In reply to Somebeach (Forum Supporter) :
Definitely interested. I seem to remember you having a bunch of stuff for sale, but assume it had all sold. Didn't you have a fairly solid 1st gen Blazer body? The ZR2 rear would be of particular interest. Not sure, but I think the steering box that comes with the Xtreme/ZQ8 package is the quickest ratio on a factory S10.
In reply to eastsideTim :
I sent you a PM. I did have a very solid 1st gen blazer. I wish I still had it. But my automotive ADD was just to strong.
84FSP, wae, and Cooper_Tired all stopped by this morning for the next step. Didn't take too long, and now the S10's bed is spending the winter vacationing under the back deck, along with the hood. Then, the truck was driven back into the garage for what was likely to be the last time with 4.3 "power". We then vacuumed, chipped, brushed, and swept several pounds of rust and pine needles off the truck (weight reduction!), and discussed plans a bit.
Over the next couple of weeks, I plan on taking some additional measurements, then pulling the engine and transmission, and getting the engine sold quickly to make space. The biggest change in plans is I've decided that, if possible, I'd like to run in the 2025 event. We won't attempt to win, and will be running a "Don't Judge Me" sticker on the windshield during concours, but next year will be 20 years since the first time I attended the challenge, so it'd be neat to be there. Other than not worrying much about how it looks, I think the leaf spring suspension will stick around for this round, but I do still intend to complete a bunch of other major chassis modifications, as I don't want to leave them on hold until next spring.
I'm still compiling a list of parts that are likely to be needed. A fuel cell has been added to that list, and I think I am just going to grab a 5 gallon Ebay special, as they are generally in the same price range as some of the utter crap I've seen advertised on FBM. Going to try to order the majority of parts needed in the next week or so, so I am not waiting around whenever I have time to work on something.
If it's a two wheel drive S10, I am fairly sure that G body and 3rd gen Camaro boxes will fit. There's a 12:1 or so ratio box available.
I mean, you COULD just splice in a 1.5:1 quickener, too, but depending on what kind of deals you find, the box may be cheaper.
Edit: Looks like a certain year range Grand Cherokee gets you the 12.7 ratio and no rare-parts tax.
In reply to Pete. (l33t FS) :
ZQ8 box should be 12.7 already, but if it is looking sketchy, I'll keep that in mind when looking for a replacement.
I think I may be using a Grand Cherokee steering shaft for a little extra length, and getting rid of the rag joint.
In reply to eastsideTim :
In my last truck, I told the kid at autozone that I drove a 3rd gen with the sport package. It's been a few years, but it was a cheap upgrade.
Sadly can't do that with the new one. It's manual and I need the advantage.
8" ground clearance at the front of the cab, 8.5" at the back of the driver's door, and 8.75" at the back of the cab
Just adding a quick note to myself, those numbers change to 8", 8.875", and 9.5" when the bed and hood are removed.
Been plugging away at tearing down the front end/engine compartment of the S10. Finding some bad rust in spots, but planning on keeping at it, because it is still more solid than the Trailblazer was. Not exactly a high bar. It also helps that I just want to get it running and driving for 2025, I can worry about appearances in 2026.
Speaking of rust, Chevy used a lot more clip nuts in the 2nd gen than in the 1st. Despite being careful, I broke 3 of them on the core support alone. Thank goodness for the dremel.
Over the last several days of working on it, here is where it sits. I think I have one more work session (and a lot of garage cleanup) until it is time to pull the engine and transmission.
Parts orders are starting to come in, too. It'll be nice to start mocking up the 5.3 and actually see a light at the end of the tunnel where I start attaching things to the truck rather than detaching them.
Oh yeah, body bushings on this thing are toast. I did some reading, and it appears most hockey pucks are considered too hard, and practice pucks are too weak. Any other ideas? OEM style mounts are way too expensive for a challenge car. If the hardware can be salvaged, polyurethane inserts would be cheaper, but still pretty expensive. At least I could reuse those on the 1st gen, though.
I mean... I've seen aluminum used. Or bodies just welded to the subframe on old F-bodies.
Too hard is not a problem for Challenge car. Hockey pucks can be had for free.
Good point. I may spend a bit on the pucks, too, as some reading mentioned only using ones made in Canada or Europe, because the cheaper ones crack and split pretty quickly. Might stop by the local used sporting goods store first. It'll still be way less than the correct bushings.
In reply to eastsideTim :
When I started rallycrossing, I made spring spacers from 99c hockey pucks purchased from Dick's.
Later, with my Golf, I made a new shifter bushing (the infamous ball at the main shifter rod) with a hockey puck stuck on a bolt in a drill press, and a file. Lasted the life of the car...
One thing I did do with the spring spacers, because I slit them so they could be pigtail shaped, was wrap them in electrical tape so they wouldn't squeeze out.
Did a bit of checking today, since I had an errand to run. I think a difference between southern and northern Ohio is the availability of hockey equipment in stock at discount and sporting goods stores. That's okay, I'll take the reduced amount of road salt as a consolation prize. 
In reply to eastsideTim :
Hockey isn't big here either. I was actually kind of surprised to find them, so I bought a roll, or a pack, or whatever a large grouping is called.
The plan to shorten the frame and move the body has been canceled. Been spending more time under the truck getting ready to pull the engine, and things just keep looking worse. Found a bit more frame rust, although I think I could patch it if need be. However, the seam between the firewall and the floorpan is way worse than I thought it was, and this is what the front left body mount looks like:
No way is that just going to unbolt and re-bolt up elsewhere. And if I start wire wheeling and grinding off rust, I suspect the damage will be more extensive than it looks now. There simply isn't time between now and March to fix it, and do everything else.
