CK5
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FullSize S10 Bogger/Mud Racer

The driveshaft clears the lip of the angle iron bolted to the crossmember by a decent amount. There is actually more room in the hoop around the shaft than it looks. I jacked up the front end by the frame to check droop clearance...had plenty. No real easy way to check bump, but I'm not too worried about that.

Ideally I'll never need to test the loops out. If the front shaft ever lets go, the loop might help save the cast transmission pan.
 
Been real busy with work lately, but I've still been running this thing.

Two weeks ago was our city fair. Normally they have a pit for the mudbog, but because of the farmer in the neighboring field...they had to change directions and went with a side by side drag race. New facility was built, supposed to be the only side by side track in lower Michigan. Being the only track like this, it brought out the fast trucks from all over the state. Most everybody was expecting this to be a mud drag, well it wasn't. It was very dry, so dry that I didn't even have to wash the truck after and I was the first truck to run after they watered down the track again. It was being run as single elimination, loose once and you're done. I got knocked out in my first round. Lost by about half a truck length. Not surprising really, most everyone in my class was running a built BBC. Still had a good time and I only had to go about 4 block from my house to get there.


Last night I went out to one of the county fairs and their bog. This is the place whose rules I kind of built the truck around. Their pit is a very thick gooey mud. Best way to describe it is a mixture of peanut butter/oatmeal/wet cement. I ran in 36mod with some borrowed tires. Took 2nd place out of 13 trucks. Was the third to run in the class. Made it almost all the way out of the pit but got hung up in the last deep hole. Was sitting in 1st untill the second to last truck ran, he made a full pass and put me into 2nd. Second place paid out $75 plus my entry fee ($25 which included my pit pass). My cut Boggers would have put me into the open class, which is usually full of guy who have way more into their truck than I do and I wouldn't stand a chance. Turns out I could have ran in the open class and probably won it. Only two trucks in it, one broke on the line and the other didn't make it nearly as far as I did with my smaller tires on it. Towards the end the starting line was getting really bad. Some of the guys in the 40mod class were getting stuck trying to exit after being pulled back out of the pit. All in all it was a good night. Got my evening paid for and the truck drove itself onto the trailer at the end.

Was planing on washing the truck today, but it was raining when I got out of work. Even though I usually end up pretty wet, I really didn't feel like getting rained on while power washing it. So I just unloaded the truck/trailer and parked it outside and let nature get a start on it for me. Tomorrow or Monday I'll wash it and pull it into the barn to regrease everything. I know I have to replace the drivers side rear hub seal (did the passenger side about a month ago), have some gear oil dripping down the inside of the tire.

For as gooey as the mud was, the truck didn't get too dirty. But what is on there is thick and chunky.





 
Anything new on this?


Sort of. I let it go early this year. Listed it for sale for a somewhat high price and got some decent offers. Think it was end of Feb/early March when it sold. Stuck the money away for the Jimmy project.

I am collecting parts to build another. For what I had into this one, cost wise, is made out alright.

Fwiw, the guy who bought it pulled the motor out and it's been sitting since. Not sure why exactly, was turn key ready. Small part of me wishes I kept it, but I'm haply with what I got out of it. Part of the fun with this one was the build.
 
Anything new on this?


Can safely say, yes there is something new on it now.

Guy who bought it from did pulled the motor and did absolutly nothing with the truck. It sat from pretty much the second day he got it home. Finally decided that he wasn't going to do anything with it and put it up for sale.

Ever since I had gotten rid of it, I sort of, but not really, regreted selling it. Saw the add on Facebook Friday morning and knew I had my chance to get it back. Messeged him and worked out a deal. Picked it up late Friday night.

Truck is pretty much exactly the same. He did get a new alluminum radiator and when pulling the front clip to pull motor out, lost the inner fenders. Other than that it is untouched. Got the intake, carb, headers and 5.13's I didn't install yet back with it. He kept the heads and sold the short block.

Plans are to install the gears and drop the big block I originally used when I set the cab down on the frame, probably toss a cam and intake at it first.

Only picture I have now, but it looks about the same as before. If I get bored I'll go back to fix the pictures that photobucket screwed up.

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Pulled the BBC out from under the shelf and hosed it off. Guy I got it from said it came from a motorhome. He's a real stand up guy, runs a mega truck and have dealt with him a few times...no reason to doubt him when he said it ran good but smoked a little.

