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[ProjecT] Work Truck

183K views 2K replies 162 participants last post by  tytotheler92 
#1 ·
So 3 weeks ago my daily driver Beretta decided to crap out on me and I was left with no vehicle and starting a new job in 5 days. Well I didn't have the 2-3 weeks that it was going to take to tear down and rebuild the motor (again) and my parents said that since I wasn't gonna tear down and rebuild the motor that they were "repo-ing" my car and I was now on my own for a vehicle. Well I scraped together all the money I had, and bought a new daily driver/work truck. Its a '95 S10 short cab short bed with a 2.2/5speed and 84,000 miles. Its pure bare bones/work truck. Heat only (no A/C), rubber floor, bench seat, non-tilt column, and even a GM rollpan that was a cheaper option than a real bumper. I got a super deal on it and its been a great work truck for the past 3 weeks. Here's some pics from when I brought it home:













What I love about this truck is the POTENTIAL it has. As you can tell, some aspects of it are a bit rough. The front end is smashed, the passenger mirror is missing, the rollpan is hanging by who knows what, the tailgate handle is bent/crooked, etc. etc. But the body is in great shape for being a '95 and a work truck. There's probably a grand total of 15-20 dents on the truck INCLUDING ones INSIDE the bed. My new job is at a bodyshop so a large part of the plans for the truck is to practice/hone my bodyworking skills on it and then paint it a bit nicer color lol. But the front end needs to be fixed, so might as well swap it for a '98 up front end, right? I need a new mirror so might as well get some Street Scene ones... The rollpan is falling off, so I'm thinking about putting a stock bumper on (EVERYBODY has rollpans....who runs bumpers on a custom truck these days? Besides...all the people who have rollpans can hardly GIVE AWAY their old stock bumpers lol). The tailgate handle is crooked, so might as well shave it and relocate it to the inside...


But anyway...not really sure where this truck/project will head but anything that happens with it will go here in this thread.
 
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#962 ·
Thanks for the good words guys!

Some progress from yesterday...

I was able to drill all the holes for the brake brackets at work on my lunch break, then when I got home I tapped out the caliper abutments to 7/16" and then worked on getting the brackets set up. I made them both on 1 piece of 1/4" plate and only started working on 1 to start, so the other one is the excess material hanging off the back







The bends were facilitated by cutting the metal about halfway through with the cutoff wheel and then hammering it over to the desired bend in the vice. Then the V that opened up due to the bend will get filled in with weld. Unfortunately I chose to guesstimate the amount of distance to add the the length of the bracket that would be required to make it sit at the right place after the bend instead of using geometry to calculate it out, and after the bend was put in the caliper sits too far out on the disc. It's not a hard fix, but it will require completely cutting the caliper part of the bracket off, shortening the area where the bend is, and then welding it back on in the right place.

While I was working on all the caliper stuff, my buddy Matt was busy grinding away, cleaning up the leafs and shackles and stuff to prep them for POR. He's been a huge help with all my projects in the past 9 months or so and it's awesome to have a friend that doesn't mind being a worker bee, even with the most tedious tasks like grinding.



In that last pic you can see how the caliper sits too far out on the disc, and how the 2nd bracket is drilled but uncut and still attached to the first bracket. That was all the farther I got before hitting a wall of being dead tired, so I called it a night.

Today Matt is at the house working more on the cleanup/prep work (he doesn't have a job right now and loves getting out of the house and helping, even if it just means grinding all day lol). I'm hoping that by the time I get home everything can be prepped and maybe even painted so that we can roll the truck in and get this all installed and just be DONE with this project
 
#964 ·
Yeah he's been a godsend when it comes not only to helping get the work done, but helping me stay motivated to want to do the work :)

And thanks... I know the brakes will turn out good, it's just hard not being able to have them done before I swap them on, like I was able to do with the fronts
 
#968 ·
Oh I know... that's why the next step for this truck is to get my No Axle Arc 6link which will lay out on the 32s but still lift up 18" to match the front, all while keeping the rear wheels perfectly centered in the wheelwells the whole time :)
 
#969 ·
Brent = 2wd S10 Jedi


Sent from my Autoguide iPhone app
 
#972 ·
No problem Jordan.

