Yeah, but this guy is right down the road from me. Gave me a substantial discount for paying cash in person.

That Mastercool set is even better because you can take it to the vehicle & flare what you need there. Can't do that with mine - has to be in a vise. But it's the easiest & fastest way to flare lines that I've ever seen.

 

Ended up spending some more dough that I didn't want to spend ... but that's how these things go.

Tried in vain to get the Jimmy exhaust to fit. Spent a whole day trying to make it work - dropped the crossmember, unbolted rear shock .... not happenin'. The tailpipe bends are almost opposite where they need to be ... and that muffler ... 4' long, 55lbs.! WTF is that?? Never saw an original before - since the Jimmy was from GA it was still there, rust free too.

So back to square 1. Threw original Y pipe/cat back in & ordered up a whole new exhaust from the local parts store. That's done. Wasn't a total loss because I managed to fit the Jimmy crossmember in there - which was also rust free.

Got the old gasket scraped out of the oil filter adapter, & installed the new gasket & o-ring in that. Also got the 2 stubs I made for the tranny lines bolted in the tranny. So I'm thinking I should have this thing in by next weekend as long as the torsion bar mounts come in on schedule. Grabbed a set of Moogs for those. Had this horrendous bang over bumps on the drivers side from the torsion bar hitting the crossmember. When I removed the old one, it came out in 3 pieces - hard as a brick too.

Once I get the engine in, all that will be left will be rigging up the throttle, cruise, & kickdown cables. I bent up the original mount to make it fit - we'll see how that works .....

Only thing I need to do to the Jimmy radiator is cut off these stubs ... then it will fit just like the stocker. At least one thing is easy ....

And check out that mammoth muffler!

 

Made lots of progress on this thing this week. Been going at it non stop.

Bolted up the old water pump, & all the old belt-driven accessories, installed a block heater, installed new oil filter lines & wrapped them in plastic wire loom I stole off the Jimmy, welded 2 washers to both sides of the motor mount to fit it on the original mount supports on the frame, then jumped in engine compartment & installed the fuel pressure regulator, clear filter, & a new hose all the way back to the tank .. bypassing the original filter, dropped engine in & hooked everything up! Then I threw in 5 quarts of Amsoil Signature Series oil & primed the oil pump for about 5 minutes to get that fresh oil circulated all around the engine. It's been sitting in my enclosed trailer for 18 months ... so it certainly needed it.

Had to make a few modifications along the way. The ones I can remember are as follows: the stud on the drivers side front of the engine for the alt/pwr steering pump had to be removed & the lift bracket cut, then the stud had to be moved one hole higher on the bottom. Then the assembly fit flush. Then, I had to cut 2 of the 6 tranny bellhousing-to-engine bolts in order to fit them back in with the limited clearance. The Jimmy threads are metric ... but the originals were standard .. and a bit shorter. Had to modify the Jimmy radiator to fit as well. That was easy - just cut off & grind down tabs & a raised portion - all plastic.

Removed this ancient alarm system & the spaghetti rats nest of wiring with it. Was glad to get that crap out of there! Also I finally fixed the broken plastic handle on the hood release by welding a piece of a Yamaha RT100 shift shaft in it's place! Works great now!

Everything fits good! The distributor was a little tight though. it's double the size of the old one - I'll post pics of that later. Not much room for adjustment with the giant vacuum advance assembly hanging off the side. Also very little room to install the vacuum hose for the power brake booster.

One problem I ran into by installing the Jimmy radiator is a lack of the heater hose hookup. I installed a spigot on the intake manifold ... but there's no place to hook up the return! I'll see if I can get a T fitting for the lower hose ...

I still have quite a bit of work left hooking up wiring & coolant hoses, carburetor & cable mounts, etc.. Hoping to be done & driving today or tomorrow!

 

Lookin good man! i thought about this thread last night. I didnt know the muffler weighted that much!!! Id go aftermarket on something later. Heck the cherrybomb turbo muffler weighs like 5lb and isnt a annoyance loud noise. autozone has em for like 20 bucks too.

 

Yeah the thing was gigantic - unreal! I ended up buying a complete system from Advance Auto. Just stock, nothing fancy ... but I got the heavy-duty muffler with the lifetime warranty. Complete system shipped to my door, with sales tax was $90. Gotta love coupon codes!

 

I should have this running today .... so I'm going to keep this brief so I can get out there & back to work.

Got the plug wires, tranny lines, cooling system & power steering all hooked up. Lost several hours yesterday by having to take a ride to find a 1-1/2" x 3/4" T, so I could hook up the heater hoses. Didn't find exactly what I needed, but I was able to mickey-mouse a dishwasher branch tailpiece in PVC.

I cut it to the size I needed which eliminated the treads on the end. There was also a little baffle inside to prevent a drain from slowing the flow of the dishwasher drain, so I had to make sure to get that facing the correct direction of flow. I installed this setup on the lower hose, so I'm not worried about the coolant getting hot enough to soften the PVC. Figure most dishwashers get up to 180° anyway, and being that this is on the lower hose where the coolant is at it's coolest (and the fact that this is a winter beater anyway) it will be fine.

Now we have heat.

 

She lives!!

Still need to hook up exhaust, & I need to buy a spacer for the air cleaner. Due to the gigantic HEI distributor, I'll have to reuse the stock air cleaner assembly, which means more fab work - have to weld up that vacuum tube on the base. No biggie, but now I have to wait before I go for a test drive. Also the torque converter/flywheel cover won't fit with the Vortec block design back there. Might have to leave it exposed if I can't come up with something. Not a real big deal, but I'd rather have it covered - especially with winter salt splashing all over under there.

But anyway, I'm absolutely exhausted .... smoked .... bruised ... beat. Goin to bed.

Here's the vid. She has a small exhaust leak here.

Can't seem to upload the vid ... I'll try this instead:

Blazerproject-FIRSTFIRE10-9-11.mp4 video by jjs05polaris - Photobucket

 

Awesome sauce! glad to hear it run man!

 

Sounds mean... don't bother with exhaust! lol jp

 

I thought so too! I should have crawled underneath & videoed the 2 foot flames & carbon sparks shooting out of the manifolds when I slammed the throttle shut.

In this state I'd probably get just out of my town, then the next town over, cops would get 100 calls a minute.

Wish I could've taken it for a ride & put a real load on the engine. That would've sounded nice. The Y pipe is just sitting there on the crossmember, & no air cleaner, so no need sucking dirt in the brand new carb. Just ordered up some spacers for the air cleaner in 3 different sizes. I'll pick whatever one works without hitting the hood, & sell the other 2.

Today it's exhaust day, & check the fluids .... and find out why my power door locks quit working. It's definitely due to that rats nest of wiring I yanked out from the 80's alarm system. That explains what those speaker wires went to through the kick panel ...