Hell I might shoot for BB2018....
All else fails I could wheel a 747....
All else fails I could wheel a 747....
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)
Famous last words. My girls are 5 1/2 years apart...neither was a 'surprise'.
Yep mine are 5 years apart to the month.
Build a seat .......... mine as well
chulisohombre
1/2 ton status
You've already chopped up everything else and modded it. At least the rear seat will still look period correct. You could probably rework the leather that's on it if it's in good shape still. You will have at least 9 inches of extra on either side to work with after the cutdown.
2015.05.05 - UPDATE!!! - !!! SOFA KING STUPID !!!
Sometimes I swear... I'm not just stupid, I'm "Sofa King" stupid.
I head out last night to put some finishing touches on my hours-long lower strut mount bracket project....cap off the end, drill a nice drain hole for water and get the bolt into double-shear. Everything is looking GOOD.
So I drop the ORI into the bracket and run the bolt through it, and use my high-tech bungee cord upper mount to stabilize the whole thing and stand back to admire my work.
Then I see it.
The bracket is built off the rear axle truss which is raked backwards (since it's aiming the pinion up to the transfercase area. So my bracket is also sloping downward at about 8* toward the back bumper. Not a big deal, except for the fact that I'm running the bolt front-to-back also, which means that when the shock is mounted vertically, there is already 8* of misalignment used up in the lower heim joint. By the time I try to rake the ORI forward another few degrees.... that lower heim is completely bound-up and there's no more adjustment left.
After hitting myself in the head with a ball peen hammer a few times, I realized that what I SHOULD have done was to set up the holes in the mounting bracket with an 8* forward rake to them so that the strut would be 100% perpendicular to the bolt at ride height (leaving LOTS of misalignment available in all directions). Even if I had just built the bolt holes level to the ground I probably would have been OK.
So....after crowning myself the new "King" I took a new photo with the bolt completely removed from the rear bolt hole just to get a better feel for what the mounting scheme and angle will need to ACTUALLY look like:
More steel into the tuition pile!
-G
Sometimes I swear... I'm not just stupid, I'm "Sofa King" stupid.
I head out last night to put some finishing touches on my hours-long lower strut mount bracket project....cap off the end, drill a nice drain hole for water and get the bolt into double-shear. Everything is looking GOOD.
So I drop the ORI into the bracket and run the bolt through it, and use my high-tech bungee cord upper mount to stabilize the whole thing and stand back to admire my work.
Then I see it.
The bracket is built off the rear axle truss which is raked backwards (since it's aiming the pinion up to the transfercase area. So my bracket is also sloping downward at about 8* toward the back bumper. Not a big deal, except for the fact that I'm running the bolt front-to-back also, which means that when the shock is mounted vertically, there is already 8* of misalignment used up in the lower heim joint. By the time I try to rake the ORI forward another few degrees.... that lower heim is completely bound-up and there's no more adjustment left.
After hitting myself in the head with a ball peen hammer a few times, I realized that what I SHOULD have done was to set up the holes in the mounting bracket with an 8* forward rake to them so that the strut would be 100% perpendicular to the bolt at ride height (leaving LOTS of misalignment available in all directions). Even if I had just built the bolt holes level to the ground I probably would have been OK.
So....after crowning myself the new "King" I took a new photo with the bolt completely removed from the rear bolt hole just to get a better feel for what the mounting scheme and angle will need to ACTUALLY look like:
More steel into the tuition pile!
-G
Can you not run the bolt side to side? The shock eyes should have plenty of angle to not bind up I would think 
(ps at work so I just skimmed, didn't really read much)
(ps at work so I just skimmed, didn't really read much)
Can you not run the bolt side to side? The shock eyes should have plenty of angle to not bind up I would think
(ps at work so I just skimmed, didn't really read much)
I'm not 100% sure that would work.
In a perfect world, you want the bolt to run front-to-back so that all the articulation can happen without requiring ANY misalignment of the lower heim. The joint just "rotates" axially around the bolt.