So, I am debating my options. First impulse is to scrap and start over, and not fall for the sunk cost fallacy. Second is to just do a basic LS swap, and use 2025 as a test bed for the engine and transmission. If I do that, I just need to figure out how much in unrecoverable purchases I need to make in order to get the truck ready to go. I suspect that'll be mostly ball joints, brake parts, used brake booster, etc. I really want to compete at the 2025 event, so that may just be the way to go.
May also look for a hat car to put on a shortened S10 frame.
Remove the remaining mounts and throughbolt the body to the frame in a dozen or so locations with 1/2" bolts?
In reply to eastsideTim :
Old skateboard wheels really well
Pete. (l33t FS) said:Remove the remaining mounts and throughbolt the body to the frame in a dozen or so locations with 1/2" bolts?
That might be too janky, even for one of my challenge builds. The floor is not flat, so shimming will be required, and the frame is boxed under the cab, so it'd be some very long bolts, and in theory, they'd need some tubing to run through for extra strength.
If I had more working space, some 1x3" rectangular tubing could be used to fab up some replacement floor reinforcement, but what I was planning was already going to be difficult in my garage, I don't want add even more complexity. Not to mention the aforementioned problem of how much cutting/grinding away until I find something solid enough to bolt or weld to.
I'll sleep on it, and see if any new ideas pop up. At the very least, I still might as well pull the drivetrain, so I can get what I want from the transmission.
If the rest of the mounts are okay, and from past pictures that looks to be the case, I'd just start cutting. Tubing is a good idea to span the area you will cut out. It will suck but might as well address that area in case you want to add a roll bar later.
Took the catalytic converter, radiator, and condensor to the scrapper this morning. Netted another $44.50. This puts the S10's budget at $130.50
To get to the challenge in 2025, I think there are two options: Build the S10 like a normal LS swap, or scrap it, then pull the black S10 in the garage for some much needed work, and take it down as an overbudget entry.
If I am willing to skip 2025, and maybe I'll just go down and spectate, cutting into the S10 body is viable, since I'll have more time. Would just need to budget for more steel and bondo/fiberglass than originally planned on.
Secondary option is to buy something else to swap the 5.3 into. Was thinking C4 or 4th gen F-body. But, possible plans for that have changed in the last couple of hours. I need to do some research on how much hackery I can get away with to install the drivetrain into a different platform.
Pulling the drivetrain is the top priority, then I'm going to push the S10 into a corner (figuratively speaking, there's not that much space in the garage) for a while, and concentrate on other work, like cleaning up the engine wiring harness, and converting the Trailblazer transmission to 2WD. Oh yeah, and selling more parts. I've had things listed on FBM for a while, but I have finally ventured back to eBay after a long selling hiatus.
Pretty certain I won't just do a quick swap on it, just to get it to the 2025 event, so it will come down to keeping it, and doing a bunch of extensive work (much of which was already planned), or swapping to another platform. There is a $1200 C4 within a few hours, but I'll need to run numbers to see if the massive handling head start is worth the budget hit. Not to mention the risk of the Corvette tax if there are any oddball suspension bits that need to be replaced. At least stock S10 parts are cheap, and lots of circle track stuff is easy to adapt. Back to reading about 3 link suspension design.
Remind us why you're shortening the frame? If you don't need to do that, you don't need to remove the body. If you don't need to remove the body, you can just ignore that rust and move on with the engine swap :)
maschinenbau said:Remind us why you're shortening the frame? If you don't need to do that, you don't need to remove the body. If you don't need to remove the body, you can just ignore that rust and move on with the engine swap :)
It's partly trying to do something unique to stand out in concours, but also a good chunk of it is to try to improve the dynamics. F/R weight balance and polar moment is horrible on an extended cab S10, so I figured moving the cab back a few inches, the engine back a little less, and the rear axle forward considerably more would help a lot. Also, It should allow me to use the aluminum driveshaft from the trailblazer, instead of the two piece stock driveshaft.
Edit: I feel like I should expand a bit to justify the S10 in the first place. This particular one was chosen because it was cheap and nearby. One of its downfalls is it is the longest wheelbase S10, at 123". The S10 in general was on the list of potential vehicles because I am familiar with it, they can be made to handle respectably well (although we need better than respectable if we intend to win), and it is on the relatively small side for a chassis that can handle a significant increase in horsepower without requiring a ton of engineering or expensive or not so fun to fabricate parts. One reason I kind of wanted to show up in 2025 was to see how much of a handicap the leaf spring rear suspension was, and if I really needed to change it, but I'm a little afraid of doing all the other work, keeping the rear suspension stock-ish, and running out of testing time if I have to change it up.
If cheap, relatively solid fox bodies still grew on trees, I'd probably pick one of them. Miata could be an answer, but they are getting expensive, and neither myself or my teammates own a tubing bender, so any rollcage work would be prohibitive to the budget.
Please don't take any of this as me being offended by you asking the question. It's good to have ones ideas challenged. It's part of why I am seriously thinking about the C4. I think with the old budget recoup rules, showing up with an LS-swapped C4 would be difficult, but now, with the new rules, if one gets lucky (or makes their own luck) on finding a suitable car, it's a viable option, one that I should have considered earlier.
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