Project Blazilla

[Mr Banshee]

Been a member of this site for over a year now and found this a wealth of knowledge in addition a great resource for parts for my 72 K5 4x4 build and just wanted to say thanks to members that I have been in contact.

I purchased this truck about 2 years ago. What caught my attention was the Big Block in it with ¾ ton running gear. I looked past a lot of the rust on the structure and over all considering its 40+ years old, its more than restorable.

That’s about where the good stuff ends as it has had 40 years of mis-engineered and rigging. Everything has been touched and it is far from safe. I figured I would start a build thread and share it with others. I pulled the engine out about six months ago to remove the badly damaged engine cross member and replaced it with a DIY4X unit. Got some pictures of process.

[swyfor5]

Welcome to the board! Looks like a nice start for your build. Been looking at the DIY4X4 crossmember for a long time. Need to pick one up before I swap in my 383 stroker motor. What are your plans for your build? Lift, tires/wheels, back to stock look or custom?

[Mr Banshee]

Thanks for review! Currently building the 402 which I'll post some pics. It has 33's for tires now and I believe its a 6" inch Super lift as there is evidence of the name on some of the components. I would like to keep the 6 inch lift or what ever it is as I like the stance. May go with 35's but debating on that. Plan is for now is to finish the Big Block and going to replace the Turbo 350 with a 400 that I have. After that, make mechanically sound and move on to the structure of it.

[swyfor5]

Sounds good! Keep us all posted and take lot's of pic's! Ran a 4" lift w 35" BFG's w trimmed fenders for a long time, and loved the way it worked.

[Mr Banshee]

Finally finished the Big Block 402 assembly. Here are some pictures during the assembly:

[notsolo]

Engine looks Great !

[Mr Banshee]

Thanks!!! Moving on to the next dilemma. Since I went with the drive belt system using a short water pump design the alternator is tucked back and doesn’t clear the tall valve covers I went with. So on to engineering a bracket to extend the alternator outward from the valve cover.

[Chulisohombre]

Subd. Found ya. Nice engine. That should he a wholelotta fun.

[Mr Banshee]

Started working on changing the body mounts before setting the engine back in. Found that every mount was rigged from the prevous owner. Like the cheap body lift kit made out of exhaust tubing?

[Mr Banshee]

Found that the rear cross member was heavilly rotted along with the corner posts. Irippen6 hooked me up with a pair. Began removing the one quarter today and rear cross member. Found that the rott was well into the inner bed side. Rear posts aren't gonna fix it. At this point I will probably go with complete bedsides and sell the doner corner posts.

[Chulisohombre]

Looks like mine. Your p o didn't even put rubber back in on his exhaust body mounts. That had to be s stuff ride. I did Polly mounts on mine. I had the original rubber on mine but there wasn't much left of them. I went around a corner and the whole ass end shifted off the mounts. Scary.

[jjzepplin]

WOW! Give a guy a torch and watch him ruin some stuff. Still amazed at how many unsafe rides may be headed right at you on the freeway etc. That looks like a real nice new member though. I have the same rust beginning on my rear section. How hard is it to get to?
Swapping out that th350 to a th400 will require some machining to the 205 case for a larger input bearing and th400 input shaft or a th400 case. 350's can be made to handle some good torque... Just sayin what you prolly already know.
Gonna be a nice ride if you keep this up.

[Mr Banshee]

Here more pictures of the other body mounts:

[Chulisohombre]

Nice mounts. Can't believe what some people will do sometimes.

[Mr Banshee]

Agreed. I didn't snap a photo of the rad core support mounts but the Yahoo had 1/2 nuts threaded on the 7/16 carriage bolts. Structure underneath is worse than thought but I can fix it. Was hoping just to do the mounts for now and put the engine back in but this will have to be addressed first. Waiting for the weather to break and coming up with plan to start on the structure. Meanwhile got my headers installed on my mockup engine. These hooker headers fit well. Only area that I ran into was the passenger side spring hanger. Clearanced the collector today. Have about 5/8 clearance between the shackle bolt and the header collector. You really can't see from the picture but the hangers are badly twisted. Going to order some ORD heavy duty hangers and recheck the header clearance then send them off for coating.

[Chulisohombre]

Looks good. I have the ord shackles as well. They are tough. And I like that they are using a bigger bolt through them. Seems much stronger. Can't believe how week the stock ones look next to them. Don't even seem strong enough but after 40 years they were still hanging on.

[Mr Banshee]

Definitly weak when you have em lifted. Did you get the greasable ones? I am going to go with the non greasable because of the collector on th pass side. I'll probably need to reverse the bolt the opposite way.

[Chulisohombre]

I got the non greasable and forgot to turn the bolt on mine. I just used my sawzall and cut off the extra threads so it wasn't so close to the collector. Lifted or stock it just kinda seems Chevy should have put in a tougher shackle than what they did.

[Mr Banshee]

Well it has been some since I’ve posted. Completed the engine and wanted drop it in a drive it for some time before moving onto the next phase of the project however the body structure was in very poor shape as you can see from some of the photos above. As I ripped into it I found I need to go all the way. I’ve been waiting for a while for a complete cab floor for the Blazer to come out however it doesn’t appear it will be out any time soon so I began reinforcing the structure to begin sheet metal work. Last week in June I made the trip down to Bowling Green Kentucky and visited Southern Kentucky Classics and picked up a Cab and Bed Floor, Windshield Header Set and a Bed Floor Set up Plate. SOKYClassics staff is super. Conversed with Mike Oliver via email and telephone multiple times since the beginning of this year. He is very helpful and very patient! I’m blown away at the quality of the reproduction metal. This will make my job much easier to complete this project. Here are some pictures of the progress.

[Mr Banshee]

A few more pictures.

[jaros44sr]

OMG, you got your hands full. Please post up lots of pics as I m contemplating same thing

[Torpex]

Hi, thats serious work! I am working on replacing the bed on my 70. About to set the new bed, but I couldnt get an aftermarket Blazer Bed. Using a short pickup bed.
If you can, can you take a pictures showing the bed where the "B" Pillar goes? I am looking to make sure I set the bed sides properly.

Thank You!

Frank

[Chulisohombre]

Man you don't see a blazer tore down that far too often. You are doing it the right way and will last longer than my patch job I'm sure. I need the back 2 feet of bed righ before the tailgate roll pan. My rear quarters are good but where they connect to the floor is not. So it lets the bed wobble a bit and the top pulls the sides out so the tailgate to bed has a quarter inch gap. I got it close enough to close it and keep it closed but I need to put some plates between the two and weld it fast to keep it from flexing. You goy some great progress so far. Looks by good.

[jjzepplin]

Scary.

[Mr Banshee]

Really not scary at. Just a matter of coming up with a plan and executing it and problem solve as you move forward. Over the last month I’ve been working on the pickup truck floor modifying it to be similar to the K5 Blazer floor pan. Here are some pictures of the initial work: