New project! The "Red Herring"

[lower50's]

Nice job on the rad. keep it coming.

[JJorgensen52]

Originally Posted by 7dee2

Looks great Jim! Man you move fast!

Us single guys can put in a lot more hours

Originally Posted by lower50's

Nice job on the rad. keep it coming.

Thanks for the kind words, guys!

Tonight is a hodge-podge. New MAF sensor came in; I order the cheapest variant (Dorman brand) because I just wanted the housing:


And here it is with the correct sensor for the truck motor swapped in.


It's within a 1/16" of the diameter of the original MAF mounting point in the airbox, so I shouldn't have to mess with the tune.

Went junkyard shopping for exhaust hangers

I'm hoping to get started on that over the weekend.

I also started on some of the physical parts of wiring - I've cut in the first firewall junction block:


You can see the marking for the second just barely, inboard of the brake booster. Each one will carry 36 wires, and they're both FULL in my harness ... turns out despite there being a lot of space on the firewall, there's very few places large enough to mount these things! Hoping to get at least a little wiring done over the weekend, as well.

Last shot, rotated my waterneck down to mimic the 5th gen Camaro style

I think I can work with this, and those waternecks are only $20, vs. $130 for a swivel one ... yikes!!

[Advanced Design]

Resourceful..I vote for the $20 waterneck too. Good idea on the MAF as well.
You may have mentioned...Kwik bracket for the a/c?
Really good progress JJ...all the little things can really eat up time.

[solidaxel]

Can you extend your air box into the wheel well and maybe get some cooler air than the air from under hood by the exhaust manifolds?
Cooler air makes a BIG difference with these engines

[JJorgensen52]

Originally Posted by Advanced Design

Resourceful..I vote for the $20 waterneck too. Good idea on the MAF as well.
You may have mentioned...Kwik bracket for the a/c?
Really good progress JJ...all the little things can really eat up time.

Thanks! They really do eat time, that's for sure. The devil's in the details. I got the idea for the thermostat housing from a guy with a Nova swap, also got a good PN for a hose that fits pretty well. Glad to have one more thing sorted!

Originally Posted by solidaxel

Can you extend your air box into the wheel well and maybe get some cooler air than the air from under hood by the exhaust manifolds?
Cooler air makes a BIG difference with these engines

I definitely want cool air, and I was thinking of going directly into the wheel well, but I was a little concerned about getting water in the housing if it got driven in the rain or what have you. Right now, I'm thinking of running a duct from the box down the inner fender and pulling air from the space under the floor where the battery used to be, but outside the frame and away from the exhaust.

[solidaxel]

Anything to get cooler air

[JJorgensen52]

Working on the fuse panel tonight. I've been thinking on this one for days because there are two 5/16" studs on the one end, the fuses are fed from individual 100A busses molded into the panel. I finally came up with this arrangement where the panel is slid into two pieces of channel and screwed down on the bottom at one end, and the top at the other (giving clearance for the studs).


Here's the panel installed, I have plenty of clearance to the hood and still a goodly amount of room underneath for wiring access. You can also see my two bulkhead pass-throughs.


Hard to imagine, but I'm using all 10 relays in the center and I think 37 of 40 fuses ... yikes!!


I'm also going to be mounting the ECM/TCM on that inner fender, probably below the brake booster. They were mounted from the factory below the auxiliary battery tray on the driver's side of the truck.

[JJorgensen52]

Let's see if I can do this in something vaguely resembling order:
Intake elbow came in. Clearance is good on the fan and the belt drive. Yes my intake is presently made of PVC


Finished up the fuse panel mount. Realized I wasn't going to be able to take the panel out of it once it's wired, so painted it before installing:


Trailer hitch went on. It determines some of the exhaust, fuel and electrical routing so it was time to get it in place.


Pulled the rear springs and installed the track bar to center the rear end and push it right up to the bump stops so I can route the exhaust with adequate clearance (as well as check my tire - fender... a little snug!). Also confirmed that my driveshaft does NOT bottom out anywhere in the range ... somebody put some nagging doubts in my head on that one a while back.


