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CK5
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'72 K5 - Greg's @MightAsWellK5 Build
- Thread starter Greg72
- Start date
This is the build description. I will improve this later. (GB)
bp71k5
3/4 ton status
Yep, should have added more smilies after it.
Too bad you can't sink a couple cup holders into that top surface.I guess you could save the top part of the door that was cut off and add some kind of fasteners to it so it can attach back onto the top of the door. Maybe even glue the glass into it, like removable T-tops. Then it might look all factory?
Yukon Jack
1/2 ton status
Getting the door and rail level is one of the best mods that can be done to these K5's. Nice work - looks great!
2009.10.04 - UPDATE! - BODY MOUNTS...FINALLY.
It has been a frustrating few weeks to say the least. Who would have guessed that something as simple as rubber body mounts would be SO hard to find??
I tried one source....backordered indefinitely, another source claimed to have a set "in stock", but when I received the kit it included polyurethane bushings and was missing about 40 of the 84 parts normally included. Strike Two!
I decided to place a new order with LMC and simply "wait it out" on their backorder which was supposed to take 3 weeks. I am happy to report that barely one week after placing the order the parts arrived.
So today was spent putting OEM style rubber mounts into all 10 factory positions. (I still have a set of core support mounts to use later on) Things went pretty smoothly until I got to positions #4 and #5 on the driver's side. Turns out the frame horn was being tweaked about 1/2" out of position by an overly-wide hidden hitch setup built by yours truly. I guess that's what happens when you've never had a complete and correct set of body mounts as a starting point for dimensions!
The side-effect of this issue was that I had to remove the hitch AND a gas tank containing roughly 20.99999 gallons of varnish/fuel.... and now I get to figure out how to safely dispose of it.
The good news is that after installing all the body mounts, the door gaps look just as good as before, so I don't have any new shimming to do.
It has been a frustrating few weeks to say the least. Who would have guessed that something as simple as rubber body mounts would be SO hard to find??
I tried one source....backordered indefinitely, another source claimed to have a set "in stock", but when I received the kit it included polyurethane bushings and was missing about 40 of the 84 parts normally included. Strike Two!
I decided to place a new order with LMC and simply "wait it out" on their backorder which was supposed to take 3 weeks. I am happy to report that barely one week after placing the order the parts arrived.
So today was spent putting OEM style rubber mounts into all 10 factory positions. (I still have a set of core support mounts to use later on) Things went pretty smoothly until I got to positions #4 and #5 on the driver's side. Turns out the frame horn was being tweaked about 1/2" out of position by an overly-wide hidden hitch setup built by yours truly. I guess that's what happens when you've never had a complete and correct set of body mounts as a starting point for dimensions!
The side-effect of this issue was that I had to remove the hitch AND a gas tank containing roughly 20.99999 gallons of varnish/fuel.... and now I get to figure out how to safely dispose of it.
The good news is that after installing all the body mounts, the door gaps look just as good as before, so I don't have any new shimming to do.
gasoline makes an excellent degreaser 
"gonna start a fire..."
Must be near enough to leaf burning season in your neck of the wood Greg? Time to get 'neighborly'
Prolly best to wait until the leaves are in piles, rather than lighting the ones still on your neighbors trees though.
Pics...
Pics...
Pics...
uhhhhh
we need pics of something.
Take pics of fire.
Pic's of bozo body mount kits
More pic's of door gaps.
Pic's of varnishy fuel
Pic's of bad hidden hitch
Pic's of your wife?
C'mon man, an update without pic's?
How about more pic's of takeout Chinese food?
A KM2 pic from a different angle? Did i mention the P-metric KM2 thing yet?
Love,
Rene
Must be near enough to leaf burning season in your neck of the wood Greg? Time to get 'neighborly'
Prolly best to wait until the leaves are in piles, rather than lighting the ones still on your neighbors trees though.
Pics...
Pics...
Pics...
uhhhhh
we need pics of something.
Take pics of fire.
Pic's of bozo body mount kits
More pic's of door gaps.
Pic's of varnishy fuel
Pic's of bad hidden hitch
Pic's of your wife?
C'mon man, an update without pic's?
How about more pic's of takeout Chinese food?
A KM2 pic from a different angle? Did i mention the P-metric KM2 thing yet?
Love,
Rene
I definately think I'll pass on that hidden hitch now.
"gonna start a fire..."
Must be near enough to leaf burning season in your neck of the wood Greg? Time to get 'neighborly'
Prolly best to wait until the leaves are in piles, rather than lighting the ones still on your neighbors trees though.
Pics...
Pics...
Pics...
uhhhhh
we need pics of something.
Take pics of fire.
Pic's of bozo body mount kits
More pic's of door gaps.
