1986 GMC S-15

[Andrew_S]

Thanks gentlemen.

Next up was wiring up the winch. As I previously mentioned I came up on a good bit of underground burial cable from work.



It was plenty for what I needed.



I reused the heavy steel loom with the rubberized coating. It worked out quite nicely.
The wire is aluminum which isn't ideal as it fatigues with movement but it's 2 gauge which is great for the long run, and free.
For how little movement the wire will ever see it should suffice for now.







I then addressed the fuel system. Starting with the filter.



I would guess original to the truck



Next up I rebuilt the throttle body. First time doing this and I have to say it's a super easy job.








Cleaned up real nice. Installed new injectors as well.



I keep getting constantly surprised at how cheap this truck is to work on. Had a headlight burn out and a tail light as well.



It's not often you can fix your trucks problems for the less than what a cup of coffee costs. Everything above for $2.50



At some point I picked up a hawse fairlead for the winch. Plan to switch to synthetic as it's quite cumbersome to lift out of the truck.
Any lb's I can shave may save my back in the future.



I was having an issue with water getting into the canopy. So I resealed the windows with some silicone. Worked out perfect.





During christmas break from school we took the truck ice fishing nearly everyday so here's a bunch of pics from that.








Our set-up














A huge passion of mine is getting out ice fishing in the winter. Hitting the freshly covered snow roads, the trees are all white.
Also there are so few people out at this time of year. Plus the fishing is usually great. I wish I could just take winters off work and do this everyday.

 

[Andrew_S]

Now that I was using the truck a bunch I was quickly learning it's limitations. The biggest being the current tires. They are a Nokian all season that are 10+ years old. So not only do they lack clearance and bite, they rubber is getting quite hard. I have a set of cheap cable chains and I ended up using them a few times in the deeper snow when the tires would just spin an ice slick.



This was a big stepping stone for my faith in the truck. In this pic we are roughly 60 km's back into the bush on an fsr that doesn't get plowed or see any traffic. If something happened here it would have been a long walk back.




I've been stuck enough times in the past to know a good set of chains are worth their weight in gold. We were venturing out far enough that I became weary of the dinky little cable chains I was using. So I decided to upgrade. I had set these aside a couple years ago. They are some tandem axle truck chains for plowing in the winter. They were being thrown away and I knew I would make use of them one day.



The chains were clearly far to large currently as they were designed to fit a 40" tandem tire. My dinky little 27" nokians meant I need to completely disassemble and rebuild.



I had enough links so I decided to turn them into double duty chains.



After making one I did a trial fit, made some adjustments and made the others.





These are seriously beefy. I don't think I'll ever have to worry about them in the future.



Installed. No bungies as I was just checking the fitment and clearance, hence they look loose. When I strap them down though, they are solid.
It's like a little tank in 4lo in the snow now.



Love having the long box, never could have done this with my sierra's stupid 5'8" box.



Still stoked on the rear leafs. This is close to 600lbs of gear in the back of the truck and it barely sags.

 

[Andrew_S]

I picked up some more recovery stuff. Made this chain up and an 80' winch extension.



Should have brought a set of chains this trip.






Now we we're getting close to school ending and it was time to start seriously consider using this for camping this spring/summer.

Started reading a lot on different builds. Random post wash picture.




So we really needed only two more things. A rack for the canoe, and ideally somewhere to sleep as we camp a lot in bear country and we were tired of being soft shelled tacos.

First up was the rack. Picked up some aluminium stock.




Cut out and fitted up my uprights.



All cut up and ready for welding. The White plastic is HDPE that I thought would work nice for sliding the canoe on and off.



I took it all from there to a friend of a friend and had him tig weld it up for me. Total cost of material and labour for the rack was $210








Next up was where do we sleep? I had contemplated a RTT for a few mins but the logistics of having the canoe on the rack as well and setting up the tent every night just wasn't working out for us. So we decided to build a false floor under the canopy for sleeping.

We looked at a ton of different super elaborate designs. Ones with multiple slide outs and cupboards and on and on. Very cool but not what we were looking for.

We decided on this very simple 3 piece design, that I have to give the credit to Nicole for, it was her idea.



The whole thing pops out in under two mins. The end towards the tailgate is supported by our cooler when we are sleeping. It's made out 3/4" aspen.