Started in on the exhaust tonight. System is 304SS, 2.25" true duals, doing a traditional H-type crossover in 1.75" behind the trans cross member. Decided to route below the frame rather than through, because once my running boards are on, this will be level with them anyway so no need to take all the extra effort.


Let me tell you what, welding 16ga tubing to 1/2" manifold flanges is a PAIN!!! Using a 312SS rod on the stick welder to do a base pass and capping with the MiG ... ugly but it'll hold.



The flanges are set up for 2.5" OD pipe, so I had to expand the end of the tube to fit, which is okay because it allowed for some misalignment to clear the lower A-Arm mounts.

In other news, the new water neck came in today. It's not clocked down *quite* as much as I had hoped, which means it's back to the catalog for round #3 of hunting for a lower hose, but it WILL clear the frame so that is good news.

Lastly, started laying out the engine harness in prep for doing the wiring - decided I'm not happy with the routing, so I'm going to be re-looming a portion of that and shortening some stuff up, to do a partial wiring tuck so it will all be hidden under the center cover I haven't made yet. Going to relocate PCM/TCM to the firewall and bring the harness off the motor at the rear for neater appearance.

Wow. Words!

[Advanced Design]

Good progress JJ. Getting a lot done!

[JJorgensen52]

Originally Posted by Advanced Design

Good progress JJ. Getting a lot done!

A lot of effort for sure Thanks!

Didn't get a whole lot done tonight -if there's one tool I really rely on for this stuff it's my angle grinder, and I wore the thing plum out! Just brushes, I ordered some replacements and jury rigged it for now, but that put a dent in my shop time.



I'm working on the H-pipe right now, have to cope the second end and then I'll move on to test fits. Thinking maybe that's enough exhaust ???

Also, for anybody interested, I'm using this tool:
http://www.metalgeek.com/static/cope.pcgi

Turns out to be pretty handy for making tubes fit together.

[Advanced Design]

Thanks for the link...http://www.metalgeek.com/static/cope.pcgi

Saved in favorites. Pretty handy!

[lower50's]

I second that with the angle grinder.

[JJorgensen52]

Originally Posted by lower50's

I second that with the angle grinder.

It's a love hate relationship for me, I'm not a huge fan of using it and it loves to try and kill me

Got the h-pipe in tonight


I also mounted my front two hangers to the frame (no mounts on the exhaust yet) and I've planned exactly my moves as far as the mufflers right ahead of the rear axle - after that, it's all still a bit wishy-washy but I've got an idea what should work. Stay tuned to see what kind of zany plumbing I come up with

Wednesday is usually a short shop day for me, goings on at church in the evening. Tomorrow isn't looking good either, late afternoon meetings at work. I'm really hoping to hear this thing run soon!

[JJorgensen52]

More progress. Snapped this one while I was welding the V-bands on the muffler side elbows (a LOT easier out of the truck, but I must've pulled this thing a dozen times today )


Also added the requisite O2 sensor bungs


One of the things I'm working on as I design and build parts for this truck is ease of service - I've worked on or around too many customized vehicles where you just can't get to anything, and I want no part in it. So every stage of this involves thinking and fiddling and trials to make sure those little things (like the O2 sensors) are easy to access, you can get a wrench on them. The devil's in the details!

A little detail here - these particular pieces are the tailpipe hangers from '98+ S10 pickups - they've got a bend to them, and they only come in one direction, so I have one mounted on top and one underneath to get the angles right.

And with the front section installed:


That 3/8" stainless hanger rod is TOUGH to bend, but it's plenty strong so I'm not too worried about the length of the horizontal run on the hangers. They're preloaded just a tad, to take a little stress off the manifolds.

This shows the run of the leg where it climbs over the trailing arms:


With the V-bands in place there, I have about 1" clearance to the trailing arm at the bump stop.

Last shot, I've got the mufflers mocked up:


I need to extend my 45 degree bends about 3" to get the bend in the right place, then I'll drop over the axle with a 90 and another 90 out underneath and up towards the fender - I'm going to drop the tips out at the back of the fender at probably 30 degrees downward and 45 degrees out.

