1990 Chevrolet Sport forever project

[Matt R]

Hi folks, I'm new here and want to introduce myself.

My name is Matt Roberts. I have a bit of a sad story about the truck. I inherited it from my brother when he passed away in 2001. He bought the truck almost new in '90. My brother pampered the truck for the first few years, then we used it as a work truck. He bought a new Impala SS in 95 and it became his new baby. The truck then got somewhat neglected. It sat in the weeds, had 4 flat tires, fuel injectors go bad, rust on the roof and hood, ect.

It kinda became my outlet or therapy to work on the truck. My brother was into car audio and got me into it when we were teenagers so I had to do a killer system in it. I spent a couple years working on it slowly, repairing the interior, lowering it, stereo, ect. I then decided to do some audio competitions and got in pretty deep. The truck is a pretty accomplished competition vehicle with 4 championships in IASCA and MECA.

I've done 2 rounds of upgrades to the truck in the last 7 years or so. I'll post up some of the first pics of the truck. I did a 3-4 drop with djm 3" Aarms and 4" shackel and hanger kit. It spent 6 months in a bodyshop and got painted twice (long, bad story). The paint is two tone black with house of kolor marble on top with brandy wine candy over it. The paint turned out pretty good and held up for several years. It is now showing signs of needing a redo The wheels are 20" boss 301

[Matt R]

Round 2 was to step up my game with better speaker placement in the dash. That meant a new dash. I built the whole thing from scratch. The truck also got 22" 9.5" wheels with BFG kdw's. I also put new amps in and painted them like the exterior of the truck.

[Matt R]

The truck is now getting round 3. It is getting a little lower and all new suspension. I've been reading about No Limits "make it handle" and want to do some of the cool suspension upgrades. I've been chopping up the frame a little, boxing it in, moving crossmembers ect. I'm moving the gas tank and battery to the back. The rear end is getting chemically stripped right now and a 4 bar, coilover kit is coming as soon as the rearend comes back. I'll be updating pics of the suspension and all the other stuff coming up.

Hope you enjoy, Matt

[Matt R]

Here are a couple pics at an audio competition.

[Kim57]

Welcome.
Sorry for the loos of your brother.
Very nice looking truck.
Kim

[jb1016]

Yes, nice truck; I bet your brother would be proud.

[Matt R]

Thanks guys, I've been working hard on boxing and stiffening the frame. I'll have some pics up of that soon.

[gmt400]

Good lookin truck. look forward to seeing more

[Matt R]

So here are some pics of the start of the rear rebuild. The rear had a 4" drop from DJM and some Doesh Tech shocks. All that is coming out for a home made frame notch and some fairly serious, (IMO) even over board chassis mods.

[Matt R]

I measured a bunch and came up with a total height for the frame. I'll have to notch the hat channel under the bed in a few spots but I really didnt want to raise the bed or put a big box in the middle of it.

The notches are made frome some really heavy duty stuff and doubled up. It is 3/16" x 1.5" x 3.5" material for a total of 3" by 3.5" double tube.

[Matt R]

Here is before I doubled up the notch. I also started on boxing the frame. That meant wending in some nuts for the rear bumper before i boxed it in.

[Matt R]

Here is a home made version of a hidden hitch that i'm also using as tortional frame stiffening. It forms an A frame that is much harder to twist than a more standard rear frame brace. It'ss plated with 1/8" plate on the front and back. There are also pics of the new gas tank location, its a 1988 Blazer tank.

[Matt R]

I mocked up the old rear end to check clearences and such. I have more tortional stiffening done to the middle of the frame, those pics will be coming next.

[Kim57]

Looks good.
Kim

[Matt R]

I got some more done on the frame. I've made 2 tortional braces and I have one more planned. The next one will double as the trans crossmember. I'll be doing it later when the new trans gets in. It will be a th400 and it mounts 5" further back than the th350 that is in it now.

[Matt R]

Here is some more pics of the frame bracing closer to finished

[Matt R]

I did a little mock up of the sway bar, just to get an idea of what I need to do to mount it.

[Matt R]

I dont know if I mentioned the future driveline plans but it's going to be a stroker bigblock with a th400 trans. I have a friend that had some closed chamber heads already punched out with big valves. I wanted to get an idea of what it was going to take to fully port the runners and work the bowls. I haven't ported a set of heads in probobly 15 years or so, i just wanted to get my feet wet again.

[Matt R]

I got the rear end back and started to set it up for the suspension. I got the pinion angle set and welded the rearend to the frame with some braces.

[Matt R]

I mocked up the 4 bars on the bench to get a good idea of placement.

[Matt R]

the panhard bar was next, I had to shorten the axle mount a bit to keep it as close to the rear end as possible. The gas tank is going to be pretty tight and needs as much clearance as possible.

[Matt R]

I had to get a little creative to make my current sway bar work. The mounts had to pass through the frame to get some length to the arms. I had to make them straight to make it happen.

[Matt R]

You can see the sway bar mount on top of the frame in this shot, I think. These are also the coilover mounting pics. Thanks for looking.

Matt

[Kim57]

That's some wild work you're doing Matt.
Looks good.
Kim

[Matt R]

Thanks Kim, i'm painting the rearend today so it can go back to the dif shop for finishing up.