Pic's of varnishy fuel
Pic's of bad hidden hitch
Pic's of your wife?
C'mon man, an update without pic's?
How about more pic's of takeout Chinese food?
A KM2 pic from a different angle? Did i mention the P-metric KM2 thing yet?
Love,
Rene
LOL - and I second this motion from Rene!
Representative body mount pic....
After all the problems I'd had with missing parts, I decided to accurately capture what SHOULD be in each position. Those lower cups are cool...as you tighten them, they bulge out and become perfectly round like a doughnut (mmm, doughnuts!). It doesn't take a whole lot of bolt torque either. The center "puck" is rubber with two steel washers molded onto either end.... those eccentric star-patterned washers are a nice touch also.
Even though the kit was $180, it didn't seem at all unreasonable once I saw the completeness of the kit and the careful way each set of parts was organized and bagged.
After all the problems I'd had with missing parts, I decided to accurately capture what SHOULD be in each position. Those lower cups are cool...as you tighten them, they bulge out and become perfectly round like a doughnut (mmm, doughnuts!). It doesn't take a whole lot of bolt torque either. The center "puck" is rubber with two steel washers molded onto either end.... those eccentric star-patterned washers are a nice touch also.
Even though the kit was $180, it didn't seem at all unreasonable once I saw the completeness of the kit and the careful way each set of parts was organized and bagged.
LUBA
1/2 ton status
So where did you buy this complete kit from? Also what is the difference between stock rubber mounts and the energy suspension poly ones?
Rubber mounts are superior in that they will help isolate noise and vibration better..... Also the softer material (rubber) won't squeak like the poly mounts do.
These are available from LMC Truck, and it looks like the backorders have finally been filled.
Unfortunately, going with the nice, flexible rubber mounts makes the cagework more complicated but I believe the end result will justify all the extra effort.
These are available from LMC Truck, and it looks like the backorders have finally been filled.
Unfortunately, going with the nice, flexible rubber mounts makes the cagework more complicated but I believe the end result will justify all the extra effort.
FYI- just called on body mounts today @ LMC. Backordered, with no ETA. They do have seperate kits (radiator mount & body) available seperately for $20 more.
Well I have to admit your comment reminded me that I had never gone back to repair roughly 200 broken photo links in this build thread.
So... I just spent several hours locating all the original files and uploading them to Photobucket and editing each post to re-direct the links from the old NorCalBigDawgs site to the Photobucket gallery.
I'm unhappy to discover that roughly 2 dozen of the original files on my PC have corrupted .JPG headers now, so the originals are ruined and I don't have any other copies of those photos.
If the NorCal site comes back online with the photo gallery intact, I might be able to grab copies of those images and restore the remaining broken links in this thread.Basically..... if you see a "red X" anywhere in this thread now, it's because the photo was ruined. It's a bummer for sure, I figured Google would have "indexed" these photos by now and I'd at least be able to do an image search to find them again.
Ouch! That stinks Greg. I'm always a little paranoid about losing my pics off of the local forum where I store mine.
GRINCH
1/2 ton status
I think 30+ days is enough time for an update. What's Greg been doing?I will post pics on my build on Sunday. This weekends goal.. See how the Cad 500 fits.
2009.11.15 - UPDATE! IN THE AIR TONIGHT...
Thanks to everyone for your patience. Fall has arrived in New England and the last 30 days were a mad scramble to do all the house projects that absolutely had to be completed before the snow started flying. Thankfully all of that work is now behind me, and I can begin to dedicate time once again to this build thread.
VTBlazer was kind enough to come down this weekend to give me the official "kick in the pants" motivation I needed, and brought me a gift that caused a bit of deja-vu...
Astute viewers of the 1st Gen Forums will recognize this frame. It was actually sitting underneath Kurt's '69 Blazer project.....a project that interestingly was purchased originally from me! The tub for that project was sold (again) but the frame was not part of the deal, and in a strange twist of fate it has arrived right back at the place where it started.....my own garage. Admittedly, now it's much snazzier, with a nice coat of POR and grey primer to boot.
Given some of the issues I was having with the body mounts in previous updates, due mostly to tweaks in the rear of my original frame, I jumped at the chance to swap out my old frame for this much cleaner example...
The only problem, of course is that the original frame is on the bottom of the truck, with axles and a complete drivetrain installed into it already. Oh yes, and the fact that I only have a single car bay to work in, and no lift to get the body into the air.
Necessity is the mother of invention, so we came up with a way to lift the front of the body with two come-a-longs suspended from an overhead beam. This took the weight off the front of the frame.... in the rear, we were able to stack up some wood blocks on a strong weight bench to get the rear of the tub a few inches off the body mounts.
