Yeah I'm not planning on caging the front in mostly because I do not want to tear the new dash up. The cage is mostly to protect the back seat when the hard top is off
CK5
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You don't have to mess the dash up.
Is that yours? I like it but its a bit much for my daily driving. I wish I could say that I needed that cage but my buddies don't have trucks nearly as capable as mine.
Yes, that is mine. But mine is mainly offroad.
Summer I realized my frame was cracked behind the steering box. SUPRISE! well I ordered the frame brace kit LMC offers and knocked that out in a weekend. After taking the box off we found a junk patch my dad doesn't remeber doing that had some welds done by a 5 year old. Also picked up some nice new rancho steering stabilizers
Good looking rig.
I say don't build a cage around a sub box...but that's just me I guess. Here are a couple pics below of my cage. I went in front of the dash as well. I could have hugged the dash a little tighter like @GWeakland620 did, but for me it's not a deal breaker cause I'm only 5'8" tall so I can get away with it.
I say, if you are going to build a cage, just do the whole thing while you are at it. I think you will be a lot happier in the end with that. The cab on these blazers don't offer that much support, especially once you remove the hard top. I used 2" .120 wall HREW on mine with 1" .120 wall HREW for bracing. I think it turned out alright, but I mainly do technical rock crawling, so I built my cage around that.
IMO the trick to a well built cage is bracing. The pic you uploaded before asking for ideas is a very basic cage. It will probably get the job done for one little flop, but that's it. Building a cage usually isn't a weekend project. If you are going to invest some money and time to do it, may as well do it right and know it will stand up no matter what position you put yourself in. Cause even if you think you are not going to get into a certain type of wheeling one day, you never know what might happen later on in life. And there is nothing worse than spending time and money on something just to have to cut it off and start over later down the road (to me at least).
Anywho, hope that gives you some ideas. Keep us up to date with the pics of this thing!
I say don't build a cage around a sub box...but that's just me I guess. Here are a couple pics below of my cage. I went in front of the dash as well. I could have hugged the dash a little tighter like @GWeakland620 did, but for me it's not a deal breaker cause I'm only 5'8" tall so I can get away with it.
I say, if you are going to build a cage, just do the whole thing while you are at it. I think you will be a lot happier in the end with that. The cab on these blazers don't offer that much support, especially once you remove the hard top. I used 2" .120 wall HREW on mine with 1" .120 wall HREW for bracing. I think it turned out alright, but I mainly do technical rock crawling, so I built my cage around that.
IMO the trick to a well built cage is bracing. The pic you uploaded before asking for ideas is a very basic cage. It will probably get the job done for one little flop, but that's it. Building a cage usually isn't a weekend project. If you are going to invest some money and time to do it, may as well do it right and know it will stand up no matter what position you put yourself in. Cause even if you think you are not going to get into a certain type of wheeling one day, you never know what might happen later on in life. And there is nothing worse than spending time and money on something just to have to cut it off and start over later down the road (to me at least).
Anywho, hope that gives you some ideas. Keep us up to date with the pics of this thing!
Thanks I will definitely use your advice. I don't think I will extend it into the cab just because it will take too much room. Maybe one day but I'm going to college in the fall.Good looking rig.
I say don't build a cage around a sub box...but that's just me I guess. Here are a couple pics below of my cage. I went in front of the dash as well. I could have hugged the dash a little tighter like @GWeakland620 did, but for me it's not a deal breaker cause I'm only 5'8" tall so I can get away with it.
I say, if you are going to build a cage, just do the whole thing while you are at it. I think you will be a lot happier in the end with that. The cab on these blazers don't offer that much support, especially once you remove the hard top. I used 2" .120 wall HREW on mine with 1" .120 wall HREW for bracing. I think it turned out alright, but I mainly do technical rock crawling, so I built my cage around that.
IMO the trick to a well built cage is bracing. The pic you uploaded before asking for ideas is a very basic cage. It will probably get the job done for one little flop, but that's it. Building a cage usually isn't a weekend project. If you are going to invest some money and time to do it, may as well do it right and know it will stand up no matter what position you put yourself in. Cause even if you think you are not going to get into a certain type of wheeling one day, you never know what might happen later on in life. And there is nothing worse than spending time and money on something just to have to cut it off and start over later down the road (to me at least).
Anywho, hope that gives you some ideas. Keep us up to date with the pics of this thing!
So I have gotten kind of out of order but I want to start back at the beginning in May of 2014. The truck had sat for 15 years with the occasional start up every 3-4. The first picture is the day i took it to get smogged no work had been done on it at this point
In June all of the LMC parts came in and we started to strip the interior. I probably would have just bedlinered it and put 5 points with bucket seats, but my dad was set on restoring it to its original glory the way he remembered it. We ordered so many parts LMC sent us a Christmas card! New dash, upholstery kit, carpet kit, insulation, headliner and more. The pictures are basically just the tear down.
After stripping all the carpet there were a few small rust spots in the back and the tailgate and door jams had been pretty scratched up. I sanded everything down then gave it a coat of tan rustoleum bed liner. We ran all new speaker wire and put the insulation in. The dash was a pain to get out and the old insulation had been put down with some really terrible adhesive.
After the insulation was in I began stripping the old upholstery off the seats and replacing the headliner. The only color dash we could buy through LMC was Black so we used their vinyl paint which I give a 6/10. It isn't the most durable or best finish.
Finished the upholstery up and put everything back together. Reassembly took about 3 weekends. I didn't put the old center console in because i wanted to build my own (will be posting pictures soon). Stereo and Grant steering wheel were also installed. This was pretty much the end of the first summer of work.
Holy crap that's a lot of pictures!
Where in CA are you? Nice looking K5 man!
Where in CA are you? Nice looking K5 man!
Inland Empire/San Bernardino. Sorry for the overload of pictures but I have three years of pictures and I just showed a whole year.
Sweet looking blazer! I like the colour!
Nice job fixing it up.
We all like pictures...keep em coming.
Nice job fixing it up.
We all like pictures...keep em coming.
We'll have to hit up Azusa some time. Seems the closest around and I'm sure I can get at least one other truck to join. Have you been?
No I have always wanted to but never wanted to spend the gas money
The interior pre pics were so nice, I would have just left it.
Guess there was a little dust to repair though.
Martin
Guess there was a little dust to repair though.
Martin
Are you talking about when all the interior was stripped?
