Come on TheRandom1 your killing me , no just kidding , before the week end they should be on there . I can't use my tire machine to change the tires over because the rims are really soft , but I have a friend who has the right tire machine to do the job . I just returned home from garys u pull it and got the steering box I needed , and I had to go to autozone and get a new drag link because I cut the one that was on the jeep and welded a female end on it so I could hook it to the s10 pitman arm , but little did I know that the astro van steering box has a female pitman arm . I'll post more pictures tonight and show what I'm typing about . I installed the new gear box and new drag link end , and the steering works great . And I installed the drive shaft and backed it out of where it was , and moved it to where the arc welder is . I had to remove the rear end again and weld the perches on there solid , I'm almost done now I just have to bolt the rear end back in . I don't have any shocks hooked up yet , man I'll tell you its all over the place . The steering works great though , there's no binding and it turns the right way now , and my tires don't rub LOL .

 

Heres the astrovan steering box I picked up today .

Here is the s10 pitman arm and the drag link from the jeep .

this is the new drag link that hooks to the pitman arm .


And here it is all cleaned up .

And I guess I'm going to get the tires changed Thursday , I did get to drive it around a little bit tonight , I did a couple brake stands to make sure the drive shaft I made was going to hold up . With no shocks it wheel hops like crazy , go figure LOL . Even driving at slow speeds I can tell the difference in the gears , I like it . tomorrow the plan is to get the cross member built and the front drive shaft , and I have to bleed the front brakes .

 

Those leafs you got should still have lift to them. from the pic u took they look almost inverted/ negative arch. wont be good. but dont know for sure, but looks like it from the angle u took the pic. if you want to stay with 47" leafs up front, see if u can track down a set of rancho 44044. they are waggy lift leafs. will support the weight of the v8 better and still yeild bout 2.5" of lift. better options if you want to move you shackle mounts for longer leafs.

Dont spend alot of time on that rear end either. if it breaks or you have to change the brakes...lol, swap to an 8.8 out of a first gen explorer. same lug pattern as d30 so your adapters will still work, and its just as strong as d44. Sorry for being negative, but i only have one last tip, do not buy a new set of thornbirds!!

Whats your plans for front driveshaft?

 

I think its the way the camera took the picture , but they did flatten out quite a bit . But I do agree that I should get the 44044 springs and I would like to change to the waggy axles anyway , I'm hoping that these will last this season . And the brakes that came on the rear are good , I just have to run new lines on the rear end itself . I'm going to keep my eye open for a set of dana 44s or who knows I may even put some rockwells under the old girl . My friend is putting 4 wheel steer on his excursion , so he will have a rear end , I'll just have to find a front . The more I think about it I'll more than likely go with the rockwells . And you don't have to apologize for being negative , you have some valid concerns . And for the front drive shaft I'm not really sure what I'm going to do for sure yet . Any suggestions are welcome , and I can take criticism very well , so don't hold back if you see something I'm doing wrong or could do better. I take it you don't like the thornebirds , why ?

 

I hate to bust your *****, i know how much work goes into it. This case you could have ran stock rear end, way stronger then the dana35 from the jeep. The thorntirds, are for mall crawlers. Its pretty much a fancy looking all terrain tire that does not perform that well. especially in mud the tires dont clean out well. Youll have fun when it rains though on the street...woohoo hang on...lol.

u still have stock transfer case? most run a shortened cherokee (xj) drive shaft. i ran a first gen explorer driveshaft which worked great til i did my motor swap, now i have the shortened xj shaft. these are double cardan shafts.

 

I have the stock transfer case that was bolted to the ford c6 transmission , its a 208 case . And now that you mention it the tires did load up with mud pretty good on the jeep they came off , but it only had a four banger , I figured my freshly built v8 would turn them fast enough to clean them out , I only bought the thornebirds for 100 bucks . I was going to trade my scrap metal but they backed out of the deal , and said they wanted 100 bucks instead , I thought it was a great deal . I took the scrap to the junk yard and got almost 400 bucks . As for the running the stock rear , I would have had to change the gears in the rear end and I hate doing gears , just doing the bearing and shim kit in the dana 30 was bad enough . My old boss said to just reuse the old shims that came off the front and the it all went together better , It just kept binding up on me . But like I said this will not be in my blazer for long and I'll have something better . I thought I did all the necessary reading on the SAS swap but I guess I should have done more . The bad thing about this is I bought 1000 dollars worth of crap , my own fault , live and learn , right . I'm not going to let it get me down though , I'll tear it up till it falls apart and start over . I do appreciate your advice , thank you .

 

not a bad deal on a used set of 35s at all. i was swaying you from the new set...lol.

The foundation is the hard part, youll get tons of enjoyment, probably will be worth every penny you spent too. No doubt alot better then stock!! build it, beat it, break it....repeat!

i looked up the 208, seen some have yokes and some have a flange on the front output. from what i seen, ppl wanting to upgrade to larger ujoints, so i would take a good guess and say it is indeed 1310 ujoints same as the d30. the yoke will be the easiest. not sure what you would need to find to make a flange work.

 

Yes my transfer case does have the yoke , not the flange . So I should keep the yoke ? I'm taking the day off from working on the blazer and spending time with my kids , there on easter break . But I will be researching this , hopefully better than I researched the axles . Did you make your own transmission cross member or did you buy one ? Also do you have any pictures that you can share of your cross member ? Ok this is what I'm going to do with the cross member http://mypeoplepc.com/members/voet//...ures/sfa21.jpg this looks like the best route to go . Let me know if you think that is not what I should do .

 

yeah keep yoke. double cardan shaft should bolt right up to it from the xj or explorer. you will probably have to get a mesurment and take it with u to upull. see whats going to work out best. these have a slip yoke in the middle, so u have to keep in mind that it needs to be able to move in and out with the suspension. xj one will probably be too long, but best one to cut and make work.

I will be making my own crossmember soon. the v8 swap changed all my angles, and when my suspension droops now driveshaft rubs crossmember. I havent had anytime to do any work on mine, my garage is the street. weather started to suck again so, waiting til i can get some stuff done. im terrible at taking pics when i do stuff, i found one ive seen alot of em done like this.

 

What is that cross member for ? Is it a s10 cross member ? It looks simple enough to make , yea its cold and raining here to , I have a huge shop but its not heated . Usually once I get working the temp don't really bother me , but I hate the dampness .I like that setup better than the link I posted , because I would worry about bottoming out the hoop and binding up my drive shaft . Skotti do you have a build thread on here that I can check out ? I have all the steel to make one like you posted right now , I think I'm going to give it a shot , I'll take pictures and let you know how it works out . Tomorrow morning I'm going to my buddie Matts house to get my 35s mounted , I can't wait to see what it looks like .