Later on I routered all the edges and give it a bunch of coats of stain.

Late spring snow


A little too ambitious for the current all season tires.

 

[Andrew_S]

Well at this point school was just finishing and I we were ready. So we set out on our first trip to see what we had.

Our very first trip was just under 3000 km's during may long weekend. We met up in Golden (wife works in calgary) and then set out.



This was the second half of the trip.



It was such a great adventure.



This is moose or Alces Lake, beautiful camp spot.




Temps dipped down to 0* C but we were very warm and comfortable. We actually ended up sleeping with the back hatch open all night and a nice fresh breeze.




The only issue we had all trip was the new canopy clamps I purchased were junk and kept rattling loose on the backroads. A frustrating number of times I had to pull out our gear and retighten them down. After this trip I returned them and went back to the old school ones that worked perfectly fine previously. The old saying "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" held true.




A lot of guys I work with share a similar interest in camping but hate going out on long weekends because they say it's too crowded. Well we quickly discovered the really great thing about our new rig was we took up such a small footprint we could go to a lot of places and set up where many others could not. This is white Swan Lake, we did not stay here. Very busy place.





Nicole is a big mushroom fan and we stumbled across this little crop of Morels while waiting for the Galena Bay Ferry.





Second night was beautiful. Temps got down to -5*C but we were still super warm.




Nothing like having to turn around because of a fresh landslide but finding $20 on the ground made it ok for Nicole.



This was at Beaver Lake just outside of Nakusp. Absolutely beautiful paddle.






We had to make a lot of changes to our plans due to avalanches, mudslides, impassable snow, and washed roads this trip.
This pack was about 30' across and just solid ice.






Wilson Falls, tough to get a good pic here.




Next stop was Esplanade bay on Kinbasket lake. We lucked out and had the entire rec site to ourselves.



What was really neat about this time of year is the lake was down nearly 20 meters from normal.




One of the nicer spots in the site,



Same spot during normal water levels,



This wrapped up our may long trip. Couldn't have asked for better weather, fishing and sights to see.

 

[Andrew_S]

One afternoon we did a "quick" backroads trip to scout out new lakes for ice fishing this winter.






Our second big trip was on July Long weekend. We met up in the Kootenays again.
We ended up doing roughly 1200kms.



Our first night we spent camping at Summit lake just outside of Parson. Beautiful one truck spot right on the lake. Panoramic views of the mountains.



I convinced Nicole to pose for a super cheeseball photo with the big paddle, I want to say around Canal Flats.




Next stop was Marion Lake,





We didn't stay here but talk about a site with a view. Wapta Falls below, incredible.



Spent the night right on the kicking horse River.




Quick hike at wapta Falls



Natural Bridge just outside Field.



I used to have a bad habit of letting other people ruin these destinations for me. By that I mean these large tourist traps where people just pile off the buses and your bumping shoulders with people who just want to take selfies. I let it ruin the beauty of the attractions for me. This summer I found as soon as we hiked a little ways off the beaten trail and got away from the crowds it was very easy to enjoy these places we used to avoid.

If you ever visit the Natural Bridge, Hike down stream a few hundred meters and you will get to see some beautiful rock gorges and waterfalls 99% of the people visiting miss.


Next stop was Emerald Lake. Once we got the canoe on the water and paddled across the lake it was easy to relax and enjoy the beatiful mountains and blue water.








The truck was running great at this point. The only modification I had to make in 4000 km's was a new rad cap because the old one started to weep slightly

 

[edlaffoon]

Awesome truck man, sure is beautiful up there.

 

[Andrew_S]

We then did a trip in the middle of a July. It worked out to roughly 1500 km's total.




The first night we spent on Arrow Lake camped out at this little hidden gem by ourselves.



Love being the only ones on the water.



This was a beautiful spot, right next to a triple cascading water fall and a great swimming hole. Nice patches of grass with butterflies in them right next to camp.



the next day we headed back to Six Mile Lakes, a destination we previously had to turn around from due to snow. Beautiful High elevation lake with lots of brookies.




From there we headed over to Kaslo, then up to duncan lake.



This was by far my favourite spot we stayed all summer. The temperature was perfect, the water was warm, not a single bug to be found and the sand was beatiful. Hard to beat camping right on the beach all by yourself with this kind of scenery.






