made. Local guys are really good and the differance between making new and reworking old is not much.
Jimmy

[grandpas66]

Originally Posted by PGSigns

Wont touch on all of it but here are my thoughts. Use American auto wire for the harness. The classic update harness is the best setup. Look at the Boyd welding tank. It is not 30 gallons but the fit and function is hard to beat. I have had two and really like them. I did not want the tank handing way low and in harms way. On the LS swap I have the POL mounts for the 5.3 swap for the Suburban and thinking of going to the Dirty Dingo sliders to give me wiggle room on placement of the engine. Drive shaft I will just have made. Local guys are really good and the differance between making new and reworking old is not much.
Jimmy

Thanks, I will look at the dirty dingo mounts. I have looked at American auto wire, they have been in a close second. The Boyd’s tanks look amazing and I like that they tuck up tightly to the frame. I will look at them again. Your driveshaft point is one I haven’t considered. I will look into it. Thanks again
J
Posted via Mobile Device

[bonehead]

ummmmm... why not just restore it if you want to drive grandpa's truck.

[theastronaut]

Originally Posted by grandpas66

Junk yard 5.3/4l60e with wire harness, CPU and gas pedal. Possibly more, see below
Fuel tank - Either blazer or move the rear cross member and go with a K5 tank. I like the idea of having 30 gallons, but don't like moving the cross member.
Fuel pump will be a late 80/early 90's in-tank pump off a EFI truck from that era.
Fuel lines - braided 6 AN and to engine and return
Fuel filler behind tail light
Electrical- New wiring kit- leaning toward Kwikwire 22 circuit with LED flashers, Halogen relays and expandable loom kit.
LED turn signal and marker lights
Gauges - Intellitronix digital dash kit - they are $400 ($300 on ebay) that is a lot less than the competition.
Tach adapter (from 4 cyl signal out of an LS to the 8 cyl signal that is standard)
Stock LS CPU flashed - source needed, if you have experience, good or bad with a source, please let me know
Stock LS harness modified - undecided if I will hire someone or do it myself. Thoughts?
Motor mounts- Performance Online gets great reviews in the forums - thinking I will go with them.
Driveshaft - Undecided if I should shorten my stock two piece, or take a donor single piece shaft to shorten. Thoughts?
Transmission - replace/upgrade the accumulators pistons to billet pieces
Trans cross member - undecided between modifying a donor or ordering a new from performance online
Trans cooler - at least needed temporarily, I might upgrade the radiator later
Exhaust - undecided between flowmaster 70 series and stock take offs from a modern camaro/mustang. I will run 2.5 inch duals with an H pipe. Any thoughts?
lower steering was added in the 90's, I will need a few adapters to connect the modern pump to the existing steering box.
Long term I will add an Air conditioner, Radio (not cutting the dash), change the rear gear (probably to a 3.73 - maybe a 3.43 (unlikely), upgrade the bench seat, add power windows and paint the entire truck top to bottom and inside out
Am I missing something? any guidance or the voice of experience is greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance

I just swapped a 5.3/4l60e into a 51 GMC, so I can give a few pointers.

The 80's/90's fuel pump runs at low pressure (16ish?) compared to the high pressure pump you'll need to run a LS. I used a Tanks Inc. tank with built in pump, and a factory Corvette fuel pressure regulator.

Make sure you get a matching engine, harness, pedal, and tac module.

I used an American Autowire harness. Don't cheap out here. You said "LED flashers and halogen relays"... you'll have to add in resistors to make the flasher relays work, even electronic flashers need a load on them to make them work. A relay harness for the headlights is a good idea to get full voltage to the headlight bulbs. Cibie H4 halogens from Amazon are the best headlight upgrade for the price. Stay away from LED headlight under ~300 bucks, or the cheap LMC/Ebay H4's.

I bought an engine harness from PSI, it dropped right in place and the engine fired up on the first try. They also flashed the factory ECU and had an extended pedal/tac module harness.

Since your truck already had a 283, you can get LS to SBC adapters to use the factory perches.

You'll want to upgrade the radiator with a LS swap, so get one with a trans cooler built in. Make sure to match the inlet/outlet sizes to the LS, and you'll need a steam port added to the top tank. Stay away from RnD Fabrication who advertises on here. If you're looking to add A/C later get a radiator that can handle the added heat of a condensor in front of the radiator, and fan(s) that flow enough CFM to keep it cool in traffic.

My exhaust shop suggested 2.25" for dual exhaust on a stock 5.3.

[shp4man]

Originally Posted by bonehead

ummmmm... why not just restore it if you want to drive grandpa's truck.

Well, I'm glad I'm not the only one here. to the OP, Just repair gramp's old ride, maybe change out the 4.11's. That's just me, though- do what you want.

[grandpas66]

Originally Posted by PGSigns

Wont touch on all of it but here are my thoughts. Use American auto wire for the harness. The classic update harness is the best setup. Look at the Boyd welding tank. It is not 30 gallons but the fit and function is hard to beat. I have had two and really like them. I did not want the tank handing way low and in harms way. On the LS swap I have the POL mounts for the 5.3 swap for the Suburban and thinking of going to the Dirty Dingo sliders to give me wiggle room on placement of the engine. Drive shaft I will just have made. Local guys are really good and the differance between making new and reworking old is not much.
Jimmy

Jimmy- can you talk me through why you prefer American auto wire over Kwikwire? Thanks
Posted via Mobile Device

[PGSigns]

I built race cars and street rods for many years and used the painless and other universal harnesses and they worked fine for what I was doing at the time. With the advent of the classic update harness things changed in the way I do wiring. If you go to AAW's website and down load the instructions you can see how they package the harness in stages and how it is designed to go in the truck. The way they do the harness allows for things like the factory plugs in the firewall for things like the hood harness and the correct plugs for all the lights inside and out of the truck. It gives you the option of factory or aftermarket dash and steering columns. This ensures things like turn signals and wiper motors work correctly. They supply the correct ignition, headlight and dimmer switches and plugs to work with the truck. So when you start adding the things the others don't include that you need and then having to figure out and make harnesses for things like the wipers and heater and the time the kit saves the overall value becomes apparent.
Jimmy

[Keets64]

Jimmy
Thanks for the tip, looks like a good alternative to Painless as we're going with an LS2 and Vintage Air