It's not another Project car. I Swear...

Welcome friends, Let me tell you a little story...

I've been lost project car wise for quite sometime now.  I have had a seemingly long string of cool cars that should have motivated me, but did not.  It seems all I had been doing was buying a car, collecting parts, losing interest and selling for a loss.  This year as I approached the 1 year anniversary of buying my C4 Corvette project I realized that I had invested probably $5000 in it and not worked more than 10 hours on it in the last year.  I didn't have time and when I did, I couldn't find the motivation to go do the work.  I did some soul searching and put the Corvette up for sale.  I was done.  No more project cars.  Between work, Family and Music I had very little time left to build cars/bikes.  The next vehicle to enter the garage needed to be fun, but also running and driving...  Something I could enjoy and do improvements to, but not a build. 

I sold the Corvette at a loss to a 15 year old who had mowed lawns for a year to save money, but not enough to pay my asking price.  I lowered my price to make it work for him.  If I was going to lose money anyway, it might as well be to help keep the hobby alive. Honestly, it felt really good. He and his father loaded it up and headed for home.  Within 2 weeks, he had it running and driving.  I look forward to him taking me for a ride in his car someday!

About that time, a couple of other things happened that guided me to a hopefully happy place. 

First, my youngest sons truck blew up.  Teenage shenanigans may have played a significant part in that, so I let him suffer a little..  He daily rode his motorcycle to work for a good 2-3 months, all weather because he had to while he tried to pull money together to buy a vehicle. At the time I was driving my 1st gen beater CTS 6spd daily and though it needed a timing chain, it was pretty solid as a driver. To help him out and to give him a break from the bike I decided to sell him the CTS CHEAP so he could continue to save money and take the $2000 I had in my garage fund and buy a new daily driver for me.  Only criteria I had was that is was easy to work on, a manual transmission, fun and...  Bonus points if these wheels fit it...

I bought this set of C5 magnesium wheels for the Corvette for $300 and spent another $500 in tires for them.  I removed them when I sold the Vette to make the loss not hurt as much.  I had the wheels tires for sale at the time, but If my new daily could wear them, all the better.  So the search was on.

About the same time, I had the opportunity to buy a car that had been part of my life for about 20 years, but never "mine"  I had always wanted it, but timing was never right.  It is a Running, driving, obscene amount of fun type car...  a deal was struck and we brought it home.

Cliff hanger time, because lunch is over and I need to get back to work...  feel free to Guess the daily and the new toy!  If you know, don't spoil the fun for the others...  :-)

Ill post the answer on the daily here ASAP and start a new thread for the Toy as well!

I'm under the impression that the corvette wheels will fit the new car, correct?

Firebird/camaro?

In reply to Floating Doc (Forum Supporter) :

They mostly fit...  lol nope, not a Firebird/Camaro

You mentioned running and driving which makes me think it's older. Not clear if the new daily can wear those shoes. Second gen MR2? If the new daily can kinda wear them.. E90 BMW?

Is it another Corvette?

V8 s10

04-06 gto? 

$1?

Corvette wheels does not narrow it down much...

In reply to pinchvalve (Forum Supporter) :

With this crowd, no.... no it does not!.   

Subaru Baja?

Lots of great guesses and a couple of you nailed it.

I was shopping Marketplace and saw an ad for a two thousand dollar 1992 S10.  It was of the single cab, short bed variety, 2.8 / 5 spd with 210,000 miles on it and advertised as rust free.....  I went to take a look and livably rusty was more accurate. It was not the most hateful thing I had ever seen, but it wouldn't win any shows either.  It was honestly a nice work truck.  That was fine with me, so I took it on a test drive.

Steering had a TON of play, brakes worked, lights worked, horn and wipers worked, heat and a/c.. not so much and the throw out bearing made a ton of noise.  It ran and drove pretty well otherwise.  With a little shrewd negotiating, I had bought myself a new daily driver for a mere $1500.

I know, I know....  you guys are DYING to see it right??  Don't be jealous....  :-)

And on the drive home it was given its first name.... "Shop Truck" That name would stick until the next week when I drove it to work and it became know as "Hater Pipe" for its obnoxious side exhaust. 