The following day we did the Monica Meadows Hike.


The last two km's of the drive there got the truck running hot. It's about a 20% grade and slow winding switch backs.




The plan was to camp at trout lake next but it just wasn't our kind of place so we moved on and ended up at downie arm on revelstoke lake.






We then played tourist in Revelstoke. We had been to the dam before but always drove straight by the forestry museum. It's a neat place to see.




The tank on the back of the truck was for Water to cool the brakes on long hills.


Next stop was Revelstoke mountain. We lucked out and it was the first day they opened the peak. It was pretty neat to be hiking in 30* weather but in 4ft of snow.

 

[KLAKEBRONCO]

This thread......Man.
First and foremost this should speak to the "overland industry". You don't need to spend 20k plus upfitting a 40k truck.

The things you are seeing......Wow. I hope you are able to truly appreciate how amazing those places are. Especially to those with limited access to those types of areas.

The truck itself is a nice example of upgrades made to suit how the owner uses it.

 

[Andrew_S]

Awesome truck man, sure it beautiful up there.

Thanks! Yes BC is beautiful.

Shortly after classes end for the summer I got my act together and mailed my collector insurance application. There are a lot of requirements the truck must meet in order for it to qualify. Mainly it has to be stock, and in good enough shape that it will appreciate in value over time and not depreciate. There are a lot more details like the rims must be era correct within like 2 years, tires can't be to large or too small. The motor has to be original and not dressed up at all, etc, etc. The idea behind this is the cost savings. The truck cost me $945 a year to insure in 2016 and it increased to $1117 in 2017 at no fault of mine. I finally got my application and plates back approved and my insurance dropped to $275 for the year. Making having a second vehicle a feasible idea. For those that don't know, insurance in BC is incredibly expensive compared to most other places. We have a government crown corporation for insurance called ICBC and unlike private insurance it is ridiculously expensive.


Anyway, long story short, collector plates approved and the wife was happy.



Just about caught up to the present day. I really had my heart set on a set of 16" rims and some nice tall skinny tires for the truck.
Unfortunately there is absolutely no 16" rims available for this truck that would fulfill "collector" insurance prerequisites. Actually aside from Camaro wheels that would look terrible on it, there is just no options for 16" rims at all. So I settled on these mags from AR racing that are period correct. I picked these up used for $140 with some cosmetic issues.



The clear coat was peeling pretty bad on all of them,


and it didn't look like the brake dust had ever been cleaned off the drums,



Picked up some paint stripper, hit them with that, then pressure washed them off.



After hours and hours of scrubbing with scotch brite they turned out a lot better.



Definitely not show quality, but good enough for the bush.



The inside drums didn't come out nearly as nice but at least you can touch them now without your hands turning brown.




After doing over 5000 km's of camping I decided it was time to stop pushing our luck with the 10+ year old Nokians and 30 year old spare tire.
So I ended up buying some BFG All Terrains for the new wheels. I had the old K02's on a blazer and they were excellent.
The mud terrains were a bit much and loud when I had those previously. This was just an economical and enjoyable choice.
Most of the terrain this truck will see if not hwy is loose dusty gravel roads. So a mud terrain just isn't justifiable.



No one local could come close to Costco's price,


These tires are roughly 2" larger than the Nokians, so it was a nice easy inch of extra clearance.
Also replaced the spare that was orginal




picked up some more parts, cv is for the wife's car



I'll eventually have to pull the valve covers and intake and re-gasket them as they are weeping slightly. The current valve covers have some spots of rust so it was an easy decision to pick these up.




Also finally found one of these skid plates. The plastic one on the S15 was cracked and, it was plastic. This was a nice upgrade for $15.



Now the truck has 3 full aluminium skid plates and a punched steel skid plate for the gas tank.



I waxed the truck for the first time as well. Pleasantly surprised with now nice the 30ish year old paint glossed up

 

[RPhil]

Great introduction! You have stayed at some beautiful places. I will be following along.

 

[Andrew_S]

This thread......Man.
First and foremost this should speak to the "overland industry". You don't need to spend 20k plus upfitting a 40k truck.

The things you are seeing......Wow. I hope you are able to truly appreciate how amazing those places are. Especially to those with limited access to those types of areas.

