69 C-10 Gen III buildup

[Wasted Income]

These next few posts are copy and paste from my thread on another page. Thought you guys might want to see, too.

This will be a work in progress, and I'll post updates as I complete them...dunno how fast this is going to progress along, but my bonus check comes in March

The subject:
1969 C-10 pickup that I've had since I was 14 years old. Started life with a 250 Inline 6 cylinder and a three on the tree, was converted to a 1994 TBI 350 and 700-R4 by me back in high school, and I sort of lost interest in this truck in college. I also ripped the EFI off of it several years ago because it never quite ran right. Hello Holley 4 bbl. Well now that I have a job that pays better than minimum wage, I can get back to work on this thing. Here's a couple pics of the rig, and the mota that's in it now.




The new bullet:
1999 5.3L Gen III Small Block Chevy with 80,000 miles on 'er. Also gonna find a 4L60E or a 4L80E (in prep for twin turbos) and get it in and running before I mess with it too much. Gonna stab a Z06 cam in it though before it goes between the framerails, and I've got some stainless shorty headers for it, too. Then comes a pair of snails, or perhaps one big one....we'll see.

[Wasted Income]

SWEEEEEEEEEEEET!!!

I just found for sale locally, a '99 4L60E with 116k miles on it, with converter, 3 month warranty, and they claim it works perfectly.

$308.85 out the door, with tax, and since it's local, I don't need to pay to ship it. Whoo hoo!! Hope to go pick it up later this week! Getting closer!!

[Wasted Income]

Well even though I've been pretty sick lately (flu or something) I enlisted the help of a couple of buddys (bribed with beer) to help me yank the old engine and trans out, for the guy who bought it.

Here's the trans I bought last week...1999 4L60-E, and it's the exact same length as the 700R4 that I pulled out:


Gettin' started:


Slowly but surely coming apart:


Where did the top of the core support go???:


Oh...there it is : )


Took some tweaking and prying to get it all out in one piece with the headers on, but we got it:


Eeew...lots of cleanup to do. Gotta get rid of all those wires. Most are left over from the TBI setup:

[Wasted Income]

Ordered my fuel pump today. Walbro 255 60 gph at 60 psi ought to git R dun.....this pump is supposed to safely supply 800 hp....hehehe.

[Wasted Income]

Updatez:

Here's my wiring harness just before being sent to Speartech for a stand alone conversion. I could've done it myself and saved $450, but saving myself the headache and time is worth more to me...plus I'll know it's done right.


The new powerplant just itching to get between those fenders and rock the blue truck's world.


Yuck. Got some cleaning up to do. Been thinking about spraying the firewall flat black? Any feedback on that idea?


The interior is pretty ugly right now, too, but I'm re-wiring the whole cab, and getting ready for the AutoMeter Ultralite gauges I'm planning to keep tabs on da 5.tree.


Picked up some goodies I needed from a buddy at work: Extra intake (how would that look plumbed with a fogger nitrous kit??), extra fuel rails and injectors, cruise control box, throttle cable, extra throttle body, Y-pipe with cats, and a Mass Air Flow sensor.

[Wasted Income]

Yay for new parts! Some fuel line, fittings, my Walbro fuel pump, and a urethane trans mount. I think that should pretty much take care of the fuel system parts.


Couple of shameless shots of my girls



FECK! Pulled the driver side exhaust manifold to find this. Tried to get it out with an easy out, and you guessed it, busted the easy out off in it. Gonna try to drill around the easy out with tiny drill bits and then helicoil it...else I guess I'm getting some LS6 heads


Took advantage of some of the 60* weather we had here to wash up the engine bay a little. Much better!


Had to do a little grinding on the block to make my LSx to SBC motor mount adapters work.


Not bad for an hour on solidworks, and 30 mins on the CNC plasma! Those are my old busted-ass SBC mounts, the new urethane ones should be here from Summit on Monday.

[Wasted Income]

Woah, that hiatus was longer than I expected!!

Anyways, on to the updates...

