A week before coming home for fall break of 2007 I drove out to DVAP to get a crucial piece for the Blazer fuel tank install. Their yard had a LWB 67-72 truck sans bed, which was perfect for my needs. I had one of the yard lackeys torch the rearmost crossmember out for me. They charged a princely sum for it, but I didn't have the patience to try and locate a 67-72 LWB in one of Phoenix's pick 'n pull yards and then sit in the sun trying to remove it's rear crossmember with hand tools. September in Maricopa County is not a pleasant time to work outdoors.
After measuring, mocking up and then relocating the original crossmember this is what I came up with:
That extra crossmember I had sourced went in front of the fuel tank. My original one was moved to just behind it. All tightened down, the tank's original rub pads cinched snugly against both crossmembers. Since I wasn't planning on dealing with rust for a long time after the Suburban reached completion, all of the fasteners I could replace on the frame and elsewhere have been stainless steel. I regularly depleted the local hardware store's stock.
That same week I had taken the fuel tank to a man in town my dad recommended me to. Said man removed the fuel filler neck from the tank, relocated it to the opposite side and filled in the hole that was left behind. This way it was positioned to utilize the stock fuel filler location without running excessively long lines anywhere.
The tank was secured in position with some new '73-'91 straps as I didn't have a clue where the originals had wandered off to. New holes were drilled in the crossmembers for stainless bolts to pass through and fit into couplers added to the tank straps.
If you look really close at that last picture you'll spot my Off Road Design 1” Zero Rate Add-a-Leaves bolted under the rear spring packs. These were necessary because they let us move the axle rearward 1.5”. If you recall, the tires had been too close to the fenders after we installed ORD's 4” shackle flip. As an added bonus, the rear was lifted an extra inch.
We reused the fuel hard lines from either my grandfather's '88 truck, or another Chevy of the same vintage. I was surprised how closely they fit the contours of my frame. A little bit of bending and tweaking took place to get them properly secured back by the tank itself but other than that everything curved perfectly. The front braided steel lines that lead to the TBI unit got a little pinched at some point in time, so I contemplated eventually replacing them.
Sometime over the past year I had ordered a full stainless steel hard brake line kit for the Suburban. Actually, I ordered Inline Tube p/n SCTB71B4 which is for a 1972 Suburban 4wd with power disc brakes. It was the option that seemed to suit my rig the best. The sales rep who took my order at Inline Tube wasn't quite sure I knew what I was doing, but the fit was almost perfect when the lines were secured in place. The rear axle hard lines couldn't be used as they were completely different, and a couple of sections needed a little adjusting with the line bender but in 2010 everything is currently connected and holding pressure.
The headers in that last picture are the final ones my dad bought for me. A nice set of ceramic coated D303Y Doug's.
Now it was starting to look like something.
Next order of business was to put the body back on the frame. I had ordered the stock replacement body mounts from Brothers Trucks many moons ago. They were on back order from General Motors for a few months, but arrived in time for the install.
I was ready to replace those old body mount bolts too.
The new ones would be zinc-coated Grade 5 or Grade 8 hardware.
Before the body went back on the frame it had to be pushed back into the shop and corralled onto the lift. Those little caster front tires miraculously still held air a year and a half later. The back ones were still useless. First I had to place a piece of plywood in the gravel under the Suburban, then the floor jack rolled on top of the plywood sheet. Otherwise we would have never negotiated the gravel with those tiny solid metal wheels on a floor jack. The proverbial sailing was fairly smooth once we got back onto the pavement. It took three guys to simultaneously push and steer all that mass up the slope that led to the bay we were headed for.
I had to go back and check my pictures in order to determine where the lift arms and stands had been placed when we removed the body. I didn't want to be lowering it onto the frame only to realize that one of the lift arms was going to hit before the body did.
One of the plans I had formulated during the 'off season' if you will, was to clean and POR-15 coat the underside of the body before it was reattached to the frame.
Because this was a shop that had to be open for business five days a week, I only got time to sand, prep and coat the parts that would be immediately covered up and made inaccessible later by the frame and drivetrain. I took a closer look at the rusty front floor supports and added them to my shopping list.
The other area I wanted to tackle before the body and frame met up again was the firewall. It was going to be unreachable behind that large motor, plus it still needed to be modified to clear that driver's side valve cover. A number of extra holes in the firewall were welded shut by yours truly at the same time. I'd been planning on a Vintage Air system for the future and liked the idea of a smoother firewall.
Here's how my firewall mod looked:
I think I took a junk transmission pan and cut it up because it already had the curvature I wanted. These were some of my first weld jobs and I wasn't very familiar with adjusting the settings on my dad's 220V machine, so the wire went on thick without much penetration. There were a couple of rust pinholes in the vent box on the passenger side that I took care of at this time as well.
All in all it looked pretty good with two coats of POR-15 applied by hand with 50¢ paintbrushes.
Now the moment of truth was upon us. Would the body and frame fit back together the way they should and agree to play nice with each other?
Wait for it....
No!
For some reason or another that big block engine seemed to be even further back than when we had mocked it up. Gaaaa!
I went inside the cab with a cut-off wheel and chopped out half of the work I had done on the driver's side, plus I trimmed it back a couple more inches to clear that pesky valve cover. My dad raised the body back up with the lift, and mini sledge in hand he coerced the passenger side of the firewall with his own brand of persuasion. That POR-15 could hold up to some abuse if it was applied properly.
Everything finally fit.
The front fenders, inner fenders, hood and bumper were quickly thrown on with a couple of bolts each. I had purchased a SS bolt kit from Brothers but saved it for the future, whenever the final assembly would take place.
It looked like a Suburban again for the first time in more than two years.
As an added side effect, it was no longer taking up a bay (or at times two) in my dad's shop. Back out to the gravel it went until my next visit. This time no floor jacks were required to hold up the rear end.