Tire carrier time!!!
 

ok, so im going to start this thread for when i do mire carrier this weekend, ill do my best to keep picture through the steps, i've gotten everything i need so far other then mounting bolts.

instructions on how to install, recevied from blazer forum fellow members
tire carrier, received from scrap yard, 20$ (CDN)
chevy blazer, bought 2 years ago, 1500$ (CDN)

i will be doing the project this coming weekend hopefully, but for now, i will put up pictures of before and propped up to give an idea of the look.

I have considered doing this but it makes me nervous to drill into the body of my Blazer.

the wife and I were the same way. but as long as you seal it up, there wont be any issues, just gotta remember, measure 6 times and drill once lol. ill be doing it on Saturday so hopefully everything goes smoothly

Does yours not have the underside tire mounting in the back?

Yes sir it does. But unfortunately because of the age and lack of usage, the cable snapped. To order a new one from gm ur looking at about 150 Cdn. So instead I reside to go upon doing this, plus it'll remover any need of having to crawl on the grown for the tire and having to replace it again in 3 years.

I got a decent one from the u-pull it for like $9.

I've been debating doing this to my S10 pickup. It's a little funky looking, but with a truck cap it looks alright!

Ours around here are all flat on the ground with no clearance. They will pick it up for you to get something but they won't pick it up to check first.... It's either that or nothing unless it's absolutely dead with nothing to do. It'll cost me about 15$ at the scrappers, but I'm gambling on how long it'll last, if it's any good, and if my tire is gonna fall off while I'm driving. I never really liked them down there anyways... Plus doing this, it opens my possibility of putting the gas tank from a zr2 in its place. I live my road trips lol.

Craig, I googled one and saw it on a 4 door s10 I thought it looked great with the cap on the box.... Plus it's so much more convenient.

Understood, I just think it would get on my nerves having a lot of my rear vision blocked by a tire. lol

so the blazer had a plan of its own this week. the fuel pump has decided to quit on me. so i went to do it wed night, no go... stayed home thurs, and it decided not to let me get the ring off in one piece. so off to the shop she went. and now i must wait until monday to get her back :(... but so far this week i have grinded all the rust off, gave it a prime and then a few coats of flat black... ill post some pics of the final project soon, its been a rough week going.

This is exactly what I want to do when I get a crew cab!

so after a rough few weeks, I'm hoping that everything will fall back onto schedual this weekend. finally with a new fuel pump and two new break lines, shes running the roads again. I still haven't gotten any pics of the tire carrier all cleaned up. but just updating for the time being.

Here are some pics of the tire carrier after I did the sanding and painting, I didn't replace any hardware on it. Just a wash sand and rust coat paints. I got some 1/8 thick rubber for in-between the mounts and the body for an extra seal before the caulking. And I also picked up some 12gauge steel sheets I cut to fit from top to bottom to reinforce the side panel in-between.

The carrier looks good. What kind of paint did you use?

I got cheap from Walmart and put on about 3 coats. It's an outdoor appliances rust coat paint... Cost me 5$ Cdn a can.... Rust-Oleum is the name

Carrier looks clean! Glad to hear she's back on the road...Fuel pump seems to be a pretty common issue on the s10s

When I met my gf, she was driving a Sonoma. In the middle of january on the coldest night I had to change hers, luckily I cut a hole in the box and just layed the bed liner back over top. That was about 2 years ago. Now we got the blazer and it decided to give me the same problem. Yet again at the coldest time of the winter. Curse you Chevy!!

So the day didn't go as planned, but she's 85% finished! I have gotten the tire carrier on the blazer! I took a couple of pics of the work but not all is there, and there's bolt sizes!! But I cut three of the four bolts down to about 3". The hex socket head bolts I used where only used because I didn't have the flat heads, they will be swapped out in the warmer weather. I have to finish the caulking around the hinge and latch panel, adjust the bumpers on the carrier and pull my spare out of storage and mount it on. Maybe one day when the snow decides to stop!

That looks great! Good work, and thanks for the pics showing the hardware needed. I've thought about doing this before, but I'm scared to loose visibility when reversing. I may modify one to hold a Jerry can and hi-lift jack though.

Definitely looks awesome on the 4 doors though. Can't wait to see it with the tire on there

I was thinking of that myself, I'm waiting to see. When I was younger my foster dad had a 2 door zr2 with 32's on it... It took up most of his rear view but I didn't mind it too bad... But I like my mirrors too so who knows lol. But there a plate you can get that lowers it by about 2-3"... I seen a forum where someone actually cut it off and re welded it lower aswell, sat it right on the bumber and relocated his plate to beside the wheel on the carrier. The one problem I have now is that the back window isn't able to open while the carrier is shut

Forgot to say tho that u can fit the small Jerry can in behind the tire carrier... I'll be getting that out of storage to lol.

