Actually, it was Thanksgiving day but, installed a CURT MFG class 3 receiver hitch.



CURT mfg hitch

 

Gave my Blazer a really good bath. I did a manual wash at the DIY car wash followed by the automatic car wash. They started salting the roads here in north Idaho which sucks as I will have to spend more money at the car wash.

 

Test fit the winch mount. Pretty darn good fit! Much to my surprise, no interference issues with the brush guard! So I can run them both











Going to work tomorrow bumperless :P







Got some trimming to do to get the bumper bar and the winch to actually fit, so it was easiest just to leave it all off as I plan to do the trimming actually at work after hours.

Gotta notch the bar to have physical access to the free spool lever and visual access to the drum at least.









Also gotta remove some material from the upper bumper brackets in order to get the winch to even fit. Not too worried about them loosing some structural rigidity, considering there's going to be a large hunk of steel bolted to the frame directly underneath it lol











Also gotta grind some factory welds flat so the bracket will sit a little more flush on the frame...

 

Replaced rear brake pads and found the rear driver side sway bar link hardware had snapped off where it connects to the body. One thing leads to another !

 

Started he Blazer for the second time today and it came alive in all it's glory.I am now getting the expected results from a neglected Blazer..

- CEL with DTC P0155
- ABS light on, will need to scan that for a code later
- Leaking upper Radiator hose
- Leak coming from bottom of radiator
- Enough moisture coming from exhaust to fill a pool (slight exaggeration , but it was dripping out the exhaust)

Then found out that someone supplemented the Dex-cool with some green coolant.

LIM Leak , head gasket leak, cracked head , cracked block??!! Who knows...I guess we'll find out one way or another..

What did I do with my Blazer today? I uncovered more issues..

 

After sitting for a long time, the ABS check valves and such could just be temporarily stuck. I got mine going by bleeding brakes to flush old fluid through master cylinder... and maybe a few strategic taps with a hammer... ;-)

My money is on LIM gaskets. IMO, Dexcool is the devil. Your gaskets are likely soggy and in terrible shape. Regardless, you have to flush the Dexcool/Green mixture out of there. They are not compatible and will turn to sludge. You'll be fine running the green stuff once the Dexcool is completely eliminated.

Good luck!

 

Thanks for the reply... I am thinking that as well...Prev owner had someone actually replace the LIM itself and they used the wrong one...So now I at least need to get the correct LIM , at which time we'll swap the LIM gaskets.. I could tell the job wasn't done in a clean professional manner either , because there is that crappy red gasket sealer all over the upper manifold..

What a mess....We'll get it straightened around...

 

Got some cutting done Got room to drop the winch in now. Came home and hit the bare metal with some paint so it doesn't start to rust... Also went ahead and put a coat of primer on the winch mount after hitting it with some sand paper to stop the surface rust...

 

What is your method for removing the pinstripe?

 

Gotta love Dexcrap! My '00 Jimmy was loaded with the crap, plus stop leak. Was hard to tell what was caused by the Dex, and what was caused by the stop leak. It was a friggin mess either way!







GM also used the crappiest gaskets they possibly could, to compound the problems ...






That Jimmy was the biggest turd I had ever owned. I yanked the engine, slapped a carb, & HEI ignition on it, and ran it computer free in a '89 S10 Blazer. The engine suddenly became reliable! Had great power, and got the SAME mileage as the Jimmy did with FI, after some minor tuning. Got 17 MPG at first, with a failure prone chinese eBay ignition.