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I pulled a valve cover when I originally got it, just to see what heads it had on it. Looked real clean at that time.

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Pulling the intake and other valve cover confirmed that it was clean and looked to be in good shape. The water/moisture is from me spraying it off with the hose. Heads are nothing special, peanut ports....i've got that problem solved though (more on that later).

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Once the heads were off, things took a turn downhill. Drivers side was first one off and looked good, some carbon build up, but nothing serious. Was feeling pretty good at that point. Getting the other head off revealed the problems, and why it smoked.

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The number 8 piston was missing a good portion of the top. Appeared to have been run that way for awhile. Bore looks good still, head looked fine too.

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Looking at those pistons, they aren't stock. Cleaning one off shows that they are .030 over. Just from a quick glance, block looks to have been zero decked too.

Wasn't planning on buying pistons, but it gives me a chance to bump the compression some now. Plan is to see how much power i can make on a modest budget. I've got another 454 and stroker crank, that one i'll sink some money into. This one will be a cheap effort to get the truck going again.
 
Disassembled the 454 today. Motor had some decent parts in it, Melling oil pump, Cloyes double roller timing set, Clevite 77 bearings.

Not that it matters at this point, but the number 6 piston was also missing chunks of the top. Also found part of a broken pushrod in the pan. My guess is that motor was running hot and detonating, eating away at the pistons, number 7 had some wear on the top as well.

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Unloaded the truck from the trailer and got it into the barn. Will order up some bearings to get the 5.13's installed while I have parts at the machine shop. Will be placing a big order with Summit either tomorrow or Monday.
 
Maybe they fed it lots of nitrous? Sounds like a cooler reason for broken ring lands right?

Generally, yes that can do it too. I don't think that's the case here though. When I got the motor, it was complete carb to pan. Could tell that carb hadn't been off in a long time, so I doubt they had a plate under it. I'm guessing too much timing in the heavy motorhome in too high of a gear. The broken pushrod is from something previous. All 16 I pulled out were in good shape.
 
Some updates:

Heads and intake came in last week. Nothing too special. Jumped on too good a deal to pass up on a set of aluminum Dart knock offs. 320cc runners, 119cc chambers. Reading around online and most everyone says the castings are decent but the valves and springs are where you've got to pay attention. I'll give them a good look and pull them apart before they go onto the motor.

Pistons are at the machine shop getting installed on the rods. Took advantage of needing to buy pistons and up'd the compression. Should come in at a hair under 10.5:1. I don't feel that's very high for what this truck will be used for. Not like I'll be lugging the motor any or putting serious weight behind it.

Cam, another budget piece here. Used Summit 1303 cam with some new lifters I've had sitting around. Have used quite a few Summit cams in several builds and have been very happy with them and how they run. The price was right and it should fit the build nicely. Can always upgrade down the line.

Gaskets, bearings, timing set, roller rockers, head studs, and other misc parts are here too, just waiting on the machine shop. I cleaned and prepped the block so that's ready too.

Hope to get rods back sometime this week so I can assemble next weekend, measure for pushrods and maybe drop the motor in the truck.

On the truck side of things, I got the new thicker aluminum radiator installed and fans back on. Pretty much mounted it the same way as before, had to modify the hold downs a little bit. Rebuilt the fuel pump (Holley Black) and drained the old stuff out of the tank. Charged the battery and according to my smart charger, it's in good shape and ready to go.

Have my carts "built" for my next round of parts for the motor and gear install, probably get that stuff on it's way soon.
 
Update time:

Ordered everything for the gears and got those installed. That was more of a hassle than it should have been.

My cousin was the one who bought the 1ton axles and put them in. He told me they had 4.10's, so that's what I ordered gears for (thick gears). Turns out I had 4.56 gears which requires a differn't carrier in the rear. I didn't realize that my old gears were 4.10's till I tried putting the 5.13's in and they didn't fit. Dug through my stash of parts and found the correct carrier, was a gov-loc so I pulled it appart and welded it up. While the hubs were off I replaced the seals since I had a leaker.

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What it looks like when you try sticking thick gears on the wrong carrier into the housing.

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Huge differance between the 5.13 gears on the 4.56 carrier vs. the 4.10's on their carrier.