Thus began the process of sorting out my new daily driver...

On to the second part of the story and the subject of the next forum thread I'll Start  What "Toy" car did we buy?

!!Behold!!

I have been in love with this lady since the day my son Aaron found it in the junkyard over 20 years ago.  Wrong time for me, so it went the the Nelson's where Andy, I and a bunch of others built it into our 2005 Challenge Car.  Through the years its made (2) Challenge appearances, and been the subject of one of Calvin Nelson's 4200 engine swap video series on YouTube.  A couple of years back Aaron bought it from the Nelsons and enjoyed his time with it, making wome pertty cool upgrades to it! Since he is finishing up his '67 Camaro build he needed to make space in his garage so we worked out a deal for me to buy it from him to keep it in the family.  Look for a thread on this car in the near future as I work to polish it to the level it deserves!

When we last left Hater Pipe we were tasked with sorting it out and making it a bit more livable as a daily...

First order of business, obtain wheel spacers to allow us to mount those magnesium C5 wheels to the thing.  Amazon to the Rescue....

Now that the important part is done, lets focus on why it has a check engine light on...  Oh yeah, totally forgot.  On the drive home the CEL came on.  Every time I would drive it, after about 10-15 minutes that little light would glow so bright.  

A little time under the truck would reveal a disconnected O2 sensor as well as a group of 3 or 4 wires in an awkward spot that had all of their insulation melted off of them by the pass side exhaust .  I patched/taped most of them the best I could, but there was one I couldn't get fixed.  It went to the smog pump so it was ignored who needs that anyway...  so I balled them all  up out of the way, forgot about them and got on with my life. ( remember this...  it will matter in future posts)  Hell I had wheels to mount, and mount them I did. 

That is 1000% better, but it sits way too high.  We need a plan...

Remember, this isn't a project vehicle Sean, its a daily driver.  Keep all the planed upgrades doable over a weekend. Work on a budget, we want to spend our money on the Fiat, not on Hater Pipe. Bonus points if it will hold its own at the occasional autocross/track day.  Even the daily needs to be fun right?

1. We need to address the play in the steering, so that could be anything from a worn component to a complete rebuild.

2. Fix the heat

3. It obviously need to have low added.

4. Rework that exhaust

5. Transmission works, but loves to throw itself out of first at the most inconvenient times.

6. The 2.8 runs well, but is showing its age and way under powered.  Lets put a small block in it. Since everyone is doing the LS thing, small block parts are getting inexpensive.  Shoot for 300hp, that way the transmission doesn't have to be anything expensive. I know this will break the "doable over a weekend" rule, but if planned properly and done in the summer when I can ride the Ural, I can afford to have it down a little longer.

7. DONT touch the body...  I love the trucks character.  Plus, if it isn't nice, I wont be afraid to do truck things with it.

At this point, I have a $1500 truck wearing $900 in wheels/spacers/tires  $2400 total so far. I'll try to keep a running total, so I have a reason to take my depression meds.

Time to open the Wallet and buy some parts.  

First on the list, an inexpensive bed cover to keep my DJ gear dry hauling it to and from gigs.  Amazon to the rescue on this one.  Enough with practicality, lets move on to the fun stuff.

After looking over the whole steering system I was happy to see almost all new components.  It looked like someone before me was trying to find the play in the steering.  Fearing the worst I had a helper rock the steering wheel while I looked for play.  I expected it to be in the steering box but was surprised to find the WORST worn rag joint i had ever seen. All its metal parts had broken and left me with just a rubber ring connecting the wheel to the box.  Next part ordered was a Hooker u-joint steering shaft to replace the rag joint.  Amazon had the best price and free shipping, so why not.  While I was at it I ordered steel roll pan to replace the step bumper.  All in total at amazon was $290 for the bed cover, steering shaft and roll pan.

Next stop, the junk yard.  While there I grabbed a set of the spindle assemblies from a 1998 2wd blazer.  This gave me bolt on wheel bearings as well as bigger brakes.  the whole set up ran me $68 out the door for spindles, bearings, rotors and calipers.  Everything was in good condition and usable as bought.