And to update everyone, got the prep work done on the leafs/shackles/etc but we ran out of time for paint to we just had to assemble everything and I'll paint it later either on or off the truck. With the stock springs and lift shackles alone it sat a little too tall, but we had to compress the springs a bit to get the shocks to bolt in, so the shocks limit it to sit perfectly level with the front, if not a tick bit higher. When the bed goes on it will probably be just enough weight to not stress the shocks. The calipers and everything else just got reassembled as is because my wife needed her truck today. Well unfortunately at 1:30am we were still probably an hour from being done so my wife told me to pull the plug and that she would find a way to work out a ride today and I could finish it up tonight. Needless to say she wasn't too thrilled about it lol

All that's left to do is finish cleaning the old gasket material off the diff and then seal it up and fill it, cut/bend/grind/weld the other brake bracket, and then mount the caliper and bleed the brakes. Also at one point when pulling the truck back in the garage it decided to puke a bunch of trans fluid so I need to check/fill that, and also secure the taillights down to the bumper with tape or some other method (bed won't be going back on til I can get everything painted)

No pics today, sorry. Hopefully lots tomorrow tho
 
#979 ·
so after seeing this thing with it's stance, i feel you need some wicked wide rollers, beefy tars, glass fenders and bed and a long travel setup and make it into a prerunner.

kthx! expect those pics tomorrow of all that done!
 
#981 ·
Ok, got it done last night, but not done done in my mind. Just done enough to drive. Got the diff sealed up and filled up with fresh gear lube, built the other caliper bracket, installed it, and then bled brakes, and then strapped the taillights to the frame. Then I took a quick trip to the gas station for gas and to top off the brake fluid (and of course to see how it rode/drove). The front rides awesome with the shocks at 100psi. The rear however, needs some help. The shocks are shorter than the free hanging height of the leafs so we had to compress the leafs a bit to get the shocks to bolt on. Well as it sits there's constant tension on the springs due to that, plus with having no weight on the back it just rides stiff as a brick and is bouncing all over the place. I'm going to see if I can mount the leaf in the lower height hole of the shackles so that it's full extended when the shocks are, and the two aren't battling and giving me a stiff ride.

Only 1 pic just now in the morning as I got to work... I'll try to get more at lunch time

 
#989 ·
Yeah I can agree with that. I prefer the slammed stance (especially now that I have the Stealths), and wish I had some nice 33x12.50x18 Mud Grapplers or something to go on the 18s for the lift. But these are the parts I have, I have nearly nothing invested in it all, and It looks pretty decent for what it is IMO.

Once I get my 6link built it will be going back to being slammed for summertime. I'm debating that if I take it to Camp N Drag to show it on Fri slammed and then show it lifted on Sat, like a 'multiple personalities' kinda thing, and to show off the range/benefits of my 6link (and probably my upper arms at that point too) and maybe even compete for a Best Engineered award


I guess it's not so much about the overall look when it is in this 'lifted mode' as it is the fact that I can be lowered or lifted whenever I want, by simply changing spindles and wheels
 
#999 ·
Well you must be some type of future teller, because that's the exact plan :) Truck will be getting everything finalized to be 100% reliably daily driveable in it's current lifted state and then will be staying that way while I work to finish putting the crew cab together. Once the crew cab is done I am using it to build my 6link on, then the 6link will get swapped onto this and it will go back to being slammed until I choose to lift it again :cool:
 
#996 ·
#997 ·
556mm said:
driveway kustoms said:
wicked mayhem said:
man i totally dont understand the point of this. It looked way better on the new style zq8's laying on the ground. Maybe if it had a meaty looking tire on its lifted setup it would look better?
yea the whole idea of lowering it, lifting it, and lowering it again is totally dumb :p
i was thinking the same thing. Pot meet kettle.
Driveway Kustoms said:
I was just making fun of his blazer, as 556mm said haha
beandip said:
That was a joke towards wicked mayhem lol.

He lifted, then lowered, then sold it, and then lowered, then lifted lol.
http://www.stanceiseverything.com/2009/12/indecisive/
Ah ok, I got it all now after looking more closely at who quoted who and whatnot. And that is rather humorous, although I don't know that I ever knew he had lifted his Blazer before he slammed it. Thanks for clearing that up guys!
 
#1,003 ·
lol no, the job I have is far from badass. I don't make much at all and my wife and I are stretched rather thin because of it :( Like I've said before though, most of the parts and stuff for this thing I've had for 2-4 years now, and I just finally got around to putting them all together and making something out of them :)
 
#1,004 ·
That makes it even better man. You've done some cool stuff for someone on a budget. I hope my stuff gets done the way I've got it in my head. Lol. I know where you're coming from since I've got 2 kids and a wife that stays home to take care of them :haha:

Anyway...awesome trucks man. Lookin foward to updates on all of them
 
#1,005 ·
That makes it even better man. You've done some cool stuff for someone on a budget. I hope my stuff gets done the way I've got it in my head. Lol. I know where you're coming from since I've got 2 kids and a wife that stays home to take care of them :haha:

Anyway...awesome trucks man. Lookin foward to updates on all of them

i hear ya on the 2 kids and wife staying at home. Its hell to build a nice truck on 1 income
 
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