Based on a quick calculation the joints are probably going to be pretty maxed-out
Assumptions:
48" spacing between lower shock mounts
7" bump
8.375" droop
Linear travel of axle (not an arc)
Sketching it all out on paper, it's a simple 90* triangle with a 24" side (1/2 the lower strut mount spacing), a 25" side (hyp.) and a 8.375" side (worst case angle)
That gives me 19.2* of angularity of the heim at full droop.
I don't think the ORIs have that much misalignment available.
Anyway, I know the "right" way is to run the bolt front-to-back and I won't be happy unless I rework the bracket to solve it correctly. Steel is cheap and my time is free.
-G
Yah makes sense. My point of view is more towards static travel. So I always want the bolts sideways in my mind.
Hey Greg, I know this is a bit of "yesterdays news" but if it were me I'd put a little thought into trying to find a way to keep as much of the seat width as possible. IMO one of the cool things about the 1st gen blazer is it's size. Lowering the seating capacity to less than a jeep for something this size seems like a waste.Knowing that I'm going to mount the strut behind the axle now... I can drop the entire thing a lot lower than my previous attempts, but with the articulation of the axle I still need to keep the upper mount pretty steeply angled inward to avoid contact with the inside tire sidewall. There's really NO chance to fit the stock width seat into that equation, so I temporarily set it in there just to mark how much narrower I think it will end up being.
The seat is originally about 48" wide, but realistically it's going to end up at around 30" wide to allow the installation of all the upper strut mount tubing. The main structural components are going to drop straight down to the top of my new frame sections, which will be a lot stronger than trying to support the weight of the truck from the current horizontal cage tubes.
-G
Obviously you are building your rig to a very specific purpose and if you just don't care, well it's your project afterall. But as good as you've done fitting some crazy modifications together to this point maybe it's worth putting a little thought into a way to keep more seat.
Just a thought.
Hey Greg, I know this is a bit of "yesterdays news" but if it were me I'd put a little thought into trying to find a way to keep as much of the seat width as possible. IMO one of the cool things about the 1st gen blazer is it's size. Lowering the seating capacity to less than a jeep for something this size seems like a waste.
Obviously you are building your rig to a very specific purpose and if you just don't care, well it's your project afterall. But as good as you've done fitting some crazy modifications together to this point maybe it's worth putting a little thought into a way to keep more seat.
Just a thought.
Ash,
Yeah, I know....it's a real heartbreaker of a concession to have to make.
What that photo doesn't show is how CRAZY the tire interference gets in the one-wheel-up, one-wheel-down configuration. The inside edge of that tire is WAAAAAY inside of where the factory floor cutout (for the wheelwell) is defined. Making it worse is the fact that the shock body has to tuck-in on the inside that inner tire sidewall without rubbing....
By the time you've got the tire angled all the way over, and provided room for the shock to live... that green tape is really just about all the room you've got left to play with.
I will definitely fight for every extra inch of seat width I can find... but there's just no way to keep the rear seat "stock" and build a workable strut mount with 16" of travel.
Believe me, the whole "not being able to carry sheets of plywood" thing was a serious bummer.... as I've said many times before that is what separates "real" trucks, from buggies with "truck sheetmetal" hung on the sides. At this point, the plywood won't fit on the bedfloor but it WILL travel on those doubled-up bedrail bars pretty well... and that was a compromise that I was willing to accept to move things along. I'll enjoy the suspension travel FAR more often than I will carry plywood...
Sleeping space is getting tight, but with the rear seat removed I will have a ~30" wide section right down the middle for a sleeping bag and pad.
-G
Fair enough. As we all know not EVERYTHING is possible all in the same rig. Compromises have to be made. I'm glad to hear you are at least trying for as much as you can.