The springs and axles were stripped out from underneath to give us more working room, and to make it easier to drop the frame out from the bottom. Unfortunately we still had about 1000Lbs of driveline in the way....so that needed to be jettisoned and placed to the side first.
It was a rainy day, so each part we removed ended up in the opposite bay of the garage.... the space was getting really tight, and we were having plenty of close calls, tripping over parts, loose fasteners and tools. Not my favorite working environment to be sure....
Looks like I'd better post up a "1-Ton Axles for sale" thread in the parts area to clear some room.
Finally after a couple of hours, we got the payoff and were able to drop the frame all the way down to the floor.
And a few minutes later, it was draqged out sideways from under the truck and unceremoniously dumped onto the driveway.
That left us with a 1972 Blazer tub effectively just hanging in mid-air!!
Pretty cool actually....though I was not excited about the prospects of spending much time underneath it.
It was well past lunchtime by the time we got the new frame underneath and into position, but that didn't stop us from creating a makeshift table out of it and grabbing a few slices from the local pizzeria. Thank goodness for delivery!
Shortly thereafter, Kurt waved goodbye and headed back home. It was a great day in the shop and we got a LOT of work accomplished. Many thanks go out to Kurt for making the trip down here and for solving my bent frame horn problems with a sweet like-new replacement frame.
Next steps will be to clean up the shop as much as possible, then build a stronger and more permanent scaffold to hold the body/rollcage up in the air. I'll be spending quite a bit of time doing frame-related activities, and it will be much more convenient to have a bit of working room around it.
Thanks to everyone for your patience. Fall has arrived in New England and the last 30 days were a mad scramble to do all the house projects that absolutely had to be completed before the snow started flying. Thankfully all of that work is now behind me, and I can begin to dedicate time once again to this build thread.
VTBlazer was kind enough to come down this weekend to give me the official "kick in the pants" motivation I needed, and brought me a gift that caused a bit of deja-vu...
Astute viewers of the 1st Gen Forums will recognize this frame. It was actually sitting underneath Kurt's '69 Blazer project.....a project that interestingly was purchased originally from me! The tub for that project was sold (again) but the frame was not part of the deal, and in a strange twist of fate it has arrived right back at the place where it started.....my own garage. Admittedly, now it's much snazzier, with a nice coat of POR and grey primer to boot.
Given some of the issues I was having with the body mounts in previous updates, due mostly to tweaks in the rear of my original frame, I jumped at the chance to swap out my old frame for this much cleaner example...
The only problem, of course is that the original frame is on the bottom of the truck, with axles and a complete drivetrain installed into it already. Oh yes, and the fact that I only have a single car bay to work in, and no lift to get the body into the air.
Necessity is the mother of invention, so we came up with a way to lift the front of the body with two come-a-longs suspended from an overhead beam. This took the weight off the front of the frame.... in the rear, we were able to stack up some wood blocks on a strong weight bench to get the rear of the tub a few inches off the body mounts.
The springs and axles were stripped out from underneath to give us more working room, and to make it easier to drop the frame out from the bottom. Unfortunately we still had about 1000Lbs of driveline in the way....so that needed to be jettisoned and placed to the side first.
It was a rainy day, so each part we removed ended up in the opposite bay of the garage.... the space was getting really tight, and we were having plenty of close calls, tripping over parts, loose fasteners and tools. Not my favorite working environment to be sure....
Looks like I'd better post up a "1-Ton Axles for sale" thread in the parts area to clear some room.
Finally after a couple of hours, we got the payoff and were able to drop the frame all the way down to the floor.
And a few minutes later, it was draqged out sideways from under the truck and unceremoniously dumped onto the driveway.
That left us with a 1972 Blazer tub effectively just hanging in mid-air!!
Pretty cool actually....though I was not excited about the prospects of spending much time underneath it.
It was well past lunchtime by the time we got the new frame underneath and into position, but that didn't stop us from creating a makeshift table out of it and grabbing a few slices from the local pizzeria. Thank goodness for delivery!
Shortly thereafter, Kurt waved goodbye and headed back home. It was a great day in the shop and we got a LOT of work accomplished. Many thanks go out to Kurt for making the trip down here and for solving my bent frame horn problems with a sweet like-new replacement frame.
Next steps will be to clean up the shop as much as possible, then build a stronger and more permanent scaffold to hold the body/rollcage up in the air. I'll be spending quite a bit of time doing frame-related activities, and it will be much more convenient to have a bit of working room around it.
Wow...
Now that is an update, and that was awesome of Kurt is all regards!!!
Hell, I can't seem to find the motivation to rake up some leaves and make a trip to the dump lately...
Nice work!!
Rene
Now that is an update, and that was awesome of Kurt is all regards!!!
Hell, I can't seem to find the motivation to rake up some leaves and make a trip to the dump lately...
Nice work!!
Rene
very awsome