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I lucked out on the gear situation with the front axle though. As far as I know, 5.13 thick gears aren't avalible for a D60, so a 4.56 carrier is needed. I was originally planning on getting a locker when I picked up the gears used, for now it'll stay open.


Finally got my pistons back from the machine shop. A few of the bolts were loose, so new Arp's went in along with getting the big ends resized.

A while back I cleaned and prepped the block. Wire wheeled the outside, chased all the holes, hosed it off and shot some light oil on it to keep it from rusting.

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Once all the parts were back home I started assembly. Dropped the crank in and checked clearances with some Plastigauge. Mains came in at .0025 and rods at .0020. Pulled crank back out to lube it up and put the rear main seal in. I also put the cam in at this time. I like to do that before the rods go in, easier to see where it's at going through the bearings.

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Sprialed the rings onto pistons and started sending them home.

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After that I put the timing set on, oil pump and pan on.

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Called it a night after that. Next day I masked it up and sprayed some color. Thought I had a picture of that process but I don't. In this one I had the studs in already. Studs went in with sealer on their threads.

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Put the heads on next.

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That's about as far as I got. Still need to put guide plates and rocker studs in. Then measure for pushrods. Once I do that I can probably drop it down into the truck.


Parting shot.

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Pushrods were ordered yesterday and should be here on Wed. Might be able to get them in along with the rocker studs and guide plates before the weekend. If I'm lucky I might even get the motor in the truck.

As much as I don't want to, I'm going to fit some sort of exhaust system to the truck. At least for the first few times it goes out. On a new build and breaking the motor in it's much easier to listen to what it wants without the open headers.
 
I'll let the pictures do the talking.

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Finished assembling the motor today. Took a few hours to get the rest of the guidplates situated. Tossed the intake and vlave covers on. Primed the oil system till I had oil coming out pushrods. Put the wiring for the MSD into the distributor, set the timing and dropped that in.

Setting the motor in place literally took 5 minutes. Not having the front end on and the cab being set back a little more than normal gives so much more room.

Test fit the headers. A year or so ago I picked up two sets cheap. Guy said one was from a truck and didn't know what the other set was from (both were covered in mud, so both sets were ran in trucks). The set that was in better shape are the ones I went with. They look like a set of Chevelle headers (which are supposed to work on 73-87's). They fit and clear all the major things great. They don't hang down near as low as actual truck header on my friends truck. I'll need to move my fuel line a little bit and one of the ground wires, but that's it.

Still lots to do before I can fire it up. Pretty much everything, starter, converter, water pump, alternator, power steering, plumbing. Also need some more hardware for the headers and some longer bolts for the motor mounts.
 
It runs!.....well sort of.

Yesterday I spent some time getting things finished up. Starter, water pump, alternator, headers, hoses, converter, wiring. Did what I could before it got too late and started making a list of what all I needed.

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Today after work I went by Napa then went home and got to work. Installed spark plugs, cap/wires, coolant plugs in intake, bypass hose, gauge connections. Pulled the Holley carb that came with the 454 out of the cabinet and went through that real quick. Tossed some new gaskets into it and gave it a cleaning.

I wanted to fill the float bowls up, but it's got a weird vent tube that makes it difficult...and for some reason my fuel pump doesn't work (even though it did a week ago). So I shot a couple squirts of carb cleaner down the intake and hit the starter. Motor rolled over not even a full turn before firing up and running for about 5 seconds. That's all I wanted to run it before actually breaking in the cam. Can't do that till I get some kind of exhaust on it, it's super loud as it is.

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I'm not particularly proud of how the plugs wires are ran. They are a universal set that came with the 454. 6 of them are way too long and the other are to short. They'll work for now though.

Before break in, other than the exhaust, I need to pick up a belt for the water pump/alternator. Also need to figure out how the power steering pump mounts. I can sort of see how it goes on, but only two holes line up. And using one of those would lock it solid and not let me adjust it. I may try adapting the small block pump to it.
 
Fixed my fuel pump, One of the magnets had come unglued from the case and was stuck to the other one.

Got the power steering pump figured out. Turns out the bracket was bent and on the pump wrong. Once I took it apart it was pretty clear how it went. Picked up belts as well.

Mufflers and rest of the other misc. things I needed should be in tomorrow. Hoping to be able to break in the motor this weekend or early in the week.
 
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