2wd 1977 Blazer LS swap, mild drop….escalating

[Advanced Design]

And we had fun today, bolting parts back on the engine! Good times….

The ps return tube contacted the frame and a little downward bending resolved the interference.

Mrs A.D. handled the coil and bracket refurbishment. She remounted those and the intake, torquing the bolts to spec.

The AC bracket came with the VA Sure Fit….not a fan of the looks of either, so we will be going a different route on both of those components….. The sure fit items on the firewall and the ac bracket.

Replacement throttle body is on the “gotta order” list too.

[Ad Cam]

Awesome build! Cool to see another truck from the Land of Lincoln.

[Advanced Design]

Originally Posted by Ad Cam

Awesome build! Cool to see another truck from the Land of Lincoln.

Thank you! My office was in Naperville, so I’ve spent a lot of time in your neck of Illinois over the years.

Originally Posted by oldman3

Doug, looking good and moving along...Jim

Thanks Jim! We are trying, though the trip to FL a couple weeks ago slowed us down a bit.

Originally Posted by youngrodder

Hey a complete roller...Wont be long know..

Looks good.

Marc

Thanks Marc, we hope so.

The new drive shaft is in. From Inland Empire in CA.

[Advanced Design]

Seat belts were restored by TKCR, and they worked some magic on them.

Here is a before and several after pictures. The belts came out extremely nice!

[Advanced Design]

Ran into a young man who started a pressure washing business, and he thought he could clean the floor bottoms to my liking.

He used hot high pressure water, cleansing agents and even steam to get them clean. I am thrilled with the results!

Included a couple before and after pics too.

[oldman3]

Doug, looking good and moving along...Jim

[youngrodder]

Hey a complete roller...Wont be long know..

Looks good.

Marc

[OutlawDrifter]

Very cool, my favorite color combo! And the hood stripes to boot!

Just got caught up, very cool project

[87chevy.com]

Pretty lucky with the high hump transmission tunnel. With the 6l80e, it wouldn't have unless its tilted down pretty far.

I wonder what the offset on those rotors is. When I did my Wilwood c-10 pro spindle with the same style caliper, I wound up using 12.915"x 30mm thick rotors from a 2006 jeep Cherokee. It does require taking it to the machine shop and having the center hub bored to fit. It was the same thickness as the NNBS brakes so it matched.

clint

[LT7A]

What's the latest? Guessing there might be some updates. What a cool rig you found. I want to do whatever I had to do to buy a rig like that if I found it. That color combo with the '77 ochre trim? Dude! I hope you guys are having fun with it.

[LT7A]

It appears that Elvis has exited the building. I don't know Mr. AD personally and so I don't know the circumstances but it appears he hasn't been on here since last April. It's too bad, I would like to be seeing what's happening with this rig. I hope all is well.

[TotallyHucked]

Man, that was a really cool truck you guys scooped up! Hope all is well and the build is still progressing

[mongocanfly]

X2..!!!!!

[Advanced Design]

Thanks guys! After a fling messing with a 1970 Cadillac and a 1996 Caprice, we sold those and picked up a clean 1996 Tahoe. Struggled with wheel stud replacement for the new wheels for the 56 with a couple days before leaving on Hot Rod Power Tour, and moved the 1949 Chevy truck my Grandpa bought new from my late Uncles barn to our shop. He used it for farming up until 1997 and it was parked. Finally we were able to get back on Garth.

Guess I kinda took a year sabbatical from trucks and I missed them!

[Advanced Design]

We had a friend handle the seat restoration as he and his wife are wanting to do interiors as a side business. They did really well! Here are some before and after.

[Advanced Design]

Wife handled the console refurbishment. She did really well too.

[Advanced Design]

When I went on pause, I was replacing the KWIK ac mounting bracket, shown a few posts ago, with the Holley mounting bracket. The Holley look fits in better with the look of the factory accessory drive on the other side of the engine.

There was an issue with the GM tensioner not fitting as it is too thick / deep between the mounting bosses. The tensioner contacts the mounting bracket at this location before seating and tightening down. A tensioner from another source worked fine.

And the Holley instructions had the ac compressor mislabeled as an SD5 rather than an SD7 as shown on the label on the compressor. Anyway, using the Holley mounting hardware Holley had labeled as SD5 worked for mounting the SD7 compressor.

While I didn’t like the look of the KWIK bracket, I’m not sure it was worth the work and expense to switch over to the Holley bracket.

Having the new shop stool, which is an early birthday present from wife and our two daughters, helped increase the comfort working on the brackets.

[Advanced Design]

The Holley provided procedure to measure for belt length worked really well. Secured the correct belt on the second try working with O’Reilleys.

[Advanced Design]

Installing the new parking brake cables and refurbished supporting hardware was made easier with the disassembly pictures. Phone camera tech has come a long way, making zooming into detail easy.

It appears the parking brake cable will be in the way of the exhaust. Need to give that more inspection and thought…you know, when you sit there and stare at it for awhile? Doing cad cam modeling in your head working on a solution.

[Advanced Design]

Wife and I finished the firewall.

[Advanced Design]

Grandson, wife and I put the body back on the frame. Though we were tired, we did have fun!

[oldman3]

Looks good...Jim

[youngrodder]

Always motivating when you can set the body back on the chassis. It all looks really good.

Marc