Stomis
Professional Amateur
Can you not run the bolt side to side? The shock eyes should have plenty of angle to not bind up I would think
(ps at work so I just skimmed, didn't really read much)
Im with adam. I would think far more misalignment would be need during droop to account for the mount getting closer and farther from the frame when twistered up rather than the slight change it will get during "pinion" angle change during cycling.
Thats how mine are mounted, and I was surprised at how little the side to side angle really ends up in real life during flexing.
Greg, it's ok man.... Sometimes the youngsters just see it. Mainly because they can actually still see things...
bp71k5
3/4 ton status
You guys have seen this right?
Gets easier to see why front-back might be a decent plan.
Gets easier to see why front-back might be a decent plan.
...and that wasn't even CLOSE to maximum articulation!!
-G
-G
Is that the location of the shocks now? I thought they were way more inboarded than that now?
The more inboard you go, the less it will effect that shock eye IMO. As the axle moves less the more inboard you bring it.
Im not trying to argue at all. Im just trying to get the picture of it all in my head.
The more inboard you go, the less it will effect that shock eye IMO. As the axle moves less the more inboard you bring it.
Im not trying to argue at all. Im just trying to get the picture of it all in my head.
Stomis
Professional Amateur
...and that wasn't even CLOSE to maximum articulation!!
-G
Hmmm now that I actually looking at the picture and thinking of the way I had/have my front and my buddys jeeps front setup I think I totally said that backwards. The appearance of your mount just threw me for a loop. For some reason it didnt look "right".
After messing around with the rear struts again last night, I'm starting to think that there is no reason to keep that extra set of "parallel" tubes as part of the design.
They looked kind of interesting, but they add nothing structurally now that the upper strut mount isn't going to be in a massive speedhole tower.... I think I'll just cut a few tack welds and pull them out of there for a better "clean sheet" opportunity. Coming straight up from the new rear frame section and creating a strut mount that way will be really strong, and perhaps low-profile enough for me to save just a bit more of my rear seat width.
If I could stand the look of it (which I'm pretty sure I couldn't) I could rake the rear struts backward at the top so that they followed the rear seatback angle and wouldn't encroach on the seat space quite so much. Not sure..... that might also create some odd dampening effects as well being that it's not really lined up well with the arc of the rear axle travel anymore. 
-G
They looked kind of interesting, but they add nothing structurally now that the upper strut mount isn't going to be in a massive speedhole tower.... I think I'll just cut a few tack welds and pull them out of there for a better "clean sheet" opportunity. Coming straight up from the new rear frame section and creating a strut mount that way will be really strong, and perhaps low-profile enough for me to save just a bit more of my rear seat width.
If I could stand the look of it (which I'm pretty sure I couldn't) I could rake the rear struts backward at the top so that they followed the rear seatback angle and wouldn't encroach on the seat space quite so much. Not sure..... that might also create some odd dampening effects as well being that it's not really lined up well with the arc of the rear axle travel anymore.
-G
Put that big 'ol engineering brain to work!Coming straight up from the new rear frame section and creating a strut mount that way will be really strong, and perhaps low-profile enough for me to save just a bit more of my rear seat width.
If I could stand the look of it (which I'm pretty sure I couldn't) I could rake the rear struts backward at the top so that they followed the rear seatback angle and wouldn't encroach on the seat space quite so much. Not sure..... that might also create some odd dampening effects as well being that it's not really lined up well with the arc of the rear axle travel anymore.
-G
It might be worth at least mocking it up that way to see how it looked/worked.
Sometimes it really frustrates me not being local to some of you guys. Just cause I would like to just look at the problem. Not just pics.
So Greg. How about wheel spacers. Get your tires out a touch which will help protect the body while wheeling. It will give more room for the struts. Which will give more room for the seat. Also it will allow the opportunity to learn new skills making the fenders look stock while still covering the wheel wells.
So Greg. How about wheel spacers. Get your tires out a touch which will help protect the body while wheeling. It will give more room for the struts. Which will give more room for the seat. Also it will allow the opportunity to learn new skills making the fenders look stock while still covering the wheel wells.
