Quote:
Originally Posted by Desert1957
My thoughts about the S10 is, I can totally do the frame, suspension, engine and drive train while keeping the donor completely together in case of needing to move it around.
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a very good point and one that I logged in to make until I saw your post.
my advice is to keep the AD in as big of chunks as you can. the front clip can be taken off in one piece and isnt that hard to move around by yourself, especially if you put it in a wheelbarrow. there is no need to break it into smaller pieces, you can work it and install it as the larger chunk easily. or for another example, you can keep the fenders on the bed by flipping it over, taking them off is just one more reassembly step. taking doors off means you have to get them lined back up. if you keep it as a front clip, cab, and bed, the only other parts you end up with are the hood (has to come off only because the cab wont balance on a cherry picker with it installed) the running boards and the bumpers. build simple wooden carts to roll the big stuff around.
for deciding on your plan, I have posted this before and it can help decide between various suspension types:
what is your...
1. space? Do you have room to have one or two or even three trucks completely taken apart and still have room to work? garage or driveway?
2. tools? Do you have a welder? a torch? a grinder?
3. skill? have you ever welded? wired a vehicle from scratch? replaced every part of every system on a vehicle?
4. punchlist? LS/LQ/LM swap? Air conditioning? Interior? see #3, can you do all of this yourself (no lying, if you havent done it and you think you can that can be the kind of hubris that makes a lot of these projects get sold on craigslist as a pile of parts)
5. timeframe? drive in a year? two years? next month?
6. budget? this is a big one. take a piece of paper and write down everything you think you will buy, then write down what you think it will cost. add it up. double it. double it again. do you have that much?