So I stopped by storage and got my spare tire out, I threw on one of my summers on the carrier for the time being until I get the spare cleaned up. I took a pic too if the view from between the two front seats so you can get an idea of the view. Hopefully this will help people in the future if they are having a hard time deciding. As for the Jerry can, the smallest I have is 2.5 gallon, and it's too big for the spot I thought it would go, right in the middle behind the tire on the carrier. But might make a bracket to mound on the carrier to strap it or wait until I get my roof rack

Looks really good!

Do you have any pictures of your reinforcements?

I do not sorry, I took pictures of the plates before hand, for the two outer most bolts, I was able to go through the side wall and the body reinforcement on the inside of the truck.for the two middle bolts is where I put the reinforcement. Let me tell you now that that was the hardest and bigger pain ever! For the two bolts above and below I did not use any reinforcement. There was on the other hand a couple of pictures of reinforcement for those two bolts on another fellow members pictures of his work. I can't remember whom it was but if you search tire carrier it'll be at the top of the list.

Looks good.

Looks good.

Specs on the Blazer? (Tire size/lift? I noticed those are 2wd steelies)

I got 235/75/15's all the way around. Goodyear Wrangler druratrac's for winters, and summer are still the crappy motormaster that came with them when I bout it on the American racing rims that I have a safe my temporary​ spare. I will be putting my factory spare on at some point. So far there are no mods done, all stock. Slight torsion adjustment but that's all... She's all looks for now :icon_cry:. Since I put the tire carrier on the back I've notice she's sagging so I'm going to be looking into 2" blocks for the rears and maybe swapping out the torsion keys. 2" body lift at some point and maybe a 3" suspension in the future. But it's a low budget build so we will see what's on sale when I got cash kinda thing lol

But I got the S10 offsets for 40$ Cdn for my winters. And forgot to mention that I'm looking at some Cooper cobras for summers.
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Blocks lower these trucks. Factory spring under setup.

It's not recommended to go beyond a 1.5" to 2" crank on the IFS (most likely need new upper control arms at that point).

Sorry, shackles not blocks. Control arms are good. Front end will be getting worked on in the summer, just did the torsion keys to give myself cowardice for the Goodyear's

So for some reason I forgot I started a build thread for the blazer a long time ago.... But I'm just gonna continue off of this one so I don't have a shopping list of threads started for each part lol

So after a year of having my S10 rims I finally found some center caps for them! I payed 40$ for all four in decent shape. I have cleaned them up and painted them silver to match the rims. Come summer I'm hoping to fill in the GMC with Bondo or something and placing a custom bowtie on it.

Also driving in town today I seen a rear window decal of a white bowtie and in the middle it said "bowtie till I die". Now I'm thinking of finding a printing company to make one up for me with a blazerforum.com at the bottom. Any thoughts?

Oh and from my other post, I solved my massive clinking noise... My lower ball joints bolts were all loose for some reason... Noise solved :). Now my ujoints are making noises I'm assuming from what I've read.

So I had to rewire my trailer plugin. Last year the trailer came off the ball and broke the bracket. It was a little tricky, the 7 prong plugin doesn't work, but the 4 flat does so I'm not concerned on fixing it until after my road trip.

Also decided to throw on my summers. Going to lower my torsion keys a little tomorrow after work and hopefully install my 2" shackles. I'm going to have to replace the leafs at some point... Running flat atm.

Any chance you got a shot down the side with the 2wd wheels / Duratracs?

(showing the how far past the fenders they are)


:::EDIT::: Nevermind, there's one on the front page.

They aren't too bad on the back, but the front sticks out a little. Tires fit good, just had to take off the much flap on the front and tighten the torsion keys so they would stop hitting the top of the fender. Other then that, there was no modifications. Would look better with a 1" spacer on the back to even out the wheel spacings.

My Z's pump went at about 140k~ miles on the way to work one morning. Managed to get it pushed across the street (I was sitting at a light) part way into a parking lot, luckily I had the phone number of the guy I was working with that morning. Gave him a call, he came down and gave me a hand getting it moved into a parking space and gave me a ride to work.

Replaced it with a genuine AC Delco pump ( $$$ Ouch). No problems since.