do mine next? cool build dude, good luck with it

 

Lots of progress today, diesel purged the engine and it did make quite a diffrence... then proceded to rip everything down, Im now to the point where I have to unbolt the drive shaft , cut 3 vacuum lines and two motor mounts and then pull the benz engine.

 

Progress today:

Every thing on the Benz is done, engine is ready to be pulled, Now I need to find/borrow/buy a engine hoist for this project..

 

You will need to use the diesel fuel pump and drop a pickup tube into the Blazer tank.
As far as the gauges... I would take the "easy" way out and install all mechanical gauges into a "new by you" blank instrument bezel. I have seen this done on old hot rods, etc... I am not too sure about gettin the speedo drive to work though.

 

yeah figured out the fuel pump already way to high of pressure.. need to rip it out of there and make a dip tube..

As for the spedo.. I think there is a speed sensor on the blazer tranny.. if i can use that sensor and make a dohicky to go from the mechanical output from the benz tranny to the sensor.. i can get the gauge to work, then just re letter the gauge face to match my real speed..

Id love to keep the stock blazer gauges , but if I cant I'll just mount the benz gauges in the blazer dash, the entire cluster would fit in the cluster of the blazer. IF that doesnt work I'll just use a GPS unit as the speedo and then add in after market oil tack and temp gauges. The benz motor has a simple basic tack sensor on the front of the engine, for oil pressure its mechanical but I can adapt a electrical sender in that port for the mechanical oil pressure port, and the temp sedned can easly be swapped.

 

For tonight the progress was getting a engine hoist, got a nice one, and brought it over to the shop, tomorrow I'll assemble the lift and pull the Benz engine, then bring the blazer in and get started on that.

Sadly I have to work Sunday this weekend, and then long days till Wednesday, and next weekend I have a award weekend to go on. So that weekend is shot to heck too.. only getting a few hours every day to work on it makes slow going.... well too slow for me anyway.

More tomorrow!

 

Today i got a few more hours in on the swap, made lots of progress.

at 11 am i started assembling the lift... 1 hour and 10 minutes later i had it completed and in the next 10 minutes removed the Benz motor.


Next i got the benz sheel out and parked, and then ate lunch and then got the Blazer in the shop and started digging into that.


After a couple hours i had a few thing left to do before ripping out the blazers drive line.. and neeed tools i didnt have at the shop like a saws all with ametal cutting bit to chop the exhaust.. So I decided to call it a day and head out to the lake for a few beers and some R&R.

THe blazer is far more complicated to pull the engine , electrical plugs everywhere and very tight quarters with that 4.3l v6 in there..

Looks like the blazer is going to become a 2wd blazer.. the transfer case is pretty sloppy with 225k on it and not worth taking the time to divorce it and make it work.. so Ill be pulling the front differential and drive shafts and making it a 2wd blazer.. this was the original plan when i got the blazer.. adding 4x4 would have been a plus , but i can still do that later down the road , I'd do a solid axle in front if i did this later anyway.

Everything is looking good after digging in to the blazer.. the motor will fit, there seems to be enough room for the front sump and the trany will be able to mount on the stock trany mount.. and there is even frame crossbars bars there for the carrier bearing from the original Benz setup..

More to come!

 

looks like fun. keep it up, cant wait to see this thing finished

 

No progress today, had to work on a special event at work today.. tomorrow I'll get some time in however.. Hopefully get that pesky gasoline motor pulled.

 

Progress today... the motor is ready to pull minus two simple things, I have to disconnect the fuel line under the car.. and then cut the exhaust.. today I pulled both front motor mounts and that was a big task , gosh I'm glad I"m not putting a 4.3 back in to this thing, I removed the front radiator supports and grille ect.. and did a few odds and ends that still needed to be done, like pulling the starter and other misulanious things I had missed.

I wont be able to get to the motor pulled till probably Wednesday, or Thursday I'll be working some long hours tomorrow and won't have time to do it tomorrow.

But the progress continues.. more to come.