Though usable, I decided to go with new bearings, rotors, pads and calipers.  Off to RockAuto for those along with a new front air dam to replace the broken one, a door hinge repair kit and some other misc parts. I spent about $470 there.

Last on the list was the suspension.  I went with DJM 3" front 4" rear kit with shocks for $650.  The front uses tubular control arms with deep spring pockets to give you the drop.  I also ordered a pair od Speedway 8" tubular upper control arms for a G body as well as long upper ball joints.  That was another $226.

It was also about now, that I settled on the final "theme" for the build.  GMC had the Typhoon and Syclone, I give you the....

After the traditional waiting period for parts to arrive, it was time for a solid weekend of installation...

First the rear, because how long could it take to install spacer blocks...  Yeah, longer than I wanted.  It was worth the effort though.

Front next, 

When I took the driver side apart, I was greeted with this bit of engineering....

Yes, they were holding the spring compressed, I gained about 3/4 inch when I cut them.

I also decided to cut 1/2 coil off of the front springs because it still sat just a little to hig in the front. I had the pass side together and apart about 5 times for various reasons, but after lessons learned, the driver side was a breeze.

So lets get her out of the shop and take a look...

Looks Great,  But I still think we can do better n the graphics package....

I got the truck back on the road not a moment too soon.  Why you may ask?  Well I needed it to do truck things.....

New powerplant acquired!

Now lets talk graphics... I designed, printed and redsigned the logo 4 times before I got what I wanted.  I think the final product really suits the character of the truck and the build.

Well, now the internet has caught up to the build...  next time, we can talk about the engine parts deal I fell into last week.  :-)

Oh, as we sit its at $3450 total so far

I called one of my favorite automotive recyclers a few weeks ago and asked if they had any 1st gen S10/Blazers in the yard. They said they had a couple, so I grabbed my go bag and headed out. When I got there I was disappointed to see that the few they had were fairly well picked over.  Then I noticed it... another S10 kind of hidden back in the corner.  I went to investigate and it was picked clean with the exception of a set of OEM Baja wheel flares.  I had seen a few sets for sale while looking for parts, but they were anywhere from $100 to $400 depending on condition. I had $50 with me, so I pulled them and headed out, fingers crossed.  With my wallet now $10 lighter, I loaded them in the bed and headed for home!

Last night I got a few minutes of daylight after work and decided to throw them on.  

I know the body work is horrid, and honestly that's ok with me.  Actually its more than ok with me...  I love the look of this truck.  Its honest, it has character.  I fully embrace the ridiculousness of this truck!  At the End of the day, my vision of the perfect daily/beater/giggle mobile is taking shape.  The next fix on the list is the heater install and mounting the old wheels/tires for winter use.  Over the winter, I'll find some sway bars, build the motor, find a transmission and collect the rest of the parts for the V8 swap. Hopefully by spring it will be finished.

I am really into square S-10s and "driveabeater" stuff, so this checks a lot of boxes for me. Rad!

Winter is coming and the Magnesium Wheels tire combination was NOT going to cut it in the snow.  I hated the wheels that the truck came with but decided to keep them for winter duty.  The tires had good tread, so why not.  Honestly, with it lowered I don't hate them.  

It's not glamorous, but it needed done.  Started my heater replacement this week and first step was pulling the seat to give me a bit more room to work.  I was met with a TON of gross...  Lots of mold and rodent droppings...

Out it all comes...  Bare floors it is!

All cleaned up and liquid bed liner applied.

Also, to make room for the upcoming V8 swap I decided since I had to replace the heater core anyway I would pull the whole heater box and install a under dash heater.  That's later this weekend.  For now, let's just put in the block off plate and add some Horsepower with stickers!

Heater is in!  Everything is back together with the exception of the shift knob which I broke.  Everything is temporary, as I plan to put in an aluminum dash and door panels when I do the V8 swap in the spring.  

Needed a shifter boot...  Had a knock off Bride boot from a parts car laying around.  Since the theme of the build is ridiculous...  Why not.