Me and a buddy built a MUCH needed workbench for my garage. I don't know how I lived for so long without one!!??


After the bench was built, it was on to getting the motor and trans bolted together for some mockup action. Got too late to get it stabbed in the framerails, but it will go in soon.


Mmmmm...pretty new parts!!


My Speartech harness came a few weeks ago. This thing looks great. Only a few wires to hook up, and then all I have to do is tune the ECM.


Decided to wire on a deutsch connector to the fuel pump, for ease of assembly and possible future disassembly.


Here's the fuel pump and all associated hardware and wiring, ready to be mounted in the frame, plumbed up, and wired. I'm getting ever closer!!

[Wasted Income]

Here's all my old exhaust that I sawzall'd off.


Here's the fuel pump in it's new home. Just needs to be mounted yet.


Nothing like a little help from your younger brother.


What's this?? Motor in the framerails??


My nifty GM quick disconnect to -6 AN fittings with the fuel lines hooked up.


Got the trans crossmember in place and bolted in. Everything bolted up really well, surprisingly.


Gave the 5.3 and 4L60-E a bath in Simple Green. Much nicer!!

[Wasted Income]

Painted the firewall and heater box flat black. Me likey!


Remember that broken bolt with the broken EZ-out? Well, I ended up hogging the hole out enough to get it out. My buddy Craig came over and welded it up, and now I'm gonna re-drill and heli-coil it.

[Wasted Income]

Progress has been somewhat slow....getting paid once a month sucks!!

Anyways...

Here's the latest glamour shot of my mota.


Picked up some nifty caps to cap off some of my AN lines.



Got the welded head drilled, tapped and heli-coiled. Bolted right up. SWEET!


New GM Performance Parts plug wires....bling bling.

[Wasted Income]

My buddy Portholio helping with the "final" install. I think he was saying something to the effect of "What??? You're not letting me port your heads yet?????" They will make their way to the dojo of flow soon enough.





Hmm...looks like I need to port the frame!!



Fuel lines are all hooked up and ready to go.


More bling. My new radiator. It's pretty cool....haha

[Wasted Income]

Looks like I can check the power steering lines off the list, too.


Drilled the water pump and plugged it for the time being, until I can run the steamlines here.


Poor pic of the mounting of my Derale tran cooler.

[jkade]

Dang, you are moving right along.

[Hart_Rod]

Looks great! Nice documentation.

[blaznhot_23]

looks good nice editorial with each pic

[Wasted Income]

Got the radiator mocked up, and fabbed some mounts. Still need to find some better hardware and shoot some paint on them, but they seem to do the trick, perfectly.




Finished up with the frame grinding, and got my trans cooler lines run and secured out of the way. It's finally starting to look like a truck again....

[oscareltemblo]

Nice.

[droppedgmc]

shweet

[Yukon Jack]

That was some good reading! Quite the project.

[killer71]

keep the pictures coming!

[Wasted Income]

Originally Posted by killer71

keep the pictures coming!

LOL, you guys are gonna keep me motivated on this project, wanting all these pictures and whatnot!! (No worries, motivation....and cash, has been lacking lately )

[shifty]

it's cool stuff, always nice to see how everyone else does it, one of these days, after enough people post their way of doing things, we'll have a well-defined outline of how to pull off the swap in a couple of days, parts lists required, costs involved, options available for configurations, pictures galore and ...

then we'll need a subforum dedicated to GenIII swaps heh!!

[oscareltemblo]

Originally Posted by shifty

it's cool stuff, always nice to see how everyone else does it, one of these days, after enough people post their way of doing things, we'll have a well-defined outline of how to pull off the swap in a couple of days, parts lists required, costs involved, options available for configurations, pictures galore and ...

then we'll need a subforum dedicated to GenIII swaps heh!!

I agree we need one ...

[Ford Assassin]

I am going to build a custom Auto Meter dash for my '69 C10 that is currently going through a 5.3/4L65 swap.

Can I tap into the factory wiring harness to make the water temp, oil pressure, speedo, and tach?

[lofly'a]

bump!!