Hopefully these pictures of the process are helpful to somebody down the road. I know I spent hours combing through build threads looking for ideas.

On a different note - how close can I get to the bed floor, and do I need heat shields over my mufflers?? I'm thinking yes on muffler shields, but the bend at the axle wants to be within about 1" of the bed floor and I'm not so sure I like that plan...

[JJorgensen52]

Finally found a lower radiator hose that fits


And I got my mufflers welded up with hangers:


I'm cutting the 45 elbows down and putting a V-band right ahead of the axle so I can still get them in and out easily. May have to do some funny business with the angles to get it all to fit and clear ... we'll see

Another S10 hanger - this one hangs the muffler on Blazers

[DeanTX]

Its cool you will be able to keep the full depth of your bed. Did you have to raise the bed any?

[JJorgensen52]

Originally Posted by DeanTX

Its cool you will be able to keep the full depth of your bed. Did you have to raise the bed any?

Nope, the bed is sitting right at the height it's supposed to be. I am not going to be running the axle this high, I would have to C-notch if I wanted to do that, but it's allowing me to route for clearance.

[Advanced Design]

Exhaust looks good JJ. Nice work! You are killing it on progress. How many hours a week are you able to put in on the truck?

[JJorgensen52]

Originally Posted by Advanced Design

Exhaust looks good JJ. Nice work! You are killing it on progress. How many hours a week are you able to put in on the truck?

Thanks! Right now, I'm probably managing 30 - 35 hours a week. Work is generally a bit slower for me in the summertime.

I was thinking the other day about how many total hours I have in this (and how much it would cost to have had it built ), and I decided I wasn't interested in trying to figure it out

[JJorgensen52]

I've been a little distracted this weekend... more on that in a minute.

Built the passenger's side tailpipe


I had to slice the tubing all which ways to get the clearance I wanted ... I wish I had a mandrel bender



You may note there's not a hanger yet - it's going to be the same hanger as an S10 Blazer tailpipe, just haven't drilled the mounting holes yet. That makes three hangers per side.

I'm going to slash cut the tip about 1" below the fender line, but I want it to be parallel to the ground so I'm not sure where that is yet, so not yet.


So who recognizes this one?


I picked this little bugger up for a song with no engine or trans but a nice clean body and all the important pieces that go with it - it's going to get an LS1/T56 swap in the future - but I had it at a friend's house and it was sitting in a field, so I wanted to retrieve it and get it home now that I have some space.

[lower50's]

Great job on the exhaust, should sound sweet. I'm doing the same accessible thing for the maintenance on my truck. As for the clearance for the mufflers and pipe 1" to the bed should be lots, I have 1/2"- 3/4" clearance from the mufflers to the fiberglass tub on my jeep 2' from the motor for many years no prob. If that helps.

[Advanced Design]

Typhoon?

[oldman3]

Originally Posted by Advanced Design

Typhoon?

Doug, I think you mean Syclone (spelling?) for pickups. Typhoon was the Blazer type. Drove both of them when I was with Chevy, at the time they were fast...Jim

[Advanced Design]

Originally Posted by oldman3

Doug, I think you mean Syclone (spelling?) for pickups. Typhoon was the Blazer type. Drove both of them when I was with Chevy, at the time they were fast...Jim

Jim, yes I think that is right. I was Buick back then and we didn't get to spend time with the trucks. I had the Typhoon and Syclone reversed in my memory. They were 4.3 turbo's weren't they? Been a long time for me.

So JJ, another project?

[iowaboynca]

Originally Posted by Advanced Design

They were 4.3 turbo's weren't they?

Oh...giddyup of a Grand National in a truck. I wanted one as a kid and the rumor was could never get it insured. Forget the fact i couldn't afford one in the first place.

What cracked me up were the guys that put 200lbs of stereo equipment in the Typhoons and think they were bad a...you get the idea. (where's my Def Lepard "Hysteria" cassette???)

Nice haul, looks like your toy box is growing