The truck itself is a nice example of upgrades made to suit how the owner uses it.

Thanks a lot I really appreciate those comments. Lately I've found it's more about the experiences and the things we are seeing than what we are doing it in.

I'm a big fan of the Dirt Every Day series and there was an episode where Fred was saying the best way to find out what you need is to use your vehicle first and build from what it's lacking. I've really tried to follow that philosophy with this build.

The last trip we went on during aug long weekend was to Jasper and through Hwy 93.
It's been very smokey around the interior for the last month and we just wanted to get away from it.



This is driving through glacier national park along the Hwy 1. There were multiple different fire locations.



Our first night we camped along the kicking horse river again as it was a nice meeting point. The next morning we hit the road towards Jasper with a quick stop in Field for coffee. Interesting that only 140 people live in this small town year round. I had driven by it countless times but it was quite interesting to stop and drive through the old neighbourhood.




This was at bow Lake along 93.



Originally we just stopped to make a quick snack but I couldn't resist throwing the canoe in.






This is probably the most photographed tree in Jasper at Lac Beauvert.




Out for an evening paddle on Maligne lake we were lucky enough to get to watch this great looking cow feeding for about 15 mins.


This was the first time I had seen rain in over 60+ days. It was quite pleasant at that moment.



On the way back to camp one night, the sunset over medicine lake. Whats neat about this lake is the outlet is actually underground and not visible until a few km's downstream.






The next morning we made a point of getting up early and making the most of the day. Pyramid Lake, pictures say it all.









Got a chance to watch these elk Cow's and their Calf's feeding early in the morning. One little Bull in the mix.



We also went and checked out athabasca falls and Edith Cavell Mountain, which is the tallest mountain solely in Alberta.





After getting a quick glimpse of the lake and the crystal clear water I was honestly sprinting back to the truck to get the canoe.







We spent the next night camped near Maligne Lake. This was probably my favourite stop of the trip. In the evening we were the only ones out there. The water was just like glass. Pictures don't even come close to capturing how nice of a place this was.



We got up for an early fish, Nicole was cold and brought her fleece along. One fish, and one heck of a sunrise.









part two in a minute

 

[Andrew_S]

We started our loop back at this point, taking a pit stop at the Columbia Ice Field.
We hiked up the Glacier much to Nicole's dismay.

v

They have these great looking monster buses that run tourist up non stop all day. Imagine the fuel bill if you were overlanding in one of these pigs.




Had to take a pic of this Tacoma with tear drop camper in the parking lot. Wish I could shake this guys hand, the camper was beautiful. Wooden hinges was a really nice touch.



Quick hike up to the lookout at Peyto Lake.



Nicole mentioned Peyto is known as the blue-est lake in Alberta.




The last night we camped out at Marble Canyon Rec Site, this is definitely a hidden gem. We stopped through every site in Lake Louise and they were all completely full. When we got here we found 36 sites and only 2 were actually occupied.






The last day we stopped at Takkakaw falls. What an incredible drive in and beautiful waterfall.




The falls are 990' tall.


A huge rock slide had happened during the winter months leaving Rocks as big as Pit trucks laying on the hill side. We must have spent two hours hiking through the affected area. The waterfall actually took second place to the rock slide.






It's crazy they actually bring tour buses down this road. They actually drive straight forward and back up or down the first switch back and then drive forward through the next one. If there was one more switch back there would be no way they could make it through without reversing the rest of the way.



here's one backing down, I had to quickly get out of his way after this photo.



The drive back to Kelowna was definitely the worst smoke I've experienced.

 

[Andrew_S]

So that sums up the last year and half pretty well. This summer has really put the icing on the cake of this build.
I'm moving this week and then headed back to school this fall. Hoping we can get out for a few hunts this fall and then of course ice fishing again this christmas break.
The truck is now sitting at 70,000 km's and we put about 12,000km's on it this summer totally trouble free.

I still have a number of things I would like to do to the truck before next summer. Hopefully I can find the time.

-Andrew

 

[case]

Thanks for all the pics and the details of your truck and adventures.

An older truck, kept simple, and lots of canoe time while hiking/camping is pretty much my idea of a perfect life.

 

[RedF]

Outstanding photos. Thanks very much for sharing.